August 13, 2025 • 48 mins
Hello and welcome back to the show. Today, I'm joined by Les Johnson, a NASA technologist, science fiction author, and consultant on films like Europa Report and Lost in Space. We'll be diving into what it takes to bring science to the screen, how to balance scientific truth with a good story, and the real-world passion behind space travel. Stick around, you won't want to miss this!Show Notes
- What is a Science Consultant? Les explains his role as a science consultant on films and TV shows like Europa Report, Lost in Space, and Beacon 23. He describes the different levels of input he has had, from a deep collaboration on Europa Report to being dismissed from a project for stating a plot point was "totally implausible".
- Balancing Science and Storytelling: A major challenge is balancing scientific accuracy with a compelling narrative. Les shares that he and his editors work to avoid "data dumps" and instead provide just enough detail for a lay reader to find the story plausible without getting bogged down in technicalities. He also discusses the common trope of faster-than-light travel and how it's often used to make a story more interesting, even if it's not currently possible according to the laws of physics.
- Inspirational Sci-Fi: Les names two TV series he considers the "gold standard" for accuracy and creativity: For All Mankind, which presents an alternate history of the space race, and The Expanse, which he praises for its special effects and technical consulting.
- The Passion for Space: Les traces his love for science and storytelling back to his childhood, recalling the pivotal moment of watching the Apollo landing at age seven and later watching reruns of the original Star Trek with his sisters. This led him to pursue a career as a physicist at NASA.
- A Personal Imperative: He believes that spreading life from Earth into the universe is an "imperative". He discusses his philosophical belief that life on Earth is special and worth preserving by expanding it to other worlds like Mars and the moons of Jupiter. He also notes that getting to Mars will be a "very, very difficult" process, likely starting with domed cities and self-sufficient colonies
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hello, and welcome back to Filmmaking Conversations with Me your
host Damien Swaby. Today I'm joined by Les Johnson, and
that's a technologist, science fiction author and consultant on films
like Europa Report and Lost in Space. We'll be diving
into what it takes to bring science to the screen
and how to balance scientific truth with a good story
(00:34):
and the real world passion behind science. Travel Stick around.
You won't want to miss this excellent conversation. Les. So
you've worked on You've worked as sorry a technical consultant
on Europa Report, Lost in Space and Beacon twenty three.
What does a science consultant actually do on a film
(00:56):
or TV project?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
It largely depends on the director and the staff that
he assigns to it. The most extensive input I had
technically was on Europa Report, and I was really pleased
because they were very focused on telling a good story
and making it believable and we're willing to work with
(01:21):
me and me work with them to help make that
story believable. And then I've had other experiences where I
was interviewed for a film that shall not be named
that they were considering to use me as a consultant.
They ran it by me and I said, well, hey,
that's totally implausible. No one would ever do it that way.
And their response was, well, we won't use you. That
(01:45):
was a different film. So it just depends. And then
on some of the others, it's a mix. I get
feedback from the directors or their staff, well, we appreciate
your input, but that's a major plot element. We're going
to have to keep that, but we can change this
other thing you suggested to make it more realistic. And
it just just depends on who I'm working.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
With and when they say make it more realistic in
what ways?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Well, I go to see a lot of science fiction films,
as you might imagine, I'm such a genre fan, both
of the written word as well as in theaters, and
make it more realistic would be you know, what would
these what would the bridge of the ship look like?
What would be some of the control systems that they
would have, which makes nice, you know, background to make
(02:30):
the setting look realistic. Other elements might be well, how
would you what propulsion systems might we have in twenty
five years or thirty years or one hundred years that
would enable us to get to say, Europa in a
matter of months versus years, right, And I have to
look at what possible technologies could be developed and flown
(02:53):
and what are their real limits in terms of performance,
so that when they're saying, you know, start the few
usion engine or whatever it may be, it makes sense
and it's not something that's totally ridiculous like you see
in a lot a lot of films where they don't
hire a consultant or someone just does a Google search.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Are there any recent sci fi films or series that
really impressed you with their accuracy or creativity?
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Well, there are two TV series that I think have
done a really excellent job in the last five to
ten years. One aired on Apple TV. I had nothing
to do with it. I wish I could claim credit.
It's called for All Mankind and it was an alternate
history of the space Race of the sixties that imagined
the Apollo landing did not happen before the Soviets could
(03:41):
get there, and the Soviets were actually the first to
land on the Moon and the USA was second. And
how that would alter history moving forward toward the present day.
Really really well done. They went out of their way
to be accurate, gave a very fair portrayal, in my opinion,
to real historical characters, some of whom I had met
in my early career days. Thought they did an excellent
(04:02):
job with that. The other was The Expanse, which is
based on a really best selling science fiction book series.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
And.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
It's a solar system wide first contact kind of adventure,
and they really did a nice job with special effects
and had really good technical consultants. Again, I'm jealous that
I wasn't involved.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I can understand it sounds like you really know these
shows and like them really well. But if you could
fix one scientifically implausible situation in a film, what would
it be.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Well, that's a tough one because there is a very
common theme and a lot of science fiction that we
just don't think is possible, and I wish it were,
but the known laws of physics say it isn't. And
that's going faster than Light and Star Wars, Star Trek.
Most science fiction movies have us zipping around the galaxy
(04:59):
like we would get on an airplane and travel from
here to Singapore right wherever here is, you know, going
to another part of the globe, And unfortunately, the laws
of physics aren't going to let us do that as
we understand it. I'm holding out hope that we find
out we're all wrong, we missed a loophole, and one
day we'll be able to do that. But unfortunately, I
(05:19):
think there's a misperception in the public's mind because of that,
that it's inevitable we'll have a faster than light drive,
and it sure doesn't look that way. So I think
what I would fix is trying to level set people's expectations,
and I would have more science fiction space adventures set
in a realistic space travel kind of scenario.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
When you say the speed of light, why do you
think that mistake is always happening, Because even in the UK,
where I'm from, we have that in some of our
shows and some of our films.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
I think it's because it makes the show more interesting
and fun. I mean, what's more fun than being the
Captain of the Enterprise on Star Trek and exploring strange
new worlds? Right, and you've only got nine worlds or
eight worlds to explore in your own Solar system. Where
you have to go to sleep for a thousand years
to get to the nearest one. It kind of makes
could make a boring story arc. So I think they
(06:15):
they and I tend to ignore this problem because I
like a good story like the next person, and so
I'm willing to suspend by disbelief on faster than like
travel because I think it's a it's a clue in
order to tell an interesting story. And if they try
to get everything else right or close to right, but
assume that, Okay, well we found some new theory of
(06:37):
physics and we're able to do this, but everything else
still holds, I'm okay with that. I like to enjoy it.
I love Star Wars. Who doesn't very few I haven't
found very many people who don't.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
And it's clear that you are a love of storytelling
with scientific integrity. As both a NASA technologist and a
science fixed sorry and a fiction author. How do you
balance the scientific truth with the narrative drama or do
the two ever conflict?
Speaker 1 (07:07):
The two definitely conflict, and that's why you have a
good editor. The editors I've had at both ban Books
and tor who are my two science fiction publishing houses,
are very very good at telling me when I've got
too much of what they call a data dump, where
I try to explain somehow in the story the science
(07:28):
that's enabling something to happen, and they have to remind
me less you're telling a story, You're not writing a
popular science and nonfiction book, which I also do, And
so sometimes I mess up and I put in too
much detail. I think the balance is to put in
just enough detail so that the lay reader or the
(07:49):
educated in the field reader knows that it's plausible without
necessarily me getting bogged down in the intricacies of how
the propulsion system works. Right, So it's story first, absolutely,
And when I do mess that up again, I love
a good editor. It's actually comforting to know that they
(08:10):
take the time and come back and help me correct
that out of the story sometimes.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So how do you approach creating and crafting characters and
plots that feel grounded in science yet emotionally resonant for
readers and potential viewers.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Well, I try to put the story first. I can
give an example the setting for one of one of
my novels, Mission to Methany. It was about a first
contact and it came about as actually a result of
a conversation at work one day in a meeting, and
(08:45):
I came home that night and plotted out the story.
But I wanted to have a compelling character have this encounter.
So the character I created was a man who is
on the autism spectrum, and I told the story from
his perspective without ever really mentioning that he was on
(09:05):
the spectrum, just trying to convey how someone who looks
at the world differently might interpret the events around them.
And to get that right, I consulted some folks that
have in conversation I know that they're on the spectrum
and ask them to read it, and they helped me
correct and make sure I was telling the story, you know,
(09:26):
in a way that would be plausible for a person
with a different way of looking at the world right,
would interpret the events that were happening. That was a
story I wanted to tell of a neurodivergent person who
was encountering these things in our future, and it worked.
The book got good reviews, and I got some really
(09:46):
good feedback from pretty broad range of readers on that.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
Gosh, that's one of the most original stories I think
I've ever heard. Wow, and how much time do you
take to do the research for a story like.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
That, Well, it takes a first draft of a novel
takes at least a year for me, and then my
own self editing and polishing and sending it out to
beta readers another half year almost. Then it goes to
the publisher, and by the time they do editing and
everything else, it adds another six to eight months. So
the total production time is about two years, a little
(10:22):
over two years from first word on screen to actually
getting the book published. So it takes some time, and
some go quicker than that, and others take longer.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Your passion for story and your passion for science are amazing.
I've only been speaking to you for a short amount
of time now, and I can already feel it in
my bones. Where do you think this passion comes from?
Is it something in your childhood, is it something in
teenager life, or is it something you've learned the way
through being educated?
Speaker 1 (10:54):
That question? I get asked that question a lot, and
it's not necessarily in the context of my past for writing,
but more of my passion for science and telling people
about the wonders of space and space travel. I can
definitely relate it to two pivotal events in my childhood.
The first was this will give away my age. I
was seven years old when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon,
(11:18):
and I remember my parents bringing me in to watch
on this grainy black and white television the Apollo landing,
and they were conveying to me about always on the moon,
how far it is. Let's go out and look at
the moon and you can see this, And I was
super excited as a seven year old, and I got
interested in space at that point. And then a few
years later, my sisters, who I dearly love, allowed me
(11:42):
to stay up late with them on Friday nights to
watch reruns of the original Star Trek, and from there
it was all downhill. I started reading every science fiction
novel I could get my hands on, reading about science,
and decided I wanted to be a physicist and worked
for NASA dog on it. And so I pursued that,
achieved that, and almost I don't know, fifteen to twenty
(12:05):
years ago, I had the opportunity to start writing and
the books sold well enough that the publisher kept coming back,
so I had the opportunity to actually kind of pay
it forward. I'm trying to reach that next mini me
that's out there and ignite the same kind of passion.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
And your books are filled with so many cinematic ideas.
Has there been any interest in adapting your work for
the screen?
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Only once? And that was my understanding from the publisher,
that it was looked at by a production company and
then they decided to pass on it. So none of
my work's ever been optioned. I'm hoping in the future
that some will be. I think a lot of the
books are definitely of a type that could be considered
for that, But I don't know. I don't know how
(12:53):
you get the right attention to them. I guess as
part of it. But I have some great publishers and
see what happens.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
What would be the ideal relationship for you to have
a production company if they were to try and option
one of your books.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Well, the answer to that question is, first and foremost,
I would be absolutely thrilled at the opportunity to see
it come to the screen. I would try not to
be one of those prima donna demanding types that you
see about in movies. Right or an author has their
book option, but I would try to work with them
(13:29):
and encourage them to keep at least the core of
the story and the elements of the journey I either
journey of the hero or heroin that's undertaking the experience
would experience, even if some of the details had to
be changed. I don't know how I would react if
they tried to do something that was not physically possible
(13:51):
just for enhancing the story. I guess I'd have to
deal with that in real time. It would definitely be
a different feeling than when I encountered that consulting for
some of these movies, because they weren't changing my original work.
I was trying to get them to change to be realistic.
I would try not to take it too personally, I guess,
and that might be difficult.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
And if a Traveler's Guide to the Stars were made
into a documentary, what would you want it to look
and feel like?
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Oh? I would wow. I would like for it to
have the same feel that a lot of my readers
have told me they got when they read the book,
and the feel that I strove for, and I was
so gratified in some of the feedback I've gotten is
that when people read the book, they feel like they're
sitting in a coffee shop with me having a pastry
(14:41):
and coffee talking about how we might go to the stars.
And so, if it were ever turned into a documentary,
I'd like to have it be, of course, visuals to
be exciting and compelling, and the information conveyed, but I
would like for it to have a sense of conversation
and not be attempting to go over someone's head. I'd
(15:04):
like to have it be the same conversation I might
have with someone at my high school reunion that has
no technical background at all, that says, hey, less I
heard you wrote a book. What's it about. That would
be the feel I would like for it.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
To have, and why would you like it to have
that type of feel?
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Because I firmly believe that space exploration and space travel
is not something that should be the province of either
the very wealthy alone or the technical elite alone of
scientists and engineers. The expansion of our species of life
on Earth into the Solar System and maybe beyond is
(15:45):
something that we'll have to involve everyone, and I think
that people need to understand why it's important, understand how
difficult it's going to be, and have them be interested
in being a part of making the journey happen. So
I think it's more important for this information to be
(16:08):
conveyed to people and went to high school and college with,
or someone I might just meet at a casual event
somewhere to understand it than it is for the scientists
and engineers to have it, because those are the people
that might actually help make it happen.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
And when you say about the expansion of the human race,
are you potentially talking about human beings living on Mars?
Speaker 1 (16:31):
I'm well, okay, this is where I get personally philosophically
at a little I don't know personal here. I look
at life on Earth in what appears to be a cold, harsh,
dead universe, as being a very special thing and worth preserving.
All life on Earth, from you know, plankton in the oceans,
(16:55):
to my dog, to you to me. And I believe
that music is a gift, and the love that we
feel for our loved ones or that our pets is
something transcendent and is morally good. And I believe we
as a human species, the technological thinking species on the planet,
(17:18):
should not only be protecting the Earth for all the
life that's here, but we should be looking to spread
that moral goodness into the universe, and so yes, I
think someday we should be living on Mars. I think
someday we should be living on some of the moons
of Jupiter, and ultimately in several hundred or thousand years
(17:39):
send worldships filled with Earth life and people to go
live on otherwise dead worlds surrounding other stars. I think
it's an imperative that we should spread life far and wide.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
So when I was a kid, there was a film
called Calto Rico ourn Schwarzenegger, and they went, some of
them at least, went to live on Mars. How realistic
was the portrayal of that in that film? And how
soon could it be possible for us here?
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Well, let's hope we don't have the same adventure that
Arnold Schwarzenegger had. No, I love that movie, by the
way I saw it back when it came out. How
realistic is it? It's first off, it's not impossible, but
it's going to be very very difficult. I mean, reproducing
a self sustaining ecosystem on another world is not going
(18:36):
to be easy for the same reasons that life on
Earth appears to be rare. It will be difficult to
recreate a lot of those conditions on another world. So
I think in the short term domed cities and very large,
controlled recycling environments will be the first step. But if
(18:57):
we think in terms of geologic history or the history
of our species, in a thousand years or more, we
might be able to modify Mars so that you do
have a short sleeve environment and you can go out.
But I don't see that happening anytime in the near future.
I think it'll be more akin to glorified camping and
(19:20):
eventually some kind of domed cities with self replicating parts,
three D printing parts without the supply chain, and eventually
becoming self sufficient.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
Interesting, and of course, in so many films we see
aliens that come down to Earth, and we go and
visit planets that have aliens on in films. What is
the likelihood from the work you've done, that there are
aliens that have visited this planet And if you were
to write a story about that, what would it be?
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Wow. I wrote an essay on this that's available online
from my public sure at Banned Books. I called it
the Aliens Are Not among Us? And in it I
discuss the probability of well, let me rewind just a
little bit. Do I believe it's possible for there to
be life on other worlds in the universe? Absolutely?
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
It appears, however that this life, whatever it may be,
is probably extremely rare. And one thing that people who
think about this topic are really good about thinking about
is deep space and traveling through space to get there.
But they don't think about deep time and our existence individually.
(20:38):
You know, seventy to eighty years, if we do well,
is just a blip in the history of the Earth,
and your life is important, and I don't mean to
demean anyone's seventy to eighty years, because I think that
we all make a difference and every life is valuable.
But in the scope of history, that is a very
very small amount of time. And if the Earth we're
(21:00):
ever having been visited by a being from another star,
it is far more likely that they came during the
reign of the dinosaurs, which lasted tens of millions of years,
than the time period in which we humans have been around,
which might be fifty two one hundred thousand years, right,
because it's as much smaller amount of time, and the
(21:22):
likelihood of them coming now in the century where we're
actually traveling to the stars, or not to the stars,
but into outer space, which is less than one hundred
years out of the four and a half billion year
history of the Earth. It's a very low probability. That
doesn't mean it's not fun to play around within stories.
That's why I have first contact stories, and that's why
they're believable, is because that happens. But do I believe
(21:45):
it's likely to happen. The answer is no. I think
we might find evidence that there was once life on Mars.
Is their life there now? It's doubtful. I can't say no.
I don't know, but I think it's likely when we
started exploring these other worlds and eventually take the steps
to the nearest stars, which will be hard enough, we
(22:06):
will likely find just very cold, dead worlds there. Now,
my comment about spreading life, I have to give one
big caveat, and that is if the world we visit
already has its own life, we should leave it alone.
So if we go to Mars and find out that
there is life there already, I don't believe we should
(22:29):
establish a permanent presence or try to change the environment
to suit us. But if we go there and find
that there is no life and there never has been,
then I think it's fine for us to try to
spread life to there, and we should.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And when you say life, for example, if we were
to find bugs, would that be something you would consider
a life not worth time print with?
Speaker 1 (22:52):
Yes, I think from a scientific point of view, to
understand it and how it came to be where it
is and what it does and the potentiality for its
future in that deep time sense is more important than
us having the real estate.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
And why do you think the aliens would have come
to Earth or potentially would have come to Earth? Sorry,
when the dinosaurs were amongst the planet.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Oh, I'm not saying I don't know why they would
have come here. I just know that if they ever did,
as let's say, explorers like humans explore, right, we do
that the Polynesians in the settlement of the islands in
the South Pacific, that was done island by island, you know,
boat by boat, exploring group by exploring group, and they
had whatever reasons they had for doing it, whether it's
(23:38):
population pressure or that young person who said, I wonder
what's over there? You know, they did that exploration and
I think it could very well be the same motive
for any intelligent species. I mean I a transcendent experience
for me is to go out on a clear, starry
(23:59):
night and lie down on the ground and look at
the stars and wonder about what's out there? Is there
anyone there looking back? And I think if I know that,
that motivates a lot of people in the airspace community,
in the space exploration community to do what they do,
because they are driven to go see what's out there.
(24:19):
That's why we build the big telescopes. That's why we
send probes to Mars, to Pluto. It's because it's there
and we want to understand it. And I think any
intelligent species anywhere, if they're an intelligent tool using species,
probably has a similar curiosity, and they might have seen
the Earth through their telescopes and said, hey, you know,
(24:41):
this might be a good candidate for a life. Let's
go see what's there. Do I think they're here for
resources or anything like that. No, the energy expenditure is
too huge and the difficulty too high. If they're here
at all, it's probably a matter of exploration. I don't know.
I can't you know that for certain. Yeah, that's my intuition.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
So do you think the film industry has a responsibility
to represent space and science responsibility or can it be
just pure entertainment. Hmm.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
When you say responsibility it means to whom right, I mean,
if the responsibility is only to their shareholders and bringing
in as much money as possible, then the answer is
they have no obligation to treat science right. But if
they want to do that while they entertain and contribute
something meaningful to the culture, which I would like to
(25:37):
see more of in our entertainment, then I think yes,
they would want to and have an obligation to try
to treat it fairly. So I guess maybe I have
too noble a goal that some filmmakers, and I think
this is true. Some filmmakers make films because they really
want to tell something important and they want to be
(25:59):
meaningful and affect the culture. And those are the folks
whose films I want to work on.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Ah. I like that. I was going to say, be
really biased and to say exactly, that's exactly what I
think in terms of well people should want to work
on in some of that they're passion about. Everybody's different,
everybody's got different points of view. So everything's good and
nice in that way.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
But I also believe that those important stories can also
be entertaining me too. You talk to a lot of
people on your interviews, and I speak to a lot
of people at events that I go to, and everyone
has a story. Everyone has a story, And I find
I don't know of anyone that I've had a lengthy
conversation with and I asked them about their history and
(26:46):
how they got to be where they are. They don't
have a fascinating interesting story to tell, even if they
don't think they do.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
You're right. Everybody has a story, and everyone is the
lead character in their story a lot of the time.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Uh yeah, and they don't they sometimes they think they're
the good guy when they're not.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah, that is one hundred and ten percent right. But
if you if you could write or console on a
big budget sci fi movie tomorrow or television show on Netflix,
Amazon or even NBC, ABC or whatever it might be,
what would it be about, and any dream directors or
collaborators you have in mind.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
I think I'm fascinated with the topic that I've spent
a lot of time talking to you here about, which
is this notion of what would it be like if
we did find other life out there? What would it
be like? How would they think? Would they how would
they interact with us? How would they view us? How
would we react to them? I'd like I like first
(27:51):
contact stories. Yeah, I am very much not a fan
of dystopian science fiction. I don't like to read it,
I don't like to watch it. And so in terms
of my dream to be involved in such a project,
it would be a project that had an interesting story
(28:12):
to tell that led to an outcome that improves somebody's
life or the society's life, or leaves you feeling hope
and optimism. I do not like what was the trend
like ten to twenty years ago, very popular with teens,
which I found to be very disturbing because my adult
(28:33):
children now are teens at those times. This dystopian that
the world is just going to get worse and worse
and it's going to become a big fight one day
over resources or whatever. I don't want to be a
part of anything like that unless it's a story of
someone who is overcoming those odds that shows that there's
(28:54):
a way out and that we can have that better future.
And I think that gets back to my inherent optimism
that I have that I inherited from my parents, who
were in the greatest generation. I think about my mother
and father grew up during the Depression, fought World War II,
(29:19):
were the ones who built the economy and helped establish
and ultimately win the Cold War. And I look at
that and I think, Wow, those people went through terrible,
terrible traumatic times in an ends, existential crises, the Depression,
World War II, fighting Nazism, and they did it and
(29:42):
they came out of it and they made a better world.
And I think that's that's what we humans can do
when we put our minds to it and were properly motivated.
Those are the stories I'd like to be involved telling.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
See, I love your way of thinking and the type
of story want to be involved in. Why do you
think we've moved away as a society from wanting to
tell those type of stories and looking back in the
past from our parents or grandparents that can influence in
a great way.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Why have we moved away from it? I think we
have been as a people. I'm a boomer, I admit it.
I don't like to admit it, but I am. I'm
a late boomer, But I'm a boomer. We then betrayed
by our institutions, and we've seen institutions that we were
(30:35):
told and we grew up with that we should trust
betray us. I remember my first really evidence to portrayal
for me was Watergate. For my older sisters, it was
the Vietnam War. And then since then, it just seems
like all the way from established religion to politicians to
(30:56):
just to scientists. Even you just finished series of podcasts
hearing about academic fraud and peer reviewed publications and this
notion that people make up data that can't be reproduced.
It shatters our faith in these institutions that we're supposed
to have faith in. And I think it made people cynical.
(31:18):
And I think a lot of creative people took that
cynicism and amplified it to create these dystopian stories because
they could sense that people were being cynical. But I
also have seen the reaction to that among younger generations
who still believe a lot of them do you know
the world can be a better place. And I'll just
(31:42):
tell you right now. When I'm at I'm a person
of faith. I am a Christian. When I'm at church.
I'd rather talk to the twenty and thirty somethings of
my church than my peers, because they have children, They're
optimistic about the future, they have goals and dreams, and
I think that for a while we lost that. I
(32:02):
think I were seeing a resurgence of that though in film,
in Hollywood and in the culture. Although there's a lot
to be depressed about. I'm not trying to put on
rose colored glasses and say, you know, all the politics
and all the institutions are well, they're not. But I
also am seeing signs of hope, and so I think
(32:23):
that's not as prevalent as it was, this dystopian trend,
but it's still there and it's going to take a
while to get over it. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Perfect sense? And I think I'm right by saying you're
based in Alabama.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
That's correct.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Great, great, and the film see there in regard to
science and aliens and think of that nature? Is it
quite big? How is it for you? Do you do
a lot of consulting work in the potentially in the future.
Can you see that happening?
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I would love to do that. There's not a lot
of film being made here in Alabama. That's science and
space related. I can tell you though, there is extreme
interest in the community here. I'll give you an example.
I am soon to be retired from my job at NASA,
so I'm just speaking as a private citizen here, not
(33:13):
speaking for my employer. But when the movie Interstellar came out, yeah,
I don't know, ten years ago, and that was a
big deal. The big one of the big new theaters
here in town that has the stadium seats really comfortable
and all that had a midnight preview the night before
the official release, and they asked me to get up
(33:35):
after the film was over and talk about the real
possibilities of deep space exploration and space travel. And I
was not a consultant on the film, but people stayed
in that audience until almost one in the morning, asking questions. Wow,
it was amazing, and so for me. I also consult
(33:56):
with other science fiction writers. I go to these things
called science fiction conventions. I don't know if you've ever
ever heard of these. No. They're typically gatherings of anywhere
from two hundred to one thousand people in cities all
across the country. They tend to be fairly science fiction
literature focused. They're not like comic Con or something like that.
(34:16):
Nothing wrong with comic Con. Those are a lot of
fun too. But a lot of writers go to these
and some don't have the technical background that I do,
And so I get emails from established writers asking me
questions to help them get the science in their written
stories correct. And so I've done some film consulting the
movies you mentioned, but I also do literally consulting and
(34:40):
have helped some of these writers craft their stories so
they're more believable. And I enjoy it because I like
talking to people. You can tell I'm the quiet, shy,
reserved type, and I also enjoy, like I say, hearing
their stories and helping them make them better.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
I hope, what type of stories are these? Why to
bring in to you? Oh?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
It ranges across the board, and that's where it gets
really challenging. I had a great writer, a fellow named
Jack McDevitt come to me, and he had written a
story and written himself a little bit into a corner
of how to get the people on the planet off
the planet. And he had built this infrastructure in space
(35:24):
of an old space elevator. If your listeners don't know
what that is, It's an idea put forward by Arthur
Clark that would have a big cable that runs twenty
three thousand miles from the equator all the way out
to deep space, that instead of launching things on rocket,
you would ride the elevator and then throw them off
the top of the elevator. You know, it's stuff that
we might do, some data we can't do right now.
And I had to help him come up with a
(35:46):
plausible way where the remains of that space elevator had
been broken could be used to get them off the planet.
That was fun. I don't know. It was kind of
a mystery I had to help him solve. And that
would be one example. It's great book. It's called Deep Six.
It's been out for I don't know, twenty years, twenty
five years. Great great story, though Jack mcdibbitt is the author,
(36:09):
all the way to stuff that I don't know how
to help them, because they'll come to me sometimes with
not just a totally implausible scenario, but a totally implausible
whole background for the book, and I just have to
tell them I can't help you with this. This is
more space fantasy than science fiction. There's so much here right,
there's no way I can help you. So it spans
(36:29):
the space.
Speaker 2 (36:31):
So what advice would you give to filmmakers or screenwrits
is listening to this podcast right now who want to
ground their science fiction in real science without losing creative spock.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
I would say, you really need to work with your
technical consultants and let them help you. And if they
come up with something that would cause you to alter
your vision of the story, don't reject it out right.
Sit down and have a conversation with them with lots
of what ifs, because in that brainstorming process you might
(37:06):
come up with an innovative solution. That happened in Europa report.
And my first experience consulting was the original Lost in
Space movie that was made in the nineties, and that
actually happened in that film, although they did a lot
of things I told them not to do, and the
director said, well, I'm doing it anyway, and that's okay,
that's all right. He is the director, right, But they
(37:26):
did change a few things and it came about because
hours long conversations and what if discussions, and if they're
willing to put that kind of time in, then a
good technical consultant can help them be more accurate without
compromising story.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
I see, are their particular scientific concept you think of
right for expiration in future films that haven't yet been
done well.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
That will require some thought, and I'm not sure I
can extemporaneously come up with any right now.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
I have.
Speaker 1 (38:03):
The whole time travel thing has been done so many
times and so poorly and so well that it's hard
to see how to improve that. I think, yeah, I
think so. I think realistic deep space travel was portrayed
pretty accurately in the original Alien film. Oh I love that.
I also think that the deep space love story Passengers
(38:27):
of All Things did a really nice job of conveying
what it would be on an ultra long voyage and
what happens if somebody wakes up early, right, and the
human tragedy and triumph that that became in that story.
If you haven't seen that, you need to see Passengers.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
I think this notion of what realistic deep space travel
might be like has not been plumbed because people think
it would be boring to talk about a spaceship that
has to take a thousand years to get to its destination.
And I would beg to differ because if the people
are alive and living on that ship, you've got generations
(39:06):
of people with generations of stories to tell in an
environment that's very different than our environment here on Earth.
Right It's a constrained, closed place, and those stories would
be fascinating to tell. And then what would await them
on the other end when they get to a destination
that is not Earth two point zero, and the struggles
(39:29):
they would have to survive there and create ultimately in
the end another Earth. Perhaps I don't think that's been
well portrayed realistic deep space long duration travel. I think
producers are scared of it because they think it might
be boring. But I don't think it'd be boring. I
(39:49):
think that you've got to tell the human story in
that backdrop of the immensity of time that it would
take and the distance involved.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, that sounds an amazing story. I for one, would
love to watch it if it if it came out,
I would love to. But you mentioned Back to the Future,
and I I am a lover of two of the
Back to the Future films, and particular in a way
debate which but which one is better? Part one or
Pot two? But can you tell me some of the
(40:20):
inaccuracies in the time travel in those films that just
quiet may be ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Well, you're not gonna like my answer. I think nature
is not going to allow time travel. And the reason
I think that, and by the way, well i'll say
this in a few minutes. I think nature is not
going to allow time travel for one very simple reason
because in every situation in nature that we see, there
(40:50):
are two conservation laws that are never violated. One is
the conservation of energy. That the energy of a system
total energy can't change. It can change four sunlight can
become heat. Ultimately, everything becomes heat. But if you look
at the total energy content in the system, it doesn't change.
And conservational momentum, which means that basically mass that's moving
(41:15):
mass time's velocity doesn't change before or after an interaction.
And you're saying, well, how does this relate to time travel? Well,
if I travel me Les Johnson or you and your
body goes back one hundred years, you have removed energy
and matter from the universe and inserted it somewhere else. Okay,
(41:35):
and the atoms that are in your body already exist
somewhere in that previous time period in a tree, in
the air, in another person's body, or in a skunk
that's running across the field. Some of those atoms that
they leave in the crop that your parents ate a
few days before they conceived you, right became you. And
(41:58):
so you are changing the energy density or the matter
density of the universe by time traveling. And I don't
think nature is going to allow us to do that.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
So the whole concept of Duck creating this time machine
is just completely scientifically flawed in every measurable way.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Given what we know about how the universe works, which
is an example a caveat I'm always going to give.
I don't pretend that we know how everything works based
on our current understanding. It's totally impossible. But it's a
great story. Yes, it's a great thought exercise, and getting
people to think is a great thing to get people
(42:47):
to ponder things they haven't pondered. What if I have
to say that, I don't think we do that as
much today as we used to because we're too busy
on our phones or watching streaming, which I like to do.
But what I'd like to do is watch something interesting
streaming and then have a discussion with whoever I watched
(43:07):
it with about what we just saw, what we liked,
what we didn't like, and was it plausible. And I'll
give you an example of the best time I had
doing that was way back in the nineties was the
series Twin Peaks. Oh Yes, and Twin Peaks came out
every week and it was such an eclectic, esoteric story
that was difficult to really understand what David Lynch was
trying to do, and I'm not sure he really understood.
(43:30):
We would have watch parties, we would get together the
next day over lunch and try to understand and talk
about what that was. To me, that is great storytelling
when you can engage people to want to talk about
it right and figure it out. And there have been
other series that do that. I'm not saying that's alone,
(43:51):
but that was the first time that I experienced that
kind of communal experiencing of it. And I know people
do that today in discussion groups on their phones, TikTok,
other you know, meet me groups or whatever. They haven't
watch parties, right, that's great, and they're doing it online.
I'd like to see more of people getting together and
(44:13):
experiencing these shows and then talking about it. Oh yeah.
And if I were the writer or the director or
the producer of a show that got people to talk
about my work like that, I'd be really gratified.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
Oh completely, And you can't be doing that in person,
I feel. I believe they're similar to when you go
to the cinema and watch a certain film in a
group in an audience. You don't necessarily get to talk
about it afterwards with everybody there, but you would certainly
discuss the film with whoever you went with, or if
you went with more than one person, you could all
(44:46):
discuss it. So I do wish for those type of
things to come back. I would have been a bit
too young to have enjoyed a watch along for twin Peaks.
Another project, another series someone I spoke about on this
podcast was thirty something when they used to do that
for that show. It seems like maybe in the nineties
(45:09):
without the Internet and the eighties without the internet, and
without these unique well they're not unique now, but these smartphones,
things changed and things could have been a bit different.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
And I don't want to sound like a you know,
an old fuddy complaining about the new time.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
I'm not doing no, no, I don't I don't think you
are at all.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
Yeah, I just I just. I just love people, and
I love being around people and hearing their thoughts and
having that dialogue. It's just part of who I am.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
I'll compete me too, in a slightly different topic, in
a slightly different way. That's why I love going to
the pub to speak to people and enjoy dialogue and
things of that nature.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
I wanted a memorable pub experience I had in the
UK was I had written a book about interstellar travel.
This is been fifteen years ago, and I had a
business trip that took me to the UK and someone
from the premier space exploration society that's existed since the thirties,
the British Interplanetary Society, Arthur C. Clark was a member.
(46:15):
It was, you know, they were the forefront of thinking
about all these issues of deep space travel. The editor
of their journal said, Hey, you're going to be over here,
let's meet at a pub and talk deep space travel.
And to meet in a pub with someone from this
premier space organization and talk about exploring the universe was
one of those moments I'll never forget. It was wonderful.
It was just wonderful. So the pub experience is something
(46:37):
you get. I'm presuming you in the UK or other
places they get that we Americans don't really experience.
Speaker 2 (46:44):
So well, yes, it's slightly different from my time in America,
and obviously coming from Hey, I see the differences. But
what pub did you go to? Do you remember?
Speaker 1 (46:54):
I do not know. It was near Surrey. Oh okay,
I don't remember which pub it was. I would love
for it to have been the pub that J. R. R.
Tolkien and Cus Lewis frequented, but it was not, I'm sure,
but if I could ever have that experience there, I
would do that. I'm also a big buff of going
(47:16):
to famous places where writers and scientists lived and did
their work, so it's something I get a charge out
of when I travel.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Excellent. It's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you. I've
learnt so much and thought about so much while speaking
to you. You've been one of the most unique guests
as well as one of the best guests to come
on the podcast, so I truly appreciate you coming on
and I hope to have from you soon.
Speaker 1 (47:44):
Well. Thank you, and I'd like to extend the invitation
to you and any of your listeners, come join us
here in Huntsville, Alabama. We have a lot of really
wonderful people talking about space and space exploration. We've got
a fantastic space museum here, and you never know when
you'll run into a rocket scientist walking down the street.
So consider that invitation a sincere open invitation to you.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
Thank you,
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hello, and welcome back to Filmmaking Conversations with Me your
host Damien Swaby. Today I'm joined by Les Johnson, and
that's a technologist, science fiction author and consultant on films
like Europa Report and Lost in Space. We'll be diving
into what it takes to bring science to the screen
and how to balance scientific truth with a good story
(00:34):
and the real world passion behind science. Travel Stick around.
You won't want to miss this excellent conversation. Les. So
you've worked on You've worked as sorry a technical consultant
on Europa Report, Lost in Space and Beacon twenty three.
What does a science consultant actually do on a film
(00:56):
or TV project?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
It largely depends on the director and the staff that
he assigns to it. The most extensive input I had
technically was on Europa Report, and I was really pleased
because they were very focused on telling a good story
and making it believable and we're willing to work with
(01:21):
me and me work with them to help make that
story believable. And then I've had other experiences where I
was interviewed for a film that shall not be named
that they were considering to use me as a consultant.
They ran it by me and I said, well, hey,
that's totally implausible. No one would ever do it that way.
And their response was, well, we won't use you. That
(01:45):
was a different film. So it just depends. And then
on some of the others, it's a mix. I get
feedback from the directors or their staff, well, we appreciate
your input, but that's a major plot element. We're going
to have to keep that, but we can change this
other thing you suggested to make it more realistic. And
it just just depends on who I'm working.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
With and when they say make it more realistic in
what ways?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Well, I go to see a lot of science fiction films,
as you might imagine, I'm such a genre fan, both
of the written word as well as in theaters, and
make it more realistic would be you know, what would
these what would the bridge of the ship look like?
What would be some of the control systems that they
would have, which makes nice, you know, background to make
(02:30):
the setting look realistic. Other elements might be well, how
would you what propulsion systems might we have in twenty
five years or thirty years or one hundred years that
would enable us to get to say, Europa in a
matter of months versus years, right, And I have to
look at what possible technologies could be developed and flown
(02:53):
and what are their real limits in terms of performance,
so that when they're saying, you know, start the few
usion engine or whatever it may be, it makes sense
and it's not something that's totally ridiculous like you see
in a lot a lot of films where they don't
hire a consultant or someone just does a Google search.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Are there any recent sci fi films or series that
really impressed you with their accuracy or creativity?
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Well, there are two TV series that I think have
done a really excellent job in the last five to
ten years. One aired on Apple TV. I had nothing
to do with it. I wish I could claim credit.
It's called for All Mankind and it was an alternate
history of the space Race of the sixties that imagined
the Apollo landing did not happen before the Soviets could
(03:41):
get there, and the Soviets were actually the first to
land on the Moon and the USA was second. And
how that would alter history moving forward toward the present day.
Really really well done. They went out of their way
to be accurate, gave a very fair portrayal, in my opinion,
to real historical characters, some of whom I had met
in my early career days. Thought they did an excellent
(04:02):
job with that. The other was The Expanse, which is
based on a really best selling science fiction book series.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
And.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
It's a solar system wide first contact kind of adventure,
and they really did a nice job with special effects
and had really good technical consultants. Again, I'm jealous that
I wasn't involved.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I can understand it sounds like you really know these
shows and like them really well. But if you could
fix one scientifically implausible situation in a film, what would
it be.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Well, that's a tough one because there is a very
common theme and a lot of science fiction that we
just don't think is possible, and I wish it were,
but the known laws of physics say it isn't. And
that's going faster than Light and Star Wars, Star Trek.
Most science fiction movies have us zipping around the galaxy
(04:59):
like we would get on an airplane and travel from
here to Singapore right wherever here is, you know, going
to another part of the globe, And unfortunately, the laws
of physics aren't going to let us do that as
we understand it. I'm holding out hope that we find
out we're all wrong, we missed a loophole, and one
day we'll be able to do that. But unfortunately, I
(05:19):
think there's a misperception in the public's mind because of that,
that it's inevitable we'll have a faster than light drive,
and it sure doesn't look that way. So I think
what I would fix is trying to level set people's expectations,
and I would have more science fiction space adventures set
in a realistic space travel kind of scenario.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
When you say the speed of light, why do you
think that mistake is always happening, Because even in the UK,
where I'm from, we have that in some of our
shows and some of our films.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
I think it's because it makes the show more interesting
and fun. I mean, what's more fun than being the
Captain of the Enterprise on Star Trek and exploring strange
new worlds? Right, and you've only got nine worlds or
eight worlds to explore in your own Solar system. Where
you have to go to sleep for a thousand years
to get to the nearest one. It kind of makes
could make a boring story arc. So I think they
(06:15):
they and I tend to ignore this problem because I
like a good story like the next person, and so
I'm willing to suspend by disbelief on faster than like
travel because I think it's a it's a clue in
order to tell an interesting story. And if they try
to get everything else right or close to right, but
assume that, Okay, well we found some new theory of
(06:37):
physics and we're able to do this, but everything else
still holds, I'm okay with that. I like to enjoy it.
I love Star Wars. Who doesn't very few I haven't
found very many people who don't.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
And it's clear that you are a love of storytelling
with scientific integrity. As both a NASA technologist and a
science fixed sorry and a fiction author. How do you
balance the scientific truth with the narrative drama or do
the two ever conflict?
Speaker 1 (07:07):
The two definitely conflict, and that's why you have a
good editor. The editors I've had at both ban Books
and tor who are my two science fiction publishing houses,
are very very good at telling me when I've got
too much of what they call a data dump, where
I try to explain somehow in the story the science
(07:28):
that's enabling something to happen, and they have to remind
me less you're telling a story, You're not writing a
popular science and nonfiction book, which I also do, And
so sometimes I mess up and I put in too
much detail. I think the balance is to put in
just enough detail so that the lay reader or the
(07:49):
educated in the field reader knows that it's plausible without
necessarily me getting bogged down in the intricacies of how
the propulsion system works. Right, So it's story first, absolutely,
And when I do mess that up again, I love
a good editor. It's actually comforting to know that they
(08:10):
take the time and come back and help me correct
that out of the story sometimes.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So how do you approach creating and crafting characters and
plots that feel grounded in science yet emotionally resonant for
readers and potential viewers.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Well, I try to put the story first. I can
give an example the setting for one of one of
my novels, Mission to Methany. It was about a first
contact and it came about as actually a result of
a conversation at work one day in a meeting, and
(08:45):
I came home that night and plotted out the story.
But I wanted to have a compelling character have this encounter.
So the character I created was a man who is
on the autism spectrum, and I told the story from
his perspective without ever really mentioning that he was on
(09:05):
the spectrum, just trying to convey how someone who looks
at the world differently might interpret the events around them.
And to get that right, I consulted some folks that
have in conversation I know that they're on the spectrum
and ask them to read it, and they helped me
correct and make sure I was telling the story, you know,
(09:26):
in a way that would be plausible for a person
with a different way of looking at the world right,
would interpret the events that were happening. That was a
story I wanted to tell of a neurodivergent person who
was encountering these things in our future, and it worked.
The book got good reviews, and I got some really
(09:46):
good feedback from pretty broad range of readers on that.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
Gosh, that's one of the most original stories I think
I've ever heard. Wow, and how much time do you
take to do the research for a story like.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
That, Well, it takes a first draft of a novel
takes at least a year for me, and then my
own self editing and polishing and sending it out to
beta readers another half year almost. Then it goes to
the publisher, and by the time they do editing and
everything else, it adds another six to eight months. So
the total production time is about two years, a little
(10:22):
over two years from first word on screen to actually
getting the book published. So it takes some time, and
some go quicker than that, and others take longer.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Your passion for story and your passion for science are amazing.
I've only been speaking to you for a short amount
of time now, and I can already feel it in
my bones. Where do you think this passion comes from?
Is it something in your childhood, is it something in
teenager life, or is it something you've learned the way
through being educated?
Speaker 1 (10:54):
That question? I get asked that question a lot, and
it's not necessarily in the context of my past for writing,
but more of my passion for science and telling people
about the wonders of space and space travel. I can
definitely relate it to two pivotal events in my childhood.
The first was this will give away my age. I
was seven years old when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon,
(11:18):
and I remember my parents bringing me in to watch
on this grainy black and white television the Apollo landing,
and they were conveying to me about always on the moon,
how far it is. Let's go out and look at
the moon and you can see this, And I was
super excited as a seven year old, and I got
interested in space at that point. And then a few
years later, my sisters, who I dearly love, allowed me
(11:42):
to stay up late with them on Friday nights to
watch reruns of the original Star Trek, and from there
it was all downhill. I started reading every science fiction
novel I could get my hands on, reading about science,
and decided I wanted to be a physicist and worked
for NASA dog on it. And so I pursued that,
achieved that, and almost I don't know, fifteen to twenty
(12:05):
years ago, I had the opportunity to start writing and
the books sold well enough that the publisher kept coming back,
so I had the opportunity to actually kind of pay
it forward. I'm trying to reach that next mini me
that's out there and ignite the same kind of passion.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
And your books are filled with so many cinematic ideas.
Has there been any interest in adapting your work for
the screen?
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Only once? And that was my understanding from the publisher,
that it was looked at by a production company and
then they decided to pass on it. So none of
my work's ever been optioned. I'm hoping in the future
that some will be. I think a lot of the
books are definitely of a type that could be considered
for that, But I don't know. I don't know how
(12:53):
you get the right attention to them. I guess as
part of it. But I have some great publishers and
see what happens.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
What would be the ideal relationship for you to have
a production company if they were to try and option
one of your books.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Well, the answer to that question is, first and foremost,
I would be absolutely thrilled at the opportunity to see
it come to the screen. I would try not to
be one of those prima donna demanding types that you
see about in movies. Right or an author has their
book option, but I would try to work with them
(13:29):
and encourage them to keep at least the core of
the story and the elements of the journey I either
journey of the hero or heroin that's undertaking the experience
would experience, even if some of the details had to
be changed. I don't know how I would react if
they tried to do something that was not physically possible
(13:51):
just for enhancing the story. I guess I'd have to
deal with that in real time. It would definitely be
a different feeling than when I encountered that consulting for
some of these movies, because they weren't changing my original work.
I was trying to get them to change to be realistic.
I would try not to take it too personally, I guess,
and that might be difficult.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
And if a Traveler's Guide to the Stars were made
into a documentary, what would you want it to look
and feel like?
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Oh? I would wow. I would like for it to
have the same feel that a lot of my readers
have told me they got when they read the book,
and the feel that I strove for, and I was
so gratified in some of the feedback I've gotten is
that when people read the book, they feel like they're
sitting in a coffee shop with me having a pastry
(14:41):
and coffee talking about how we might go to the stars.
And so, if it were ever turned into a documentary,
I'd like to have it be, of course, visuals to
be exciting and compelling, and the information conveyed, but I
would like for it to have a sense of conversation
and not be attempting to go over someone's head. I'd
(15:04):
like to have it be the same conversation I might
have with someone at my high school reunion that has
no technical background at all, that says, hey, less I
heard you wrote a book. What's it about. That would
be the feel I would like for it.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
To have, and why would you like it to have
that type of feel?
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Because I firmly believe that space exploration and space travel
is not something that should be the province of either
the very wealthy alone or the technical elite alone of
scientists and engineers. The expansion of our species of life
on Earth into the Solar System and maybe beyond is
(15:45):
something that we'll have to involve everyone, and I think
that people need to understand why it's important, understand how
difficult it's going to be, and have them be interested
in being a part of making the journey happen. So
I think it's more important for this information to be
(16:08):
conveyed to people and went to high school and college with,
or someone I might just meet at a casual event
somewhere to understand it than it is for the scientists
and engineers to have it, because those are the people
that might actually help make it happen.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
And when you say about the expansion of the human race,
are you potentially talking about human beings living on Mars?
Speaker 1 (16:31):
I'm well, okay, this is where I get personally philosophically
at a little I don't know personal here. I look
at life on Earth in what appears to be a cold, harsh,
dead universe, as being a very special thing and worth preserving.
All life on Earth, from you know, plankton in the oceans,
(16:55):
to my dog, to you to me. And I believe
that music is a gift, and the love that we
feel for our loved ones or that our pets is
something transcendent and is morally good. And I believe we
as a human species, the technological thinking species on the planet,
(17:18):
should not only be protecting the Earth for all the
life that's here, but we should be looking to spread
that moral goodness into the universe, and so yes, I
think someday we should be living on Mars. I think
someday we should be living on some of the moons
of Jupiter, and ultimately in several hundred or thousand years
(17:39):
send worldships filled with Earth life and people to go
live on otherwise dead worlds surrounding other stars. I think
it's an imperative that we should spread life far and wide.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
So when I was a kid, there was a film
called Calto Rico ourn Schwarzenegger, and they went, some of
them at least, went to live on Mars. How realistic
was the portrayal of that in that film? And how
soon could it be possible for us here?
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Well, let's hope we don't have the same adventure that
Arnold Schwarzenegger had. No, I love that movie, by the
way I saw it back when it came out. How
realistic is it? It's first off, it's not impossible, but
it's going to be very very difficult. I mean, reproducing
a self sustaining ecosystem on another world is not going
(18:36):
to be easy for the same reasons that life on
Earth appears to be rare. It will be difficult to
recreate a lot of those conditions on another world. So
I think in the short term domed cities and very large,
controlled recycling environments will be the first step. But if
(18:57):
we think in terms of geologic history or the history
of our species, in a thousand years or more, we
might be able to modify Mars so that you do
have a short sleeve environment and you can go out.
But I don't see that happening anytime in the near future.
I think it'll be more akin to glorified camping and
(19:20):
eventually some kind of domed cities with self replicating parts,
three D printing parts without the supply chain, and eventually
becoming self sufficient.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
Interesting, and of course, in so many films we see
aliens that come down to Earth, and we go and
visit planets that have aliens on in films. What is
the likelihood from the work you've done, that there are
aliens that have visited this planet And if you were
to write a story about that, what would it be?
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Wow. I wrote an essay on this that's available online
from my public sure at Banned Books. I called it
the Aliens Are Not among Us? And in it I
discuss the probability of well, let me rewind just a
little bit. Do I believe it's possible for there to
be life on other worlds in the universe? Absolutely?
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
It appears, however that this life, whatever it may be,
is probably extremely rare. And one thing that people who
think about this topic are really good about thinking about
is deep space and traveling through space to get there.
But they don't think about deep time and our existence individually.
(20:38):
You know, seventy to eighty years, if we do well,
is just a blip in the history of the Earth,
and your life is important, and I don't mean to
demean anyone's seventy to eighty years, because I think that
we all make a difference and every life is valuable.
But in the scope of history, that is a very
very small amount of time. And if the Earth we're
(21:00):
ever having been visited by a being from another star,
it is far more likely that they came during the
reign of the dinosaurs, which lasted tens of millions of years,
than the time period in which we humans have been around,
which might be fifty two one hundred thousand years, right,
because it's as much smaller amount of time, and the
(21:22):
likelihood of them coming now in the century where we're
actually traveling to the stars, or not to the stars,
but into outer space, which is less than one hundred
years out of the four and a half billion year
history of the Earth. It's a very low probability. That
doesn't mean it's not fun to play around within stories.
That's why I have first contact stories, and that's why
they're believable, is because that happens. But do I believe
(21:45):
it's likely to happen. The answer is no. I think
we might find evidence that there was once life on Mars.
Is their life there now? It's doubtful. I can't say no.
I don't know, but I think it's likely when we
started exploring these other worlds and eventually take the steps
to the nearest stars, which will be hard enough, we
(22:06):
will likely find just very cold, dead worlds there. Now,
my comment about spreading life, I have to give one
big caveat, and that is if the world we visit
already has its own life, we should leave it alone.
So if we go to Mars and find out that
there is life there already, I don't believe we should
(22:29):
establish a permanent presence or try to change the environment
to suit us. But if we go there and find
that there is no life and there never has been,
then I think it's fine for us to try to
spread life to there, and we should.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And when you say life, for example, if we were
to find bugs, would that be something you would consider
a life not worth time print with?
Speaker 1 (22:52):
Yes, I think from a scientific point of view, to
understand it and how it came to be where it
is and what it does and the potentiality for its
future in that deep time sense is more important than
us having the real estate.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
And why do you think the aliens would have come
to Earth or potentially would have come to Earth? Sorry,
when the dinosaurs were amongst the planet.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Oh, I'm not saying I don't know why they would
have come here. I just know that if they ever did,
as let's say, explorers like humans explore, right, we do
that the Polynesians in the settlement of the islands in
the South Pacific, that was done island by island, you know,
boat by boat, exploring group by exploring group, and they
had whatever reasons they had for doing it, whether it's
(23:38):
population pressure or that young person who said, I wonder
what's over there? You know, they did that exploration and
I think it could very well be the same motive
for any intelligent species. I mean I a transcendent experience
for me is to go out on a clear, starry
(23:59):
night and lie down on the ground and look at
the stars and wonder about what's out there? Is there
anyone there looking back? And I think if I know that,
that motivates a lot of people in the airspace community,
in the space exploration community to do what they do,
because they are driven to go see what's out there.
(24:19):
That's why we build the big telescopes. That's why we
send probes to Mars, to Pluto. It's because it's there
and we want to understand it. And I think any
intelligent species anywhere, if they're an intelligent tool using species,
probably has a similar curiosity, and they might have seen
the Earth through their telescopes and said, hey, you know,
(24:41):
this might be a good candidate for a life. Let's
go see what's there. Do I think they're here for
resources or anything like that. No, the energy expenditure is
too huge and the difficulty too high. If they're here
at all, it's probably a matter of exploration. I don't know.
I can't you know that for certain. Yeah, that's my intuition.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
So do you think the film industry has a responsibility
to represent space and science responsibility or can it be
just pure entertainment. Hmm.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
When you say responsibility it means to whom right, I mean,
if the responsibility is only to their shareholders and bringing
in as much money as possible, then the answer is
they have no obligation to treat science right. But if
they want to do that while they entertain and contribute
something meaningful to the culture, which I would like to
(25:37):
see more of in our entertainment, then I think yes,
they would want to and have an obligation to try
to treat it fairly. So I guess maybe I have
too noble a goal that some filmmakers, and I think
this is true. Some filmmakers make films because they really
want to tell something important and they want to be
(25:59):
meaningful and affect the culture. And those are the folks
whose films I want to work on.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Ah. I like that. I was going to say, be
really biased and to say exactly, that's exactly what I
think in terms of well people should want to work
on in some of that they're passion about. Everybody's different,
everybody's got different points of view. So everything's good and
nice in that way.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
But I also believe that those important stories can also
be entertaining me too. You talk to a lot of
people on your interviews, and I speak to a lot
of people at events that I go to, and everyone
has a story. Everyone has a story, And I find
I don't know of anyone that I've had a lengthy
conversation with and I asked them about their history and
(26:46):
how they got to be where they are. They don't
have a fascinating interesting story to tell, even if they
don't think they do.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
You're right. Everybody has a story, and everyone is the
lead character in their story a lot of the time.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Uh yeah, and they don't they sometimes they think they're
the good guy when they're not.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah, that is one hundred and ten percent right. But
if you if you could write or console on a
big budget sci fi movie tomorrow or television show on Netflix,
Amazon or even NBC, ABC or whatever it might be,
what would it be about, and any dream directors or
collaborators you have in mind.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
I think I'm fascinated with the topic that I've spent
a lot of time talking to you here about, which
is this notion of what would it be like if
we did find other life out there? What would it
be like? How would they think? Would they how would
they interact with us? How would they view us? How
would we react to them? I'd like I like first
(27:51):
contact stories. Yeah, I am very much not a fan
of dystopian science fiction. I don't like to read it,
I don't like to watch it. And so in terms
of my dream to be involved in such a project,
it would be a project that had an interesting story
(28:12):
to tell that led to an outcome that improves somebody's
life or the society's life, or leaves you feeling hope
and optimism. I do not like what was the trend
like ten to twenty years ago, very popular with teens,
which I found to be very disturbing because my adult
(28:33):
children now are teens at those times. This dystopian that
the world is just going to get worse and worse
and it's going to become a big fight one day
over resources or whatever. I don't want to be a
part of anything like that unless it's a story of
someone who is overcoming those odds that shows that there's
(28:54):
a way out and that we can have that better future.
And I think that gets back to my inherent optimism
that I have that I inherited from my parents, who
were in the greatest generation. I think about my mother
and father grew up during the Depression, fought World War II,
(29:19):
were the ones who built the economy and helped establish
and ultimately win the Cold War. And I look at
that and I think, Wow, those people went through terrible,
terrible traumatic times in an ends, existential crises, the Depression,
World War II, fighting Nazism, and they did it and
(29:42):
they came out of it and they made a better world.
And I think that's that's what we humans can do
when we put our minds to it and were properly motivated.
Those are the stories I'd like to be involved telling.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
See, I love your way of thinking and the type
of story want to be involved in. Why do you
think we've moved away as a society from wanting to
tell those type of stories and looking back in the
past from our parents or grandparents that can influence in
a great way.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Why have we moved away from it? I think we
have been as a people. I'm a boomer, I admit it.
I don't like to admit it, but I am. I'm
a late boomer, But I'm a boomer. We then betrayed
by our institutions, and we've seen institutions that we were
(30:35):
told and we grew up with that we should trust
betray us. I remember my first really evidence to portrayal
for me was Watergate. For my older sisters, it was
the Vietnam War. And then since then, it just seems
like all the way from established religion to politicians to
(30:56):
just to scientists. Even you just finished series of podcasts
hearing about academic fraud and peer reviewed publications and this
notion that people make up data that can't be reproduced.
It shatters our faith in these institutions that we're supposed
to have faith in. And I think it made people cynical.
(31:18):
And I think a lot of creative people took that
cynicism and amplified it to create these dystopian stories because
they could sense that people were being cynical. But I
also have seen the reaction to that among younger generations
who still believe a lot of them do you know
the world can be a better place. And I'll just
(31:42):
tell you right now. When I'm at I'm a person
of faith. I am a Christian. When I'm at church.
I'd rather talk to the twenty and thirty somethings of
my church than my peers, because they have children, They're
optimistic about the future, they have goals and dreams, and
I think that for a while we lost that. I
(32:02):
think I were seeing a resurgence of that though in film,
in Hollywood and in the culture. Although there's a lot
to be depressed about. I'm not trying to put on
rose colored glasses and say, you know, all the politics
and all the institutions are well, they're not. But I
also am seeing signs of hope, and so I think
(32:23):
that's not as prevalent as it was, this dystopian trend,
but it's still there and it's going to take a
while to get over it. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Perfect sense? And I think I'm right by saying you're
based in Alabama.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
That's correct.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Great, great, and the film see there in regard to
science and aliens and think of that nature? Is it
quite big? How is it for you? Do you do
a lot of consulting work in the potentially in the future.
Can you see that happening?
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I would love to do that. There's not a lot
of film being made here in Alabama. That's science and
space related. I can tell you though, there is extreme
interest in the community here. I'll give you an example.
I am soon to be retired from my job at NASA,
so I'm just speaking as a private citizen here, not
(33:13):
speaking for my employer. But when the movie Interstellar came out, yeah,
I don't know, ten years ago, and that was a
big deal. The big one of the big new theaters
here in town that has the stadium seats really comfortable
and all that had a midnight preview the night before
the official release, and they asked me to get up
(33:35):
after the film was over and talk about the real
possibilities of deep space exploration and space travel. And I
was not a consultant on the film, but people stayed
in that audience until almost one in the morning, asking questions. Wow,
it was amazing, and so for me. I also consult
(33:56):
with other science fiction writers. I go to these things
called science fiction conventions. I don't know if you've ever
ever heard of these. No. They're typically gatherings of anywhere
from two hundred to one thousand people in cities all
across the country. They tend to be fairly science fiction
literature focused. They're not like comic Con or something like that.
(34:16):
Nothing wrong with comic Con. Those are a lot of
fun too. But a lot of writers go to these
and some don't have the technical background that I do,
And so I get emails from established writers asking me
questions to help them get the science in their written
stories correct. And so I've done some film consulting the
movies you mentioned, but I also do literally consulting and
(34:40):
have helped some of these writers craft their stories so
they're more believable. And I enjoy it because I like
talking to people. You can tell I'm the quiet, shy,
reserved type, and I also enjoy, like I say, hearing
their stories and helping them make them better.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
I hope, what type of stories are these? Why to
bring in to you? Oh?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
It ranges across the board, and that's where it gets
really challenging. I had a great writer, a fellow named
Jack McDevitt come to me, and he had written a
story and written himself a little bit into a corner
of how to get the people on the planet off
the planet. And he had built this infrastructure in space
(35:24):
of an old space elevator. If your listeners don't know
what that is, It's an idea put forward by Arthur
Clark that would have a big cable that runs twenty
three thousand miles from the equator all the way out
to deep space, that instead of launching things on rocket,
you would ride the elevator and then throw them off
the top of the elevator. You know, it's stuff that
we might do, some data we can't do right now.
And I had to help him come up with a
(35:46):
plausible way where the remains of that space elevator had
been broken could be used to get them off the planet.
That was fun. I don't know. It was kind of
a mystery I had to help him solve. And that
would be one example. It's great book. It's called Deep Six.
It's been out for I don't know, twenty years, twenty
five years. Great great story, though Jack mcdibbitt is the author,
(36:09):
all the way to stuff that I don't know how
to help them, because they'll come to me sometimes with
not just a totally implausible scenario, but a totally implausible
whole background for the book, and I just have to
tell them I can't help you with this. This is
more space fantasy than science fiction. There's so much here right,
there's no way I can help you. So it spans
(36:29):
the space.
Speaker 2 (36:31):
So what advice would you give to filmmakers or screenwrits
is listening to this podcast right now who want to
ground their science fiction in real science without losing creative spock.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
I would say, you really need to work with your
technical consultants and let them help you. And if they
come up with something that would cause you to alter
your vision of the story, don't reject it out right.
Sit down and have a conversation with them with lots
of what ifs, because in that brainstorming process you might
(37:06):
come up with an innovative solution. That happened in Europa report.
And my first experience consulting was the original Lost in
Space movie that was made in the nineties, and that
actually happened in that film, although they did a lot
of things I told them not to do, and the
director said, well, I'm doing it anyway, and that's okay,
that's all right. He is the director, right, But they
(37:26):
did change a few things and it came about because
hours long conversations and what if discussions, and if they're
willing to put that kind of time in, then a
good technical consultant can help them be more accurate without
compromising story.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
I see, are their particular scientific concept you think of
right for expiration in future films that haven't yet been
done well.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
That will require some thought, and I'm not sure I
can extemporaneously come up with any right now.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
I have.
Speaker 1 (38:03):
The whole time travel thing has been done so many
times and so poorly and so well that it's hard
to see how to improve that. I think, yeah, I
think so. I think realistic deep space travel was portrayed
pretty accurately in the original Alien film. Oh I love that.
I also think that the deep space love story Passengers
(38:27):
of All Things did a really nice job of conveying
what it would be on an ultra long voyage and
what happens if somebody wakes up early, right, and the
human tragedy and triumph that that became in that story.
If you haven't seen that, you need to see Passengers.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
I think this notion of what realistic deep space travel
might be like has not been plumbed because people think
it would be boring to talk about a spaceship that
has to take a thousand years to get to its destination.
And I would beg to differ because if the people
are alive and living on that ship, you've got generations
(39:06):
of people with generations of stories to tell in an
environment that's very different than our environment here on Earth.
Right It's a constrained, closed place, and those stories would
be fascinating to tell. And then what would await them
on the other end when they get to a destination
that is not Earth two point zero, and the struggles
(39:29):
they would have to survive there and create ultimately in
the end another Earth. Perhaps I don't think that's been
well portrayed realistic deep space long duration travel. I think
producers are scared of it because they think it might
be boring. But I don't think it'd be boring. I
(39:49):
think that you've got to tell the human story in
that backdrop of the immensity of time that it would
take and the distance involved.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yes, that sounds an amazing story. I for one, would
love to watch it if it if it came out,
I would love to. But you mentioned Back to the Future,
and I I am a lover of two of the
Back to the Future films, and particular in a way
debate which but which one is better? Part one or
Pot two? But can you tell me some of the
(40:20):
inaccuracies in the time travel in those films that just
quiet may be ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
Well, you're not gonna like my answer. I think nature
is not going to allow time travel. And the reason
I think that, and by the way, well i'll say
this in a few minutes. I think nature is not
going to allow time travel for one very simple reason
because in every situation in nature that we see, there
(40:50):
are two conservation laws that are never violated. One is
the conservation of energy. That the energy of a system
total energy can't change. It can change four sunlight can
become heat. Ultimately, everything becomes heat. But if you look
at the total energy content in the system, it doesn't change.
And conservational momentum, which means that basically mass that's moving
(41:15):
mass time's velocity doesn't change before or after an interaction.
And you're saying, well, how does this relate to time travel? Well,
if I travel me Les Johnson or you and your
body goes back one hundred years, you have removed energy
and matter from the universe and inserted it somewhere else. Okay,
(41:35):
and the atoms that are in your body already exist
somewhere in that previous time period in a tree, in
the air, in another person's body, or in a skunk
that's running across the field. Some of those atoms that
they leave in the crop that your parents ate a
few days before they conceived you, right became you. And
(41:58):
so you are changing the energy density or the matter
density of the universe by time traveling. And I don't
think nature is going to allow us to do that.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
So the whole concept of Duck creating this time machine
is just completely scientifically flawed in every measurable way.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Given what we know about how the universe works, which
is an example a caveat I'm always going to give.
I don't pretend that we know how everything works based
on our current understanding. It's totally impossible. But it's a
great story. Yes, it's a great thought exercise, and getting
people to think is a great thing to get people
(42:47):
to ponder things they haven't pondered. What if I have
to say that, I don't think we do that as
much today as we used to because we're too busy
on our phones or watching streaming, which I like to do.
But what I'd like to do is watch something interesting
streaming and then have a discussion with whoever I watched
(43:07):
it with about what we just saw, what we liked,
what we didn't like, and was it plausible. And I'll
give you an example of the best time I had
doing that was way back in the nineties was the
series Twin Peaks. Oh Yes, and Twin Peaks came out
every week and it was such an eclectic, esoteric story
that was difficult to really understand what David Lynch was
trying to do, and I'm not sure he really understood.
(43:30):
We would have watch parties, we would get together the
next day over lunch and try to understand and talk
about what that was. To me, that is great storytelling
when you can engage people to want to talk about
it right and figure it out. And there have been
other series that do that. I'm not saying that's alone,
(43:51):
but that was the first time that I experienced that
kind of communal experiencing of it. And I know people
do that today in discussion groups on their phones, TikTok,
other you know, meet me groups or whatever. They haven't
watch parties, right, that's great, and they're doing it online.
I'd like to see more of people getting together and
(44:13):
experiencing these shows and then talking about it. Oh yeah.
And if I were the writer or the director or
the producer of a show that got people to talk
about my work like that, I'd be really gratified.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
Oh completely, And you can't be doing that in person,
I feel. I believe they're similar to when you go
to the cinema and watch a certain film in a
group in an audience. You don't necessarily get to talk
about it afterwards with everybody there, but you would certainly
discuss the film with whoever you went with, or if
you went with more than one person, you could all
(44:46):
discuss it. So I do wish for those type of
things to come back. I would have been a bit
too young to have enjoyed a watch along for twin Peaks.
Another project, another series someone I spoke about on this
podcast was thirty something when they used to do that
for that show. It seems like maybe in the nineties
(45:09):
without the Internet and the eighties without the internet, and
without these unique well they're not unique now, but these smartphones,
things changed and things could have been a bit different.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
And I don't want to sound like a you know,
an old fuddy complaining about the new time.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
I'm not doing no, no, I don't I don't think you
are at all.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
Yeah, I just I just. I just love people, and
I love being around people and hearing their thoughts and
having that dialogue. It's just part of who I am.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
I'll compete me too, in a slightly different topic, in
a slightly different way. That's why I love going to
the pub to speak to people and enjoy dialogue and
things of that nature.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
I wanted a memorable pub experience I had in the
UK was I had written a book about interstellar travel.
This is been fifteen years ago, and I had a
business trip that took me to the UK and someone
from the premier space exploration society that's existed since the thirties,
the British Interplanetary Society, Arthur C. Clark was a member.
(46:15):
It was, you know, they were the forefront of thinking
about all these issues of deep space travel. The editor
of their journal said, Hey, you're going to be over here,
let's meet at a pub and talk deep space travel.
And to meet in a pub with someone from this
premier space organization and talk about exploring the universe was
one of those moments I'll never forget. It was wonderful.
It was just wonderful. So the pub experience is something
(46:37):
you get. I'm presuming you in the UK or other
places they get that we Americans don't really experience.
Speaker 2 (46:44):
So well, yes, it's slightly different from my time in America,
and obviously coming from Hey, I see the differences. But
what pub did you go to? Do you remember?
Speaker 1 (46:54):
I do not know. It was near Surrey. Oh okay,
I don't remember which pub it was. I would love
for it to have been the pub that J. R. R.
Tolkien and Cus Lewis frequented, but it was not, I'm sure,
but if I could ever have that experience there, I
would do that. I'm also a big buff of going
(47:16):
to famous places where writers and scientists lived and did
their work, so it's something I get a charge out
of when I travel.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
Excellent. It's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you. I've
learnt so much and thought about so much while speaking
to you. You've been one of the most unique guests
as well as one of the best guests to come
on the podcast, so I truly appreciate you coming on
and I hope to have from you soon.
Speaker 1 (47:44):
Well. Thank you, and I'd like to extend the invitation
to you and any of your listeners, come join us
here in Huntsville, Alabama. We have a lot of really
wonderful people talking about space and space exploration. We've got
a fantastic space museum here, and you never know when
you'll run into a rocket scientist walking down the street.
So consider that invitation a sincere open invitation to you.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
Thank you,
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