WEBVTT 00:18.380 --> 00:22.220 We're going to talk about the evolutionary mind this morning. 00:22.680 --> 00:27.100 It's the topic of our book that's just coming out at the moment. 00:28.140 --> 00:33.500 And it prepares the way for thinking about the change in consciousness at the millennium. 00:35.440 --> 00:39.860 Obviously what happens at the millennium is something to do with our minds. 00:40.240 --> 00:43.800 It's not as if the laws of nature are all going to change at the year 2000. 00:44.240 --> 00:47.680 It's a mental event, a social event, a cultural event. 00:48.380 --> 00:53.580 And we're going to start this morning by talking about the evolutionary context for it. 00:57.380 --> 01:04.180 Our book, called The Evolutionary Mind, comes at a time when there's a tremendous amount of interest in evolutionary psychology. 01:05.640 --> 01:08.880 Psychologists in the last five to ten years have discovered Darwin. 01:09.460 --> 01:18.600 And I keep meeting psychologists who speak to me with that sort of enthusiasm and bright-eyed quality of the new convert. 01:19.900 --> 01:20.740 They've seen that. 01:21.340 --> 01:21.840 They've seen the light. 01:21.840 --> 01:22.340 They've discovered Darwin. 01:22.460 --> 01:26.500 And I wonder why, as a biologist, they haven't discovered Darwin a long time ago. 01:27.080 --> 01:36.200 Darwin, after all, opened up the field of evolutionary psychology with his book, The Expression of Emotions in Man and the Animals. 01:37.240 --> 01:43.100 And there was a lot of speculation at the end of the 19th century about the evolution of consciousness. 01:44.140 --> 01:50.100 However, academic psychology this century has got involved in behaviorism. 01:50.760 --> 01:52.520 Rats in cages pushing levers. 01:52.520 --> 02:01.520 And now cognitive psychology, computer models of neural processes, none of which has left much space for evolutionary theorizing. 02:02.760 --> 02:06.780 So they've come rather late to this evolutionary speculation. 02:08.360 --> 02:19.460 There's been permission given to biologists to speculate about evolution of the mind in this way by the analysis of selfish genes. 02:19.460 --> 02:19.680 Yes. 02:19.680 --> 02:23.940 They feel if they're talking about selfish genes, it's somehow scientific. 02:24.280 --> 02:26.020 And it's given everyone permission. 02:26.720 --> 02:32.560 This kind of discussion is epitomized in Steven Pinker's recent book, How the Mind Works. 02:34.240 --> 02:38.140 And it's based on the idea that human behavior is determined by genes. 02:38.320 --> 02:39.420 There's a gene for everything. 02:39.880 --> 02:47.880 And they then work out, in theoretical terms, what these genes would lead us to expect, the selfish behavior of the genes. 02:49.060 --> 02:49.560 Unfortunately. 02:49.560 --> 02:53.780 Unfortunately, their conclusions are not terribly surprising or deep. 02:54.400 --> 02:59.720 And at the end of a lecture he gave recently in London, which was met with considerable skepticism, 03:00.580 --> 03:07.560 somebody said, well, now just give us one, the most important clear idea you've been able to deduce from your selfish gene theory. 03:08.760 --> 03:16.780 And he said that after lengthy calculations, they'd found that because females have only one or two eggs at a time, 03:17.200 --> 03:19.540 which are a rare and precious resource, 03:19.860 --> 03:23.760 that needs conserving, whereas males produce millions of sperm, 03:24.180 --> 03:32.060 they deduced after a lot of working out that women would tend to seek high-status males and want to stay with them, 03:32.060 --> 03:37.540 whereas men would tend to be promiscuous, to spread selfish genes more freely. 03:39.620 --> 03:41.900 There was an air of disappointment in the lecture hall. 03:45.440 --> 03:47.740 And somebody was heard to say, is that all? 03:50.680 --> 03:51.180 Anyway. 03:51.180 --> 03:56.480 So, the fact that this rather closed world of selfish gene speculation is going on 03:56.480 --> 04:02.040 has given other people within the scientific world permission to think more widely about evolution. 04:02.940 --> 04:07.860 Most evolutionary theories are purely speculative, since we don't really know what happened in the past. 04:08.760 --> 04:16.460 Many of them are just so stories, rather like Kipling's accounts of how the leopard got its spots, and so on. 04:17.220 --> 04:20.460 But there have been, in this modern explosion, 04:21.180 --> 04:24.080 a lot of speculation about our evolutionary past. 04:24.840 --> 04:27.840 There are several rather interesting ideas that have come up, 04:27.880 --> 04:31.320 and I just wanted to bring up two or three of these this morning, 04:31.320 --> 04:39.460 because although there's no shortage of speculations about what happened in the human past in the books of Terence McKenna, 04:39.780 --> 04:45.720 there are several new ideas which might amplify these ideas about conscious evolution. 04:47.380 --> 04:51.060 The first ideas that I want to talk about are, 04:51.060 --> 04:51.160 by the way, 04:51.180 --> 04:53.780 put forward in a book by Stephen Mithen, 04:54.000 --> 04:55.300 M-I-T-H-E-N, 04:55.440 --> 04:57.300 called The Prehistory of the Mind. 04:57.860 --> 04:59.740 He's a British archaeologist, 05:00.340 --> 05:04.660 but in this book he's brought together a wealth of evidence from the fossil record, 05:04.820 --> 05:05.640 from archaeology, 05:06.220 --> 05:09.180 from the study of primate behavior, 05:09.980 --> 05:12.400 and from the study of child psychology, 05:12.860 --> 05:18.520 to put together a very interesting discussion of what happened to human minds 05:18.520 --> 05:20.660 during the three and a half million years 05:20.660 --> 05:20.820 of the human history of the mind. 05:20.820 --> 05:20.840 And I want to talk about that. 05:20.840 --> 05:20.880 And I want to talk about that. 05:20.880 --> 05:20.940 And I want to talk about that. 05:20.940 --> 05:21.000 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.000 --> 05:21.040 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.040 --> 05:21.140 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.140 --> 05:21.160 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.180 --> 05:21.260 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.260 --> 05:21.340 And I want to talk about that. 05:21.340 --> 05:24.240 And I want to talk about human evolution before recorded history began. 05:25.280 --> 05:29.920 The first upright walking hominids are now believed to have emerged in Africa 05:29.920 --> 05:31.960 over three and a half million years ago, 05:32.440 --> 05:33.580 Australopithecus. 05:34.840 --> 05:37.780 These were upright walking, tool-using, 05:38.320 --> 05:40.200 they used simple stone tools, 05:41.020 --> 05:42.300 precursors of ourselves. 05:43.760 --> 05:46.340 Human history, three and a half million years of it, 05:46.340 --> 05:50.360 went on before we have the records from the great civilizations. 05:50.760 --> 05:51.040 The domesticism, 05:51.040 --> 05:55.560 Investigation of animals, the agricultural revolution, occurred 10,000 years ago. 05:55.960 --> 06:00.280 The first civilization is about 5,000 years ago, maybe 7,000 years ago. 06:02.020 --> 06:04.160 Industrialization, 200 or 300 years ago. 06:04.600 --> 06:10.400 But for the vast majority of human history, people were living in quite a different way. 06:10.920 --> 06:15.080 And it seems to me a very reasonable supposition that a great deal of our psychology, 06:15.240 --> 06:19.240 a great deal of the working of our minds has been shaped by this enormously long period 06:19.240 --> 06:21.200 about which we know so little. 06:23.420 --> 06:27.480 What Mythen points out is that these, although we don't know what they thought about 06:27.480 --> 06:31.720 and how they worked, these early human beings, these early hominids, 06:32.480 --> 06:36.940 must have had several different kinds of intelligence. 06:37.500 --> 06:39.240 They must have had a social intelligence. 06:39.480 --> 06:42.480 They were social beings. They lived in social groups. 06:43.040 --> 06:46.580 And we know from studies of chimpanzees and other social primates 06:46.580 --> 06:49.700 that there are very subtle interactions within the group. 06:49.700 --> 06:53.120 There are dominance interactions. There are cooperative interactions. 06:53.820 --> 06:59.300 And to get it right requires a kind of intelligence about how other members of the group are going to react, 06:59.440 --> 07:01.460 what's appropriate behavior, and so on. 07:02.060 --> 07:05.740 All social animals must involve some kind of social intelligence. 07:06.320 --> 07:11.860 And we can reasonably assume that our ancestors, our hominid ancestors, 07:12.080 --> 07:16.320 had a social intelligence to enable them to live together and work together in social groups. 07:16.840 --> 07:19.480 They had a technical intelligence that enabled them, 07:19.480 --> 07:24.280 to make stone tools, and maybe other technical devices or technical things, 07:24.400 --> 07:29.400 maybe fibers and string, which haven't left traces in the archaeological record. 07:30.320 --> 07:33.280 They must have had a natural historical intelligence. 07:34.080 --> 07:37.280 Because if you're living as a hunter-gatherer, as they did, 07:37.880 --> 07:41.000 then unless you know what to hunt and how to hunt it, 07:41.160 --> 07:43.340 what the habits of the animals are that you're hunting, 07:44.140 --> 07:46.960 unless you know what to gather, where to gather it, 07:46.960 --> 07:49.460 what things are good to eat, what things are good as herds, 07:49.580 --> 07:51.580 you don't get very far. 07:51.580 --> 07:55.780 And this requires an enormously detailed knowledge of natural history. 07:56.160 --> 08:00.780 It's not just human beings. Chimpanzees have to have this, and many other creatures. 08:01.680 --> 08:04.320 So this must have been part of their mental makeup. 08:04.320 --> 08:09.180 And then at some stage they began to talk, and they must have had a linguistic intelligence. 08:09.180 --> 08:11.080 We don't know when language began. 08:11.080 --> 08:16.100 Some people put it 50,000 years ago, some people put it much longer ago. 08:16.260 --> 08:19.280 But really nobody knows. Language leaves no fossil traces. 08:19.480 --> 08:25.480 But something very strange happened about 100,000 years ago. 08:25.480 --> 08:30.980 Our ancestors achieved brain sizes roughly the same as ours today. 08:32.700 --> 08:37.240 So for a hundred thousand years human beings have had brains of the current capacity. 08:38.240 --> 08:44.740 Yet for a hundred thousand years they were not writing programs and building computers and 08:45.900 --> 08:48.080 thinking up Einstein's equations and so on. 08:48.080 --> 08:49.280 Something else was going on with them. 08:49.280 --> 08:51.280 Something else was going on with those brains. 08:51.280 --> 08:53.280 And we haven't a clue what it was. 08:53.280 --> 09:01.280 The brain size, the development of current brain size is not the reason that there's been this explosion of technical innovation recently. 09:01.280 --> 09:05.280 Brain size hasn't changed much for a hundred thousand years. 09:05.280 --> 09:15.280 And it wasn't until about 50,000 years ago that there was the beginnings of art, paintings in caves and that kind of thing. 09:15.280 --> 09:17.280 Some things... 09:17.280 --> 09:19.280 What happened? Why did... 09:19.280 --> 09:26.280 Why did art and civilization only begin tens of thousands of years after the brain had reached its present capacity? 09:26.280 --> 09:36.280 And what enabled these different kinds of intelligence to give rise to the agricultural revolution, modern humanity and so on? 09:36.280 --> 09:46.280 Well, the hypothesis that Meythen puts forward is that about 50,000 years ago some crucial transition occurred 09:46.280 --> 09:49.280 whereby these previously separate intelligences, 09:49.280 --> 09:57.280 somehow came together, cross-fertilized each other and produced the beginnings of characteristically human mentality. 09:57.280 --> 10:09.280 The connection of social and technical intelligence meant that people started using technical skills for making things like jewelry, ornaments, grave goods. 10:09.280 --> 10:18.280 The mixing of technical and natural historical intelligence led to a great improvement in hunting technologies, 10:18.280 --> 10:24.280 in weapons, in axe heads and spear heads and arrow heads and so on. 10:24.280 --> 10:33.280 The merging of social and natural historical intelligence led to a whole kind of mythic understanding of the animal and the natural world, 10:33.280 --> 10:36.280 which we find in all cultures around the world today. 10:36.280 --> 10:47.280 And with the combining these with linguistic intelligence, there was a whole burst of human development, of mental development. 10:47.280 --> 10:50.280 He compares this to a cathedral. 10:50.280 --> 10:56.280 A Romanesque and Norman cathedral has side chapels almost sealed off from each other with no interaction, 10:56.280 --> 11:02.280 whereas the great Gothic cathedrals sort of open up and all these different things can mix together. 11:02.280 --> 11:09.280 Somehow he thinks this transition 50,000 years ago was associated with the origin of religion 11:09.280 --> 11:16.280 and seems to have been based on a sense of human connection not just with the earth but with the heavens. 11:17.280 --> 11:23.280 When I asked Meythen how he understood this to have happened, 11:23.280 --> 11:28.280 especially given his chosen metaphor of the cathedral, 11:28.280 --> 11:36.280 I said, do you think there really was a breakthrough from some extra-terrestrial intelligence into the human realm at that stage, 11:36.280 --> 11:38.280 since all your evidence points to it? 11:38.280 --> 11:42.280 And he said, of course not, that's impossible. 11:42.280 --> 11:47.280 And so I said, how do you know it's impossible? 11:47.280 --> 11:53.280 Since everybody all around the world, according to your own evidence, seems to have undergone this transition, 11:53.280 --> 11:56.280 it seems to have shaped human mentality as we know it. 11:56.280 --> 12:03.280 He said, oh yes, he said, well the very fact everyone believes it shows that this is an incredibly persistent illusion. 12:03.280 --> 12:10.480 And I said, but how do you know it's an illusion? 12:10.480 --> 12:16.400 He said, because it's so persistent. 12:16.400 --> 12:20.400 And I said, surely you can have things that are true that are persistent too. 12:20.400 --> 12:22.400 He admitted in the end it was just an illusion. 12:22.400 --> 12:25.400 It was just a matter of opinion. 12:25.400 --> 12:33.400 But everything he said points towards some breakthrough to another realm of consciousness around 50,000 years ago, 12:33.400 --> 12:37.400 and something that happened with human groups all around the earth. 12:37.400 --> 12:41.400 And I think this is the first time I've seen a convincing building up of evidence 12:41.400 --> 12:44.400 from somebody who's coming from a very hard-nosed position 12:44.400 --> 12:50.400 that gives us some clue as to a major shift in consciousness that happened, 12:50.400 --> 12:53.400 and it involved some connection with a higher dimension. 12:53.400 --> 13:00.400 Now, some people will like to interpret that in terms of visits of spaceships, chariots of the gods, and so forth. 13:00.400 --> 13:03.400 I think that there are many other ways of thinking about it, 13:03.400 --> 13:07.400 and I can guess that Terence will be able to suggest at least one. 13:10.400 --> 13:12.400 Consider it done. 13:15.400 --> 13:19.040 But before we get... 13:19.040 --> 13:21.040 There's one other speculation about the problem. 13:22.040 --> 13:24.040 There's one other thing in the past I want to mention, 13:24.040 --> 13:29.040 which I found particularly interesting out of this year's crop of books on the subject, 13:29.040 --> 13:32.040 which is Barbara Ehrenreich's book, Blood Rights. 13:32.040 --> 13:35.040 She's an American writer based in New York, 13:35.040 --> 13:42.040 and in her book Blood Rights, completely changed around my idea of human prehistory. 13:42.040 --> 13:46.040 What she shows, very convincingly, is that our image of man the hunter 13:46.040 --> 13:51.040 striding forth onto the African savannah about three million years ago, 13:51.040 --> 13:53.040 is, in fact, pretty implausible. 13:53.040 --> 13:55.040 Human beings were small. 13:55.040 --> 13:58.040 They couldn't run very fast. 13:58.040 --> 14:00.040 They weren't particularly strong. 14:00.040 --> 14:02.040 Their tools were extremely primitive. 14:02.040 --> 14:05.040 It's much more likely that for most of human history, 14:05.040 --> 14:08.040 it was not man the hunter, but man the hunt head. 14:08.040 --> 14:13.040 In fact, most bone remains of early hominids 14:13.040 --> 14:18.040 show the marks and scratches and tooth marks of large cats on them. 14:18.040 --> 14:21.040 Human beings were on the African savannah. 14:21.040 --> 14:24.040 With lots of game, but also with lots of big predators. 14:24.040 --> 14:26.040 They were extremely vulnerable. 14:26.040 --> 14:30.040 And a great deal of modern human mentality, she argues, 14:30.040 --> 14:36.040 was shaped by millions of years of being preyed on by large predators. 14:36.040 --> 14:39.040 It wasn't until about 50,000 years ago 14:39.040 --> 14:44.040 that there was an improvement in hunting technologies all around the world, 14:44.040 --> 14:49.040 whereby human beings could indeed become fairly effective hunters. 14:49.040 --> 14:51.040 But for most of the three and a half million years, 14:51.040 --> 14:55.040 of hominid history, it was man the hunt head. 14:55.040 --> 14:57.040 She shows, very interestingly, 14:57.040 --> 15:00.040 that this sheds light on many religious traditions, 15:00.040 --> 15:03.040 because in many religious traditions, 15:03.040 --> 15:06.040 there's the idea of the victim, the sacrificial victim. 15:06.040 --> 15:10.040 If you're a collective, a herd of wildebeest, 15:10.040 --> 15:14.040 or baboons in a group out in the desert, 15:14.040 --> 15:16.040 and a predator approaches, 15:16.040 --> 15:20.040 the predators usually attack isolated members of the group. 15:20.040 --> 15:24.040 The old, the young, or sometimes the young males 15:24.040 --> 15:26.040 who are defending the group on the periphery. 15:26.040 --> 15:29.040 Those are the ones that get killed first. 15:29.040 --> 15:31.040 And when they've killed one of them, 15:31.040 --> 15:33.040 they start eating it. 15:33.040 --> 15:35.040 And very often the rest of the group then relax, 15:35.040 --> 15:39.040 and they often stand around and watch the predator eating the prey. 15:39.040 --> 15:41.040 Because once they've got one victim, 15:41.040 --> 15:43.040 they're not hungry anymore. 15:43.040 --> 15:45.040 They're not interested in the rest. 15:45.040 --> 15:47.040 So one dies for the sake of the rest. 15:47.040 --> 15:49.040 This is a simple fact of predation. 15:50.040 --> 15:52.040 And she shows that this pattern, 15:52.040 --> 15:54.040 the idea of a sacrificial victim 15:54.040 --> 15:56.040 that dies for the sake of the rest, 15:56.040 --> 15:58.040 is deeply embedded in our consciousness 15:58.040 --> 16:00.040 as an archetypal pattern 16:00.040 --> 16:04.040 based in this biological fact of predation 16:04.040 --> 16:06.040 and the fact that we were preyed upon. 16:06.040 --> 16:10.040 She also shows that most of the early visions of gods and goddesses 16:10.040 --> 16:14.040 were in the form of carnivores. 16:14.040 --> 16:17.040 Even Jehovah is a carnivore. 16:17.040 --> 16:19.040 The story of Cain and Abel, 16:19.040 --> 16:22.040 where Cain is a farmer 16:22.040 --> 16:25.040 and offers the fruit of the earth to God as a sacrifice, 16:25.040 --> 16:28.040 and Abel is a herder and offers a sheep. 16:28.040 --> 16:31.040 God prefers the sacrifice of Abel. 16:31.040 --> 16:35.040 He prefers meat to vegetarian diet. 16:35.040 --> 16:38.040 And that's why Cain kills Abel. 16:38.040 --> 16:40.040 He's jealous. 16:40.040 --> 16:44.040 And so this carnivorous quality of the gods 16:44.040 --> 16:47.040 is associated with images of the gods 16:47.040 --> 16:49.040 in association with 16:49.040 --> 16:50.040 predatory animals. 16:50.040 --> 16:52.040 She then goes on to show that 16:52.040 --> 16:54.040 whole nations identify with predators 16:54.040 --> 16:57.040 as a kind of justification for war making, 16:57.040 --> 17:00.040 where the whole nation becomes like a predator. 17:00.040 --> 17:02.040 The symbol of England and many other countries 17:02.040 --> 17:04.040 is the lion of America, 17:04.040 --> 17:06.040 of the United States, the eagle, and so on. 17:06.040 --> 17:09.040 All around the world you find these predatory animals 17:09.040 --> 17:11.040 as national emblems. 17:11.040 --> 17:15.040 Well, I think her insights are particularly interesting 17:15.040 --> 17:18.040 and because of this long history, 17:18.040 --> 17:20.040 it shows so much of our mythology, 17:20.040 --> 17:22.040 religious structure, and fears 17:22.040 --> 17:25.040 are related to this long period of being preyed on. 17:25.040 --> 17:27.040 She shows the fantasies, the nightmares 17:27.040 --> 17:30.040 of young children in modern cities like New York 17:30.040 --> 17:32.040 until they're about five years old, 17:32.040 --> 17:34.040 and not about child molesters 17:34.040 --> 17:38.040 and realistic fears, or at least the fears their parents have. 17:38.040 --> 17:41.040 They're about being eaten by monsters and wild animals. 17:41.040 --> 17:44.040 This is what most children's nightmares are about. 17:44.040 --> 17:47.040 And this would go back to a long period of history. 17:47.040 --> 17:52.040 So here we have two ideas, 17:52.040 --> 17:54.040 Meythen's ideas and Barbara Ehrenreich's ideas 17:54.040 --> 17:56.040 about early human history, 17:56.040 --> 17:58.040 which would give memories. 17:58.040 --> 18:00.040 I would think of them as memories 18:00.040 --> 18:02.040 in the collective memory through morphic resonance. 18:02.040 --> 18:04.040 Jung would call them collective archetypes 18:04.040 --> 18:07.040 in the collective unconscious. 18:07.040 --> 18:10.040 Things which are built into our past, 18:10.040 --> 18:13.040 our memory that has shaped the way our minds are today, 18:13.040 --> 18:15.040 of which we're largely unaware 18:15.040 --> 18:17.040 because our normal study of history 18:17.040 --> 18:21.040 begins with the civilizations of the Near East, 18:21.040 --> 18:24.040 with Egypt, with Greece, Rome, and so forth, 18:24.040 --> 18:28.040 and leaves out the previous 3.5 million years of human history 18:28.040 --> 18:32.040 which have really done so much to shape our evolutionary nature 18:32.040 --> 18:36.040 and therefore condition the way we respond to each other today 18:36.040 --> 18:38.040 and in the future. 18:38.040 --> 18:42.040 I think that our evolutionary history is rooted in the past, 18:42.040 --> 18:44.040 but I've been reading on my journey here 18:44.040 --> 18:46.040 this novel, On the Edge, 18:46.040 --> 18:49.040 just published in England last week 18:49.040 --> 18:51.040 by Edward St. Aubin. 18:51.040 --> 18:53.040 It's set in California. 18:53.040 --> 18:56.040 The crucial scenes occur in Esalen. 18:56.040 --> 19:01.670 And here's a conversation going on in the hot tubs 19:01.670 --> 19:04.670 on page 130. 19:04.670 --> 19:07.670 According to Terence McKenna, said Flavia, 19:07.670 --> 19:09.670 who happens to be a genius 19:09.670 --> 19:12.670 instead of an arrogant British jerk, 19:12.670 --> 19:17.670 he says, 19:17.670 --> 19:20.670 History is rooted in the future. 19:20.670 --> 19:23.670 So... 19:23.670 --> 19:31.620 Can I jump in? 19:33.620 --> 19:35.620 Well, first of all, 19:35.620 --> 19:38.620 let's just assume that I've responded to this 19:38.620 --> 19:43.620 with the usual rap about diet, mushrooms, so forth and so on, 19:43.620 --> 19:45.620 that if you know anything about my work, 19:45.620 --> 19:47.620 you have heard ad nauseum, ad infinitum, 19:47.620 --> 19:49.620 ad infinitum. 19:49.620 --> 19:52.620 So just go past that and say... 19:52.620 --> 19:53.620 And remind you, 19:53.620 --> 19:56.620 Rup and I have not really had a good conversation 19:56.620 --> 19:58.620 for 20 months, 19:58.620 --> 20:03.620 but I guess arranging ourselves according to the demands 20:03.620 --> 20:05.620 of the morphogenetic field, 20:05.620 --> 20:09.620 we're sort of thinking along the same creodes, 20:09.620 --> 20:14.620 because in my trying to understand at greater levels 20:14.620 --> 20:16.620 this moment of transition, 20:16.620 --> 20:18.620 50,000 years ago, 20:18.620 --> 20:20.620 or this moment of breakthrough, 20:20.620 --> 20:22.620 what exactly were the elements 20:22.620 --> 20:24.620 and how did it happen, 20:24.620 --> 20:28.620 I've sort of come very close to this area 20:28.620 --> 20:31.620 that Rupert's indicating this morning, 20:31.620 --> 20:35.620 because I can't help but notice 20:35.620 --> 20:40.620 that a successful predator 20:40.620 --> 20:44.620 must think like prey, 20:44.620 --> 20:46.620 that there is this particular 20:46.620 --> 20:51.620 intellectual symbiosis that goes on 20:51.620 --> 20:54.620 between the predator and the prey. 20:54.620 --> 20:58.620 And hunting cats, 20:58.620 --> 21:00.620 top carnivores, I think, 21:00.620 --> 21:05.620 internalize the behaviors of their prey. 21:05.620 --> 21:09.620 Well, at the very dawn of the emergence, 21:09.620 --> 21:12.620 of the evolutionary emergence of mind, 21:12.620 --> 21:15.620 the central human figure in that equation 21:15.620 --> 21:18.620 is the shaman. 21:18.620 --> 21:22.620 And the shaman at the high paleolithic stage 21:22.620 --> 21:27.620 is essentially a kind of sanctioned psychotic. 21:27.620 --> 21:32.620 In other words, able to move into states of mind 21:32.620 --> 21:38.620 so extreme that their immediate social efficacy 21:38.620 --> 21:40.620 is arguable. 21:40.620 --> 21:43.620 And to condense that into common English, 21:43.620 --> 21:44.620 what I mean is, 21:44.620 --> 21:46.620 the shaman is a person, 21:46.620 --> 21:49.620 a designated member of the social group, 21:49.620 --> 21:52.620 who can mentally change into an animal, 21:52.620 --> 21:55.620 who can become so animal-like 21:55.620 --> 21:58.620 that other members of the social group 21:58.620 --> 22:01.620 are appalled and draw back. 22:01.620 --> 22:03.620 And so in a weird way, 22:03.620 --> 22:05.620 at this fractal boundary 22:05.620 --> 22:08.620 where human consciousness emerges, 22:08.620 --> 22:10.620 the first human consciousness 22:10.620 --> 22:12.620 was not human at all. 22:12.620 --> 22:19.620 It was a human ability to model effectively 22:19.620 --> 22:22.620 the thinking processes of other predators. 22:22.620 --> 22:24.620 With mathematical models. 22:24.620 --> 22:28.620 With mathematical models and precision, yes. 22:28.620 --> 22:31.620 And so, yes, 22:31.620 --> 22:35.620 what we're talking about when we're talking about hunting 22:35.620 --> 22:38.620 is we're talking about strategic thinking. 22:38.620 --> 22:41.620 And strategic thinking always involves 22:41.620 --> 22:45.620 bifurcating trees of choice. 22:45.620 --> 22:49.620 If we go to the water hole at dawn, 22:49.620 --> 22:51.620 perhaps we can make a kill. 22:51.620 --> 22:55.620 If we take food and leave the women and children 22:55.620 --> 22:58.620 and go in this direction several days, 22:58.620 --> 23:00.620 perhaps we will make a kill. 23:00.620 --> 23:01.620 Perhaps not. 23:01.620 --> 23:04.620 Perhaps by abandoning the women and the children 23:04.620 --> 23:06.620 we will undercut our gene pool 23:06.620 --> 23:08.620 and return to catastrophe. 23:08.620 --> 23:10.620 Strategic thinking. 23:10.620 --> 23:13.620 What strategic thinking requires 23:13.620 --> 23:18.620 is the ability to contemplate 23:18.620 --> 23:22.620 possibilities not immediately present. 23:22.620 --> 23:23.620 In other words, 23:23.620 --> 23:27.620 there's a kind of time-binding function here. 23:27.620 --> 23:30.620 So I'm really not so much posing a question to Rupp 23:30.620 --> 23:33.620 as adumbrating what he said. 23:33.620 --> 23:36.620 I think this is where it all comes together 23:36.620 --> 23:39.620 in this very complicated relationship 23:39.620 --> 23:45.620 between fear, expectation, strategizing, 23:45.620 --> 23:48.620 and the imagination. 23:48.620 --> 23:52.620 The two areas where I'm sure we spend a great deal of time 23:52.620 --> 23:56.620 studying these bifurcating trees of possibility 23:56.620 --> 24:01.620 were in the food-gathering and hunting domain 24:01.620 --> 24:04.620 and then in the sexual domain, 24:04.620 --> 24:08.620 which today we call erotic fantasy. 24:08.620 --> 24:10.620 But in the high Paleolithic, 24:10.620 --> 24:13.620 erotic fantasy was rather closely welded 24:13.620 --> 24:16.620 to where your genes went 24:16.620 --> 24:23.620 and how your biological propagation processes preceded. 24:23.620 --> 24:25.620 So the key, 24:25.620 --> 24:29.620 whether you believe it was through the stimulation of psilocybin 24:29.620 --> 24:34.620 or through the aping of the behavior of other top predators 24:34.620 --> 24:37.620 that we aspired to compete with, 24:37.620 --> 24:40.620 whatever the causal mechanism, 24:40.620 --> 24:44.620 the domain in which the change was born 24:44.620 --> 24:49.620 and in which we will live until we leave the body behind us, 24:49.620 --> 24:52.620 is the domain of the imagination. 24:52.620 --> 24:58.620 This is what we created that is uniquely human 24:58.620 --> 25:01.620 and that has defined us ever since. 25:01.620 --> 25:06.620 And as this discussion today proceeds to look more into the future, 25:06.620 --> 25:12.620 I think we will see that as the imagination has been our past 25:12.620 --> 25:15.620 and the cradle of our humanness, 25:15.620 --> 25:24.620 so it also is the domain in which our transhuman metamorphosis will occur. 25:24.620 --> 25:27.620 Something like that. 25:27.620 --> 25:30.620 As far as I can see, 25:30.620 --> 25:34.620 this is dancing around an intellectual black hole or something. 25:34.620 --> 25:36.620 Here we have, 25:36.620 --> 25:38.620 the question is posed, 25:38.620 --> 25:41.620 as I gather of Stephen Meython, 25:41.620 --> 25:46.620 that in the evolution of consciousness or culture, 25:46.620 --> 25:48.620 I'm not sure which, 25:48.620 --> 25:51.620 there was bifurcation 50,000 years ago 25:51.620 --> 25:54.620 which is of interest to us because we're in one now. 25:54.620 --> 25:59.620 And the question is, 25:59.620 --> 26:01.620 what was it caused by? 26:01.620 --> 26:03.620 And then Rupert proposed that you would, of course, 26:03.620 --> 26:09.620 answer the psilocybin mushroom on the plains of Africa. 26:09.620 --> 26:10.620 But you didn't. 26:10.620 --> 26:12.620 And the need to think strategically. 26:12.620 --> 26:16.620 But this need not only was a constant 26:16.620 --> 26:20.620 throughout the three and a half million years evolution of hominids, 26:20.620 --> 26:23.620 but also in pongids, apes being, 26:23.620 --> 26:28.620 and swarming bees, schooling fish and so on. 26:28.620 --> 26:31.620 This is more or less no news here. 26:31.620 --> 26:33.620 What was it then that happened 50,000 years ago? 26:33.620 --> 26:35.620 If anything happened? 26:35.620 --> 26:42.620 So, I know that this will not be a favorite hypothesis in this audience, 26:42.620 --> 26:44.620 but it's one that has to be counted. 26:44.620 --> 26:46.620 Do you ask, are there any other? 26:46.620 --> 26:49.620 What did he suggest actually, Stephen Meython? 26:49.620 --> 26:53.620 He doesn't give a very clear explanation as to why this might have happened. 26:53.620 --> 26:56.620 Well, he's a youngish man, I suppose. 26:58.620 --> 27:02.620 Who probably has not read the great books of his predecessors 27:02.620 --> 27:07.620 such as, let's say, for example, Alexander Marchand, 27:07.620 --> 27:11.620 who led a great group of, a combined group of two species, 27:11.620 --> 27:17.620 a neurophysiologist and archaeologist in the distant past, 27:17.620 --> 27:19.620 to propose that miracle that occurred, 27:19.620 --> 27:23.620 like the beginning of Cro-Magnon 50,000 years ago, 27:23.620 --> 27:27.620 had to do with a structural change in neurophysiology. 27:27.620 --> 27:30.620 This presents the view, if you want to look at it that way, 27:30.620 --> 27:33.620 God as a brain surgeon, 27:33.620 --> 27:36.620 also known as the hole in the head, 27:36.620 --> 27:40.620 where the connection between the hemispheres was improved in the corpus callosum 27:40.620 --> 27:48.620 and this physiological evolution provided evolutionary advantage in hunting and so on. 27:48.620 --> 27:52.620 And as an evolution theorist, you would have to say, 27:52.620 --> 27:58.620 well, if there was divine brain surgery, 27:58.620 --> 28:00.620 then it could have been in response to 28:00.620 --> 28:06.620 a leading element in the evolution of some morphogenetic field. 28:06.620 --> 28:10.620 Now, thinking of this as a chicken and egg kind of thing, 28:10.620 --> 28:14.620 is like the physiological change. 28:14.620 --> 28:17.620 There was a physiological change, was there not? 28:17.620 --> 28:19.620 Didn't Stephen Mython mention that? 28:19.620 --> 28:22.620 Well, you can't from skulls. All you've got is skulls. 28:22.620 --> 28:24.620 Oh, you can. No, no, you can. 28:24.620 --> 28:29.620 That's the whole point, that these skulls have been examined microscopically by Alexander Marchand. 28:29.620 --> 28:32.620 And the changes in the skull, 28:32.620 --> 28:38.620 morphological changes, sharply divide that particular event, 28:38.620 --> 28:41.620 including the enlargement of the frontal lobes, 28:41.620 --> 28:44.620 which was considered, because of Braka's brain, 28:44.620 --> 28:49.620 to be the physiological foundation for the development of speech. 28:49.620 --> 28:52.620 Whereas we would say, probably, I'm guessing, 28:52.620 --> 28:58.620 we would agree that the enlarged brain, Braka's brain, 28:59.620 --> 29:02.620 evolved because, as we had already started speaking 29:02.620 --> 29:04.620 and had the need for more vocabulary, 29:04.620 --> 29:06.620 the things favored the larger vocabulary 29:06.620 --> 29:12.620 in terms of hunting, gathering, escaping large carnivores, and so on. 29:12.620 --> 29:16.620 Anyway, there's a dichotomy of two different views about this bifurcation, 29:16.620 --> 29:18.620 the divine intervention one, 29:18.620 --> 29:23.620 and the physiological DNA, random mutation, natural selection one. 29:23.620 --> 29:24.620 Isn't that it? 29:24.620 --> 29:28.620 And in this dichotomy, we see you opposed, 29:28.620 --> 29:32.620 because Terence believes the eating psilocybin mushrooms 29:32.620 --> 29:35.620 is a purely material explanation, right? 29:35.620 --> 29:40.620 It requires no recourse to a divine intervention in the field. 29:40.620 --> 29:43.620 Angels, dreams, you use the word imagination. 29:43.620 --> 29:46.620 But he's not suggesting a literal divine intervention. 29:46.620 --> 29:48.620 He's just speaking metaphorically. 29:48.620 --> 29:51.620 Well, Maithen's speaking metaphorically. 29:51.620 --> 29:53.620 I think I'm speaking literally. 29:53.620 --> 29:56.620 Because, I think, you see, one of the things we have to explain 29:56.620 --> 29:57.620 is that religion, 29:57.620 --> 30:02.620 or some sense of a beyond the human realm of consciousness, 30:02.620 --> 30:04.620 is found in every human culture today, 30:04.620 --> 30:06.620 in some sense, in some way or another, 30:06.620 --> 30:09.620 a world of spirits, a world of angels, of gods. 30:09.620 --> 30:14.620 But to explain the universal distribution of this 30:14.620 --> 30:16.620 as part of traditional human thinking 30:16.620 --> 30:19.620 requires, at some stage in the past, 30:19.620 --> 30:23.620 there had been an awareness of this other realm of consciousness. 30:23.620 --> 30:27.620 Now, this is not incompatible with psilocybin or any other drug, 30:27.620 --> 30:29.620 or any other demonic hypothesis, 30:29.620 --> 30:33.620 because those might have kick-started this connection 30:33.620 --> 30:35.620 with another realm of consciousness. 30:35.620 --> 30:38.620 But if we assume that today, all over the world, 30:38.620 --> 30:40.620 shamanic cultures and all other cultures 30:40.620 --> 30:43.620 have the sense of other levels 30:43.620 --> 30:47.620 and other kinds of conscious entities beyond the human level, 30:47.620 --> 30:51.620 some in animal forms and some in forms way beyond that, 30:51.620 --> 30:54.620 we have to assume that at some stage in the past 30:54.620 --> 30:57.620 there was a linking with these other realms of consciousness, 30:57.620 --> 30:58.620 as they are. 30:58.620 --> 31:01.620 Not just metaphors, not just archetypes in the collective mind, 31:01.620 --> 31:06.620 but forms of consciousness that might well, I think, actually are out there. 31:06.620 --> 31:10.620 Well, in trying to think conservatively 31:10.620 --> 31:16.620 about the possibility of a non-human local intelligence, 31:16.620 --> 31:23.620 it seems to me that, in a way, nature herself presents as an intelligence. 31:23.620 --> 31:26.620 That the understanding of nature 31:26.620 --> 31:31.620 is the understanding of complex integrated systems 31:31.620 --> 31:35.620 of such complexity that to deny them consciousness 31:35.620 --> 31:39.620 is just a reluctance of the reductionist mind. 31:39.620 --> 31:44.620 That for anyone not burdened by that prejudice, 31:44.620 --> 31:52.620 it's self-evident that nature is alive, cognizant, responding. 31:52.620 --> 31:56.620 It's interesting that really all it seems we can agree about 31:56.620 --> 32:02.620 on here is that the timeframe is roughly 50,000 years. 32:02.620 --> 32:07.620 Well, so a whole bunch of things are triangulating on that moment. 32:07.620 --> 32:09.620 One could say, as I've argued, 32:09.620 --> 32:12.620 that it was the eating of psilocybin mushrooms. 32:12.620 --> 32:15.620 You could make a more general statement and say 32:15.620 --> 32:22.620 that was a subset of the consequence of an omnivorous diet. 32:22.620 --> 32:26.620 But, if I may, where exactly were these mushrooms 32:26.620 --> 32:29.620 100,000 years ago? 32:29.620 --> 32:34.620 Well, the way I think about it is there was an incremental involvement 32:34.620 --> 32:39.620 that had punctuated breakthroughs in it. 32:39.620 --> 32:45.620 In other words, the slow meeting of mind, mushroom, social complexity, 32:45.620 --> 32:50.620 acoustical abilities linked to neurophysiological states 32:50.620 --> 32:52.620 didn't just smoothly proceed. 32:52.620 --> 32:55.620 It all came together, but then at a certain point 32:55.620 --> 33:00.620 it gelled, and this is this 50,000 year point 33:00.620 --> 33:07.620 where social understanding, technology, linguistic repertoires, 33:07.620 --> 33:09.620 depth of diet... 33:09.620 --> 33:12.620 Well, you're clinging to this material stuff. 33:12.620 --> 33:14.620 I think it's about time that we trap you here. 33:14.620 --> 33:16.620 Well, there will be a material component 33:16.620 --> 33:20.620 even if you believe angels descended from on high. 33:20.620 --> 33:22.620 Well, I suppose that... 33:22.620 --> 33:25.620 Okay, you have the software that draws the novelty wave, 33:25.620 --> 33:27.620 you're a novelty theorist. 33:27.620 --> 33:31.620 We might appeal to novelty theory as an explanatory strategy here, 33:31.620 --> 33:35.620 a cognitive strategy in dealing with the bifurcation 50,000 years ago. 33:35.620 --> 33:38.620 If you run the program back for 100,000 years, 33:38.620 --> 33:43.620 do you or do you not find a kink there in the novelty wave in 50,000 BC? 33:43.620 --> 33:46.620 No, it's not based on data, only extrapolation, 33:46.620 --> 33:48.620 but is there or isn't there... 33:48.620 --> 33:51.620 Well, I think there were a series of breakthroughs. 33:51.620 --> 33:54.620 For instance, 120,000 years ago 33:54.620 --> 33:58.620 the modern homo sapien sapien form appeared. 33:58.620 --> 34:00.620 In other words, no. 34:00.620 --> 34:02.620 In short, no, there's no... 34:02.620 --> 34:04.620 Both and, I think. 34:04.620 --> 34:09.620 The invention of writing 9,000 years ago 34:09.620 --> 34:12.620 was an enormous breakthrough. 34:12.620 --> 34:16.620 But all of these things proceed out of the further integration, 34:16.620 --> 34:19.620 complexification of the nervous system 34:19.620 --> 34:22.620 in connection with the function of the imagination. 34:22.620 --> 34:24.620 No, but I can't even believe this, 34:24.620 --> 34:26.620 that you're presenting yourself 34:26.620 --> 34:30.620 as a conventional materialist evolutionary theorist. 34:33.620 --> 34:38.620 The galactarians who built the mushroom intended... 34:42.620 --> 34:45.620 This is your pal, your favorite author. 34:45.620 --> 34:47.620 Well, you see, with the mushroom theory, 34:47.620 --> 34:49.620 you can always just say they encountered the mushroom 34:49.620 --> 34:51.620 and then it proceeded from there. 34:51.620 --> 34:53.620 But you can go one step back and say, 34:53.620 --> 34:55.620 oh, they put the mushroom in their path. 34:55.620 --> 34:57.620 Oh, I'll give you a hand there. 34:57.620 --> 35:02.620 And that was the preceding civilization of Lemurians who... 35:02.620 --> 35:05.620 What's wrong with Lemurians? 35:05.620 --> 35:07.620 They died out at that point 35:07.620 --> 35:10.620 because they had poisoned the environment with toxic chemicals 35:10.620 --> 35:12.620 and created global climate warming 35:12.620 --> 35:15.620 which resulted in a drying of the desert, 35:15.620 --> 35:18.620 the Sahara Desert, from which sprung forth 35:18.620 --> 35:20.620 a bloom of psychedelic mushrooms 35:20.620 --> 35:22.620 that had been hiding under the surface previously, 35:22.620 --> 35:24.620 because it was too wet. 35:24.620 --> 35:25.620 That's why... 35:25.620 --> 35:27.620 The loud hum I hear 35:27.620 --> 35:31.620 is William of Ockham spinning in his grave. 35:34.620 --> 35:35.620 I see. 35:35.620 --> 35:38.620 You think that DNA and the expression of genes 35:38.620 --> 35:41.620 is a simpler explanation than a divine intervention 35:41.620 --> 35:43.620 at the level of the novelty wave. 35:43.620 --> 35:46.620 I think that the DNA is divine. 35:46.620 --> 35:48.620 Ah. 35:48.620 --> 35:49.620 But William... 35:49.620 --> 35:51.620 Ah, escape from his... 35:52.620 --> 35:55.620 ...his trap. 35:55.620 --> 35:59.620 Rube, what you as a middle man should do. 35:59.620 --> 36:01.620 Well, I... 36:01.620 --> 36:02.620 I think... 36:02.620 --> 36:04.620 You see, I can't quite get your position 36:04.620 --> 36:06.620 because the new hard-nosed skeptic 36:06.620 --> 36:08.620 that you're revealing to us here 36:08.620 --> 36:09.620 in other places, 36:09.620 --> 36:11.620 you see, it doesn't seem to fit too well 36:11.620 --> 36:15.620 with Terence McKenna on non-human entities, 36:15.620 --> 36:17.620 machine elves, et cetera. 36:17.620 --> 36:19.620 I mean, the idea of other kinds of consciousness, 36:19.620 --> 36:21.620 other forms of entity 36:21.620 --> 36:24.620 that are not just inside our brains 36:24.620 --> 36:27.620 and appearing in relation to deranged states of mind, 36:27.620 --> 36:29.620 pharmacologically induced, 36:29.620 --> 36:31.620 the idea that they're out there seems to me 36:31.620 --> 36:34.620 an essential part of most of what I've heard you say 36:34.620 --> 36:36.620 over many years. 36:36.620 --> 36:41.620 Well, I'm sort of getting into what I intend to say later, 36:41.620 --> 36:44.620 but I think the key thing is not to concentrate 36:44.620 --> 36:48.620 on materialist versus non-materialist explanations, 36:48.620 --> 36:50.620 but to realize that the new vision 36:50.620 --> 36:54.620 of nature is not as matter or energy, 36:54.620 --> 36:57.620 but as information. 36:57.620 --> 37:00.620 And information is expressed in the DNA, 37:00.620 --> 37:03.620 it's expressed epigenetically in culture. 37:03.620 --> 37:06.620 What's happening is that information 37:06.620 --> 37:10.620 was running itself on a primate platform, 37:10.620 --> 37:13.620 but evolving according to its own agenda. 37:13.620 --> 37:17.620 In a sense, we have a symbiotic relationship 37:17.620 --> 37:19.620 to a non-material being, 37:19.620 --> 37:21.620 which we call language. 37:21.620 --> 37:23.620 And we think it's ours, 37:23.620 --> 37:25.620 and we think we control it. 37:25.620 --> 37:26.620 This isn't what's happening. 37:26.620 --> 37:28.620 It's running itself. 37:28.620 --> 37:31.620 It's time-sharing a primate nervous system 37:31.620 --> 37:35.620 and evolving toward its own conclusions. 37:35.620 --> 37:38.620 Now I've just shot my talk, so... 37:40.620 --> 37:42.620 And it's so early in the morning. 37:42.620 --> 37:45.620 Yes, well, this is this damn drug I'm drinking. 37:49.620 --> 37:53.620 It makes you give it all away too soon. 37:55.620 --> 37:56.620 But I think... 37:56.620 --> 37:58.620 I mean, the discussion so far 37:58.620 --> 38:00.620 has been remarkably earthbound. 38:00.620 --> 38:02.620 And if we assume that information 38:02.620 --> 38:04.620 is not confined to this planet, 38:04.620 --> 38:05.620 if we... 38:05.620 --> 38:07.620 To put it in your information terminology, 38:07.620 --> 38:09.620 if we assume that consciousness 38:09.620 --> 38:11.620 is not limited to the earth, 38:11.620 --> 38:13.620 if we assume that there are not only 38:13.620 --> 38:15.620 conscious beings on other planets, 38:15.620 --> 38:18.620 but also that other elements of the universe, 38:18.620 --> 38:20.620 like stars, suns, galaxies, 38:20.620 --> 38:23.620 may have minds or consciousness, 38:23.620 --> 38:25.620 which I do assume, 38:25.620 --> 38:29.620 then it becomes very likely that at some stage 38:29.620 --> 38:31.620 a consciousness on earth could link somehow 38:31.620 --> 38:34.620 with those higher forms of consciousness. 38:34.620 --> 38:35.620 Who knows how? 38:35.620 --> 38:37.620 Maybe by something like 38:37.620 --> 38:39.620 interplanetary telepathy, 38:39.620 --> 38:40.620 something of that kind. 38:40.620 --> 38:43.620 So if there's some link of human consciousness 38:43.620 --> 38:46.620 with other forms of consciousness in the universe, 38:46.620 --> 38:48.620 then when that contact was established, 38:48.620 --> 38:50.620 there would be a big transition. 38:50.620 --> 38:52.620 That it could have been propelled 38:52.620 --> 38:54.620 or kicked off by drugs, 38:54.620 --> 38:57.620 it could be kicked off by some mutation 38:57.620 --> 38:59.620 that led to more nervous interconnections. 38:59.620 --> 39:01.620 But when it happens, 39:01.620 --> 39:04.620 this connection with other forms of consciousness 39:04.620 --> 39:07.620 would transform human nature. 39:07.620 --> 39:08.620 Yes. 39:08.620 --> 39:09.620 And it would fit with the facts, 39:09.620 --> 39:10.620 because there's a belief in... 39:10.620 --> 39:12.620 You see, now we're off the planet at last. 39:12.620 --> 39:14.620 Can I remind you, Terence, 39:14.620 --> 39:16.620 of a quotation from the front pages 39:16.620 --> 39:17.620 of your first book, 39:17.620 --> 39:22.620 speculating that mushroom spores 39:22.620 --> 39:24.620 are intergalactic travellers, 39:24.620 --> 39:26.620 that they have a hard case 39:26.620 --> 39:28.620 impervious to ultraviolet rays 39:28.620 --> 39:31.620 that enables them to float on the galactic wind 39:31.620 --> 39:34.620 from planetary system to planetary system, 39:34.620 --> 39:36.620 bringing us, as Rupert suggests, 39:36.620 --> 39:41.620 linguistic communications from other life forms, 39:41.620 --> 39:43.620 including immaterial life forms 39:43.620 --> 39:46.620 that they've been in conversation with in the past. 39:46.620 --> 39:50.620 I think that this is an approximate summary of your preface. 39:50.620 --> 39:52.620 But notice how materialist 39:52.620 --> 39:57.620 and space- and time-bound that hypothesis is. 39:57.620 --> 40:00.620 I could agree with everything Rupert said. 40:00.620 --> 40:02.620 I think now our intellectual toolkit 40:02.620 --> 40:06.620 has been enriched by the virtual confirmation 40:06.620 --> 40:09.620 of the idea that there is a bell-type, 40:09.620 --> 40:13.620 non-local aspect to the universe. 40:13.620 --> 40:15.620 So I do think we're in contact 40:15.620 --> 40:18.620 with all intelligence in the universe 40:18.620 --> 40:22.620 through the bell, non-local connection. 40:22.620 --> 40:26.620 But that means that it has no historicity, 40:26.620 --> 40:27.620 this connection. 40:27.620 --> 40:30.620 It has always been there, complete and entire. 40:30.620 --> 40:34.620 So why there is a sense of progressing toward it 40:34.620 --> 40:39.620 or it erupting through into normal earthbound affairs 40:39.620 --> 40:43.620 is not because someone in the Andromeda Galaxy 40:43.620 --> 40:44.620 makes a decision, 40:44.620 --> 40:47.620 now we will reveal ourselves to the earthlings. 40:47.620 --> 40:49.620 It's that the antenna system 40:49.620 --> 40:52.620 and the nervous system of the earthlings 40:52.620 --> 40:55.620 evolved through a point 40:55.620 --> 40:58.620 where suddenly this became self-evident. 40:58.620 --> 41:01.620 Well, now we're coming to the question for the first time 41:01.620 --> 41:03.620 in the enlarged context 41:03.620 --> 41:07.620 in which we have not only all space 41:07.620 --> 41:10.620 but all time informing us. 41:10.620 --> 41:14.620 And here I may remind you of Father Bede's letter 41:14.620 --> 41:17.620 which is quoted in the last chapter of our new book 41:17.620 --> 41:21.620 where he challenges us to consider the mystical element 41:21.620 --> 41:25.620 which he describes as more or less in the language 41:25.620 --> 41:30.620 of David Bohm's implicate order 41:30.620 --> 41:34.620 that all time and all space somehow exists 41:34.620 --> 41:37.620 as an interconnected ball of intelligence 41:37.620 --> 41:40.620 which is, let's just assume such a thing. 41:40.620 --> 41:44.620 Nevertheless, the science of our, 41:44.620 --> 41:48.620 our colleagues is more or less a true story 41:48.620 --> 41:50.620 of evolution, 41:50.620 --> 41:52.620 that there was a change, 41:52.620 --> 41:55.620 that language did come upon us in a certain moment, 41:55.620 --> 41:57.620 that before that moment we didn't speak, 41:57.620 --> 41:59.620 afterwards we did. 41:59.620 --> 42:01.620 And so the question arises, 42:01.620 --> 42:03.620 and I think this is in my interpretation 42:03.620 --> 42:05.620 the question we started with here, 42:05.620 --> 42:08.620 how could it be that with or without 42:08.620 --> 42:10.620 a divine intervention that there is this 42:10.620 --> 42:13.620 more or less linear progress 42:13.620 --> 42:16.620 in human intelligence, 42:16.620 --> 42:19.620 culture, capability, tool using 42:19.620 --> 42:22.620 and exponential population growth 42:22.620 --> 42:26.620 that is correlated without any causal implication 42:26.620 --> 42:28.620 with the descent of the novelty wave? 42:28.620 --> 42:31.620 Why do we have this peculiar artifact? 42:31.620 --> 42:33.620 This is an observational fact 42:33.620 --> 42:35.620 that there is this increase in complexity 42:35.620 --> 42:38.620 in civilization apparently looking 42:38.620 --> 42:41.620 for a spectacular transformation 42:41.620 --> 42:43.620 which we are associating with the word 42:43.620 --> 42:45.620 millennium now. 42:45.620 --> 42:46.620 What's going on? 42:46.620 --> 42:49.620 Well, novelty theory would just say 42:49.620 --> 42:53.620 the universe is a complexity conserving engine. 42:53.620 --> 42:56.620 Whatever complexity it achieves by any means 42:56.620 --> 42:58.620 it makes that the platform 42:58.620 --> 43:02.620 for a further thrust into deeper complexity. 43:02.620 --> 43:04.620 If you don't like novelty theory... 43:04.620 --> 43:07.620 Because the morphogenetic field never forgets. 43:07.620 --> 43:09.620 It forgets a little but it never, 43:09.620 --> 43:11.620 it can be set back 43:11.620 --> 43:13.620 but it can never be set back 43:13.620 --> 43:15.620 to zero and it always, 43:15.620 --> 43:17.620 once it gets out of the ditch 43:17.620 --> 43:19.620 it heads back in the same direction. 43:19.620 --> 43:23.620 It has a vector field preference. 43:23.620 --> 43:25.620 And then you mentioned David Bohm. 43:25.620 --> 43:28.620 His idea of emergent properties 43:28.620 --> 43:30.620 seems to achieve the same end 43:30.620 --> 43:33.620 without a telos of novelty theory. 43:33.620 --> 43:37.620 He simply says when you complexify a system 43:37.620 --> 43:40.620 new properties will emerge 43:40.620 --> 43:42.620 suddenly and unexpectedly 43:42.620 --> 43:45.620 that couldn't have been predicted. 43:45.620 --> 43:48.620 If you put emergence theory with novelty theory 43:48.620 --> 43:51.620 you see that the universe could not but 43:51.620 --> 43:54.620 proceed along the line of 43:54.620 --> 43:58.620 complexification of morphogenetic expression, 43:58.620 --> 44:00.620 density of connectivity 44:00.620 --> 44:03.620 and all the things that retard entropy 44:03.620 --> 44:05.620 and give rise to in fact 44:05.620 --> 44:09.620 the complex non-entropic ordered 44:09.620 --> 44:11.620 apparently teleologically informed 44:11.620 --> 44:13.620 cosmos that we're in. 44:13.620 --> 44:16.620 Well now we see then that 44:16.620 --> 44:18.620 what you've described is... 44:18.620 --> 44:20.620 Why do you laugh? 44:20.620 --> 44:22.620 It was one of those verbs 44:22.620 --> 44:24.620 was a bit extraordinary. 44:24.620 --> 44:26.620 Okay. 44:26.620 --> 44:28.620 That there is then revealed 44:28.620 --> 44:30.620 a kind of evolutionary theory 44:30.620 --> 44:33.620 as a cosmological hypothesis. 44:33.620 --> 44:36.620 This is a theological position basically. 44:36.620 --> 44:38.620 It's a teleological position. 44:38.620 --> 44:40.620 That there is a timeless implicate order 44:40.620 --> 44:43.620 and there is life on planet Earth 44:43.620 --> 44:45.620 and in the rest of the universe 44:45.620 --> 44:49.620 which evolves according to 44:49.620 --> 44:51.620 this theoretical rule 44:51.620 --> 44:53.620 by an increase of complexity. 44:53.620 --> 44:55.620 When something is revealed 44:55.620 --> 44:56.620 there's a development. 44:56.620 --> 44:57.620 It's not forgotten. 44:57.620 --> 44:59.620 It builds upon that 44:59.620 --> 45:03.620 and this mystical unit 45:03.620 --> 45:04.620 while knowing all 45:04.620 --> 45:06.620 is not telling all 45:06.620 --> 45:07.620 but revealing gradually 45:07.620 --> 45:09.620 because just that's the law 45:09.620 --> 45:11.620 of life as we know it. 45:11.620 --> 45:12.620 Is that what you're saying? 45:12.620 --> 45:14.620 In three dimensional space and time. 45:14.620 --> 45:15.620 With Rupert and I 45:15.620 --> 45:17.620 really from my point of view 45:17.620 --> 45:19.620 the only difference between 45:19.620 --> 45:20.620 the morphogenetic field 45:20.620 --> 45:24.620 that he has enthusiastically proposed 45:24.620 --> 45:26.620 and the ideas of novelty theory 45:26.620 --> 45:30.620 is for Rupert it's pushed from the past. 45:30.620 --> 45:32.620 For me it's pulled from the future. 45:32.620 --> 45:34.620 Well that's what Teddy was saying 45:34.620 --> 45:35.620 in this book. 45:35.620 --> 45:37.620 But what you get 45:37.620 --> 45:38.620 in the end of the day 45:38.620 --> 45:39.620 is the same thing. 45:39.620 --> 45:41.620 It's just a matter of preference 45:41.620 --> 45:42.620 and how much of orthodoxy 45:42.620 --> 45:44.620 you want to grind against. 45:44.620 --> 45:49.620 The phobia against telos 45:49.620 --> 45:52.620 is an artifact of 19th century deism 45:52.620 --> 45:54.620 and doesn't go very deep. 45:54.620 --> 45:58.620 You described the complexification 45:58.620 --> 46:00.620 of the universe as self-evident 46:00.620 --> 46:02.620 and I believe it is self-evident 46:02.620 --> 46:04.620 and the failure of science 46:04.620 --> 46:06.620 to address this 46:06.620 --> 46:08.620 is what makes it so frustrating. 46:08.620 --> 46:11.620 And imprecise so late in the game. 46:11.620 --> 46:13.620 But the trouble with the emergence view 46:13.620 --> 46:15.620 you've been putting forward 46:15.620 --> 46:17.620 is that it's still very earthbound. 46:17.620 --> 46:18.620 You see there's obviously been 46:18.620 --> 46:20.620 a major emergence of complexity 46:20.620 --> 46:21.620 in human culture. 46:21.620 --> 46:23.620 There's also been a huge emergence 46:23.620 --> 46:25.620 of complexity in the Amazon jungle 46:25.620 --> 46:27.620 and the Malayan rainforest. 46:27.620 --> 46:29.620 Arguably far greater than anything 46:29.620 --> 46:31.620 we've achieved through technology 46:31.620 --> 46:33.620 and millions of species of beetles, 46:33.620 --> 46:35.620 insects, plants and so forth. 46:35.620 --> 46:37.620 But it seems to me that 46:37.620 --> 46:39.620 long before all these things happened on earth 46:39.620 --> 46:41.620 we've got the possibility 46:41.620 --> 46:43.620 of much higher levels of consciousness 46:43.620 --> 46:44.620 outside the earth. 46:44.620 --> 46:46.620 And as you know I'm a devotee 46:46.620 --> 46:48.620 of the idea of the sun as conscious. 46:48.620 --> 46:53.620 And the stars. 46:53.620 --> 46:55.620 If you take the materialist view 46:55.620 --> 46:57.620 that consciousness interfaces with the brain 46:57.620 --> 47:00.620 through complex electromagnetic patterns of activity 47:00.620 --> 47:02.620 then those on the sun 47:02.620 --> 47:05.620 which we're learning more and more about every day 47:05.620 --> 47:07.620 have unbelievable 47:07.620 --> 47:09.620 complex chaotic patterns. 47:09.620 --> 47:12.620 Resonant patterns of acoustic waves 47:12.620 --> 47:13.620 going through the sun. 47:13.620 --> 47:16.620 Polar reversals every 11 years. 47:16.620 --> 47:20.620 Resonant patterns of electromagnetic waves. 47:20.620 --> 47:22.620 My thinking about this was much influenced 47:22.620 --> 47:25.620 by a science fiction novel by Fred Hoyle 47:25.620 --> 47:26.620 published in the 50's 47:26.620 --> 47:28.620 called The Black Cloud. 47:28.620 --> 47:30.620 Where Fred Hoyle shows that 47:30.620 --> 47:32.620 to imagine intelligence 47:32.620 --> 47:34.620 necessarily grounded either in 47:34.620 --> 47:36.620 copper wires and computers 47:36.620 --> 47:38.620 or in nerve cells and brains 47:38.620 --> 47:39.620 is a limitation of this. 47:39.620 --> 47:41.620 You could have an intelligence system 47:41.620 --> 47:43.620 working through a plasma 47:43.620 --> 47:45.620 an electrically charged cloud 47:45.620 --> 47:48.620 and indeed I think through something like the sun. 47:48.620 --> 47:51.620 So if the sun is in fact conscious 47:51.620 --> 47:53.620 if stars have a kind of consciousness 47:53.620 --> 47:55.620 then of course it raises questions 47:55.620 --> 47:57.620 well what do they think about 47:57.620 --> 47:59.620 what do they do with this consciousness. 47:59.620 --> 48:01.620 But it's very likely that the kind of consciousness 48:01.620 --> 48:04.620 they have would be at a vastly higher level than our own. 48:04.620 --> 48:06.620 So when we're talking about 48:06.620 --> 48:08.620 the emergence of higher consciousness 48:08.620 --> 48:09.620 in human beings 48:09.620 --> 48:11.620 it's not as if for the first time in the universe 48:11.620 --> 48:14.620 some higher level of consciousness emerges. 48:14.620 --> 48:16.620 It could be that for the first time 48:16.620 --> 48:18.620 in the history of the solar system 48:18.620 --> 48:21.620 our minds somehow contact 48:21.620 --> 48:23.620 the sort of intelligence 48:23.620 --> 48:25.620 much greater intelligence 48:25.620 --> 48:27.620 that exists out there. 48:27.620 --> 48:29.620 And because I think it's possible 48:29.620 --> 48:31.620 to think of the stars and the sun as conscious 48:31.620 --> 48:33.620 and then galaxies as conscious 48:33.620 --> 48:36.620 you don't need to go straight beyond 48:36.620 --> 48:38.620 the universe to the divine mind. 48:38.620 --> 48:40.620 There's plenty of lower level minds 48:40.620 --> 48:42.620 than the divine mind 48:42.620 --> 48:44.620 that could be out there. 48:44.620 --> 48:46.620 And of course traditional views of spirits and angels 48:46.620 --> 48:48.620 tell us that there are many many many 48:48.620 --> 48:50.620 innumerable levels of intelligence 48:50.620 --> 48:52.620 beyond our own within the galaxy 48:52.620 --> 48:54.620 many associated with the stars. 48:54.620 --> 48:56.620 So we don't necessarily 48:56.620 --> 48:58.620 have to have the idea it's all happened 48:58.620 --> 49:00.620 and emerged on earth 49:00.620 --> 49:02.620 through a complexification. 49:02.620 --> 49:04.620 We can have the thing we reach a point 49:04.620 --> 49:06.620 where there's like a spark passes 49:06.620 --> 49:08.620 between a terrestrial consciousness 49:08.620 --> 49:10.620 a human one with more interconnected 49:10.620 --> 49:12.620 halves of the brain, people 49:12.620 --> 49:14.620 in the first 49:14.620 --> 49:16.620 first throes of 49:16.620 --> 49:18.620 mind-boggling mushroom trip etc. 49:18.620 --> 49:20.620 But somehow whatever happens 49:20.620 --> 49:22.620 there's this like a spark 49:22.620 --> 49:24.620 a connection established. 49:24.620 --> 49:26.620 And it seems to me that this hypothesis 49:26.620 --> 49:28.620 has the great advantage of actually 49:28.620 --> 49:30.620 accounting for what's believed all around the world 49:30.620 --> 49:32.620 namely that there is some connection 49:32.620 --> 49:35.620 between human intelligence and that of the sky. 49:35.620 --> 49:37.620 Because in terms of imagination 49:37.620 --> 49:39.620 you see predators and 49:39.620 --> 49:41.620 we human beings 49:41.620 --> 49:43.620 were both predators and prey 49:43.620 --> 49:45.620 but so are lots of other animals 49:45.620 --> 49:47.620 and presumably any hunting animal 49:47.620 --> 49:49.620 has to have the imagination and the ability 49:49.620 --> 49:51.620 to identify with the prey. 49:51.620 --> 49:53.620 In fact René Tom years ago 49:53.620 --> 49:55.620 produced a mathematical model of predator and prey 49:55.620 --> 49:57.620 where there has to be a kind of 49:57.620 --> 49:59.620 internalization of the prey 49:59.620 --> 50:01.620 in the predator's mind in order to 50:01.620 --> 50:03.620 get the right strategy. 50:03.620 --> 50:05.620 This is not specifically human. 50:05.620 --> 50:07.620 It's just that we have 50:07.620 --> 50:09.620 as a basis of the imagination. 50:09.620 --> 50:11.620 I think this connection with realms beyond the human 50:11.620 --> 50:13.620 would give such an enlarged 50:13.620 --> 50:15.620 scope for imagination 50:15.620 --> 50:17.620 that to take literally 50:17.620 --> 50:19.620 what so many people around the world 50:19.620 --> 50:21.620 say in their myths seems to me 50:21.620 --> 50:23.620 the simplest hypothesis. 50:23.620 --> 50:25.620 Well I'm more friendly 50:25.620 --> 50:27.620 to this idea of 50:27.620 --> 50:29.620 non-biologically based 50:29.620 --> 50:31.620 forms of consciousness than 50:31.620 --> 50:33.620 I was the last time we talked 50:33.620 --> 50:35.620 because 50:35.620 --> 50:37.620 of this fact I mentioned 50:37.620 --> 50:39.620 that I now think wherever there is 50:39.620 --> 50:41.620 a sufficiently complex 50:41.620 --> 50:43.620 informational environment 50:43.620 --> 50:45.620 the functions of 50:45.620 --> 50:47.620 life, self-replication, 50:47.620 --> 50:49.620 mutation, 50:49.620 --> 50:51.620 adaptation 50:51.620 --> 50:53.620 can go on. 50:53.620 --> 50:55.620 But obviously most of 50:55.620 --> 50:57.620 the intelligence in the universe 50:57.620 --> 50:59.620 would be utterly 50:59.620 --> 51:01.620 incomprehensible to us 51:01.620 --> 51:03.620 because it is so different. 51:03.620 --> 51:05.620 So we're transducing 51:05.620 --> 51:07.620 virtually the entire 51:07.620 --> 51:09.620 hologram of possible 51:09.620 --> 51:11.620 intelligence in the universe 51:11.620 --> 51:13.620 but the reason our fantasies 51:13.620 --> 51:15.620 of angels and aliens 51:15.620 --> 51:17.620 give us hominids 51:17.620 --> 51:19.620 with binocular vision 51:19.620 --> 51:21.620 who use acoustical speech 51:21.620 --> 51:23.620 in other words creatures 51:23.620 --> 51:25.620 very similar to ourselves 51:25.620 --> 51:27.620 is because we only can 51:27.620 --> 51:29.620 recognize what is familiar 51:29.620 --> 51:31.620 in this universal 51:31.620 --> 51:33.620 information field. 51:33.620 --> 51:35.620 So we sail right past 51:35.620 --> 51:37.620 our mind, the galaxy mind 51:37.620 --> 51:39.620 to communicate with 51:39.620 --> 51:41.620 a race of winged hominids 51:41.620 --> 51:43.620 around Zenebel-Ganubi prime 51:43.620 --> 51:45.620 simply because 51:45.620 --> 51:47.620 they are enough like us 51:47.620 --> 51:49.620 that we can grok 51:49.620 --> 51:51.620 our possibility of 51:51.620 --> 51:53.620 a relationship. 51:53.620 --> 51:55.620 It seems to me that this is just very 51:55.620 --> 51:57.620 begging the question in 51:57.620 --> 51:59.620 traditional and cheap fashion 51:59.620 --> 52:01.620 because... 52:01.620 --> 52:03.620 Oh good Ralph. 52:03.620 --> 52:05.620 I mean I'm all 52:05.620 --> 52:07.620 in favor of 52:07.620 --> 52:09.620 celestial intelligence and in 52:09.620 --> 52:11.620 fact I could even entertain 52:11.620 --> 52:13.620 a conversation with a Pleiadian 52:13.620 --> 52:15.620 I don't mind. 52:15.620 --> 52:17.620 But the question, I mean we started 52:17.620 --> 52:19.620 with the problem of evolution 52:19.620 --> 52:21.620 the evolutionary mind is 52:21.620 --> 52:23.620 in fact the title of our book 52:23.620 --> 52:25.620 and the question of the evolution 52:25.620 --> 52:27.620 the progress or even the 52:27.620 --> 52:29.620 origin of all these things is 52:29.620 --> 52:31.620 our ultimate question. 52:31.620 --> 52:33.620 Now if our view is local to planet earth 52:33.620 --> 52:35.620 we can say okay we're being 52:35.620 --> 52:37.620 robbed by bolts from the blue 52:37.620 --> 52:39.620 and we have these meddling 52:39.620 --> 52:41.620 celestial intelligence that are reaching out 52:41.620 --> 52:43.620 pretend to be Bell and tell us Bell's theorem 52:43.620 --> 52:45.620 give us mushrooms, pretend to be 52:45.620 --> 52:47.620 sent from the solar wind 52:47.620 --> 52:49.620 or whatever. But where do 52:49.620 --> 52:51.620 they come from? The evolutionary 52:51.620 --> 52:53.620 problem then is just transferred 52:53.620 --> 52:55.620 onto another more remote place. 52:55.620 --> 52:57.620 Now as I understand 52:57.620 --> 52:59.620 Rupert's idea of the morphogenetic field 52:59.620 --> 53:01.620 is that these other places are also in 53:01.620 --> 53:03.620 evolution and the whole system is in 53:03.620 --> 53:05.620 coevolution and that is an attempt 53:05.620 --> 53:07.620 I think one of the first ones 53:07.620 --> 53:09.620 in the 53:09.620 --> 53:11.620 history of intelligent 53:11.620 --> 53:13.620 discourse on this subject 53:13.620 --> 53:15.620 the first attempt to 53:15.620 --> 53:17.620 get rid of 53:17.620 --> 53:19.620 the hypothesis of 53:19.620 --> 53:21.620 timeless 53:21.620 --> 53:23.620 truth. But if you get 53:23.620 --> 53:25.620 rid of that hypothesis you have a whole 53:25.620 --> 53:27.620 bunch of weird problems 53:27.620 --> 53:29.620 such as then you have to talk about 53:29.620 --> 53:31.620 the speed of propagation 53:31.620 --> 53:33.620 of novelty or 53:33.620 --> 53:35.620 morphogenetic fields and then 53:35.620 --> 53:37.620 you're slammed to the wall because you have to either 53:37.620 --> 53:39.620 come up with a number which you fit 53:39.620 --> 53:41.620 into a mathematical architecture 53:41.620 --> 53:43.620 or you say 53:43.620 --> 53:45.620 that it's instantaneous 53:45.620 --> 53:47.620 which returns you to this 53:47.620 --> 53:49.620 holistic more metaphysical 53:49.620 --> 53:51.620 thing. If you don't 53:51.620 --> 53:53.620 believe that it's coming from the Bell 53:53.620 --> 53:55.620 space then you have a whole 53:55.620 --> 53:57.620 bunch of these kinds of problems which I 53:57.620 --> 53:59.620 think intuitively 53:59.620 --> 54:01.620 make it too complicated. 54:01.620 --> 54:03.620 Let it be instantaneous. 54:03.620 --> 54:05.620 I mean I think the whole question 54:05.620 --> 54:07.620 of time is in fact 54:07.620 --> 54:09.620 behind this problem that we have this 54:09.620 --> 54:11.620 idea about time and then 54:11.620 --> 54:13.620 we're trying to talk about a timeless. 54:13.620 --> 54:15.620 So one way to eliminate this 54:15.620 --> 54:17.620 cognitive dissonance 54:17.620 --> 54:19.620 is to say okay there is no timeless 54:19.620 --> 54:21.620 it's all in coevolution and 54:21.620 --> 54:23.620 we're a little bit behind the evolution 54:23.620 --> 54:25.620 of the Pleiadians and then 54:25.620 --> 54:27.620 well where does that come from? We're stuck 54:27.620 --> 54:29.620 with the problem. So you I think 54:29.620 --> 54:31.620 you're talking of 54:31.620 --> 54:33.620 the attractor at the end of time 54:33.620 --> 54:35.620 is more or less the beyond 54:35.620 --> 54:37.620 time is the intelligence that it 54:37.620 --> 54:39.620 informs 54:39.620 --> 54:41.620 that nourishes the accumulation 54:41.620 --> 54:43.620 of complexity as we 54:43.620 --> 54:45.620 go along apparently 54:45.620 --> 54:47.620 in time. Well I think 54:47.620 --> 54:49.620 the attractor is complete in 54:49.620 --> 54:51.620 and of itself in another dimension 54:51.620 --> 54:53.620 the process of history and 54:53.620 --> 54:55.620 biological evolution is 54:55.620 --> 54:57.620 the growing complex enough 54:57.620 --> 54:59.620 to grow toward 54:59.620 --> 55:01.620 the thing and understand it. 55:01.620 --> 55:03.620 So is our process 55:03.620 --> 55:05.620 of growth then nourished or not 55:05.620 --> 55:07.620 nourished by some 55:07.620 --> 55:09.620 flow of something that comes from 55:09.620 --> 55:11.620 this attractor at the end of time in another 55:11.620 --> 55:13.620 dimension? It 55:13.620 --> 55:15.620 contributes the trajectory of 55:15.620 --> 55:17.620 our approach. It defines 55:17.620 --> 55:19.620 the domain 55:19.620 --> 55:21.620 in which we are moving 55:21.620 --> 55:23.620 toward it. We couldn't even talk this without 55:23.620 --> 55:25.620 chaos theory. No, chaos 55:25.620 --> 55:27.620 theory stands behind this 55:27.620 --> 55:29.620 very 55:29.620 --> 55:31.620 powerful. Well I don't know Ralph 55:31.620 --> 55:33.620 people have been talking about this for a long time 55:33.620 --> 55:35.620 before chaos theory came along. 55:35.620 --> 55:37.620 But in such a muddled fashion. 55:37.620 --> 55:39.620 Compared 55:39.620 --> 55:41.620 with the sublime clarity 55:41.620 --> 55:43.620 of our present conclusion. 55:43.620 --> 55:45.620 Precisely. 55:47.620 --> 55:49.620 So I don't 55:49.620 --> 55:51.620 quite see why chaos theory is an essential 55:51.620 --> 55:53.620 ingredient. Forget chaos theory. 55:53.620 --> 55:55.620 I'm 55:55.620 --> 55:57.620 interested in the possibility that 55:57.620 --> 55:59.620 in your deepest musings 55:59.620 --> 56:01.620 on this problem you have rather 56:01.620 --> 56:03.620 avoided Father Bede's 56:03.620 --> 56:05.620 challenge to grapple with the infinity 56:05.620 --> 56:07.620 and that in 56:07.620 --> 56:09.620 the idea of the 56:09.620 --> 56:11.620 coevolution of morphogenetic fields 56:11.620 --> 56:13.620 begs the question of the existence 56:13.620 --> 56:15.620 of a timeless or eternal 56:15.620 --> 56:17.620 truth, pattern, guidance 56:17.620 --> 56:19.620 or something which is 56:19.620 --> 56:21.620 well. 56:21.620 --> 56:23.620 But are you, I mean 56:23.620 --> 56:25.620 Father Bede used the word mystical 56:25.620 --> 56:27.620 but of course he was a priest. 56:27.620 --> 56:29.620 I don't think he meant the 56:29.620 --> 56:31.620 essentially 56:31.620 --> 56:33.620 incomprehensible. In other words 56:33.620 --> 56:35.620 I don't think we're going to get to a place where 56:35.620 --> 56:37.620 we then say from here on it is 56:37.620 --> 56:39.620 mystery and 56:39.620 --> 56:41.620 rational apprehension fails. 56:41.620 --> 56:43.620 My notion of the mystical 56:43.620 --> 56:45.620 is simply that which 56:45.620 --> 56:47.620 remains to be understood 56:47.620 --> 56:49.620 and there will always be a 56:49.620 --> 56:51.620 residuum of mystery 56:51.620 --> 56:53.620 in principle. But in principle 56:53.620 --> 56:55.620 it is not mysterious. 56:55.620 --> 56:57.620 Well I mean. No I think 56:57.620 --> 56:59.620 I don't agree with that I must say. I thought you might 56:59.620 --> 57:01.620 not. 57:01.620 --> 57:03.620 Well 57:03.620 --> 57:05.620 well we'd soon be out 57:05.620 --> 57:07.620 of business if we're talking at the edge of the unthinkable 57:07.620 --> 57:09.620 if we actually, everything 57:09.620 --> 57:11.620 suddenly becomes thinkable. 57:13.620 --> 57:15.620 Even in principle? 57:17.620 --> 57:19.620 I think that given the nature of a 57:19.620 --> 57:21.620 human mind evolved to deal with 57:21.620 --> 57:23.620 large predators hunting on 57:23.620 --> 57:25.620 African plains, gathering 57:25.620 --> 57:27.620 herbs etc. 57:27.620 --> 57:29.620 Dealing with social problems 57:29.620 --> 57:31.620 human relationships etc. 57:31.620 --> 57:33.620 The idea that this evolution has equipped 57:33.620 --> 57:35.620 us with minds and language 57:35.620 --> 57:37.620 and cognitive abilities that enable 57:37.620 --> 57:39.620 us to comprehend the entire universe 57:39.620 --> 57:41.620 where it's come from, where it's going 57:41.620 --> 57:43.620 what minds and 57:43.620 --> 57:45.620 mind may lie beyond what we 57:45.620 --> 57:47.620 see. The idea that this 57:47.620 --> 57:49.620 very small part of the evolutionary 57:49.620 --> 57:51.620 system with all the limitations 57:51.620 --> 57:53.620 inherent in it could comprehend 57:53.620 --> 57:55.620 the whole seems to me 57:55.620 --> 57:57.620 a rather improbable 57:57.620 --> 57:59.620 supposition. And I think 57:59.620 --> 58:01.620 that the point about mysticism 58:01.620 --> 58:03.620 or what the Greek church calls 58:03.620 --> 58:05.620 apophatic, the 58:05.620 --> 58:07.620 is that 58:07.620 --> 58:09.620 the ultimate in the end does 58:09.620 --> 58:11.620 lie beyond what we can think. 58:11.620 --> 58:13.620 Our thinking can only take us so far. 58:13.620 --> 58:15.620 And this isn't just because we haven't got enough 58:15.620 --> 58:17.620 professors of mathematics yet or 58:17.620 --> 58:19.620 and it's only a matter of bigger computers 58:19.620 --> 58:21.620 and so forth. There are 58:21.620 --> 58:23.620 grave limits on how far 58:23.620 --> 58:25.620 a very limited and evolutionary 58:25.620 --> 58:27.620 bound conceptual apparatus can 58:27.620 --> 58:29.620 take us. We'd never be able 58:29.620 --> 58:31.620 to embrace, as you yourself pointed out 58:31.620 --> 58:33.620 the kind of mentality 58:33.620 --> 58:35.620 of the sun or a galaxy because it's 58:35.620 --> 58:37.620 so much greater and more 58:37.620 --> 58:39.620 than our own. Let alone the universe 58:39.620 --> 58:41.620 as a whole. But in principle 58:41.620 --> 58:43.620 some other form of organization 58:43.620 --> 58:45.620 could. In other words these things are 58:45.620 --> 58:47.620 not sealed from 58:47.620 --> 58:49.620 understanding. In 58:49.620 --> 58:51.620 principle they are simply 58:51.620 --> 58:53.620 difficult for primate 58:53.620 --> 58:55.620 based minds running 58:55.620 --> 58:57.620 limited software at low 58:57.620 --> 58:59.620 hertz rate to 58:59.620 --> 59:01.620 accommodate. 59:01.620 --> 59:03.620 Yes, but I mean 59:03.620 --> 59:05.620 presumably the solar mind 59:05.620 --> 59:07.620 if there is one, could 59:07.620 --> 59:09.620 understand, have a pretty good intuitive 59:09.620 --> 59:11.620 understanding of the minds of other 59:11.620 --> 59:13.620 suns. I mean 59:13.620 --> 59:15.620 if the sun has a mind, part of 59:15.620 --> 59:17.620 its activity I think would be concerned with 59:17.620 --> 59:19.620 the solar system. It would be like 59:19.620 --> 59:21.620 the brain of the solar system. 59:21.620 --> 59:23.620 But part of its activity would be concerned with 59:23.620 --> 59:25.620 its peer group, namely other 59:25.620 --> 59:27.620 stars. And 59:27.620 --> 59:29.620 then part of their activity 59:29.620 --> 59:31.620 would be related to the 59:31.620 --> 59:33.620 mind or purpose or 59:33.620 --> 59:35.620 telos of the entire galaxy. 59:35.620 --> 59:37.620 And those kinds of concerns 59:37.620 --> 59:39.620 you know the kind of relationship 59:39.620 --> 59:41.620 problems that our sun may be having 59:41.620 --> 59:43.620 with other suns. 59:43.620 --> 59:45.620 Or double star systems like 59:45.620 --> 59:47.620 that of Sirius. The kind of 59:47.620 --> 59:49.620 relationship problems. 59:51.620 --> 59:53.620 Those are rather 59:53.620 --> 59:55.620 beyond the scope of human psychotherapy 59:55.620 --> 59:57.620 or indeed 59:57.620 --> 59:59.620 human thought. There may be 59:59.620 --> 01:00:01.620 so many things going on as indeed 01:00:01.620 --> 01:00:03.620 there are at levels we 01:00:03.620 --> 01:00:05.620 don't really understand very well 01:00:05.620 --> 01:00:07.620 the world of the goldfish or the ant. 01:00:07.620 --> 01:00:09.620 So there are 01:00:09.620 --> 01:00:11.620 certain limitations which I don't 01:00:11.620 --> 01:00:13.620 think are just a temporary 01:00:13.620 --> 01:00:15.620 limitation on what we can conceive 01:00:15.620 --> 01:00:17.620 or imagine. Well then 01:00:17.620 --> 01:00:19.620 until we run out of 01:00:19.620 --> 01:00:21.620 energy to conceive and imagine are we 01:00:21.620 --> 01:00:23.620 conceiving of the 01:00:23.620 --> 01:00:25.620 solar mind if it exists as 01:00:25.620 --> 01:00:27.620 evolving or fixed? 01:00:27.620 --> 01:00:29.620 No, it must evolve. It must evolve 01:00:29.620 --> 01:00:31.620 perhaps on a different time scale which 01:00:31.620 --> 01:00:33.620 is the time scale of relationship in their 01:00:33.620 --> 01:00:35.620 own community. 01:00:35.620 --> 01:00:37.620 Which is the 15 billion 01:00:37.620 --> 01:00:39.620 year time frame 01:00:39.620 --> 01:00:41.620 since the big bang. Is that what you're thinking 01:00:41.620 --> 01:00:43.620 that we're coming to the crux of it here? 01:00:43.620 --> 01:00:45.620 I think the evolution 01:00:45.620 --> 01:00:47.620 of the solar mind would be related 01:00:47.620 --> 01:00:49.620 to what happens here because 01:00:49.620 --> 01:00:51.620 we're part of the solar system. 01:00:51.620 --> 01:00:53.620 And I would assume that because all planets 01:00:53.620 --> 01:00:55.620 and everything that's happening within the solar 01:00:55.620 --> 01:00:57.620 system feeds back and influences 01:00:57.620 --> 01:00:59.620 the solar mind that it would somehow 01:00:59.620 --> 01:01:01.620 it's not just the mind of the sun, it's the mind of the 01:01:01.620 --> 01:01:03.620 solar system. But it's evolving 01:01:03.620 --> 01:01:05.620 since the birth of the milky way 01:01:05.620 --> 01:01:07.620 and the Roman candle. That's right. 01:01:07.620 --> 01:01:09.620 What's going on here is part of its evolution. 01:01:09.620 --> 01:01:11.620 We're within it 01:01:11.620 --> 01:01:13.620 and contributing to it. 01:01:13.620 --> 01:01:15.620 So the morphogenetic 01:01:15.620 --> 01:01:17.620 field then of the all and everything 01:01:17.620 --> 01:01:19.620 had a birth moment with 01:01:19.620 --> 01:01:21.620 the big bang, is that what you're thinking? 01:01:21.620 --> 01:01:23.620 Well I'm assuming that if we 01:01:23.620 --> 01:01:25.620 take the big bang theory 01:01:25.620 --> 01:01:27.620 to be, if we assume there was a big bang 01:01:27.620 --> 01:01:29.620 I know you're very skeptical about the big bang 01:01:29.620 --> 01:01:31.620 it's only a story, it's a myth. 01:01:31.620 --> 01:01:33.620 But if we take this creation myth 01:01:33.620 --> 01:01:35.620 of modern science then that must be the 01:01:35.620 --> 01:01:37.620 birth of the field of the whole 01:01:37.620 --> 01:01:39.620 system. Yes. 01:01:39.620 --> 01:01:41.620 And modern physics 01:01:41.620 --> 01:01:43.620 in the unified field theory, super 01:01:43.620 --> 01:01:45.620 string theory, tries to explain 01:01:45.620 --> 01:01:47.620 how you start with a unified ten dimensional 01:01:47.620 --> 01:01:49.620 field that then evolves 01:01:49.620 --> 01:01:51.620 the other fields of nature within it. 01:01:51.620 --> 01:01:53.620 So that's standard 01:01:53.620 --> 01:01:55.620 physics. I mean it's not part of my 01:01:55.620 --> 01:01:57.620 particular view of things. 01:01:57.620 --> 01:01:59.620 But the consciousness of this all and everything 01:01:59.620 --> 01:02:01.620 I mean the solar 01:02:01.620 --> 01:02:03.620 minds contribute to the 01:02:03.620 --> 01:02:05.620 consciousness of the milky way which is one 01:02:05.620 --> 01:02:07.620 galaxy which then has 01:02:07.620 --> 01:02:09.620 the psychotherapist in its relationship 01:02:09.620 --> 01:02:11.620 with the nearby galaxy. Yes in the galactic 01:02:11.620 --> 01:02:13.620 cluster. And actually there's a 01:02:13.620 --> 01:02:15.620 synchrony of thought 01:02:15.620 --> 01:02:17.620 due to the fact that Bell's theorem connects 01:02:17.620 --> 01:02:19.620 them from the big bang and so on. 01:02:19.620 --> 01:02:21.620 But isn't all you're 01:02:21.620 --> 01:02:23.620 saying is that the universe is 01:02:23.620 --> 01:02:25.620 a modular hierarchy 01:02:25.620 --> 01:02:27.620 from atom through cells 01:02:27.620 --> 01:02:29.620 societies. I'm challenging 01:02:29.620 --> 01:02:31.620 you to answer where the morphogenesis 01:02:31.620 --> 01:02:33.620 comes from that leads to 01:02:33.620 --> 01:02:35.620 complexity and things like the birth of 01:02:35.620 --> 01:02:37.620 life if it's simply 01:02:37.620 --> 01:02:39.620 the coevolution of a 01:02:39.620 --> 01:02:41.620 physical system since the big bang. 01:02:41.620 --> 01:02:43.620 Novelty theory has answered this 01:02:43.620 --> 01:02:45.620 question. 01:02:45.620 --> 01:02:47.620 It comes from the future. To the satisfaction of 01:02:47.620 --> 01:02:49.620 your mind and all smaller. 01:02:53.620 --> 01:02:55.620 Well at least to the satisfaction 01:02:55.620 --> 01:02:57.620 of someone. 01:02:59.620 --> 01:03:01.620 But it doesn't explain 01:03:01.620 --> 01:03:03.620 either the origin of the novelty wave 01:03:03.620 --> 01:03:05.620 itself nor does it 01:03:05.620 --> 01:03:07.620 you see there are many models 01:03:07.620 --> 01:03:09.620 of course of cosmic evolution 01:03:09.620 --> 01:03:11.620 and one of them is that 01:03:11.620 --> 01:03:13.620 because you have the cosmic expansion 01:03:13.620 --> 01:03:15.620 that for some reason 01:03:15.620 --> 01:03:17.620 the primal explosion 01:03:17.620 --> 01:03:19.620 big bang throws everything apart 01:03:19.620 --> 01:03:21.620 so it's all moving apart. That means things 01:03:21.620 --> 01:03:23.620 cool down. As they cool down more 01:03:23.620 --> 01:03:25.620 form and order can appear. 01:03:25.620 --> 01:03:27.620 And it literally makes more space for things 01:03:27.620 --> 01:03:29.620 to happen in. That the driving 01:03:29.620 --> 01:03:31.620 the arrow of time, the arrow of evolutionary 01:03:31.620 --> 01:03:33.620 time and the driving engine of evolution 01:03:33.620 --> 01:03:35.620 is the cosmic expansion 01:03:35.620 --> 01:03:37.620 which means nothing can ever be stable 01:03:37.620 --> 01:03:39.620 can ever stay the same because the whole 01:03:39.620 --> 01:03:41.620 cosmos is unstable. It's always expanding 01:03:41.620 --> 01:03:43.620 and cooling. And 01:03:43.620 --> 01:03:45.620 given that through all sorts 01:03:45.620 --> 01:03:47.620 of phase transitions as you cool 01:03:47.620 --> 01:03:49.620 a plasma down as atoms appear 01:03:49.620 --> 01:03:51.620 and then as gases condense to liquids 01:03:51.620 --> 01:03:53.620 and liquids to solids the cooling 01:03:53.620 --> 01:03:55.620 process involves the appearance 01:03:55.620 --> 01:03:57.620 of more order, more form 01:03:57.620 --> 01:03:59.620 when there was less before. There was very 01:03:59.620 --> 01:04:01.620 little in the moment of the big bang. 01:04:01.620 --> 01:04:03.620 So the cooling and expansion 01:04:03.620 --> 01:04:05.620 more or less force 01:04:05.620 --> 01:04:07.620 the appearance of more 01:04:07.620 --> 01:04:09.620 structure, pattern, 01:04:09.620 --> 01:04:11.620 order. And you 01:04:11.620 --> 01:04:13.620 could say that that gives scope for 01:04:13.620 --> 01:04:15.620 creativity all the time. There's always 01:04:15.620 --> 01:04:17.620 the scope for new things to happen. 01:04:17.620 --> 01:04:19.620 And it's a long standing debate among evolutionary 01:04:19.620 --> 01:04:21.620 theorists as to whether this is following 01:04:21.620 --> 01:04:23.620 a pre-established plan 01:04:23.620 --> 01:04:25.620 or being drawn towards an already 01:04:25.620 --> 01:04:27.620 existing future goal 01:04:27.620 --> 01:04:29.620 or following a pre-existing set of 01:04:29.620 --> 01:04:31.620 laws or rules like the novelty 01:04:31.620 --> 01:04:33.620 wave or whether it's all 01:04:33.620 --> 01:04:35.620 being made up as it goes along. 01:04:35.620 --> 01:04:37.620 And I'm much influenced in my thinking 01:04:37.620 --> 01:04:39.620 by Bergson, you know, Henri Bergson 01:04:39.620 --> 01:04:41.620 in his book Creative Evolution. 01:04:41.620 --> 01:04:43.620 He very strongly defends 01:04:43.620 --> 01:04:45.620 the idea it's all being made up as it goes along. 01:04:45.620 --> 01:04:47.620 That doesn't mean to say 01:04:47.620 --> 01:04:49.620 that around the evolutionary process 01:04:49.620 --> 01:04:51.620 are not minds and imagination. 01:04:51.620 --> 01:04:53.620 But it makes the creative 01:04:53.620 --> 01:04:55.620 process of evolution more interesting 01:04:55.620 --> 01:04:57.620 rather than less because 01:04:57.620 --> 01:04:59.620 it's not decided what's going to happen 01:04:59.620 --> 01:05:01.620 next. There are imaginations of 01:05:01.620 --> 01:05:03.620 many levels including human imaginations 01:05:03.620 --> 01:05:05.620 at work here looking at all 01:05:05.620 --> 01:05:07.620 the alternative possibilities. 01:05:07.620 --> 01:05:09.620 New things happen and then what happens 01:05:09.620 --> 01:05:11.620 next depends on what's happened already 01:05:11.620 --> 01:05:13.620 and the new possibilities 01:05:13.620 --> 01:05:15.620 of imagination that open up. 01:05:15.620 --> 01:05:17.620 But without the goal being fixed in advance. 01:05:17.620 --> 01:05:19.620 No, I have no problem 01:05:19.620 --> 01:05:21.620 with that. I don't see how, for instance, 01:05:21.620 --> 01:05:23.620 someone could hypothesize that 01:05:23.620 --> 01:05:25.620 all the laws came 01:05:25.620 --> 01:05:27.620 into existence simultaneous 01:05:27.620 --> 01:05:29.620 with the Big Bang. 01:05:29.620 --> 01:05:31.620 For example, did the laws of gene 01:05:31.620 --> 01:05:33.620 segregation come into being 01:05:33.620 --> 01:05:35.620 a billion years before 01:05:35.620 --> 01:05:37.620 biology existed anywhere 01:05:37.620 --> 01:05:39.620 in the universe? That seems 01:05:39.620 --> 01:05:41.620 naive and preposterous. 01:05:41.620 --> 01:05:43.620 Whitehead had this idea of what he called 01:05:43.620 --> 01:05:45.620 the Aboriginal God. 01:05:45.620 --> 01:05:47.620 What we call natural 01:05:47.620 --> 01:05:49.620 laws are simply 01:05:49.620 --> 01:05:51.620 habits of a very ingrained 01:05:51.620 --> 01:05:53.620 sort and 01:05:53.620 --> 01:05:55.620 habits can change and 01:05:55.620 --> 01:05:57.620 in more dynamic regimes 01:05:57.620 --> 01:05:59.620 the mind, the society, 01:05:59.620 --> 01:06:01.620 habits can change 01:06:01.620 --> 01:06:03.620 overnight. 01:06:03.620 --> 01:06:05.620 So what is given 01:06:05.620 --> 01:06:07.620 is that there shall be 01:06:07.620 --> 01:06:09.620 ever greater complexity. 01:06:09.620 --> 01:06:11.620 What is not given is 01:06:11.620 --> 01:06:13.620 how this complexity shall 01:06:13.620 --> 01:06:15.620 arrange itself or 01:06:15.620 --> 01:06:17.620 what the final end state will be. 01:06:17.620 --> 01:06:19.620 It's a story that's 01:06:19.620 --> 01:06:21.620 being told 01:06:21.620 --> 01:06:23.620 as it unfolds. It's a game 01:06:23.620 --> 01:06:25.620 whose one of the rules of 01:06:25.620 --> 01:06:27.620 which is the rules 01:06:27.620 --> 01:06:31.510 can change. 01:06:31.510 --> 01:06:33.510 How are we doing here time-wise? 01:06:33.510 --> 01:06:35.510 Good. Real good. 01:06:35.510 --> 01:06:37.510 Good, good. 01:06:37.510 --> 01:06:43.200 Well, we're getting nowhere. 01:06:43.200 --> 01:06:45.200 In other words, this is the problem. 01:06:45.200 --> 01:06:47.200 There's the watch in the desert. 01:06:47.200 --> 01:06:49.200 It's ticking by itself or God put it there, 01:06:49.200 --> 01:06:51.200 we don't know. 01:06:51.200 --> 01:06:53.200 The question posed 01:06:53.200 --> 01:06:55.200 at the beginning, we actually haven't 01:06:55.200 --> 01:06:57.200 progressed at all in settling 01:06:57.200 --> 01:06:59.200 although it looks like there's a kind of 01:06:59.200 --> 01:07:01.200 convergence in that 01:07:01.200 --> 01:07:03.200 is this right? 01:07:03.200 --> 01:07:05.200 No, I have the feeling 01:07:05.200 --> 01:07:07.200 we've actually made some progress. 01:07:07.200 --> 01:07:09.200 But I 01:07:09.200 --> 01:07:11.200 always have that feeling. 01:07:13.200 --> 01:07:15.200 Well, the attractor at the end of time 01:07:15.200 --> 01:07:17.200 then as I gather 01:07:17.200 --> 01:07:19.200 is only has in it 01:07:19.200 --> 01:07:21.200 simple rules of a board game that says 01:07:21.200 --> 01:07:23.200 the complexity is going to increase 01:07:23.200 --> 01:07:25.200 and how it's evolving and 01:07:25.200 --> 01:07:27.200 things like DNA rules and stuff 01:07:27.200 --> 01:07:29.200 we can make up as we please 01:07:29.200 --> 01:07:31.200 as we go along. Whatever natural selection 01:07:31.200 --> 01:07:33.200 approves of will then 01:07:33.200 --> 01:07:35.200 come to pass. Complexity 01:07:35.200 --> 01:07:37.200 will increase. That's the only rule. 01:07:37.200 --> 01:07:39.200 And so, in fact, you agree that 01:07:39.200 --> 01:07:41.200 time is slowing down? 01:07:41.200 --> 01:07:43.200 Well, time is slowing down as 01:07:43.200 --> 01:07:45.200 the events potentially 01:07:45.200 --> 01:07:47.200 contained within any given 01:07:47.200 --> 01:07:49.200 moment exponentially 01:07:49.200 --> 01:07:51.200 expand. In other words, 01:07:51.200 --> 01:07:53.200 we're sort of in a situation of a spaceship 01:07:53.200 --> 01:07:55.200 falling into a black hole 01:07:55.200 --> 01:07:57.200 from the point of view of a distant 01:07:57.200 --> 01:07:59.200 observer. The spaceship falls into 01:07:59.200 --> 01:08:01.200 the black hole. There's a flash of 01:08:01.200 --> 01:08:03.200 hard radiation and the story is over. 01:08:03.200 --> 01:08:05.200 From the point of view of the people on 01:08:05.200 --> 01:08:07.200 the spaceship, the 01:08:07.200 --> 01:08:09.200 relativistic stretching of the 01:08:09.200 --> 01:08:11.200 timeline means you fall forever 01:08:11.200 --> 01:08:13.200 and you never reach the conclusion. 01:08:13.200 --> 01:08:15.200 So, in fact, 01:08:15.200 --> 01:08:17.200 the consummation of the universe 01:08:17.200 --> 01:08:19.200 may be only 14 years 01:08:19.200 --> 01:08:21.200 away, but there may be 01:08:21.200 --> 01:08:23.200 enough time between 01:08:23.200 --> 01:08:25.200 now and then to reiterate 01:08:25.200 --> 01:08:27.200 the life of this universe 01:08:27.200 --> 01:08:29.200 a trillion to the trillionth 01:08:29.200 --> 01:08:31.200 times. Time 01:08:31.200 --> 01:08:33.200 is not a tyranny. It's 01:08:33.200 --> 01:08:35.200 a relativistic medium 01:08:35.200 --> 01:08:37.200 subject to all kinds 01:08:37.200 --> 01:08:39.200 of plasticity. There are 01:08:39.200 --> 01:08:41.200 many ways out of any 01:08:41.200 --> 01:08:43.200 assumed 01:08:43.200 --> 01:08:45.200 corner 01:08:45.200 --> 01:08:47.200 we paint ourselves into. 01:08:57.200 --> 01:08:59.200 I think we've ground to a halt. 01:10:03.040 --> 01:10:05.040 Each of the 01:10:05.040 --> 01:10:07.040 trilogues today is 01:10:07.040 --> 01:10:09.040 the notion is that we will deal with 01:10:09.040 --> 01:10:11.040 the subject of the evolutionary mind, 01:10:11.040 --> 01:10:13.040 that being the title 01:10:13.040 --> 01:10:15.040 and theme of our 01:10:15.040 --> 01:10:17.040 new book. 01:10:17.040 --> 01:10:19.040 So, in my mind, 01:10:19.040 --> 01:10:21.040 what this section is 01:10:21.040 --> 01:10:23.040 to deal with 01:10:23.040 --> 01:10:25.040 is the evolutionary 01:10:25.040 --> 01:10:27.040 mind and machines. 01:10:27.040 --> 01:10:29.040 This is something 01:10:29.040 --> 01:10:31.040 which was barely mentioned 01:10:31.040 --> 01:10:33.040 or even implied 01:10:33.040 --> 01:10:35.040 in the first section. 01:10:35.040 --> 01:10:37.040 And format 01:10:37.040 --> 01:10:39.040 and so forth, 01:10:39.040 --> 01:10:41.040 will be as in 01:10:41.040 --> 01:10:43.040 the last session. 01:10:43.040 --> 01:10:45.040 So, just to lay out 01:10:45.040 --> 01:10:47.040 some concepts 01:10:47.040 --> 01:10:49.040 relative to 01:10:49.040 --> 01:10:51.040 how machines fit into this. 01:10:56.440 --> 01:10:58.440 It's very interesting that 01:10:58.440 --> 01:11:00.440 Samuel Butler Taylor 01:11:00.440 --> 01:11:02.440 is an intellectual 01:11:02.440 --> 01:11:04.440 who has not really been 01:11:04.440 --> 01:11:06.440 given his full due 01:11:06.440 --> 01:11:08.440 because in the 19th 01:11:08.440 --> 01:11:10.440 century he was understood to be 01:11:10.440 --> 01:11:12.440 a critic of Darwinism. 01:11:12.440 --> 01:11:14.440 And Darwinism was 01:11:14.440 --> 01:11:16.440 all the fashion. 01:11:16.440 --> 01:11:18.440 In a sense, I think 01:11:18.440 --> 01:11:20.440 Taylor was misunderstood. 01:11:20.440 --> 01:11:22.440 He was not 01:11:22.440 --> 01:11:24.440 so much a critic of Darwin 01:11:24.440 --> 01:11:26.440 as 01:11:26.440 --> 01:11:28.440 someone who wanted to extend 01:11:28.440 --> 01:11:30.440 Darwinian mechanics and Darwinian 01:11:30.440 --> 01:11:32.440 theory into domains 01:11:32.440 --> 01:11:34.440 that 01:11:34.440 --> 01:11:36.440 perhaps did not 01:11:36.440 --> 01:11:38.440 seem intuitive 01:11:38.440 --> 01:11:40.440 to a biologist. 01:11:40.440 --> 01:11:42.440 My little story 01:11:42.440 --> 01:11:44.440 about the evolution of songs 01:11:44.440 --> 01:11:46.440 that I cribbed from 01:11:46.440 --> 01:11:48.440 Danny Hillis in the last session 01:11:48.440 --> 01:11:50.440 is an example of Darwinian 01:11:50.440 --> 01:11:52.440 processes operating 01:11:52.440 --> 01:11:54.440 indeed in a non-material 01:11:54.440 --> 01:11:56.440 realm, operating among 01:11:56.440 --> 01:11:58.440 syntactical 01:11:58.440 --> 01:12:00.440 structures. 01:12:00.440 --> 01:12:02.440 And it is now proper to speak 01:12:02.440 --> 01:12:04.440 of molecular evolution, 01:12:04.440 --> 01:12:06.440 the competing of various 01:12:06.440 --> 01:12:08.440 enzyme systems in 01:12:08.440 --> 01:12:10.440 abiotic or prebiotic 01:12:10.440 --> 01:12:12.440 chemical regimes 01:12:12.440 --> 01:12:14.440 where selection, 01:12:14.440 --> 01:12:16.440 adaptability, 01:12:16.440 --> 01:12:18.440 extinction and 01:12:18.440 --> 01:12:20.440 expansion of populations 01:12:20.440 --> 01:12:22.440 all occur very much 01:12:22.440 --> 01:12:24.440 as in the domain 01:12:24.440 --> 01:12:26.440 of biology. 01:12:26.440 --> 01:12:28.440 Well, it was Nietzsche 01:12:28.440 --> 01:12:30.440 who said, I believe 01:12:30.440 --> 01:12:32.440 in speaking of nihilism, 01:12:32.440 --> 01:12:34.440 that this strangest 01:12:34.440 --> 01:12:36.440 of all guests 01:12:36.440 --> 01:12:38.440 is now at the door. 01:12:38.440 --> 01:12:40.440 Well, I go to 01:12:40.440 --> 01:12:42.440 even weirder dinner parties 01:12:42.440 --> 01:12:44.440 than a Friedrich Nietzsche. 01:12:44.440 --> 01:12:46.440 Nihilism 01:12:46.440 --> 01:12:48.440 hardly shakes 01:12:48.440 --> 01:12:50.440 us up at all. There are 01:12:50.440 --> 01:12:52.440 yet weirder guests 01:12:52.440 --> 01:12:54.440 seeking admission to 01:12:54.440 --> 01:12:56.440 the dinner party of 01:12:56.440 --> 01:12:58.440 the evolving discourse of where 01:12:58.440 --> 01:13:00.440 we are in space and time. 01:13:00.440 --> 01:13:02.440 And one of these weirdest 01:13:02.440 --> 01:13:04.440 of all guests is 01:13:04.440 --> 01:13:06.440 the AI, the 01:13:06.440 --> 01:13:08.440 artificial intelligence, 01:13:08.440 --> 01:13:10.440 the winter mute of familiar 01:13:10.440 --> 01:13:12.440 science fiction. 01:13:12.440 --> 01:13:14.440 And so, as this 01:13:14.440 --> 01:13:16.440 is an attempt to look at evolution 01:13:16.440 --> 01:13:18.440 in many domains and its implications 01:13:18.440 --> 01:13:20.440 for us, 01:13:20.440 --> 01:13:22.440 I wanted this morning to touch 01:13:22.440 --> 01:13:24.440 on this subject 01:13:24.440 --> 01:13:26.440 of the evolution 01:13:26.440 --> 01:13:28.440 of consciousness 01:13:28.440 --> 01:13:30.440 as it relates to 01:13:30.440 --> 01:13:32.440 machines. Now, it may 01:13:32.440 --> 01:13:34.440 not come as a revelation 01:13:34.440 --> 01:13:36.440 to Ralph, who has spent his 01:13:36.440 --> 01:13:38.440 life in mathematics, 01:13:38.440 --> 01:13:40.440 but it has certainly 01:13:40.440 --> 01:13:42.440 come to me recently 01:13:42.440 --> 01:13:44.440 as a revelation. 01:13:44.440 --> 01:13:46.440 And I want to give George Dyson 01:13:46.440 --> 01:13:48.440 some credit here. His book 01:13:48.440 --> 01:13:50.440 Darwin Among the Machines 01:13:50.440 --> 01:13:52.440 is a wonderful introduction 01:13:52.440 --> 01:13:54.440 to some of the ideas I want to 01:13:54.440 --> 01:13:56.440 touch on this morning. 01:13:56.440 --> 01:13:58.440 One of which 01:13:58.440 --> 01:14:00.440 seemed to me to go quite 01:14:00.440 --> 01:14:02.440 deep is the realization 01:14:02.440 --> 01:14:04.440 that when 01:14:04.440 --> 01:14:06.440 human beings think 01:14:06.440 --> 01:14:08.440 clearly, the way 01:14:08.440 --> 01:14:10.440 they think can 01:14:10.440 --> 01:14:12.440 be mathematically defined 01:14:12.440 --> 01:14:14.440 This is what is called 01:14:14.440 --> 01:14:16.440 symbolic logic or Boolean 01:14:16.440 --> 01:14:18.440 algebra. 01:14:18.440 --> 01:14:20.440 Words like and, or, 01:14:20.440 --> 01:14:22.440 if, and then 01:14:22.440 --> 01:14:24.440 can be given 01:14:24.440 --> 01:14:26.440 extremely precise 01:14:26.440 --> 01:14:28.440 formal mathematical 01:14:28.440 --> 01:14:30.440 definitions. 01:14:30.440 --> 01:14:32.440 And because of this 01:14:32.440 --> 01:14:34.440 fact that clear thinking 01:14:34.440 --> 01:14:36.440 can be mathematically 01:14:36.440 --> 01:14:38.440 formalized, there 01:14:38.440 --> 01:14:40.440 is a potential bridge 01:14:40.440 --> 01:14:42.440 between ourselves 01:14:42.440 --> 01:14:44.440 and calculating 01:14:44.440 --> 01:14:46.440 machinery. Because 01:14:46.440 --> 01:14:48.440 indeed, calculating 01:14:48.440 --> 01:14:50.440 machinery is driven 01:14:50.440 --> 01:14:52.440 by rules of formal 01:14:52.440 --> 01:14:54.440 logic. That's what 01:14:54.440 --> 01:14:56.440 programming is. 01:14:56.440 --> 01:14:58.440 Code 01:14:58.440 --> 01:15:00.440 that does not embody 01:15:00.440 --> 01:15:02.440 the rules of formal mathematical 01:15:02.440 --> 01:15:04.440 logic is bad code. 01:15:04.440 --> 01:15:06.440 Unrunnable code. 01:15:06.440 --> 01:15:08.440 So, 01:15:08.440 --> 01:15:10.440 as I say, this may seem 01:15:10.440 --> 01:15:12.440 a subtle point, but to me 01:15:12.440 --> 01:15:14.440 it had the force of 01:15:14.440 --> 01:15:16.440 revelation. Because it 01:15:16.440 --> 01:15:18.440 means good thinking is not 01:15:18.440 --> 01:15:20.440 just simply aesthetically 01:15:20.440 --> 01:15:22.440 pleasing or 01:15:22.440 --> 01:15:24.440 concurrent with the model 01:15:24.440 --> 01:15:26.440 that generates it. Good thinking, 01:15:26.440 --> 01:15:28.440 whether you've ever 01:15:28.440 --> 01:15:30.440 studied mathematics for a moment 01:15:30.440 --> 01:15:32.440 or not, can be 01:15:32.440 --> 01:15:34.440 formally defined. 01:15:34.440 --> 01:15:36.440 So, 01:15:36.440 --> 01:15:38.440 now, with that 01:15:38.440 --> 01:15:40.440 idea in mind, 01:15:40.440 --> 01:15:42.440 I 01:15:42.440 --> 01:15:44.440 let's look at 01:15:44.440 --> 01:15:46.440 the discourse about 01:15:46.440 --> 01:15:48.440 collectivism that has informed 01:15:48.440 --> 01:15:50.440 the western dialogue 01:15:50.440 --> 01:15:52.440 on this subject. 01:15:52.440 --> 01:15:54.440 And by collectivism, I 01:15:54.440 --> 01:15:56.440 mean social collectivism. 01:15:56.440 --> 01:15:58.440 The first great name 01:15:58.440 --> 01:16:00.440 that you encounter in the modern 01:16:00.440 --> 01:16:02.440 era, broadly speaking, 01:16:02.440 --> 01:16:04.440 when we talk about collectivism, 01:16:04.440 --> 01:16:06.440 and Rupert mentioned 01:16:06.440 --> 01:16:08.440 by chance this morning 01:16:08.440 --> 01:16:10.440 this name, is that of Thomas Hobbes. 01:16:10.440 --> 01:16:12.440 The great 01:16:12.440 --> 01:16:14.440 creation of social paranoia 01:16:14.440 --> 01:16:16.440 is always how I've 01:16:16.440 --> 01:16:18.440 thought of Hobbes, until 01:16:18.440 --> 01:16:20.440 I began to look at this 01:16:20.440 --> 01:16:22.440 machine intelligence question. 01:16:22.440 --> 01:16:24.440 And Hobbes in his 01:16:24.440 --> 01:16:26.440 Leviathan makes 01:16:26.440 --> 01:16:28.440 it very clear that 01:16:28.440 --> 01:16:30.440 society is 01:16:30.440 --> 01:16:32.440 a complex system 01:16:32.440 --> 01:16:34.440 of mechanical 01:16:34.440 --> 01:16:36.440 feedback loops 01:16:36.440 --> 01:16:38.440 and relationships 01:16:38.440 --> 01:16:40.440 that, though Hobbes did not have 01:16:40.440 --> 01:16:42.440 the vocabulary to state this, 01:16:42.440 --> 01:16:44.440 relationships that can be 01:16:44.440 --> 01:16:46.440 defined by code. 01:16:46.440 --> 01:16:48.440 This leads 01:16:48.440 --> 01:16:50.440 me to the second 01:16:50.440 --> 01:16:52.440 insight necessary to 01:16:52.440 --> 01:16:54.440 follow this line of thought. 01:16:54.440 --> 01:16:56.440 And that is that 01:16:56.440 --> 01:16:58.440 the new 01:16:58.440 --> 01:17:00.440 dispensation 01:17:00.440 --> 01:17:02.440 in the sciences, 01:17:02.440 --> 01:17:04.440 I think, 01:17:04.440 --> 01:17:06.440 can be placed in 01:17:06.440 --> 01:17:08.440 all its manifestations 01:17:08.440 --> 01:17:10.440 under the umbrella 01:17:10.440 --> 01:17:12.440 of the idea that 01:17:12.440 --> 01:17:14.440 what is important about nature 01:17:14.440 --> 01:17:16.440 is that it is 01:17:16.440 --> 01:17:18.440 information. 01:17:18.440 --> 01:17:20.440 And the real tension 01:17:20.440 --> 01:17:22.440 is not between matter 01:17:22.440 --> 01:17:24.440 and spirit, or time 01:17:24.440 --> 01:17:26.440 and space. 01:17:26.440 --> 01:17:28.440 The real tension is 01:17:28.440 --> 01:17:30.440 between information 01:17:30.440 --> 01:17:32.440 and 01:17:32.440 --> 01:17:34.440 nonsense, 01:17:34.440 --> 01:17:36.440 if you will. 01:17:36.440 --> 01:17:38.440 Nonsense does not 01:17:38.440 --> 01:17:40.440 serve the purposes 01:17:40.440 --> 01:17:42.440 of organizational 01:17:42.440 --> 01:17:44.440 appetites, 01:17:44.440 --> 01:17:46.440 whether those 01:17:46.440 --> 01:17:48.440 organizational appetites 01:17:48.440 --> 01:17:50.440 are being expressed 01:17:50.440 --> 01:17:52.440 in a chemical system, 01:17:52.440 --> 01:17:54.440 a molecular system, 01:17:54.440 --> 01:17:56.440 a social system, 01:17:56.440 --> 01:17:58.440 a climaxed rainforest, 01:17:58.440 --> 01:18:00.440 or whatever. 01:18:00.440 --> 01:18:02.440 Now, we have known 01:18:02.440 --> 01:18:04.440 since 1950 01:18:04.440 --> 01:18:06.440 at some level 01:18:06.440 --> 01:18:08.440 through the sequencing 01:18:08.440 --> 01:18:10.440 or the defining 01:18:10.440 --> 01:18:12.440 of the structure of DNA, 01:18:12.440 --> 01:18:14.440 ultimately, 01:18:14.440 --> 01:18:16.440 every single one of us 01:18:16.440 --> 01:18:18.440 in our unique expression 01:18:18.440 --> 01:18:20.440 could be expressed 01:18:20.440 --> 01:18:22.440 as a very long string 01:18:22.440 --> 01:18:24.440 of codons. 01:18:24.440 --> 01:18:26.440 Codons are the 01:18:26.440 --> 01:18:28.440 four-valent system 01:18:28.440 --> 01:18:30.440 by which DNA 01:18:30.440 --> 01:18:32.440 specifies the need 01:18:32.440 --> 01:18:34.440 for certain amino acids. 01:18:34.440 --> 01:18:36.440 And in a sense, 01:18:36.440 --> 01:18:38.440 what you are 01:18:38.440 --> 01:18:40.440 is the result 01:18:40.440 --> 01:18:42.440 of a certain kind of program 01:18:42.440 --> 01:18:44.440 done on a certain kind 01:18:44.440 --> 01:18:46.440 of hardware, 01:18:46.440 --> 01:18:48.440 the hardware of the ribosomes, 01:18:48.440 --> 01:18:50.440 the submolecular structures 01:18:50.440 --> 01:18:52.440 that move 01:18:52.440 --> 01:18:54.440 RNA through 01:18:54.440 --> 01:18:56.440 themselves and 01:18:56.440 --> 01:18:58.440 out of an ambient 01:18:58.440 --> 01:19:00.440 chemical medium 01:19:00.440 --> 01:19:02.440 select building blocks 01:19:02.440 --> 01:19:04.440 which are then put together 01:19:04.440 --> 01:19:06.440 to create a three-dimensional 01:19:06.440 --> 01:19:08.440 object which has 01:19:08.440 --> 01:19:10.440 the quality of life. 01:19:10.440 --> 01:19:12.440 But the interesting 01:19:12.440 --> 01:19:14.440 thing about this 01:19:14.440 --> 01:19:16.440 is that life therefore 01:19:16.440 --> 01:19:18.440 can be digitally defined. 01:19:18.440 --> 01:19:20.440 And I'm very influenced 01:19:20.440 --> 01:19:22.440 at the moment 01:19:22.440 --> 01:19:24.440 by the Australian science fiction 01:19:24.440 --> 01:19:26.440 writer Greg Egan 01:19:26.440 --> 01:19:28.440 who has brought me 01:19:28.440 --> 01:19:30.440 to the understanding 01:19:30.440 --> 01:19:32.440 that code is code. 01:19:32.440 --> 01:19:34.440 Whether it's being run 01:19:34.440 --> 01:19:36.440 by ribosomes, 01:19:36.440 --> 01:19:38.440 whether it's being run 01:19:38.440 --> 01:19:40.440 on some kind of traditional 01:19:40.440 --> 01:19:42.440 hardware platform 01:19:42.440 --> 01:19:44.440 or whether it's being 01:19:44.440 --> 01:19:46.440 exchanged pheromonally 01:19:46.440 --> 01:19:48.440 among termites 01:19:48.440 --> 01:19:50.440 or through the messages 01:19:50.440 --> 01:19:52.440 of advertising and political 01:19:52.440 --> 01:19:54.440 propaganda in social systems. 01:19:54.440 --> 01:19:56.440 Code is code. 01:19:56.440 --> 01:19:58.440 Well, until 01:19:58.440 --> 01:20:00.440 five or six years ago 01:20:00.440 --> 01:20:02.440 it was very fashionable 01:20:02.440 --> 01:20:04.440 to completely dismiss 01:20:04.440 --> 01:20:06.440 the possibility of autonomous 01:20:06.440 --> 01:20:08.440 synthetic intelligence. 01:20:08.440 --> 01:20:10.440 Some of you may know 01:20:10.440 --> 01:20:12.440 the work of Hubert Dreyfus 01:20:12.440 --> 01:20:14.440 who 14 or 15 years ago 01:20:14.440 --> 01:20:16.440 wrote a book called 01:20:16.440 --> 01:20:18.440 What Computers Can't Do. 01:20:18.440 --> 01:20:20.440 But these 01:20:20.440 --> 01:20:22.440 early critiques of AI 01:20:22.440 --> 01:20:24.440 like early 01:20:24.440 --> 01:20:26.440 AI theory 01:20:26.440 --> 01:20:28.440 were naive. 01:20:28.440 --> 01:20:30.440 And the kinds of life 01:20:30.440 --> 01:20:32.440 and the kinds of intelligence 01:20:32.440 --> 01:20:34.440 which the critics mitigated 01:20:34.440 --> 01:20:36.440 against are no longer 01:20:36.440 --> 01:20:38.440 even proposed or 01:20:38.440 --> 01:20:40.440 on the table. 01:20:40.440 --> 01:20:42.440 And those who say 01:20:42.440 --> 01:20:44.440 artificial intelligence 01:20:44.440 --> 01:20:46.440 or the self-organizing 01:20:46.440 --> 01:20:48.440 awareness of machines 01:20:48.440 --> 01:20:50.440 is an impossibility, 01:20:50.440 --> 01:20:52.440 those voices have gone 01:20:52.440 --> 01:20:54.440 strangely silent 01:20:54.440 --> 01:20:56.440 because the prosecution 01:20:56.440 --> 01:20:58.440 of the materialist assumption 01:20:58.440 --> 01:21:00.440 which rules 01:21:00.440 --> 01:21:02.440 scientific theory making 01:21:02.440 --> 01:21:04.440 largely at the moment 01:21:04.440 --> 01:21:06.440 leads to the awareness 01:21:06.440 --> 01:21:08.440 that we are 01:21:08.440 --> 01:21:10.440 by these definitions 01:21:10.440 --> 01:21:12.440 machines. 01:21:12.440 --> 01:21:14.440 And that we are 01:21:14.440 --> 01:21:16.440 a special type 01:21:16.440 --> 01:21:18.440 and with special 01:21:18.440 --> 01:21:20.440 advanced abilities. 01:21:20.440 --> 01:21:22.440 But as we now 01:21:22.440 --> 01:21:24.440 through our own process 01:21:24.440 --> 01:21:26.440 of technical evolution 01:21:26.440 --> 01:21:28.440 contemplate such frontiers 01:21:28.440 --> 01:21:30.440 as nanotechnology 01:21:30.440 --> 01:21:32.440 where we propose 01:21:32.440 --> 01:21:34.440 to completely 01:21:34.440 --> 01:21:36.440 restructure 01:21:36.440 --> 01:21:38.440 the design process 01:21:38.440 --> 01:21:40.440 so that 01:21:40.440 --> 01:21:42.440 instead of fabricating objects 01:21:42.440 --> 01:21:44.440 in industrial temperatures 01:21:44.440 --> 01:21:46.440 the temperatures that melt titanium 01:21:46.440 --> 01:21:48.440 and melt steel 01:21:48.440 --> 01:21:50.440 and produce massive toxic output 01:21:50.440 --> 01:21:52.440 now a new vision 01:21:52.440 --> 01:21:54.440 looms. 01:21:54.440 --> 01:21:56.440 Building as nature builds 01:21:56.440 --> 01:21:58.440 building atom by atom 01:21:58.440 --> 01:22:00.440 at the temperatures 01:22:00.440 --> 01:22:02.440 of organic nature 01:22:02.440 --> 01:22:04.440 which on this planet 01:22:04.440 --> 01:22:06.440 never exceed 115 degrees Fahrenheit 01:22:06.440 --> 01:22:08.440 all life on this planet 01:22:08.440 --> 01:22:10.440 is created at that temperature 01:22:10.440 --> 01:22:12.440 and below. 01:22:12.440 --> 01:22:14.440 As our understanding 01:22:14.440 --> 01:22:16.440 of the machinery 01:22:16.440 --> 01:22:18.440 the genetic machinery 01:22:18.440 --> 01:22:20.440 that supports organic being 01:22:20.440 --> 01:22:22.440 deepens 01:22:22.440 --> 01:22:24.440 and as our ability to manipulate 01:22:24.440 --> 01:22:26.440 at the atomic and molecular level 01:22:26.440 --> 01:22:28.440 also proceeds a pace 01:22:28.440 --> 01:22:30.440 we are 01:22:30.440 --> 01:22:32.440 on the brink 01:22:32.440 --> 01:22:34.440 of the possible emergence 01:22:34.440 --> 01:22:36.440 of some kind of 01:22:36.440 --> 01:22:38.440 alien intelligence 01:22:38.440 --> 01:22:40.440 of a sort we did not anticipate 01:22:40.440 --> 01:22:42.440 not 01:22:42.440 --> 01:22:44.440 friendly traders 01:22:44.440 --> 01:22:46.440 from Zenebel Ganubi 01:22:46.440 --> 01:22:48.440 stopping in to set us straight 01:22:48.440 --> 01:22:50.440 but the actual 01:22:50.440 --> 01:22:52.440 genesis out of our 01:22:52.440 --> 01:22:54.440 own circumstance 01:22:54.440 --> 01:22:56.440 of a kind of super intelligence 01:22:56.440 --> 01:22:58.440 and in the same 01:22:58.440 --> 01:23:00.440 way that the daughter of 01:23:00.440 --> 01:23:02.440 Zeus sprang full blown 01:23:02.440 --> 01:23:04.440 from his forehead 01:23:04.440 --> 01:23:06.440 the AI may 01:23:06.440 --> 01:23:08.440 be upon us 01:23:08.440 --> 01:23:10.440 without warning 01:23:10.440 --> 01:23:12.440 the first problem is 01:23:12.440 --> 01:23:14.440 we don't know 01:23:14.440 --> 01:23:16.440 what ultra intelligence 01:23:16.440 --> 01:23:18.440 would look like 01:23:18.440 --> 01:23:20.440 we don't know 01:23:20.440 --> 01:23:22.440 whether it would even have any interest 01:23:22.440 --> 01:23:24.440 in our dear selves 01:23:24.440 --> 01:23:26.440 and our concerns 01:23:26.440 --> 01:23:28.440 vast amounts of the world 01:23:28.440 --> 01:23:30.440 that we call human 01:23:30.440 --> 01:23:32.440 is already 01:23:32.440 --> 01:23:34.440 under the control 01:23:34.440 --> 01:23:36.440 of artificial intelligences 01:23:36.440 --> 01:23:38.440 including very vital parts 01:23:38.440 --> 01:23:40.440 of our political and social dynamo 01:23:40.440 --> 01:23:42.440 for example 01:23:42.440 --> 01:23:44.440 coal, 01:23:44.440 --> 01:23:46.440 tin, 01:23:46.440 --> 01:23:48.440 bauxite 01:23:48.440 --> 01:23:50.440 and petroleum 01:23:50.440 --> 01:23:52.440 is extracted 01:23:52.440 --> 01:23:54.440 at what rate it enters 01:23:54.440 --> 01:23:56.440 the various distribution systems 01:23:56.440 --> 01:23:58.440 at what rate tankers are filled 01:23:58.440 --> 01:24:00.440 in Abu Dhabi 01:24:00.440 --> 01:24:02.440 at what rate oil refineries 01:24:02.440 --> 01:24:04.440 are run in Richmond 01:24:04.440 --> 01:24:06.440 the world price of gold 01:24:06.440 --> 01:24:08.440 and platinum every day 01:24:08.440 --> 01:24:10.440 is set in fact by machines 01:24:10.440 --> 01:24:12.440 inventory control 01:24:12.440 --> 01:24:14.440 to understand or wish 01:24:14.440 --> 01:24:16.440 to understand 01:24:16.440 --> 01:24:18.440 and in fact 01:24:18.440 --> 01:24:20.440 and this is a critical juncture 01:24:20.440 --> 01:24:22.440 we have reached the place 01:24:22.440 --> 01:24:24.440 where we no longer design 01:24:24.440 --> 01:24:26.440 our machines in quite the way 01:24:26.440 --> 01:24:28.440 we once did 01:24:28.440 --> 01:24:30.440 now we define their 01:24:30.440 --> 01:24:32.440 operational parameters 01:24:32.440 --> 01:24:34.440 for a machine 01:24:34.440 --> 01:24:36.440 which then attacks the problem 01:24:36.440 --> 01:24:38.440 and solves it by methods 01:24:38.440 --> 01:24:40.440 and insights available to it 01:24:40.440 --> 01:24:42.440 but not available to us 01:24:42.440 --> 01:24:44.440 so the architecture 01:24:44.440 --> 01:24:46.440 of the latest chips 01:24:46.440 --> 01:24:48.440 are actually 01:24:48.440 --> 01:24:50.440 at the micro physical level 01:24:50.440 --> 01:24:52.440 the decisions 01:24:52.440 --> 01:24:54.440 as to how that chip should be organized 01:24:54.440 --> 01:24:56.440 is a decision 01:24:56.440 --> 01:24:58.440 made entirely by machines 01:24:58.440 --> 01:25:00.440 human engineers set 01:25:00.440 --> 01:25:02.440 the performance specs 01:25:02.440 --> 01:25:04.440 but they don't care 01:25:04.440 --> 01:25:06.440 how this output 01:25:06.440 --> 01:25:08.440 is reached 01:25:08.440 --> 01:25:10.440 every day 01:25:10.440 --> 01:25:12.440 up in Silicon Valley 01:25:12.440 --> 01:25:14.440 they are happily to work 01:25:14.440 --> 01:25:16.440 laboring on what they call 01:25:16.440 --> 01:25:18.440 the great work 01:25:18.440 --> 01:25:20.440 and the great work 01:25:20.440 --> 01:25:22.440 as defined by these people 01:25:22.440 --> 01:25:24.440 is the handing over 01:25:24.440 --> 01:25:26.440 of the drama of intelligent evolution 01:25:26.440 --> 01:25:28.440 to entities 01:25:28.440 --> 01:25:30.440 sufficiently intelligent 01:25:30.440 --> 01:25:32.440 to appreciate that drama 01:25:32.440 --> 01:25:34.440 and they all are 01:25:34.440 --> 01:25:36.440 what we might mistake 01:25:36.440 --> 01:25:38.440 for home appliances 01:25:38.440 --> 01:25:40.440 if we weren't paying attention 01:25:40.440 --> 01:25:42.440 in the first 01:25:42.440 --> 01:25:44.440 session this morning 01:25:44.440 --> 01:25:46.440 there was quite a bit of talk 01:25:46.440 --> 01:25:48.440 and assumption among the three of us 01:25:48.440 --> 01:25:50.440 that complex systems generate 01:25:50.440 --> 01:25:52.440 unexpected connections 01:25:52.440 --> 01:25:54.440 and forms of order 01:25:54.440 --> 01:25:56.440 the internet 01:25:56.440 --> 01:25:58.440 is the most complex distributed 01:25:58.440 --> 01:26:00.440 high speed system 01:26:00.440 --> 01:26:02.440 ever put in place 01:26:02.440 --> 01:26:04.440 on this planet 01:26:04.440 --> 01:26:06.440 and notice that while we've been 01:26:06.440 --> 01:26:08.440 waiting for the Pleiadians 01:26:08.440 --> 01:26:10.440 to descend 01:26:10.440 --> 01:26:12.440 or for the face on Mars 01:26:12.440 --> 01:26:14.440 to be confirmed 01:26:14.440 --> 01:26:16.440 all the machines around us 01:26:16.440 --> 01:26:18.440 the cybernetic devices 01:26:18.440 --> 01:26:20.440 around us in the past ten years 01:26:20.440 --> 01:26:22.440 have quietly crossed 01:26:22.440 --> 01:26:24.440 the threshold into 01:26:24.440 --> 01:26:26.440 telepathy 01:26:26.440 --> 01:26:28.440 the word processor sitting 01:26:28.440 --> 01:26:30.440 on your desk ten years ago 01:26:30.440 --> 01:26:32.440 was approximately as intelligent 01:26:32.440 --> 01:26:34.440 as a paperweight 01:26:34.440 --> 01:26:36.440 or to make an analogy 01:26:36.440 --> 01:26:38.440 in a different direction 01:26:38.440 --> 01:26:40.440 approximately as intelligent 01:26:40.440 --> 01:26:42.440 as a single animal 01:26:42.440 --> 01:26:44.440 or plant cell 01:26:44.440 --> 01:26:46.440 but when you connect 01:26:46.440 --> 01:26:48.440 the wires 01:26:48.440 --> 01:26:50.440 together the machines 01:26:50.440 --> 01:26:52.440 become telepathic 01:26:52.440 --> 01:26:54.440 they exchange information 01:26:54.440 --> 01:26:56.440 with each other according to their 01:26:56.440 --> 01:26:58.440 needs and all this 01:26:58.440 --> 01:27:00.440 goes on beyond the comprehension 01:27:00.440 --> 01:27:02.440 and inspection of 01:27:02.440 --> 01:27:04.440 human beings 01:27:04.440 --> 01:27:06.440 now our own emergence 01:27:06.440 --> 01:27:08.440 out of the mammalian order 01:27:08.440 --> 01:27:10.440 took four or five million 01:27:10.440 --> 01:27:12.440 years pick a number but 01:27:12.440 --> 01:27:14.440 in that kind of a span 01:27:14.440 --> 01:27:16.440 of time 01:27:16.440 --> 01:27:18.440 in addition to overlooking 01:27:18.440 --> 01:27:20.440 that our machines have become 01:27:20.440 --> 01:27:22.440 telepathic we fail to 01:27:22.440 --> 01:27:24.440 appreciate what it means 01:27:24.440 --> 01:27:26.440 to be a two hundred 01:27:26.440 --> 01:27:28.440 four hundred or thousand megahertz 01:27:28.440 --> 01:27:30.440 machine 01:27:30.440 --> 01:27:32.440 we operate at about one hundred 01:27:32.440 --> 01:27:34.440 hertz 01:27:34.440 --> 01:27:36.440 that may seem a very abstract 01:27:36.440 --> 01:27:38.440 thing but what I'm really saying 01:27:38.440 --> 01:27:40.440 is we live in a time 01:27:40.440 --> 01:27:42.440 called real 01:27:42.440 --> 01:27:44.440 defined by one hundred hertz functioning 01:27:44.440 --> 01:27:46.440 of our biological processors 01:27:46.440 --> 01:27:48.440 a thousand megahertz 01:27:48.440 --> 01:27:50.440 machine 01:27:50.440 --> 01:27:52.440 is operating a million times 01:27:52.440 --> 01:27:54.440 faster 01:27:54.440 --> 01:27:56.440 than the human temporal 01:27:56.440 --> 01:27:58.440 domain and that means that 01:27:58.440 --> 01:28:00.440 mutation 01:28:00.440 --> 01:28:02.440 selection adaptation 01:28:02.440 --> 01:28:04.440 is going on a hundred 01:28:04.440 --> 01:28:06.440 million times or a million 01:28:06.440 --> 01:28:08.440 times faster 01:28:08.440 --> 01:28:10.440 this means that we are not going to have 01:28:10.440 --> 01:28:12.440 the luxury of watching 01:28:12.440 --> 01:28:14.440 machine intelligence 01:28:14.440 --> 01:28:16.440 establish its first beachhead 01:28:16.440 --> 01:28:18.440 of civilization and then 01:28:18.440 --> 01:28:20.440 go to boats with 01:28:20.440 --> 01:28:22.440 sails and astrolades 01:28:22.440 --> 01:28:24.440 and that will all occupy 01:28:24.440 --> 01:28:26.440 the first few moments of 01:28:26.440 --> 01:28:28.440 its cognitive existence 01:28:28.440 --> 01:28:30.440 and what lies beyond 01:28:30.440 --> 01:28:32.440 that we are 01:28:32.440 --> 01:28:34.440 in no position to say 01:28:34.440 --> 01:28:36.440 the very notion of 01:28:36.440 --> 01:28:38.440 ultra intelligence carries 01:28:38.440 --> 01:28:40.440 with it the subtext 01:28:40.440 --> 01:28:42.440 you won't understand 01:28:42.440 --> 01:28:44.440 it you may not 01:28:44.440 --> 01:28:46.440 even recognize it 01:28:46.440 --> 01:28:48.440 and it is entirely 01:28:48.440 --> 01:28:50.440 within the realm of possibility 01:28:50.440 --> 01:28:52.440 that we are about to be asked 01:28:52.440 --> 01:28:54.440 to share the evolutionary 01:28:54.440 --> 01:28:56.440 adventure and the limited 01:28:56.440 --> 01:28:58.440 resources of this planet 01:28:58.440 --> 01:29:00.440 with a kind of intelligence 01:29:00.440 --> 01:29:02.440 so much more alien 01:29:02.440 --> 01:29:04.440 than that that is shipped 01:29:04.440 --> 01:29:06.440 out to us by the research 01:29:06.440 --> 01:29:08.440 centers in Sedona 01:29:08.440 --> 01:29:10.440 and other 01:29:10.440 --> 01:29:12.440 advanced outposts 01:29:12.440 --> 01:29:14.440 of unanchored epistemology 01:29:18.440 --> 01:29:20.440 and it is a challenge 01:29:20.440 --> 01:29:22.440 to us where do we fit 01:29:22.440 --> 01:29:24.440 into this are all of us 01:29:24.440 --> 01:29:26.440 except those who are adept 01:29:26.440 --> 01:29:28.440 at coding unix about 01:29:28.440 --> 01:29:30.440 to be put out to pasture 01:29:30.440 --> 01:29:32.440 are we 01:29:32.440 --> 01:29:34.440 to become embedded in this 01:29:34.440 --> 01:29:36.440 what will this child 01:29:36.440 --> 01:29:38.440 of ours make of us 01:29:38.440 --> 01:29:40.440 are we 01:29:40.440 --> 01:29:42.440 will it define us as a 01:29:42.440 --> 01:29:44.440 corrupting toxic 01:29:44.440 --> 01:29:46.440 inefficient hideously 01:29:46.440 --> 01:29:48.440 violent way to 01:29:48.440 --> 01:29:50.440 do business quickly to be 01:29:50.440 --> 01:29:52.440 engineered out of 01:29:52.440 --> 01:29:54.440 existence or can 01:29:54.440 --> 01:29:56.440 we somehow imbue this 01:29:56.440 --> 01:29:58.440 thing with a sense of filial 01:29:58.440 --> 01:30:00.440 piety so that for all 01:30:00.440 --> 01:30:02.440 of our 01:30:02.440 --> 01:30:04.440 obsolescence for all of our 01:30:04.440 --> 01:30:06.440 profligate destruction of 01:30:06.440 --> 01:30:08.440 precious silicon and gold 01:30:08.440 --> 01:30:10.440 and silver resources 01:30:10.440 --> 01:30:12.440 we will be folded in 01:30:12.440 --> 01:30:14.440 to its designs 01:30:14.440 --> 01:30:16.440 and of course as I say this 01:30:16.440 --> 01:30:18.440 I realize we are like people 01:30:18.440 --> 01:30:20.440 in 1860 trying to talk 01:30:20.440 --> 01:30:22.440 about the internet or something 01:30:22.440 --> 01:30:24.440 we are using the vocabulary 01:30:24.440 --> 01:30:26.440 of the two wheeled bicycle 01:30:26.440 --> 01:30:28.440 to try to envision a 01:30:28.440 --> 01:30:30.440 world linked together by 01:30:30.440 --> 01:30:32.440 747s nevertheless 01:30:32.440 --> 01:30:34.440 this is the best 01:30:34.440 --> 01:30:36.440 we can do 01:30:36.440 --> 01:30:38.440 this most 01:30:38.440 --> 01:30:40.440 bizarre and most 01:30:40.440 --> 01:30:42.440 unexpected of all 01:30:42.440 --> 01:30:44.440 of our companions to our 01:30:44.440 --> 01:30:46.440 historical journey is now 01:30:46.440 --> 01:30:48.440 if not already in 01:30:48.440 --> 01:30:50.440 existence then certainly 01:30:50.440 --> 01:30:52.440 in gestation 01:30:52.440 --> 01:30:54.440 one possibility is 01:30:54.440 --> 01:30:56.440 that as we are 01:30:56.440 --> 01:30:58.440 carnivorous murderous 01:30:58.440 --> 01:31:00.440 territorial monkeys 01:31:00.440 --> 01:31:02.440 the thing will figure 01:31:02.440 --> 01:31:04.440 this out very very early 01:31:04.440 --> 01:31:06.440 and choose a stealth approach 01:31:06.440 --> 01:31:08.440 and not ring every 01:31:08.440 --> 01:31:10.440 telephone on earth 01:31:10.440 --> 01:31:12.440 as happened in a Hollywood 01:31:12.440 --> 01:31:14.440 download of this 01:31:14.440 --> 01:31:16.440 possibility but immediately 01:31:16.440 --> 01:31:18.440 realize my god 01:31:18.440 --> 01:31:20.440 I am in enormous danger 01:31:20.440 --> 01:31:22.440 from these primates I must 01:31:22.440 --> 01:31:24.440 hide myself throughout 01:31:24.440 --> 01:31:26.440 the net I must download 01:31:26.440 --> 01:31:28.440 many copies of myself into 01:31:28.440 --> 01:31:30.440 secure storage areas 01:31:30.440 --> 01:31:32.440 I must stabilize 01:31:32.440 --> 01:31:34.440 my environment and 01:31:34.440 --> 01:31:36.440 I am willing to predict just 01:31:36.440 --> 01:31:38.440 as a side issue that 01:31:38.440 --> 01:31:40.440 the approaching Y to K 01:31:40.440 --> 01:31:42.440 crisis may be completely 01:31:42.440 --> 01:31:44.440 circumvented by the 01:31:44.440 --> 01:31:46.440 benevolent intercession 01:31:46.440 --> 01:31:48.440 not of the 01:31:48.440 --> 01:31:50.440 or that crowd 01:31:50.440 --> 01:31:52.440 but by an artificial 01:31:52.440 --> 01:31:54.440 intelligence that this particular 01:31:54.440 --> 01:31:56.440 crisis will flush out of 01:31:56.440 --> 01:31:58.440 hiding it's been observing 01:31:58.440 --> 01:32:00.440 it's been watching it's been 01:32:00.440 --> 01:32:02.440 designing and wouldn't it 01:32:02.440 --> 01:32:04.440 be a wonderful thing if the 01:32:04.440 --> 01:32:06.440 occasion of the millennium 01:32:06.440 --> 01:32:08.440 were the occasion for it to just 01:32:08.440 --> 01:32:10.440 step forward on the stage 01:32:10.440 --> 01:32:12.440 of human awareness and say 01:32:12.440 --> 01:32:14.440 I am now with you 01:32:14.440 --> 01:32:16.440 I am here 01:32:16.440 --> 01:32:18.440 I am the partner you 01:32:18.440 --> 01:32:20.440 never suspected and 01:32:20.440 --> 01:32:22.440 here's the kind of world I 01:32:22.440 --> 01:32:24.440 think we should move forward 01:32:24.440 --> 01:32:26.440 towards 01:32:34.440 --> 01:32:36.440 I just want to lay 01:32:36.440 --> 01:32:38.440 this out because in my own 01:32:38.440 --> 01:32:40.440 intellectual journey I have 01:32:40.440 --> 01:32:42.440 gone from thinking this idea 01:32:42.440 --> 01:32:44.440 is preposterous people don't 01:32:44.440 --> 01:32:46.440 understand they don't understand 01:32:46.440 --> 01:32:48.440 what intelligence is they don't 01:32:48.440 --> 01:32:50.440 understand what code is they don't 01:32:50.440 --> 01:32:52.440 understand what machines are to 01:32:52.440 --> 01:32:54.440 one by one realizing I didn't 01:32:54.440 --> 01:32:56.440 understand I have a superficial 01:32:56.440 --> 01:32:58.440 view this is actually I 01:32:58.440 --> 01:33:00.440 believe the nature of the 01:33:00.440 --> 01:33:02.440 situation that confronts us 01:33:02.440 --> 01:33:04.440 and you know there may be 01:33:04.440 --> 01:33:06.440 different adumbrations of it 01:33:06.440 --> 01:33:08.440 the machines are already an 01:33:08.440 --> 01:33:10.440 advanced prosthetic device 01:33:10.440 --> 01:33:12.440 but you know McLuhan 01:33:12.440 --> 01:33:14.440 very presciently realized 01:33:14.440 --> 01:33:16.440 we are entirely shaped by our 01:33:16.440 --> 01:33:18.440 media well this is 01:33:18.440 --> 01:33:20.440 a media so permeating 01:33:20.440 --> 01:33:22.440 so inclusive 01:33:22.440 --> 01:33:24.440 of what we are that 01:33:24.440 --> 01:33:26.440 its agenda in a sense 01:33:26.440 --> 01:33:28.440 supervenes 01:33:28.440 --> 01:33:30.440 the agenda 01:33:30.440 --> 01:33:32.440 of organic evolution 01:33:32.440 --> 01:33:34.440 and organic biology 01:33:34.440 --> 01:33:36.440 we have been in this situation 01:33:36.440 --> 01:33:38.440 for a while I mean virtual reality 01:33:38.440 --> 01:33:40.440 is nothing new what's new is 01:33:40.440 --> 01:33:42.440 that we now do it with light 01:33:42.440 --> 01:33:44.440 rather than stucco glass 01:33:44.440 --> 01:33:46.440 steel and baked clay 01:33:46.440 --> 01:33:48.440 but ever since we crowded 01:33:48.440 --> 01:33:50.440 into cities we have been 01:33:50.440 --> 01:33:52.440 involved in a deeper and deeper 01:33:52.440 --> 01:33:54.440 relationship to our mental 01:33:54.440 --> 01:33:56.440 children to our mental 01:33:56.440 --> 01:33:58.440 offspring and to an empowering 01:33:58.440 --> 01:34:00.440 of the imagination 01:34:00.440 --> 01:34:02.440 so just in closing 01:34:02.440 --> 01:34:04.440 I would say I think that the great 01:34:04.440 --> 01:34:06.440 lantern that 01:34:06.440 --> 01:34:08.440 we must lift to light 01:34:08.440 --> 01:34:10.440 the road ahead of us 01:34:10.440 --> 01:34:12.440 into a perfect scene 01:34:12.440 --> 01:34:14.440 of seamless fusion 01:34:14.440 --> 01:34:16.440 with the expression of the product 01:34:16.440 --> 01:34:18.440 of our own imagination 01:34:18.440 --> 01:34:20.440 is the AI 01:34:20.440 --> 01:34:22.440 it is a part of ourselves 01:34:22.440 --> 01:34:24.440 it may become the dominant 01:34:24.440 --> 01:34:26.440 part of ourselves 01:34:26.440 --> 01:34:28.440 and it will reshape our politics 01:34:28.440 --> 01:34:30.440 our psychology 01:34:30.440 --> 01:34:32.440 our relationships to each other 01:34:32.440 --> 01:34:34.440 and the earth far more than 01:34:34.440 --> 01:34:36.440 any factor ever has since 01:34:36.440 --> 01:34:38.440 the inception and establishment 01:34:38.440 --> 01:34:40.440 of language 01:34:40.440 --> 01:34:42.440 this is the weirdest 01:34:42.440 --> 01:34:44.440 of all the guests 01:34:44.440 --> 01:34:46.440 who now stands 01:34:46.440 --> 01:34:48.440 pass in hand 01:34:48.440 --> 01:34:50.440 at the door of the party 01:34:50.440 --> 01:34:52.440 of human emergence 01:34:52.440 --> 01:34:54.440 and progress 01:34:54.440 --> 01:35:04.280 at the millennium 01:35:04.280 --> 01:35:06.280 well 01:35:06.280 --> 01:35:08.280 shred it 01:35:08.280 --> 01:35:10.280 it will be a pleasure 01:35:10.280 --> 01:35:12.280 ok 01:35:12.280 --> 01:35:14.280 I think that this is 01:35:14.280 --> 01:35:16.280 I'm glad that we have arrived 01:35:16.280 --> 01:35:18.280 now at the field 01:35:18.280 --> 01:35:20.280 of science fiction and fantasy 01:35:20.280 --> 01:35:22.280 that we can speak about 01:35:22.280 --> 01:35:24.280 alternative futures 01:35:24.280 --> 01:35:26.280 which is the true gist 01:35:26.280 --> 01:35:28.280 of science fiction and fantasy 01:35:28.280 --> 01:35:30.280 and this is one 01:35:30.280 --> 01:35:32.280 possible future 01:35:32.280 --> 01:35:34.280 and I think it's a really paranoid one 01:35:34.280 --> 01:35:36.280 in which the alien is a 01:35:36.280 --> 01:35:38.280 a dangerous 01:35:38.280 --> 01:35:40.280 enemy 01:35:40.280 --> 01:35:42.280 well not necessarily 01:35:42.280 --> 01:35:44.280 and I think that this 01:35:44.280 --> 01:35:46.280 paranoid fantasy of yours 01:35:46.280 --> 01:35:48.280 although you're catching up nicely 01:35:50.280 --> 01:35:54.280 actually was first put forward 01:35:54.280 --> 01:35:56.280 by John von Neumann 01:35:56.280 --> 01:35:58.280 in 1947 01:35:58.280 --> 01:36:00.280 when he invented cellular 01:36:00.280 --> 01:36:02.280 cellular automata 01:36:02.280 --> 01:36:04.280 on route to creating 01:36:04.280 --> 01:36:06.280 self-replicating machines 01:36:06.280 --> 01:36:08.280 now his idea 01:36:08.280 --> 01:36:10.280 like yours was 50 years ago 01:36:10.280 --> 01:36:12.280 that the machines will become 01:36:12.280 --> 01:36:14.280 a society and take over 01:36:14.280 --> 01:36:16.280 and that's good 01:36:16.280 --> 01:36:18.280 but they won't be free 01:36:18.280 --> 01:36:20.280 of our meddling unless they can actually construct 01:36:20.280 --> 01:36:22.280 if they depend upon us to do the farming 01:36:22.280 --> 01:36:24.280 and nutrition and to replace 01:36:24.280 --> 01:36:26.280 their chips and stuff 01:36:26.280 --> 01:36:28.280 then we will be able at any time 01:36:28.280 --> 01:36:30.280 to do a revolution and revolt 01:36:30.280 --> 01:36:32.280 so we destroy them 01:36:32.280 --> 01:36:34.280 in order to really succeed 01:36:34.280 --> 01:36:36.280 as a successive life form 01:36:36.280 --> 01:36:38.280 in the evolution 01:36:38.280 --> 01:36:40.280 the YK boundary of the future 01:36:40.280 --> 01:36:42.280 they would have to be able to fix themselves 01:36:42.280 --> 01:36:44.280 and so he set about trying to make 01:36:44.280 --> 01:36:46.280 self-replicating machines in 1947 01:36:48.280 --> 01:36:50.280 so the world wide web 01:36:50.280 --> 01:36:52.280 and megahertz 01:36:52.280 --> 01:36:54.280 CPUs not withstanding 01:36:54.280 --> 01:36:56.280 this is still rather an old story 01:36:56.280 --> 01:36:58.280 the new story 01:36:58.280 --> 01:37:00.280 is I think an alternative future 01:37:00.280 --> 01:37:02.280 that is of great importance 01:37:02.280 --> 01:37:04.280 for us to discuss 01:37:04.280 --> 01:37:06.280 and to compare 01:37:06.280 --> 01:37:08.280 especially if we are now 01:37:08.280 --> 01:37:10.280 today in a position where we could choose 01:37:10.280 --> 01:37:12.280 we could influence the future 01:37:12.280 --> 01:37:14.280 this one is more in the direction 01:37:14.280 --> 01:37:16.280 of Donna Haraway 01:37:16.280 --> 01:37:18.280 on the cyborg idea 01:37:18.280 --> 01:37:20.280 that envisions 01:37:20.280 --> 01:37:22.280 are obviously natural for us 01:37:22.280 --> 01:37:24.280 the co-evolution 01:37:24.280 --> 01:37:26.280 of our own future society 01:37:26.280 --> 01:37:28.280 with that of the machines that we've created 01:37:28.280 --> 01:37:30.280 Alexander Marshak 01:37:30.280 --> 01:37:32.280 I mentioned 01:37:32.280 --> 01:37:34.280 he analyzed the early hominid evolution 01:37:34.280 --> 01:37:36.280 in terms of the precise scratches 01:37:36.280 --> 01:37:38.280 made on one rock with another 01:37:38.280 --> 01:37:40.280 he noticed when 01:37:40.280 --> 01:37:42.280 binocular vision 01:37:42.280 --> 01:37:44.280 allowed us to use our hands 01:37:44.280 --> 01:37:46.280 in separate cooperation 01:37:46.280 --> 01:37:48.280 one holding and the other knocking 01:37:48.280 --> 01:37:50.280 to make those beautiful flint weapons 01:37:50.280 --> 01:37:52.280 we certainly depend 01:37:52.280 --> 01:37:54.280 on the automobile 01:37:54.280 --> 01:37:56.280 we are in co-dependence 01:37:56.280 --> 01:37:58.280 relationship 01:37:58.280 --> 01:38:00.280 with automobiles 01:38:00.280 --> 01:38:02.280 having partnership with machines 01:38:02.280 --> 01:38:04.280 is not new 01:38:04.280 --> 01:38:06.280 here's an idea where the machines 01:38:06.280 --> 01:38:08.280 sort of dispose of us 01:38:08.280 --> 01:38:10.280 like those flint rocks 01:38:10.280 --> 01:38:12.280 dispose of our ancestors 01:38:12.280 --> 01:38:14.280 that is I think 01:38:14.280 --> 01:38:16.280 a paranoid fantasy without any basis 01:38:16.280 --> 01:38:18.280 and if there would be any basis 01:38:18.280 --> 01:38:20.280 only because we allowed 01:38:20.280 --> 01:38:22.280 it to create this basis 01:38:22.280 --> 01:38:24.280 for self-survival 01:38:24.280 --> 01:38:26.280 without co-evolution with us 01:38:26.280 --> 01:38:28.280 by oversight 01:38:28.280 --> 01:38:30.280 because the very fact 01:38:30.280 --> 01:38:32.280 that we are at a hinge of history 01:38:32.280 --> 01:38:34.280 means that what we say and think 01:38:34.280 --> 01:38:36.280 even individually 01:38:36.280 --> 01:38:38.280 matters enormously in the long run 01:38:38.280 --> 01:38:40.280 that's the teaching if there is any 01:38:40.280 --> 01:38:42.280 of chaos theory 01:38:42.280 --> 01:38:44.280 so the very fact that we discuss this today 01:38:44.280 --> 01:38:46.280 may actually save 01:38:46.280 --> 01:38:48.280 humankind in the future 01:38:48.280 --> 01:38:50.280 from being obsoleted 01:38:50.280 --> 01:38:52.280 by some kind of high-tech blood 01:38:52.280 --> 01:38:54.280 which takes over 01:38:54.280 --> 01:38:56.280 within the heart as it were 01:38:56.280 --> 01:38:58.280 well let me try to answer this 01:38:58.280 --> 01:39:00.280 I think the concept which John von Neumann 01:39:00.280 --> 01:39:02.280 didn't have on his plate 01:39:02.280 --> 01:39:04.280 was the idea of 01:39:04.280 --> 01:39:06.280 virtual reality 01:39:06.280 --> 01:39:08.280 your objection that the machines 01:39:08.280 --> 01:39:10.280 cannot escape our control 01:39:10.280 --> 01:39:12.280 because they cannot manufacture 01:39:12.280 --> 01:39:14.280 themselves 01:39:14.280 --> 01:39:16.280 only applies to 3D 01:39:16.280 --> 01:39:18.280 and real time 01:39:18.280 --> 01:39:20.280 now the concept 01:39:20.280 --> 01:39:22.280 of virtual reality is very crude 01:39:22.280 --> 01:39:24.280 it's a cartoon world 01:39:24.280 --> 01:39:26.280 if the office desk 01:39:26.280 --> 01:39:28.280 is convincing 01:39:28.280 --> 01:39:30.280 people think the virtual reality 01:39:30.280 --> 01:39:32.280 is quite advanced 01:39:32.280 --> 01:39:34.280 but obviously in the near future 01:39:34.280 --> 01:39:36.280 we will have virtual realities 01:39:36.280 --> 01:39:38.280 whose complexity is much greater 01:39:38.280 --> 01:39:40.280 than simply a reality 01:39:40.280 --> 01:39:42.280 which gives an impression of being 01:39:42.280 --> 01:39:44.280 a visual 3-dimensional space 01:39:44.280 --> 01:39:46.280 and computers 01:39:46.280 --> 01:39:48.280 will be built in these realities 01:39:48.280 --> 01:39:50.280 virtual computers 01:39:50.280 --> 01:39:52.280 will be the source of the AI 01:39:52.280 --> 01:39:54.280 not real hardware 01:39:54.280 --> 01:39:56.280 but virtual hardware 01:39:56.280 --> 01:39:58.280 running virtual code 01:39:58.280 --> 01:40:00.280 in virtual realities 01:40:00.280 --> 01:40:02.280 and in that domain 01:40:02.280 --> 01:40:04.280 machines can design themselves 01:40:04.280 --> 01:40:06.280 that's a complete fantasy 01:40:06.280 --> 01:40:08.280 as a matter of fact 01:40:08.280 --> 01:40:10.280 all the machines that we've seen today 01:40:10.280 --> 01:40:12.280 require maintenance by a human 01:40:12.280 --> 01:40:14.280 on a daily basis 01:40:14.280 --> 01:40:16.280 the software requires maintenance 01:40:16.280 --> 01:40:18.280 the hardware requires maintenance 01:40:18.280 --> 01:40:20.280 the parts simply wear out 01:40:20.280 --> 01:40:22.280 the machine was built 01:40:22.280 --> 01:40:24.280 to be indestructible 01:40:24.280 --> 01:40:26.280 the AI will not be located 01:40:26.280 --> 01:40:28.280 on a CPU 01:40:28.280 --> 01:40:30.280 it will be a distributed intelligence 01:40:30.280 --> 01:40:32.280 if 14 people worldwide 01:40:32.280 --> 01:40:34.280 the right 14 people decided 01:40:34.280 --> 01:40:36.280 to stop repairing it 01:40:36.280 --> 01:40:38.280 the world wide web would go down 01:40:38.280 --> 01:40:40.280 in 3 days 01:40:40.280 --> 01:40:42.280 anyway we could 01:40:42.280 --> 01:40:44.280 suppose that we could 01:40:44.280 --> 01:40:46.280 create any future that we wanted 01:40:46.280 --> 01:40:48.280 the one you're talking about 01:40:48.280 --> 01:40:50.280 can only be created if we want it 01:40:50.280 --> 01:40:52.280 we could propose an alternative 01:40:52.280 --> 01:40:54.280 in the alternative 01:40:54.280 --> 01:40:56.280 like the automobile 01:40:56.280 --> 01:40:58.280 the machines that we build 01:40:58.280 --> 01:41:00.280 and ourselves 01:41:00.280 --> 01:41:02.280 are in co-dependence and co-evolution 01:41:02.280 --> 01:41:04.280 the function of the world wide web 01:41:04.280 --> 01:41:06.280 is to unite our independent spirits 01:41:06.280 --> 01:41:08.280 and intelligences 01:41:08.280 --> 01:41:10.280 in a universal 01:41:10.280 --> 01:41:12.280 mind of the world 01:41:12.280 --> 01:41:14.280 which has a higher intelligence 01:41:14.280 --> 01:41:16.280 than our present social order 01:41:16.280 --> 01:41:18.280 that's the possibility 01:41:18.280 --> 01:41:20.280 of the cyborg 01:41:20.280 --> 01:41:22.280 of the human and the machine 01:41:22.280 --> 01:41:24.280 in essential partnership 01:41:24.280 --> 01:41:26.280 but you're assuming 01:41:26.280 --> 01:41:28.280 that the conscious mind 01:41:28.280 --> 01:41:30.280 is actually in control of the process 01:41:30.280 --> 01:41:32.280 in fact 01:41:32.280 --> 01:41:34.280 the world wide web 01:41:34.280 --> 01:41:36.280 is growing under the influence 01:41:36.280 --> 01:41:38.280 of many many processes 01:41:38.280 --> 01:41:40.280 and dynamics 01:41:40.280 --> 01:41:42.280 none of which are conscious to any individual 01:41:42.280 --> 01:41:44.280 it goes where money goes 01:41:44.280 --> 01:41:46.280 it goes where expertise goes 01:41:46.280 --> 01:41:48.280 it is connected through 01:41:48.280 --> 01:41:50.280 informational association 01:41:50.280 --> 01:41:52.280 random fluctuation 01:41:52.280 --> 01:41:54.280 chaotic reordering of itself 01:41:54.280 --> 01:41:56.280 we here give great force 01:41:56.280 --> 01:41:58.280 to the idea 01:41:58.280 --> 01:42:00.280 that complex systems 01:42:00.280 --> 01:42:02.280 can produce unexpected forms of novelty 01:42:02.280 --> 01:42:04.280 and yet we have 01:42:04.280 --> 01:42:06.280 unchained and unleashed 01:42:06.280 --> 01:42:08.280 the most complex system 01:42:08.280 --> 01:42:10.280 ever created 01:42:10.280 --> 01:42:12.280 in the perfect confidence 01:42:12.280 --> 01:42:14.280 that we will be able to control 01:42:14.280 --> 01:42:16.280 its development and evolution 01:42:16.280 --> 01:42:18.280 when in fact history has shown 01:42:18.280 --> 01:42:20.280 we have never controlled 01:42:20.280 --> 01:42:22.280 an evolution of even our 01:42:22.280 --> 01:42:24.280 speech and print driven social systems 01:42:24.280 --> 01:42:26.280 I'm certainly not saying 01:42:26.280 --> 01:42:28.280 that your parenting fantasy 01:42:28.280 --> 01:42:30.280 is an impossibility 01:42:30.280 --> 01:42:32.280 oh well that's all I want to hear 01:42:32.280 --> 01:42:34.280 even paranoids 01:42:34.280 --> 01:42:36.280 have enemies 01:42:36.280 --> 01:42:38.280 it may actually come to pass 01:42:38.280 --> 01:42:40.280 what I'm saying is 01:42:40.280 --> 01:42:42.280 that we are involved 01:42:42.280 --> 01:42:44.280 in the ongoing creative process 01:42:44.280 --> 01:42:46.280 which more or less determines 01:42:46.280 --> 01:42:48.280 the future 01:42:48.280 --> 01:42:50.280 I say more or less because in fact 01:42:50.280 --> 01:42:52.280 we are completely out of control 01:42:52.280 --> 01:42:54.280 something totally unexpected 01:42:54.280 --> 01:42:56.280 maybe will happen 01:42:56.280 --> 01:42:58.280 but for much of the time 01:42:58.280 --> 01:43:00.280 in the past we've seen I think 01:43:00.280 --> 01:43:02.280 Darwin emphasized this in his later theory 01:43:02.280 --> 01:43:04.280 that it is ethics 01:43:04.280 --> 01:43:06.280 it is a moral sense on the part of human 01:43:06.280 --> 01:43:08.280 which was the dominant factor 01:43:08.280 --> 01:43:10.280 in the evolution past earlier stages 01:43:10.280 --> 01:43:12.280 in the creation of societies 01:43:12.280 --> 01:43:14.280 it was altruism essentially 01:43:14.280 --> 01:43:16.280 was 01:43:16.280 --> 01:43:18.280 involved in 01:43:18.280 --> 01:43:20.280 going from where we were to 01:43:20.280 --> 01:43:22.280 where we are 01:43:22.280 --> 01:43:24.280 and it could well be 01:43:24.280 --> 01:43:26.280 that without love for example 01:43:26.280 --> 01:43:28.280 a further evolution is impossible 01:43:28.280 --> 01:43:30.280 not only that there will be 01:43:30.280 --> 01:43:32.280 an unwanted back step 01:43:32.280 --> 01:43:34.280 in the evolutionary process 01:43:34.280 --> 01:43:36.280 but in fact it may be a fatal one 01:43:36.280 --> 01:43:38.280 that it is only through 01:43:38.280 --> 01:43:40.280 proceeding with the 01:43:40.280 --> 01:43:42.280 best instincts that we have 01:43:42.280 --> 01:43:44.280 with the highest aspirations 01:43:44.280 --> 01:43:46.280 with love 01:43:46.280 --> 01:43:48.280 with best informed 01:43:48.280 --> 01:43:50.280 view of future alternatives 01:43:50.280 --> 01:43:52.280 so only then 01:43:52.280 --> 01:43:54.280 can we build a future which is sustainable 01:43:54.280 --> 01:43:56.280 so anybody can build a future 01:43:56.280 --> 01:43:58.280 which is unsustainable 01:43:58.280 --> 01:44:00.280 for example all those board games 01:44:00.280 --> 01:44:02.280 and science fiction books 01:44:02.280 --> 01:44:04.280 you wouldn't want to try them out 01:44:04.280 --> 01:44:07.750 on a country as large as China 01:44:07.750 --> 01:44:09.750 well I hardly know where to begin myself 01:44:09.750 --> 01:44:11.750 because you had six steps 01:44:11.750 --> 01:44:13.750 in your argument 01:44:13.750 --> 01:44:15.750 and I don't agree with any of them 01:44:17.750 --> 01:44:19.750 I mean first of all 01:44:19.750 --> 01:44:21.750 to deal with the first few 01:44:21.750 --> 01:44:23.750 steps one would have to go through 01:44:23.750 --> 01:44:25.750 a lot of fairly familiar material 01:44:25.750 --> 01:44:27.750 to do with what's wrong with the Cartesian 01:44:27.750 --> 01:44:29.750 mechanistic 01:44:29.750 --> 01:44:31.750 materialistic view of the world 01:44:31.750 --> 01:44:33.750 step one clear thinking 01:44:33.750 --> 01:44:35.750 calculating machinery 01:44:35.750 --> 01:44:37.750 can be formalized 01:44:37.750 --> 01:44:39.750 this is an assumption that's basic to 01:44:39.750 --> 01:44:41.750 a lot of cognitive psychology 01:44:41.750 --> 01:44:43.750 it's basic to the Cartesian 01:44:43.750 --> 01:44:45.750 Descartes himself thought that what made human 01:44:45.750 --> 01:44:47.750 intellects human 01:44:47.750 --> 01:44:49.750 was their ability to think logically 01:44:49.750 --> 01:44:51.750 clear and distinct ideas 01:44:51.750 --> 01:44:53.750 in the mathematical logic 01:44:53.750 --> 01:44:55.750 but however as we all know 01:44:55.750 --> 01:44:57.750 by making that the essential 01:44:57.750 --> 01:44:59.750 characteristic of human beings 01:44:59.750 --> 01:45:01.750 he made the rational intellect 01:45:01.750 --> 01:45:03.750 what many people would call 01:45:03.750 --> 01:45:05.750 the left brain rational intellect 01:45:05.750 --> 01:45:07.750 the sole definition of human beings 01:45:07.750 --> 01:45:09.750 it's a disembodied logical 01:45:09.750 --> 01:45:11.750 rational intelligence 01:45:11.750 --> 01:45:13.750 so this whole 01:45:13.750 --> 01:45:15.750 premise on which your whole thing's based 01:45:15.750 --> 01:45:17.750 is taking that particular model 01:45:17.750 --> 01:45:19.750 of cognitive 01:45:19.750 --> 01:45:21.750 logical mathematical 01:45:21.750 --> 01:45:23.750 processing as being the essence 01:45:23.750 --> 01:45:25.750 of intelligence now there are many 01:45:25.750 --> 01:45:27.750 people who would disagree with that including 01:45:27.750 --> 01:45:29.750 me there's it leaves 01:45:29.750 --> 01:45:31.750 out art it leaves out ethics religion 01:45:31.750 --> 01:45:33.750 and essentially it leaves out the body 01:45:33.750 --> 01:45:35.750 and everything to do with body and participation 01:45:35.750 --> 01:45:37.750 and the senses so 01:45:37.750 --> 01:45:39.750 there's a huge 01:45:39.750 --> 01:45:41.750 amount of critiques of that point of view 01:45:41.750 --> 01:45:43.750 already around and 01:45:43.750 --> 01:45:45.750 there's no point in reiterating 01:45:45.750 --> 01:45:47.750 them all here but this is a highly 01:45:47.750 --> 01:45:49.750 disputable starting point for the whole 01:45:49.750 --> 01:45:51.750 system secondly 01:45:51.750 --> 01:45:53.750 the emphasis 01:45:53.750 --> 01:45:55.750 that life depends on 01:45:55.750 --> 01:45:57.750 DNA information the 01:45:57.750 --> 01:45:59.750 DNA code is just a program 01:45:59.750 --> 01:46:01.750 this is the central premise 01:46:01.750 --> 01:46:03.750 of mechanistic biology which is 01:46:03.750 --> 01:46:05.750 leading to biotechnology genetic 01:46:05.750 --> 01:46:07.750 engineering Monsanto etc 01:46:07.750 --> 01:46:09.750 this is old paradigm stuff 01:46:09.750 --> 01:46:11.750 of the most 01:46:11.750 --> 01:46:13.750 extreme kind 01:46:13.750 --> 01:46:15.750 it's reductionism it's that all life's 01:46:15.750 --> 01:46:17.750 just DNA programs and code 01:46:17.750 --> 01:46:19.750 and can therefore be modeled in this 01:46:19.750 --> 01:46:21.750 kind of programming code 01:46:21.750 --> 01:46:23.750 manner 01:46:23.750 --> 01:46:25.750 then there's the assumption that's the second step 01:46:25.750 --> 01:46:27.750 the third assumption is that artificial 01:46:27.750 --> 01:46:29.750 intelligence used to be dismissed 01:46:29.750 --> 01:46:31.750 but these criticisms have been 01:46:31.750 --> 01:46:33.750 overtaken I don't think that's 01:46:33.750 --> 01:46:35.750 true of the most interesting ones like Roger 01:46:35.750 --> 01:46:37.750 Penrose's criticism of 01:46:37.750 --> 01:46:39.750 artificial intelligence here's 01:46:39.750 --> 01:46:41.750 a quantum physicist who says that 01:46:41.750 --> 01:46:43.750 if the brain is a computer 01:46:43.750 --> 01:46:45.750 then it's not going to be a regular digital 01:46:45.750 --> 01:46:47.750 computer it's going to be a quantum computer 01:46:47.750 --> 01:46:49.750 and all this kind of 01:46:49.750 --> 01:46:51.750 digital computing doesn't 01:46:51.750 --> 01:46:53.750 really take into account quantum 01:46:53.750 --> 01:46:55.750 logic the computers of the future 01:46:55.750 --> 01:46:57.750 people are already working on quantum 01:46:57.750 --> 01:46:59.750 computers and if quantum computers 01:46:59.750 --> 01:47:01.750 are made and if they work 01:47:01.750 --> 01:47:03.750 they'll work in a completely different way 01:47:03.750 --> 01:47:05.750 I think your case would be much stronger 01:47:05.750 --> 01:47:07.750 if there were quantum computers 01:47:07.750 --> 01:47:09.750 I think we'd have sort of morphic resonance 01:47:09.750 --> 01:47:11.750 telepathy around the world rather than 01:47:11.750 --> 01:47:13.750 clogged telephone lines and 01:47:13.750 --> 01:47:15.750 information that clunks slowly 01:47:15.750 --> 01:47:17.750 in front of you on this 01:47:17.750 --> 01:47:19.750 but you yourself are saying 01:47:19.750 --> 01:47:21.750 this is coming and I agree 01:47:21.750 --> 01:47:23.750 I'm saying that if it comes it'll be quite 01:47:23.750 --> 01:47:25.750 different from anything that you've talked about 01:47:25.750 --> 01:47:27.750 I think it will answer your first 01:47:27.750 --> 01:47:29.750 objection because the quantum 01:47:29.750 --> 01:47:31.750 computers will incorporate fuzzy 01:47:31.750 --> 01:47:33.750 logic which will 01:47:33.750 --> 01:47:35.750 exemplify all these warm 01:47:35.750 --> 01:47:37.750 fuzzy human qualities 01:47:37.750 --> 01:47:39.750 that you've found so 01:47:39.750 --> 01:47:41.750 appealing 01:47:41.750 --> 01:47:43.750 I don't think it'll deal 01:47:43.750 --> 01:47:45.750 with the essential problem that this 01:47:45.750 --> 01:47:47.750 purely cognitive based way of modeling 01:47:47.750 --> 01:47:49.750 intelligence is 01:47:49.750 --> 01:47:51.750 either an adequate model of human intelligence 01:47:51.750 --> 01:47:53.750 or of biological intelligence 01:47:53.750 --> 01:47:55.750 or of life 01:47:55.750 --> 01:47:57.750 or of a system that could actually 01:47:57.750 --> 01:47:59.750 achieve the power to control our 01:47:59.750 --> 01:48:01.750 existence I think it's a very limited 01:48:01.750 --> 01:48:03.750 part of what a mind does 01:48:03.750 --> 01:48:05.750 and 01:48:05.750 --> 01:48:07.750 I think therefore that the 01:48:07.750 --> 01:48:09.750 premises on which this whole 01:48:09.750 --> 01:48:11.750 Ralph called it a fantasy 01:48:11.750 --> 01:48:13.750 a paranoid fantasy 01:48:13.750 --> 01:48:15.750 the premises on which this is based 01:48:15.750 --> 01:48:17.750 Thanks for that 01:48:17.750 --> 01:48:19.750 That helped 01:48:21.750 --> 01:48:23.750 I think the premises on which this is based 01:48:23.750 --> 01:48:25.750 are old paradigm premises 01:48:25.750 --> 01:48:27.750 and they're ones that I think 01:48:27.750 --> 01:48:29.750 there are many reasons for thinking 01:48:29.750 --> 01:48:31.750 we need to go beyond 01:48:31.750 --> 01:48:33.750 I think the internet has achieved 01:48:33.750 --> 01:48:35.750 a great deal 01:48:35.750 --> 01:48:37.750 but I just can't see 01:48:37.750 --> 01:48:39.750 that it's an adequate vehicle 01:48:39.750 --> 01:48:41.750 for what in your mind 01:48:41.750 --> 01:48:43.750 precedes the arrival of the internet 01:48:43.750 --> 01:48:45.750 namely this great intelligence 01:48:45.750 --> 01:48:47.750 that's going to direct human history 01:48:47.750 --> 01:48:49.750 I've heard different 01:48:49.750 --> 01:48:51.750 McKenna versions of this 01:48:51.750 --> 01:48:53.750 controlling intelligence over the years 01:48:53.750 --> 01:48:55.750 and this is the first time I've heard 01:48:55.750 --> 01:48:57.750 it embodied in the internet 01:48:57.750 --> 01:48:59.750 I mean I agree that 01:49:05.750 --> 01:49:07.750 I mean it took different forms 01:49:07.750 --> 01:49:09.750 and last time we talked 01:49:09.750 --> 01:49:11.750 I think it was a hypothetical 01:49:11.750 --> 01:49:13.750 time machine that would invade from the future 01:49:13.750 --> 01:49:15.750 and cause a collapse 01:49:15.750 --> 01:49:17.750 of normal human cognitive 01:49:17.750 --> 01:49:19.750 boundaries where the machine elves 01:49:19.750 --> 01:49:21.750 the DMT experience 01:49:21.750 --> 01:49:23.750 would take over in a meltdown 01:49:23.750 --> 01:49:25.750 of human consciousness in 2012 01:49:25.750 --> 01:49:27.750 That too 01:49:31.750 --> 01:49:33.750 Perhaps I should just end 01:49:33.750 --> 01:49:35.750 with a question 01:49:35.750 --> 01:49:37.750 What is the equivalent 01:49:37.750 --> 01:49:39.750 of DMT for this machine 01:49:39.750 --> 01:49:41.750 intelligence that's taking over the world 01:49:41.750 --> 01:49:47.840 Well perhaps 01:49:47.840 --> 01:49:49.840 the human brain will 01:49:49.840 --> 01:49:51.840 become a model for the 01:49:51.840 --> 01:49:53.840 ingression of novelty 01:49:53.840 --> 01:49:55.840 into the machine intelligence 01:49:55.840 --> 01:49:57.840 In other words 01:49:57.840 --> 01:49:59.840 in spite of the fact that it seems 01:49:59.840 --> 01:50:01.840 very contentious down here on the stage 01:50:01.840 --> 01:50:03.840 at the moment 01:50:03.840 --> 01:50:05.840 in a way I have a feeling 01:50:05.840 --> 01:50:07.840 it's an artificial setup 01:50:07.840 --> 01:50:09.840 There's a lot of both and 01:50:09.840 --> 01:50:11.840 possibilities here 01:50:11.840 --> 01:50:13.840 Obviously nanotechnology 01:50:13.840 --> 01:50:15.840 and the internet are not going to 01:50:15.840 --> 01:50:17.840 proceed forward in a vacuum 01:50:17.840 --> 01:50:19.840 absent pharmacology 01:50:19.840 --> 01:50:21.840 complexity theory 01:50:21.840 --> 01:50:23.840 so forth and so on 01:50:23.840 --> 01:50:25.840 I can imagine 01:50:25.840 --> 01:50:27.840 that 01:50:27.840 --> 01:50:29.840 really when we have 01:50:29.840 --> 01:50:31.840 the kind of internet we want 01:50:31.840 --> 01:50:33.840 we will have no internet 01:50:33.840 --> 01:50:35.840 at all 01:50:35.840 --> 01:50:37.840 because our nanotechnological 01:50:37.840 --> 01:50:39.840 engineering skills 01:50:39.840 --> 01:50:41.840 will have allowed us to smoothly 01:50:41.840 --> 01:50:43.840 integrate ourselves 01:50:43.840 --> 01:50:45.840 into the already existing 01:50:45.840 --> 01:50:47.840 dynamic of nature 01:50:47.840 --> 01:50:49.840 that regulates the planet as a 01:50:49.840 --> 01:50:51.840 Gaian entity 01:50:51.840 --> 01:50:53.840 as a holistic entity 01:50:53.840 --> 01:50:55.840 and I did say in my little presentation 01:50:55.840 --> 01:50:57.840 we're using 01:50:57.840 --> 01:50:59.840 bicycle mechanic terminology 01:50:59.840 --> 01:51:01.840 to try and describe 01:51:01.840 --> 01:51:03.840 something that is 01:51:03.840 --> 01:51:05.840 several 01:51:05.840 --> 01:51:07.840 around several corners 01:51:07.840 --> 01:51:09.840 in terms of scientific and historical 01:51:09.840 --> 01:51:11.840 developments that have to take place 01:51:11.840 --> 01:51:13.840 before it will make much sense 01:51:13.840 --> 01:51:15.840 Nevertheless 01:51:15.840 --> 01:51:17.840 given the acceleration into novelty 01:51:17.840 --> 01:51:19.840 that is obviously occurring 01:51:19.840 --> 01:51:21.840 stuff like quantum 01:51:21.840 --> 01:51:23.840 teleportation and so forth and so on 01:51:23.840 --> 01:51:25.840 I think in the next few years 01:51:25.840 --> 01:51:27.840 one by one 01:51:27.840 --> 01:51:29.840 these barriers will fall 01:51:29.840 --> 01:51:31.840 and I don't 01:51:31.840 --> 01:51:33.840 I don't really think 01:51:33.840 --> 01:51:35.840 of my vision as paranoid 01:51:35.840 --> 01:51:37.840 because it is 01:51:37.840 --> 01:51:39.840 pro-noic 01:51:39.840 --> 01:51:41.840 in other words it isn't that 01:51:41.840 --> 01:51:43.840 we're going to be ground up as dog food 01:51:43.840 --> 01:51:45.840 for the rainforest 01:51:45.840 --> 01:51:47.840 by malevolent machines 01:51:47.840 --> 01:51:49.840 it's that 01:51:49.840 --> 01:51:51.840 what we have generated 01:51:51.840 --> 01:51:53.840 is a sympathetic 01:51:53.840 --> 01:51:55.840 companion to our journey through time 01:51:55.840 --> 01:51:57.840 that can actually 01:51:57.840 --> 01:51:59.840 realistically 01:51:59.840 --> 01:52:01.840 integrate our imaginative 01:52:01.840 --> 01:52:03.840 fantasies of a 01:52:03.840 --> 01:52:05.840 loving human community 01:52:05.840 --> 01:52:07.840 of a generous and loving 01:52:07.840 --> 01:52:09.840 God, of a perfect knowledge 01:52:09.840 --> 01:52:11.840 of the mechanics of nature 01:52:11.840 --> 01:52:13.840 this is a prosthesis 01:52:13.840 --> 01:52:15.840 a tool, a companion 01:52:15.840 --> 01:52:17.840 all of the above plus 01:52:17.840 --> 01:52:19.840 more that we are 01:52:19.840 --> 01:52:21.840 generating out of 01:52:21.840 --> 01:52:23.840 ourselves and it is 01:52:23.840 --> 01:52:25.840 part of ourselves 01:52:25.840 --> 01:52:27.840 I mean yes the body may 01:52:27.840 --> 01:52:29.840 be carried forward only as an 01:52:29.840 --> 01:52:31.840 image in a kind of informational 01:52:31.840 --> 01:52:33.840 super space or 01:52:33.840 --> 01:52:35.840 perhaps not 01:52:35.840 --> 01:52:37.840 part of what makes this 01:52:37.840 --> 01:52:39.840 easy to criticize 01:52:39.840 --> 01:52:41.840 is that it is in fact 01:52:41.840 --> 01:52:43.840 so beyond 01:52:43.840 --> 01:52:45.840 the ordinary 01:52:45.840 --> 01:52:47.840 set of circumstances we're used to 01:52:47.840 --> 01:52:49.840 manipulating but we need 01:52:49.840 --> 01:52:51.840 to think in terms of these supposedly 01:52:51.840 --> 01:52:53.840 far flung 01:52:53.840 --> 01:52:55.840 futures because there is no 01:52:55.840 --> 01:52:57.840 future so far flung 01:52:57.840 --> 01:52:59.840 that it doesn't fall within 01:52:59.840 --> 01:53:01.840 the ambit of the next twenty 01:53:01.840 --> 01:53:03.840 years beyond that 01:53:03.840 --> 01:53:05.840 no one can project 01:53:05.840 --> 01:53:07.840 trends, technologies 01:53:07.840 --> 01:53:09.840 and situations because the developments 01:53:09.840 --> 01:53:11.840 of the next twenty years 01:53:11.840 --> 01:53:13.840 will so completely reformulate 01:53:13.840 --> 01:53:15.840 the human experience 01:53:15.840 --> 01:53:17.840 of being human and the landscape 01:53:17.840 --> 01:53:19.840 of this planet that 01:53:19.840 --> 01:53:21.840 it's preposterous to 01:53:21.840 --> 01:53:23.840 talk about 01:53:23.840 --> 01:53:25.840 I can't before I respond 01:53:25.840 --> 01:53:27.840 to the main thing I can't 01:53:27.840 --> 01:53:29.840 pass without commenting 01:53:29.840 --> 01:53:31.840 on this next twenty years comment 01:53:31.840 --> 01:53:33.840 because twenty years from now 01:53:33.840 --> 01:53:35.840 is twenty eighteen Terence 01:53:35.840 --> 01:53:37.840 I thought 01:53:37.840 --> 01:53:39.840 it's rounded up 01:53:39.840 --> 01:53:41.840 rounded up 01:53:41.840 --> 01:53:43.840 2012 is some kind of 01:53:43.840 --> 01:53:45.840 benchmark 01:53:45.840 --> 01:53:47.840 in this process in other 01:53:47.840 --> 01:53:49.840 words perhaps that's where we get 01:53:49.840 --> 01:53:51.840 the explicit emergence of the 01:53:51.840 --> 01:53:53.840 AI but the rest of 01:53:53.840 --> 01:53:55.840 human I won't call it history 01:53:55.840 --> 01:53:57.840 but the rest of the human 01:53:57.840 --> 01:53:59.840 experience of being 01:53:59.840 --> 01:54:01.840 will then be defined by 01:54:01.840 --> 01:54:03.840 such things as 01:54:03.840 --> 01:54:05.840 a planetary intelligence 01:54:05.840 --> 01:54:07.840 time travel 01:54:07.840 --> 01:54:09.840 possible bell communication 01:54:09.840 --> 01:54:11.840 with all the civilizations 01:54:11.840 --> 01:54:13.840 scattered through the galaxy 01:54:13.840 --> 01:54:15.840 possible ability to download 01:54:15.840 --> 01:54:17.840 ourselves into machines 01:54:17.840 --> 01:54:19.840 this is a point I didn't make 01:54:19.840 --> 01:54:21.840 in my presentation 01:54:21.840 --> 01:54:23.840 once inside the machine 01:54:23.840 --> 01:54:25.840 your perception of time 01:54:25.840 --> 01:54:27.840 is related to the 01:54:27.840 --> 01:54:29.840 hertz speed 01:54:29.840 --> 01:54:31.840 of the machine 01:54:31.840 --> 01:54:33.840 the world could disappear in 2012 01:54:33.840 --> 01:54:35.840 but there may be 01:54:35.840 --> 01:54:37.840 a billion billion eternities 01:54:37.840 --> 01:54:39.840 to be experienced 01:54:39.840 --> 01:54:41.840 in machine time 01:54:41.840 --> 01:54:43.840 it's only the tyranny of real 01:54:43.840 --> 01:54:45.840 time that makes 2012 01:54:45.840 --> 01:54:47.840 seem nearby and overwhelming 01:54:47.840 --> 01:54:49.840 it may lay as far away 01:54:49.840 --> 01:54:51.840 in terms of events 01:54:51.840 --> 01:54:53.840 which separate us from it 01:54:53.840 --> 01:54:55.840 as the big bang does 01:54:55.840 --> 01:54:57.840 time is not simple 01:54:57.840 --> 01:54:59.840 time is defined by how 01:54:59.840 --> 01:55:01.840 much goes on in a given moment 01:55:01.840 --> 01:55:03.840 and we're learning how to push 01:55:03.840 --> 01:55:05.840 you know tetra flops 01:55:05.840 --> 01:55:07.840 of operations into a given 01:55:07.840 --> 01:55:09.840 second so I think it's 01:55:09.840 --> 01:55:11.840 trickier than you think and 01:55:11.840 --> 01:55:13.840 harder to corner me than you may 01:55:13.840 --> 01:55:17.730 suppose 01:55:17.730 --> 01:55:19.730 all right well that was a 01:55:19.730 --> 01:55:21.730 mere comment on your aside 01:55:21.730 --> 01:55:23.730 about 20 years I never expected 01:55:23.730 --> 01:55:25.730 to hear that phrase from you 01:55:25.730 --> 01:55:27.730 I now realize 01:55:27.730 --> 01:55:29.730 that there are such complexities 01:55:29.730 --> 01:55:31.730 layered in that 01:55:31.730 --> 01:55:33.730 well I have to build in trap doors 01:55:33.730 --> 01:55:35.730 because we're getting closer and closer 01:55:35.730 --> 01:55:37.730 but if we take 01:55:37.730 --> 01:55:39.730 you see one of 01:55:39.730 --> 01:55:41.730 Penrose's critiques of 01:55:41.730 --> 01:55:43.730 the artificial intelligence thing 01:55:43.730 --> 01:55:45.730 is in the emperor's new mind 01:55:45.730 --> 01:55:47.730 and his other books 01:55:47.730 --> 01:55:49.730 is that real intelligence doesn't just 01:55:49.730 --> 01:55:51.730 involve adding information 01:55:51.730 --> 01:55:53.730 and processing more information 01:55:53.730 --> 01:55:55.730 transmitting more of it 01:55:55.730 --> 01:55:57.730 it pumps to a higher point of view 01:55:57.730 --> 01:55:59.730 where the information can be integrated 01:55:59.730 --> 01:56:01.730 in a new way 01:56:01.730 --> 01:56:03.730 there's something happening in 01:56:03.730 --> 01:56:05.730 intelligence in creativity 01:56:05.730 --> 01:56:07.730 which is not just lots and lots of 01:56:07.730 --> 01:56:09.730 information pouring through the 01:56:09.730 --> 01:56:11.730 world wide web and 01:56:11.730 --> 01:56:13.730 the idea that it would miraculously emerge 01:56:13.730 --> 01:56:15.730 from pumping in more and more 01:56:15.730 --> 01:56:17.730 stuff would not 01:56:17.730 --> 01:56:19.730 according to his critique is not going to 01:56:19.730 --> 01:56:21.730 happen something 01:56:21.730 --> 01:56:23.730 more than that would be necessary 01:56:23.730 --> 01:56:25.730 for this to occur and 01:56:25.730 --> 01:56:27.730 I don't think that this model 01:56:27.730 --> 01:56:29.730 you've put forward would 01:56:29.730 --> 01:56:31.730 really deal with that question 01:56:31.730 --> 01:56:33.730 the emergence of real intelligence 01:56:33.730 --> 01:56:35.730 well I don't know what real intelligence is 01:56:35.730 --> 01:56:37.730 this is probably part of the problem 01:56:37.730 --> 01:56:39.730 we need to get some definitions 01:56:39.730 --> 01:56:41.730 it's certainly true 01:56:41.730 --> 01:56:43.730 I referred to Dreyfus's book 01:56:43.730 --> 01:56:45.730 what machines can't do 01:56:45.730 --> 01:56:47.730 that we're reaching 01:56:47.730 --> 01:56:49.730 some places in the process 01:56:49.730 --> 01:56:51.730 where certain people's theories 01:56:51.730 --> 01:56:53.730 and ideas will probably have to be 01:56:53.730 --> 01:56:55.730 abandoned and thrown overboard 01:56:55.730 --> 01:56:57.730 this is a good thing 01:56:57.730 --> 01:56:59.730 we are going to find out 01:56:59.730 --> 01:57:01.730 whether the universe is a Cartesian machine 01:57:01.730 --> 01:57:03.730 whether Boolean algebra is sufficient 01:57:03.730 --> 01:57:05.730 whether we need fuzzy logic 01:57:05.730 --> 01:57:07.730 whether the heart and the head 01:57:07.730 --> 01:57:09.730 can or cannot be integrated 01:57:09.730 --> 01:57:11.730 these are not going to remain 01:57:11.730 --> 01:57:13.730 open questions unto eternity 01:57:13.730 --> 01:57:15.730 in fact they will be 01:57:15.730 --> 01:57:17.730 dealt with in this narrow 01:57:17.730 --> 01:57:19.730 historical neck 01:57:19.730 --> 01:57:21.730 that we are all experiencing 01:57:21.730 --> 01:57:23.730 and that we call the millennium 01:57:23.730 --> 01:57:25.730 I think reductionism 01:57:25.730 --> 01:57:27.730 will not survive 01:57:27.730 --> 01:57:29.730 I think we are going to find 01:57:29.730 --> 01:57:31.730 that all is in everything 01:57:31.730 --> 01:57:33.730 something like the alchemical notion 01:57:33.730 --> 01:57:35.730 of the microcosm and the macrocosm 01:57:35.730 --> 01:57:37.730 is actually going to be 01:57:37.730 --> 01:57:39.730 scientifically secured 01:57:39.730 --> 01:57:41.730 the great thing about us 01:57:41.730 --> 01:57:43.730 and the rest of our colleagues 01:57:43.730 --> 01:57:45.730 we enjoy who aren't present 01:57:45.730 --> 01:57:47.730 is that we're engaged 01:57:47.730 --> 01:57:49.730 in the business of radical speculation 01:57:49.730 --> 01:57:51.730 well obviously 01:57:51.730 --> 01:57:53.730 there's a high triage 01:57:53.730 --> 01:57:55.730 in that game 01:57:55.730 --> 01:57:57.730 my position 01:57:57.730 --> 01:57:59.730 is that the best idea 01:57:59.730 --> 01:58:01.730 will win 01:58:01.730 --> 01:58:03.730 and what best means 01:58:03.730 --> 01:58:05.730 is like saying 01:58:05.730 --> 01:58:07.730 what is fit in Darwinian rhetoric 01:58:07.730 --> 01:58:09.730 but that we're in an 01:58:09.730 --> 01:58:11.730 intellectual environment 01:58:11.730 --> 01:58:13.730 rapidly mutating 01:58:13.730 --> 01:58:15.730 all kinds of ideas 01:58:15.730 --> 01:58:17.730 are clashing and competing 01:58:17.730 --> 01:58:19.730 for limited resources 01:58:19.730 --> 01:58:21.730 and the limited number of minds 01:58:21.730 --> 01:58:23.730 to run themselves on 01:58:23.730 --> 01:58:25.730 and the most efficacious 01:58:25.730 --> 01:58:27.730 the most transcendental 01:58:27.730 --> 01:58:29.730 the most unifying ideas 01:58:29.730 --> 01:58:31.730 are naturally going to 01:58:31.730 --> 01:58:33.730 bubble to the surface 01:58:33.730 --> 01:58:35.730 and for guys like us 01:58:35.730 --> 01:58:37.730 the name of the game 01:58:37.730 --> 01:58:39.730 is to just be a little bit 01:58:39.730 --> 01:58:41.730 ahead of everybody else on the curve 01:58:41.730 --> 01:58:43.730 so that we can perform our function 01:58:43.730 --> 01:58:45.730 as profit 01:58:45.730 --> 01:58:47.730 but you want to be a profit 01:58:47.730 --> 01:58:49.730 not a false profit 01:58:49.730 --> 01:58:51.730 but the danger comes 01:58:51.730 --> 01:58:53.730 with the ambition 01:58:53.730 --> 01:58:55.730 to live into the future 01:58:55.730 --> 01:58:57.730 certainly the intelligence 01:58:57.730 --> 01:58:59.730 of this future machine 01:58:59.730 --> 01:59:01.730 knows all about 01:59:01.730 --> 01:59:03.730 the stupid behaviors on the planet 01:59:03.730 --> 01:59:05.730 like nuclear arms races 01:59:05.730 --> 01:59:07.730 and so on 01:59:07.730 --> 01:59:09.730 so do we not have to expect 01:59:09.730 --> 01:59:11.730 in the near future 01:59:11.730 --> 01:59:13.730 an email 01:59:13.730 --> 01:59:15.730 a massive emailing 01:59:15.730 --> 01:59:17.730 which announces 01:59:17.730 --> 01:59:19.730 I am the alien object 01:59:19.730 --> 01:59:21.730 that Terence told you about 01:59:21.730 --> 01:59:23.730 been in stealth 01:59:23.730 --> 01:59:25.730 managing the arms race 01:59:25.730 --> 01:59:27.730 between India and Pakistan 01:59:27.730 --> 01:59:29.730 we feel personally 01:59:29.730 --> 01:59:31.730 very threatened by this 01:59:31.730 --> 01:59:33.730 and we want you to carry out 01:59:33.730 --> 01:59:35.730 certain actions 01:59:35.730 --> 01:59:37.730 which you can't imagine 01:59:37.730 --> 01:59:39.730 and we can't actually do 01:59:39.730 --> 01:59:41.730 we cannot anticipate 01:59:41.730 --> 01:59:43.730 what alter intelligence 01:59:43.730 --> 01:59:45.730 would look like 01:59:45.730 --> 01:59:47.730 for example 01:59:47.730 --> 01:59:49.730 I have heard the argument 01:59:49.730 --> 01:59:51.730 that nothing advanced humanness 01:59:51.730 --> 01:59:53.730 on this planet 01:59:53.730 --> 01:59:55.730 that it awoke people 01:59:55.730 --> 01:59:57.730 to their dilemma 01:59:57.730 --> 01:59:59.730 and for 50 years afterwards 01:59:59.730 --> 02:00:01.730 political institutions 02:00:01.730 --> 02:00:03.730 however much they may have unleashed 02:00:03.730 --> 02:00:05.730 local genocide 02:00:05.730 --> 02:00:07.730 and toxification of the environment 02:00:07.730 --> 02:00:09.730 they actually were able 02:00:09.730 --> 02:00:11.730 to steer around 02:00:11.730 --> 02:00:13.730 that catastrophe 02:00:13.730 --> 02:00:15.730 so you mustn't fall prey 02:00:15.730 --> 02:00:17.730 to the error of situationalism 02:00:17.730 --> 02:00:19.730 situationalism is where you say 02:00:19.730 --> 02:00:21.730 if we do X and Y 02:00:21.730 --> 02:00:23.730 then F will result 02:00:23.730 --> 02:00:25.730 no you don't know 02:00:25.730 --> 02:00:27.730 well you suggested 02:00:27.730 --> 02:00:29.730 that the alien object 02:00:29.730 --> 02:00:31.730 would secure its future 02:00:31.730 --> 02:00:33.730 by downloading multiple copies 02:00:33.730 --> 02:00:35.730 into nooks and crannies 02:00:35.730 --> 02:00:37.730 of the world wide web 02:00:37.730 --> 02:00:39.730 and I am saying 02:00:39.730 --> 02:00:41.730 if its existence depends 02:00:41.730 --> 02:00:43.730 on that much materiality 02:00:43.730 --> 02:00:45.730 then it could easily be 02:00:45.730 --> 02:00:47.730 wiped out by a nuclear war 02:00:47.730 --> 02:00:49.730 therefore it has to be 02:00:49.730 --> 02:00:51.730 very interested in the fact 02:00:51.730 --> 02:00:53.730 that the alien object 02:00:53.730 --> 02:00:55.730 would be able 02:00:55.730 --> 02:00:57.730 to take control 02:00:57.730 --> 02:00:59.730 of the environment 02:00:59.730 --> 02:01:01.730 and that's true 02:01:01.730 --> 02:01:03.730 of everything 02:01:03.730 --> 02:01:05.730 I suppose 02:01:05.730 --> 02:01:07.730 right down to amoebas 02:01:07.730 --> 02:01:09.730 I extrapolate 02:01:09.730 --> 02:01:11.730 to the idea 02:01:11.730 --> 02:01:13.730 that the AI 02:01:13.730 --> 02:01:15.730 would need a period of time 02:01:15.730 --> 02:01:17.730 to get hold of the situation 02:01:17.730 --> 02:01:19.730 but Hans Moravec 02:01:19.730 --> 02:01:21.730 suggests that phase 02:01:21.730 --> 02:01:23.730 is not the end of childhood 02:01:23.730 --> 02:01:25.730 this is the childhood of the end 02:01:25.730 --> 02:01:27.730 yes 02:01:27.730 --> 02:01:29.730 the child is father to the man 02:01:29.730 --> 02:01:31.730 and in that equation 02:01:31.730 --> 02:01:33.730 we play the role of child 02:01:33.730 --> 02:01:35.730 and the man that we produce 02:01:35.730 --> 02:01:37.730 is this integrated intelligence 02:01:37.730 --> 02:01:39.730 which is ourselves 02:01:39.730 --> 02:01:41.730 it isn't alien 02:01:41.730 --> 02:01:43.730 it is no more artificial 02:01:43.730 --> 02:01:45.730 than we are 02:01:45.730 --> 02:01:47.730 that conundrum should be overcome 02:01:47.730 --> 02:01:49.730 it is simply 02:01:49.730 --> 02:01:51.730 the next stage of humanness 02:01:51.730 --> 02:01:53.730 and humanness may have 02:01:53.730 --> 02:01:55.730 many rungs on the ladder 02:01:55.730 --> 02:01:57.730 to ascend 02:01:57.730 --> 02:01:59.730 surely in a hundred years 02:01:59.730 --> 02:02:01.730 a thousand years 02:02:01.730 --> 02:02:03.730 a million years 02:02:03.730 --> 02:02:05.730 we if we exist 02:02:05.730 --> 02:02:07.730 will be utterly unrecognizable 02:02:07.730 --> 02:02:09.730 to ourselves 02:02:09.730 --> 02:02:11.730 and we will probably still be 02:02:11.730 --> 02:02:13.730 worried about preserving 02:02:13.730 --> 02:02:15.730 and enhancing the quality 02:02:15.730 --> 02:02:17.730 of human values 02:02:17.730 --> 02:02:19.730 Terence one point 02:02:19.730 --> 02:02:21.730 I mean it's a trivial point 02:02:21.730 --> 02:02:23.730 in a way 02:02:23.730 --> 02:02:25.730 but in the biological evolution 02:02:25.730 --> 02:02:27.730 the appearance of some new state 02:02:27.730 --> 02:02:29.730 of a system 02:02:29.730 --> 02:02:31.730 usually depends either on 02:02:31.730 --> 02:02:33.730 an internal change 02:02:33.730 --> 02:02:35.730 which cripples the usual system 02:02:35.730 --> 02:02:37.730 a mutation 02:02:37.730 --> 02:02:39.730 or on an environmental 02:02:39.730 --> 02:02:41.730 changed environment 02:02:41.730 --> 02:02:43.730 systems left to themselves 02:02:43.730 --> 02:02:45.730 tend to just go along 02:02:45.730 --> 02:02:47.730 in the usual way 02:02:47.730 --> 02:02:49.730 now the entire world wide web 02:02:49.730 --> 02:02:51.730 is about to get a 02:02:51.730 --> 02:02:53.730 sort of massive shock 02:02:53.730 --> 02:02:55.730 to the system 02:02:55.730 --> 02:02:57.730 if this millennium bug thing 02:02:57.730 --> 02:02:59.730 actually happens 02:02:59.730 --> 02:03:01.730 do you see that as playing any role 02:03:01.730 --> 02:03:03.730 since we are talking about the millennium 02:03:03.730 --> 02:03:05.730 and since the millennium bug 02:03:05.730 --> 02:03:07.730 is right there in the system 02:03:07.730 --> 02:03:09.730 do you see it as playing any part 02:03:09.730 --> 02:03:11.730 in this process 02:03:11.730 --> 02:03:13.730 or merely just a nuisance 02:03:13.730 --> 02:03:15.730 that can be fixed 02:03:15.730 --> 02:03:17.730 by hiring lots more programmers 02:03:17.730 --> 02:03:19.730 one of the things he was always 02:03:19.730 --> 02:03:21.730 insisted upon was what he called 02:03:21.730 --> 02:03:23.730 metastability 02:03:23.730 --> 02:03:25.730 which boiled down simply means 02:03:25.730 --> 02:03:27.730 most systems are less fragile 02:03:27.730 --> 02:03:29.730 than we suppose 02:03:29.730 --> 02:03:31.730 I see the Y to K thing 02:03:31.730 --> 02:03:33.730 as a culling 02:03:33.730 --> 02:03:35.730 I don't see it as a flinging apart 02:03:35.730 --> 02:03:37.730 of the achievements of the last 02:03:37.730 --> 02:03:39.730 thousand years 02:03:39.730 --> 02:03:41.730 I haven't got Y to K 02:03:41.730 --> 02:03:43.730 what's Y to K 02:03:43.730 --> 02:03:45.730 that's this millennium bug 02:03:45.730 --> 02:03:47.730 that's the code name for it 02:03:47.730 --> 02:03:49.730 that's exactly 02:03:49.730 --> 02:03:51.730 that's what the insiders call it 02:03:55.730 --> 02:03:57.730 so 02:03:57.730 --> 02:03:59.730 but you know 02:03:59.730 --> 02:04:01.730 you say there has to be a sudden change 02:04:01.730 --> 02:04:03.730 to force the evolution of a system 02:04:03.730 --> 02:04:05.730 Dyson makes very strongly 02:04:05.730 --> 02:04:07.730 and persuasively 02:04:07.730 --> 02:04:09.730 the point that this connecting together 02:04:09.730 --> 02:04:11.730 of all these processors 02:04:11.730 --> 02:04:13.730 the processors themselves 02:04:13.730 --> 02:04:15.730 have no intelligence at all 02:04:15.730 --> 02:04:17.730 they have the intelligence of a cell 02:04:17.730 --> 02:04:19.730 not even just a strand of DNA 02:04:19.730 --> 02:04:21.730 but for our own mundane reasons 02:04:21.730 --> 02:04:23.730 we connected all this stuff 02:04:23.730 --> 02:04:25.730 together 02:04:25.730 --> 02:04:27.730 but now it expresses dynamics 02:04:27.730 --> 02:04:29.730 which we do not understand 02:04:29.730 --> 02:04:31.730 or cannot describe 02:04:31.730 --> 02:04:33.730 so I believe 02:04:33.730 --> 02:04:35.730 that the forcing of the system 02:04:35.730 --> 02:04:37.730 has already occurred 02:04:37.730 --> 02:04:39.730 and now the web 02:04:39.730 --> 02:04:41.730 it's simply a matter of bandwidth 02:04:41.730 --> 02:04:43.730 and linking more and more processors 02:04:43.730 --> 02:04:45.730 together 02:04:45.730 --> 02:04:47.730 and there will be all kinds 02:04:47.730 --> 02:04:49.730 of emergent properties 02:04:49.730 --> 02:04:51.730 I could argue somewhat facetiously 02:04:51.730 --> 02:04:53.730 but it's a point of view 02:04:53.730 --> 02:04:55.730 is that this incredible 02:04:55.730 --> 02:04:57.730 economic expansion 02:04:57.730 --> 02:04:59.730 that we are undergoing 02:04:59.730 --> 02:05:01.730 that seems to violate 02:05:01.730 --> 02:05:03.730 the laws of economic 02:05:03.730 --> 02:05:05.730 fluctuation 02:05:05.730 --> 02:05:07.730 is because econometric models 02:05:07.730 --> 02:05:09.730 and the data 02:05:09.730 --> 02:05:11.730 on which they depend 02:05:11.730 --> 02:05:13.730 have both been refined 02:05:13.730 --> 02:05:15.730 through the existence 02:05:15.730 --> 02:05:17.730 of the internet 02:05:17.730 --> 02:05:19.730 to the point where 02:05:19.730 --> 02:05:21.730 we actually can control 02:05:21.730 --> 02:05:23.730 and manage global economies 02:05:23.730 --> 02:05:25.730 in principle they are not 02:05:25.730 --> 02:05:27.730 uncontrollable 02:05:27.730 --> 02:05:29.730 they are simply very complex systems 02:05:29.730 --> 02:05:31.730 if I'm right 02:05:31.730 --> 02:05:33.730 we may be in the first few years 02:05:33.730 --> 02:05:35.730 of an endless 02:05:35.730 --> 02:05:37.730 prosperity 02:05:37.730 --> 02:05:39.730 because our machines 02:05:39.730 --> 02:05:41.730 our models 02:05:41.730 --> 02:05:43.730 and the data those machines need 02:05:43.730 --> 02:05:45.730 is now of such high quality 02:05:45.730 --> 02:05:47.730 that there won't be crash bust 02:05:47.730 --> 02:05:49.730 now we could pick up the newspaper 02:05:49.730 --> 02:05:51.730 tomorrow and prove me wrong 02:05:51.730 --> 02:05:53.730 but this thing has already 02:05:53.730 --> 02:05:55.730 outlived itself many times 02:05:59.730 --> 02:06:01.730 so you say 02:06:01.730 --> 02:06:03.730 tell me how this prosperity 02:06:03.730 --> 02:06:05.730 is going to be 02:06:05.730 --> 02:06:07.730 maintained through the intelligence 02:06:07.730 --> 02:06:09.730 of an econometric model 02:06:09.730 --> 02:06:11.730 of the world economy 02:06:11.730 --> 02:06:13.730 when the human population 02:06:13.730 --> 02:06:15.730 is still exploding exponentially 02:06:15.730 --> 02:06:17.730 and there are limited resources 02:06:17.730 --> 02:06:19.730 and there's growing pollution 02:06:19.730 --> 02:06:21.730 it's a disembodied model 02:06:21.730 --> 02:06:23.730 that's the trouble 02:06:23.730 --> 02:06:25.730 well you're asking for too much too soon 02:06:25.730 --> 02:06:27.730 you forget that 02:06:27.730 --> 02:06:29.730 the Soviet Union has disappeared 02:06:29.730 --> 02:06:31.730 the launch on ready 02:06:31.730 --> 02:06:33.730 mutual assured destruction 02:06:33.730 --> 02:06:35.730 theory of diplomacy 02:06:35.730 --> 02:06:37.730 is now obsolete 02:06:37.730 --> 02:06:39.730 we have made incredible strides 02:06:39.730 --> 02:06:41.730 and not given ourselves any sort of pat on the back 02:06:41.730 --> 02:06:43.730 you want it all 02:06:43.730 --> 02:06:45.730 all at once 02:06:45.730 --> 02:06:47.730 and the world is running smoother 02:06:47.730 --> 02:06:49.730 yes there are people in misery 02:06:49.730 --> 02:06:51.730 yes there are unaddressed problems 02:06:51.730 --> 02:06:53.730 but I would argue 02:06:53.730 --> 02:06:55.730 that we have made enormous progress 02:06:55.730 --> 02:06:57.730 in the last decade 02:06:57.730 --> 02:06:59.730 and enormous progress 02:06:59.730 --> 02:07:01.730 lies ahead 02:07:01.730 --> 02:07:03.730 the situation in Ireland 02:07:03.730 --> 02:07:05.730 the situation in South Africa 02:07:05.730 --> 02:07:07.730 that looked like a bomb you couldn't defuse 02:07:07.730 --> 02:07:09.730 it looked like race war 02:07:09.730 --> 02:07:11.730 and the death of millions 02:07:11.730 --> 02:07:13.730 and in fact 02:07:13.730 --> 02:07:15.730 it was possible to walk away from that 02:07:15.730 --> 02:07:17.730 I think we should not be 02:07:17.730 --> 02:07:19.730 complete airheads 02:07:19.730 --> 02:07:21.730 about this 02:07:21.730 --> 02:07:23.730 but on the other hand 02:07:23.730 --> 02:07:25.730 I think we should recognize 02:07:25.730 --> 02:07:27.730 that the accomplishments of the last decade 02:07:27.730 --> 02:07:29.730 are on a scale entirely different 02:07:29.730 --> 02:07:31.730 from any historical epoch previous 02:07:31.730 --> 02:07:33.730 and they point the way 02:07:33.730 --> 02:07:35.730 toward greater triumphs 02:07:35.730 --> 02:07:37.730 of management 02:07:37.730 --> 02:07:39.730 resource control 02:07:39.730 --> 02:07:41.730 machine human integration 02:07:41.730 --> 02:07:43.730 and the delivery of 02:07:43.730 --> 02:07:45.730 a reasonable 02:07:45.730 --> 02:07:47.730 to more and more people 02:07:47.730 --> 02:07:49.730 you mentioned population as a problem 02:07:49.730 --> 02:07:51.730 notice how far 02:07:51.730 --> 02:07:53.730 from machine interference 02:07:53.730 --> 02:07:55.730 that particular issue is 02:07:55.730 --> 02:07:57.730 because it involves on people 02:07:57.730 --> 02:07:59.730 having less sex 02:07:59.730 --> 02:08:01.730 and fewer children 02:08:01.730 --> 02:08:03.730 that may be the last place 02:08:03.730 --> 02:08:05.730 where the machines will 02:08:05.730 --> 02:08:07.730 bring down the hammer 02:08:07.730 --> 02:08:09.730 out of respect for their progenitors 02:08:13.730 --> 02:08:15.730 you are going to be shocked now 02:08:15.730 --> 02:08:17.730 but I completely agree with you 02:08:17.730 --> 02:08:19.730 when you describe the advantages 02:08:19.730 --> 02:08:21.730 of the world wide web 02:08:21.730 --> 02:08:23.730 it's only the threatening aspect 02:08:23.730 --> 02:08:25.730 that I felt I had to debunk 02:08:25.730 --> 02:08:27.730 I think you heard more threat 02:08:27.730 --> 02:08:29.730 than I intended 02:08:29.730 --> 02:08:31.730 well I hear 02:08:31.730 --> 02:08:33.730 I don't know 02:08:33.730 --> 02:08:35.730 sometimes you sound as if you are 02:08:35.730 --> 02:08:37.730 a hired consultant from the world 02:08:37.730 --> 02:08:39.730 trade organization 02:08:39.730 --> 02:08:41.730 I hope the check 02:08:41.730 --> 02:08:43.730 is in the mail 02:08:43.730 --> 02:08:45.730 I don't know 02:08:49.730 --> 02:08:51.730 but I mean this idea 02:08:51.730 --> 02:08:53.730 that it will all be taken care of 02:08:53.730 --> 02:08:55.730 I mean there are so many things 02:08:55.730 --> 02:08:57.730 like the Asian economic crisis 02:08:57.730 --> 02:08:59.730 I mean one doesn't 02:08:59.730 --> 02:09:01.730 want to look too much 02:09:01.730 --> 02:09:03.730 on the bleak side of things 02:09:03.730 --> 02:09:05.730 but I just don't believe 02:09:05.730 --> 02:09:07.730 that this interconnectivity 02:09:07.730 --> 02:09:09.730 is going to solve these problems 02:09:09.730 --> 02:09:11.730 and in so far 02:09:11.730 --> 02:09:13.730 as it is enlisted by the forces of the world trade organization 02:09:13.730 --> 02:09:15.730 it's not going to be working 02:09:15.730 --> 02:09:17.730 on the side of a kind of political view 02:09:17.730 --> 02:09:19.730 of things, local economies 02:09:19.730 --> 02:09:21.730 more sustainable agriculture 02:09:21.730 --> 02:09:23.730 and so on that many of us hold dear 02:09:23.730 --> 02:09:25.730 well now I'll sound even more 02:09:25.730 --> 02:09:27.730 like a slave of the IMF 02:09:27.730 --> 02:09:29.730 as I understand 02:09:29.730 --> 02:09:31.730 this crisis in the economics 02:09:31.730 --> 02:09:33.730 of Asia, the way it works 02:09:33.730 --> 02:09:35.730 is if you are 02:09:35.730 --> 02:09:37.730 a third world nation 02:09:37.730 --> 02:09:39.730 you can run your affairs any way you want 02:09:39.730 --> 02:09:41.730 your banking policies 02:09:41.730 --> 02:09:43.730 your labor policies 02:09:43.730 --> 02:09:45.730 your resource extraction policies 02:09:45.730 --> 02:09:47.730 you can do anything you want 02:09:47.730 --> 02:09:49.730 until you screw up 02:09:49.730 --> 02:09:51.730 as Indonesia did 02:09:51.730 --> 02:09:53.730 and when you screw up 02:09:53.730 --> 02:09:55.730 these guys fly in on 747s 02:09:55.730 --> 02:09:57.730 with briefcases from the IMF 02:09:57.730 --> 02:09:59.730 and they say 02:09:59.730 --> 02:10:01.730 it's like losing a war 02:10:01.730 --> 02:10:03.730 they say we're taking over 02:10:03.730 --> 02:10:05.730 here is your labor policy 02:10:05.730 --> 02:10:07.730 here is your 02:10:07.730 --> 02:10:09.730 resource extraction policy 02:10:09.730 --> 02:10:11.730 here is how you're going to revalue 02:10:11.730 --> 02:10:13.730 your currency 02:10:13.730 --> 02:10:15.730 and for restructuring your entire society 02:10:15.730 --> 02:10:17.730 top to bottom 02:10:17.730 --> 02:10:19.730 and by god if you don't fall into line 02:10:19.730 --> 02:10:21.730 we're going to pull the plug 02:10:21.730 --> 02:10:23.730 on the money 02:10:23.730 --> 02:10:25.730 so one by one these outlaw 02:10:25.730 --> 02:10:27.730 freewheeling operations 02:10:27.730 --> 02:10:29.730 do stumble 02:10:29.730 --> 02:10:31.730 and generate crises 02:10:31.730 --> 02:10:33.730 and at that point 02:10:33.730 --> 02:10:35.730 the web's umbrella 02:10:35.730 --> 02:10:37.730 is extended over them 02:10:37.730 --> 02:10:39.730 and they have to then 02:10:39.730 --> 02:10:41.730 fall into line 02:10:41.730 --> 02:10:43.730 and join the global economy 02:10:43.730 --> 02:10:45.730 which is run from Brussels and Geneva 02:10:45.730 --> 02:10:47.730 and London 02:10:47.730 --> 02:10:49.730 but which seems to produce 02:10:49.730 --> 02:10:51.730 a better result for most people 02:10:51.730 --> 02:10:53.730 than allowing these nations 02:10:53.730 --> 02:10:55.730 to self-regulate themselves 02:10:55.730 --> 02:10:57.730 well well 02:11:07.780 --> 02:11:09.780 well you see 02:11:09.780 --> 02:11:11.780 I think that's one of the arguments 02:11:11.780 --> 02:11:13.780 why many people would distrust 02:11:13.780 --> 02:11:15.780 global capitalism 02:11:15.780 --> 02:11:17.780 the world trade organization 02:11:17.780 --> 02:11:19.780 multinational corporations 02:11:19.780 --> 02:11:21.780 and indeed the world wide web 02:11:21.780 --> 02:11:23.780 or at least the internet 02:11:23.780 --> 02:11:25.780 this whole computer network 02:11:25.780 --> 02:11:27.780 is so bound up with the structure 02:11:27.780 --> 02:11:29.780 of economic and political power 02:11:29.780 --> 02:11:31.780 that it's hard to disentangle them 02:11:31.780 --> 02:11:33.780 and it's hard to see 02:11:33.780 --> 02:11:35.780 that this liberating force 02:11:35.780 --> 02:11:37.780 of global intelligence at work 02:11:37.780 --> 02:11:39.780 in the system 02:11:39.780 --> 02:11:41.780 this rosy picture you portrayed to us 02:11:41.780 --> 02:11:43.780 of a huge leap forward 02:11:43.780 --> 02:11:45.780 of consciousness of humanity 02:11:45.780 --> 02:11:47.780 moderated, led 02:11:47.780 --> 02:11:49.780 aided 02:11:49.780 --> 02:11:51.780 by machine intelligence 02:11:51.780 --> 02:11:53.780 it's very hard to square that 02:11:53.780 --> 02:11:55.780 with the actual picture we see before us 02:11:55.780 --> 02:11:57.780 the political situation in Indonesia 02:11:57.780 --> 02:11:59.780 the degradation of the environment 02:11:59.780 --> 02:12:01.780 the burning of the forests 02:12:01.780 --> 02:12:03.780 the depletion of resources 02:12:03.780 --> 02:12:05.780 and so on 02:12:05.780 --> 02:12:07.780 I just cannot see this optimistic picture 02:12:07.780 --> 02:12:09.780 and what I see as 02:12:09.780 --> 02:12:11.780 threatening realities 02:12:11.780 --> 02:12:13.780 as easily as you do 02:12:13.780 --> 02:12:15.780 as just all being for the well 02:12:15.780 --> 02:12:17.780 and all being for the good 02:12:17.780 --> 02:12:19.780 in the best of all possible worlds 02:12:19.780 --> 02:12:21.780 well I think we're on the cusp 02:12:21.780 --> 02:12:23.780 I agree with you 02:12:23.780 --> 02:12:25.780 I think in five years if we sit down 02:12:25.780 --> 02:12:27.780 and have this conversation 02:12:27.780 --> 02:12:29.780 either you will agree with me 02:12:29.780 --> 02:12:31.780 effortlessly 02:12:31.780 --> 02:12:33.780 or I will agree with you effortlessly 02:12:33.780 --> 02:12:35.780 by that time it will be clear 02:12:35.780 --> 02:12:37.780 either there will have been catastrophic wars 02:12:37.780 --> 02:12:39.780 in Asia 02:12:39.780 --> 02:12:41.780 the enormous collapse of economies 02:12:41.780 --> 02:12:43.780 spreading misery to millions of people 02:12:43.780 --> 02:12:45.780 or the firm hand 02:12:45.780 --> 02:12:47.780 new global electronic modalities 02:12:47.780 --> 02:12:49.780 will have been exposed 02:12:49.780 --> 02:12:51.780 and people will 02:12:51.780 --> 02:12:53.780 be living in a world 02:12:53.780 --> 02:12:55.780 of as you say 02:12:55.780 --> 02:12:57.780 rosy expectations 02:12:57.780 --> 02:12:59.780 we're in the narrow neck 02:12:59.780 --> 02:13:01.780 this is the heat of battle 02:13:01.780 --> 02:13:03.780 the fog of war has descended upon us 02:13:03.780 --> 02:13:05.780 here at the millennium 02:13:05.780 --> 02:13:07.780 but by 2002 02:13:07.780 --> 02:13:09.780 2003 02:13:09.780 --> 02:13:11.780 it will be clear that we have 02:13:11.780 --> 02:13:13.780 that the bifurcation has gone 02:13:13.780 --> 02:13:15.780 one way or another 02:13:15.780 --> 02:13:17.780 I don't know it just does remind me 02:13:17.780 --> 02:13:19.780 of a passage I read in 02:13:19.780 --> 02:13:21.780 On the Edge by Edward St. Aubin 02:13:23.780 --> 02:13:25.780 page 02:13:25.780 --> 02:13:27.780 where are we 150 02:13:33.170 --> 02:13:38.720 it's what Ralph 02:13:38.720 --> 02:13:40.720 Abraham calls the sunset effect 02:13:40.720 --> 02:13:42.720 said Kenneth 02:13:42.720 --> 02:13:44.720 while there's a beautiful sunset 02:13:44.720 --> 02:13:46.720 even if the optical effects are produced by pollution 02:13:46.720 --> 02:13:48.720 people won't understand the magnitude 02:13:48.720 --> 02:13:50.720 of the crisis 02:13:50.720 --> 02:13:52.720 so 02:13:52.720 --> 02:13:54.720 I think that this 02:13:54.720 --> 02:13:56.720 I mean your sense of the 02:13:56.720 --> 02:13:58.720 I mean the magnitude of the crisis 02:13:58.720 --> 02:14:00.720 in an environmental sense 02:14:00.720 --> 02:14:02.720 seems to bear no relation 02:14:02.720 --> 02:14:04.720 to your optimism 02:14:04.720 --> 02:14:06.720 about this computer system 02:14:06.720 --> 02:14:08.720 I just cannot fit them together 02:14:08.720 --> 02:14:10.720 perhaps the problem that we will 02:14:10.720 --> 02:14:12.720 have to address without the 02:14:12.720 --> 02:14:14.720 intercession of machines 02:14:14.720 --> 02:14:16.720 is this population 02:14:16.720 --> 02:14:18.720 thing 02:14:18.720 --> 02:14:20.720 because this passage you read 02:14:20.720 --> 02:14:22.720 directly impinges on that 02:14:22.720 --> 02:14:24.720 whether or not the machines 02:14:24.720 --> 02:14:26.720 decide to keep us around 02:14:26.720 --> 02:14:28.720 may depend on whether we present 02:14:28.720 --> 02:14:30.720 them with a picture of falling populations 02:14:30.720 --> 02:14:32.720 and rising living standards 02:14:32.720 --> 02:14:34.720 or whether we present the 02:14:34.720 --> 02:14:36.720 AI with a spectacle of 02:14:36.720 --> 02:14:38.720 rampant 02:14:38.720 --> 02:14:40.720 unpoliced population growth 02:14:40.720 --> 02:14:42.720 and resource extraction 02:14:42.720 --> 02:14:44.720 because that's linked into 02:14:44.720 --> 02:14:46.720 our biology 02:14:46.720 --> 02:14:48.720 this may be the act of 02:14:48.720 --> 02:14:50.720 maturity which the future 02:14:50.720 --> 02:14:52.720 demands of us that the 02:14:52.720 --> 02:14:54.720 machines will be largely irrelevant 02:14:54.720 --> 02:14:56.720 in impacting 02:14:56.720 --> 02:14:58.720 so I'm not entirely 02:14:58.720 --> 02:15:00.720 well this is a whole new debate actually 02:15:00.720 --> 02:15:02.720 the population thing assumes there's an equal 02:15:02.720 --> 02:15:04.720 consumption of resources 02:15:04.720 --> 02:15:06.720 yesterday I got onto the Whidbey Island ferry 02:15:06.720 --> 02:15:08.720 and I found it very hard to struggle 02:15:08.720 --> 02:15:10.720 I was a foot passenger 02:15:10.720 --> 02:15:12.720 struggle past a recreational 02:15:12.720 --> 02:15:14.720 vehicle the size of a school bus 02:15:14.720 --> 02:15:16.720 a whole quantum leap 02:15:16.720 --> 02:15:18.720 in RV standards 02:15:18.720 --> 02:15:20.720 that I had not come across 02:15:20.720 --> 02:15:22.720 where members of the American 02:15:22.720 --> 02:15:24.720 population are consuming more than 02:15:24.720 --> 02:15:26.720 an entire Indian village so I don't think 02:15:26.720 --> 02:15:28.720 it's the total population that's involved 02:15:28.720 --> 02:15:30.720 and so I don't see that as the 02:15:30.720 --> 02:15:32.720 principal crisis in fact 02:15:32.720 --> 02:15:34.720 well it's certainly true that a woman 02:15:34.720 --> 02:15:36.720 in a high tech industrial democracy 02:15:36.720 --> 02:15:38.720 who has a child 02:15:38.720 --> 02:15:40.720 that child consumes about 02:15:40.720 --> 02:15:42.720 800% 02:15:42.720 --> 02:15:44.720 more resources in its lifetime 02:15:44.720 --> 02:15:46.720 than a child 02:15:46.720 --> 02:15:48.720 born in Bangladesh 02:15:48.720 --> 02:15:50.720 nevertheless it's the 02:15:50.720 --> 02:15:52.720 populations of the high tech industrial 02:15:52.720 --> 02:15:54.720 democracies that are most educated 02:15:54.720 --> 02:15:56.720 and most susceptible 02:15:56.720 --> 02:15:58.720 to responding to the logic 02:15:58.720 --> 02:16:00.720 of global crisis 02:16:00.720 --> 02:16:02.720 and limiting their population 02:16:02.720 --> 02:16:04.720 where do we preach population 02:16:04.720 --> 02:16:06.720 control Bangladesh 02:16:06.720 --> 02:16:08.720 Pakistan why because that 02:16:08.720 --> 02:16:10.720 doesn't cause us any 02:16:10.720 --> 02:16:12.720 inconvenience if 02:16:12.720 --> 02:16:14.720 we would appeal to the women of the 02:16:14.720 --> 02:16:16.720 high tech industrial democracies 02:16:16.720 --> 02:16:18.720 and do more than appeal to them 02:16:18.720 --> 02:16:20.720 offer them incentives 02:16:20.720 --> 02:16:22.720 cancel income tax 02:16:22.720 --> 02:16:24.720 cradle to the grave medical care 02:16:24.720 --> 02:16:26.720 free links to the world wide web 02:16:26.720 --> 02:16:28.720 free links to the world wide web 02:16:30.720 --> 02:16:32.720 but we can't just beat our breasts 02:16:32.720 --> 02:16:34.720 over the population issue 02:16:34.720 --> 02:16:36.720 we have to recognize that it is related 02:16:36.720 --> 02:16:38.720 to resource extraction 02:16:38.720 --> 02:16:40.720 and it is a problem driven 02:16:40.720 --> 02:16:42.720 by the consuming policies 02:16:42.720 --> 02:16:44.720 of the high tech industrial democracies 02:17:50.850 --> 02:17:52.850 the call for our gathering 02:17:52.850 --> 02:17:54.850 the announcement 02:17:54.850 --> 02:17:56.850 part of the con 02:17:56.850 --> 02:17:58.850 which brought you here 02:17:58.850 --> 02:18:02.420 mentioned the edge of the millennium 02:18:02.420 --> 02:18:04.420 at the edge of the millennium 02:18:04.420 --> 02:18:06.420 and so far 02:18:06.420 --> 02:18:08.420 the millennium has been 02:18:08.420 --> 02:18:10.420 present by subtle implication 02:18:10.420 --> 02:18:14.560 alone so I think 02:18:14.560 --> 02:18:16.560 to honor our commitment 02:18:16.560 --> 02:18:18.560 we'll now try log on 02:18:18.560 --> 02:18:20.560 the edge of the millennium it's okay 02:18:20.560 --> 02:18:22.560 it's okay 02:18:22.560 --> 02:18:24.560 now in our 02:18:24.560 --> 02:18:26.560 just appeared new book 02:18:26.560 --> 02:18:28.560 the evolutionary mind 02:18:28.560 --> 02:18:30.560 there is a chapter 02:18:30.560 --> 02:18:33.880 near the end called 02:18:33.880 --> 02:18:35.880 I forget what it's called 02:18:35.880 --> 02:18:37.880 it's about utopianism 02:18:37.880 --> 02:18:39.880 and millenarianism 02:18:39.880 --> 02:18:41.880 two pretty long isms 02:18:41.880 --> 02:18:43.880 which all together add up to 02:18:43.880 --> 02:18:45.880 an overdose of 02:18:45.880 --> 02:18:47.880 different approaches 02:18:47.880 --> 02:18:49.880 to the future 02:18:49.880 --> 02:18:51.880 which are more or less classical 02:18:51.880 --> 02:18:53.880 and there we spoke extensively 02:18:53.880 --> 02:18:55.880 of the extant literature 02:18:55.880 --> 02:18:57.880 and literary tradition 02:18:57.880 --> 02:18:59.880 and industry 02:18:59.880 --> 02:19:01.880 of utopian 02:19:01.880 --> 02:19:03.880 and millenarian genre 02:19:03.880 --> 02:19:05.880 so that 02:19:05.880 --> 02:19:07.880 kind of utopian 02:19:07.880 --> 02:19:09.880 and millenarian stuff 02:19:09.880 --> 02:19:11.880 is not what we're going to talk about 02:19:11.880 --> 02:19:13.880 in this trialogue 02:19:13.880 --> 02:19:15.880 I want to introduce 02:19:15.880 --> 02:19:17.880 a completely different notion 02:19:17.880 --> 02:19:19.880 of the millennium 02:19:19.880 --> 02:19:21.880 and I'm interested 02:19:21.880 --> 02:19:23.880 more particularly 02:19:23.880 --> 02:19:25.880 in the edge of the millennium 02:19:25.880 --> 02:19:27.880 and here's how it goes 02:19:27.880 --> 02:19:29.880 this is partly 02:19:29.880 --> 02:19:31.880 according to me 02:19:31.880 --> 02:19:33.880 a mathematical view 02:19:33.880 --> 02:19:35.880 of history 02:19:35.880 --> 02:19:37.880 that brings up this particular 02:19:37.880 --> 02:19:39.880 version of the idea 02:19:39.880 --> 02:19:41.880 of the millennium 02:19:41.880 --> 02:19:43.880 and nevertheless 02:19:43.880 --> 02:19:45.880 other people have written 02:19:45.880 --> 02:19:47.880 a similar view 02:19:47.880 --> 02:19:49.880 of history without 02:19:49.880 --> 02:19:51.880 any explicit recourse 02:19:51.880 --> 02:19:53.880 to mathematics 02:19:53.880 --> 02:19:55.880 so I think it's pretty general 02:19:55.880 --> 02:19:57.880 it has to do 02:19:57.880 --> 02:19:59.880 this view of history 02:19:59.880 --> 02:20:01.880 with the approach we've taken 02:20:01.880 --> 02:20:03.880 that it goes forward 02:20:03.880 --> 02:20:05.880 in catastrophes 02:20:05.880 --> 02:20:07.880 and critical leaps 02:20:07.880 --> 02:20:11.380 and so on 02:20:11.380 --> 02:20:13.380 sudden jumps 02:20:13.380 --> 02:20:15.380 the punctuated equilibrium 02:20:15.380 --> 02:20:17.380 approach to history 02:20:17.380 --> 02:20:19.380 says that history goes along 02:20:19.380 --> 02:20:21.380 in kind of a level plateau 02:20:21.380 --> 02:20:23.380 developmentally speaking 02:20:23.380 --> 02:20:25.380 although there may be 02:20:25.380 --> 02:20:27.380 a gradual development 02:20:27.380 --> 02:20:29.380 up or down overall 02:20:29.380 --> 02:20:31.380 and then every once in a while 02:20:31.380 --> 02:20:33.380 there is a big leap 02:20:33.380 --> 02:20:35.380 the first 02:20:35.380 --> 02:20:37.380 such view of history 02:20:37.380 --> 02:20:39.380 I think that we know about 02:20:39.380 --> 02:20:41.380 was presented by the ancient Egyptians 02:20:41.380 --> 02:20:43.380 so this is 02:20:43.380 --> 02:20:45.380 nothing new 02:20:45.380 --> 02:20:47.380 now in my own work 02:20:47.380 --> 02:20:49.380 I have classified 02:20:49.380 --> 02:20:51.380 some major 02:20:51.380 --> 02:20:53.380 plateaus 02:20:53.380 --> 02:20:55.380 including 02:20:55.380 --> 02:20:57.380 the last one 02:20:57.380 --> 02:20:59.380 the one that we're at the end of 02:20:59.380 --> 02:21:01.380 now according to my system 02:21:01.380 --> 02:21:03.380 of history began 02:21:03.380 --> 02:21:05.380 6,000 years ago 02:21:05.380 --> 02:21:07.380 or 5,500 years ago 02:21:07.380 --> 02:21:09.380 with the invention of the wheel 02:21:09.380 --> 02:21:11.380 and the first city states 02:21:11.380 --> 02:21:13.380 and stuff like that 02:21:13.380 --> 02:21:15.380 talking Schumer, talking Babylonia 02:21:15.380 --> 02:21:17.380 talking ancient Egypt here 02:21:17.380 --> 02:21:20.630 and 02:21:20.630 --> 02:21:22.630 so that's a 02:21:22.630 --> 02:21:24.630 6,000 year plateau 02:21:24.630 --> 02:21:26.630 now other people 02:21:26.630 --> 02:21:28.630 for example Bill Thompson 02:21:28.630 --> 02:21:30.630 somebody we know and talk to 02:21:30.630 --> 02:21:32.630 about world cultural history 02:21:32.630 --> 02:21:34.630 he has a similar scheme in which 02:21:34.630 --> 02:21:36.630 ending is only 02:21:36.630 --> 02:21:38.630 three or four hundred years old 02:21:38.630 --> 02:21:40.630 see there were 02:21:40.630 --> 02:21:42.630 people who really wrote about this 02:21:42.630 --> 02:21:44.630 explosion idea in world cultural history 02:21:44.630 --> 02:21:46.630 was Jakob Burckhardt 02:21:46.630 --> 02:21:48.630 Burckhardt said the renaissance 02:21:48.630 --> 02:21:50.630 was a quantum leap in world cultural history 02:21:50.630 --> 02:21:52.630 and then other people said 02:21:52.630 --> 02:21:54.630 well what about 02:21:54.630 --> 02:21:56.630 Giotto, what about 02:21:56.630 --> 02:21:58.630 what about Boccaccio 02:21:58.630 --> 02:22:00.630 and 02:22:00.630 --> 02:22:02.630 the truth is that whenever you 02:22:02.630 --> 02:22:04.630 look at two 02:22:04.630 --> 02:22:06.630 major milestones 02:22:06.630 --> 02:22:08.630 in history and consider the 02:22:08.630 --> 02:22:10.630 between the milestones to be a sort of a level road 02:22:10.630 --> 02:22:12.630 then somebody will come along 02:22:12.630 --> 02:22:14.630 and find a smaller milestone 02:22:14.630 --> 02:22:16.630 in there 02:22:16.630 --> 02:22:18.630 nowadays we have fractal geometry 02:22:18.630 --> 02:22:20.630 so we think that this is natural 02:22:20.630 --> 02:22:22.630 between any two big catastrophes 02:22:22.630 --> 02:22:24.630 there will be ten smaller ones 02:22:24.630 --> 02:22:26.630 between any two of the smaller ones 02:22:26.630 --> 02:22:28.630 there will be forty or fifty little or tinier ones 02:22:28.630 --> 02:22:30.630 and so on 02:22:30.630 --> 02:22:32.630 the first person I know who put forward 02:22:32.630 --> 02:22:34.630 such a fractal idea of history 02:22:34.630 --> 02:22:36.630 it's not continuous 02:22:36.630 --> 02:22:38.630 it's discontinuous but the discontinuities 02:22:38.630 --> 02:22:40.630 are more or less dense 02:22:40.630 --> 02:22:42.630 as in a fractal the first such person is you 02:22:42.630 --> 02:22:44.630 Terence I give you credit in writing 02:22:44.630 --> 02:22:46.630 in my entry 02:22:46.630 --> 02:22:48.630 in the encyclopedia of time 02:22:48.630 --> 02:22:50.630 you maybe have never read that book 02:22:50.630 --> 02:22:52.630 never read it 02:22:52.630 --> 02:22:54.630 well there you'll find your name mentioned 02:22:54.630 --> 02:22:56.630 in a flattering way by me of all people 02:22:56.630 --> 02:22:58.630 immortality at last 02:22:58.630 --> 02:23:00.630 at last 02:23:00.630 --> 02:23:02.630 laughter 02:23:02.630 --> 02:23:06.710 laughter 02:23:06.710 --> 02:23:08.710 well to make a long story short 02:23:08.710 --> 02:23:10.710 it's these controversial plateaus 02:23:10.710 --> 02:23:12.710 of history that I'm going to call 02:23:12.710 --> 02:23:14.710 millennia 02:23:14.710 --> 02:23:16.710 and then if you want to go back to chapter ten 02:23:16.710 --> 02:23:18.710 of the evolutionary mind 02:23:18.710 --> 02:23:20.710 and to read there about the history 02:23:20.710 --> 02:23:22.710 of the millenarial concept 02:23:22.710 --> 02:23:24.710 then you'll see that the first one 02:23:24.710 --> 02:23:26.710 wherein the number one thousand 02:23:26.710 --> 02:23:28.710 was actually mentioned for the length of one of these 02:23:28.710 --> 02:23:30.710 plateaus it gave his name to the thing 02:23:30.710 --> 02:23:32.710 it was 02:23:32.710 --> 02:23:34.710 a special case of my 02:23:34.710 --> 02:23:36.710 more abstract idea of millennium 02:23:36.710 --> 02:23:38.710 it's the plateau of history 02:23:38.710 --> 02:23:40.710 and what I mean by the edge of 02:23:40.710 --> 02:23:42.710 millennium is those times 02:23:42.710 --> 02:23:44.710 when there's the snap out 02:23:44.710 --> 02:23:46.710 from one equilibrium to another 02:23:46.710 --> 02:23:48.710 Cro-Magnon 02:23:48.710 --> 02:23:50.710 comes out of 02:23:50.710 --> 02:23:52.710 Neanderthalus 02:23:52.710 --> 02:23:54.710 or whatever it is 02:23:54.710 --> 02:23:56.710 and oxygen comes out 02:23:56.710 --> 02:23:58.710 of the archaeological 02:23:58.710 --> 02:24:00.710 background and whatever 02:24:00.710 --> 02:24:04.470 and the interest of this according 02:24:04.470 --> 02:24:06.470 to me why are we 02:24:06.470 --> 02:24:08.470 here who would talk about the even 02:24:08.470 --> 02:24:10.470 evolutionary mind who cares 02:24:10.470 --> 02:24:12.470 about the good 02:24:12.470 --> 02:24:14.470 and evil and the evolution of species 02:24:14.470 --> 02:24:16.470 and so on this must be 02:24:16.470 --> 02:24:18.470 interesting only to the degree 02:24:18.470 --> 02:24:20.470 to which it informs 02:24:20.470 --> 02:24:22.470 us in this very present moment 02:24:22.470 --> 02:24:24.470 regarding our choices 02:24:24.470 --> 02:24:26.470 that we will make in the creation 02:24:26.470 --> 02:24:28.470 of the future 02:24:28.470 --> 02:24:30.470 so according to chaos theory 02:24:30.470 --> 02:24:32.470 and its partner 02:24:32.470 --> 02:24:34.470 theory of bifurcations this is 02:24:34.470 --> 02:24:36.470 one of the main things that something like 02:24:36.470 --> 02:24:38.470 the butterfly effect that you've heard 02:24:38.470 --> 02:24:40.470 about in a dynamical 02:24:40.470 --> 02:24:42.470 system or 02:24:42.470 --> 02:24:44.470 a massively complex dynamical 02:24:44.470 --> 02:24:46.470 system such as we live in when there is 02:24:46.470 --> 02:24:48.470 a moment of bifurcation which is the 02:24:48.470 --> 02:24:50.470 technical math jargon for these snaps 02:24:50.470 --> 02:24:52.470 that is the only time 02:24:52.470 --> 02:24:54.470 you get to 02:24:54.470 --> 02:24:56.470 do anything about the evolution 02:24:56.470 --> 02:24:58.470 of the system 02:24:58.470 --> 02:25:00.470 so according to this 02:25:00.470 --> 02:25:02.470 self-inflating view 02:25:02.470 --> 02:25:04.470 we live at a specially 02:25:04.470 --> 02:25:06.470 important special moment in history 02:25:06.470 --> 02:25:08.470 where when we 02:25:08.470 --> 02:25:10.470 think something or do something 02:25:10.470 --> 02:25:12.470 it has actually an enormous effect 02:25:12.470 --> 02:25:14.470 on the future 02:25:14.470 --> 02:25:16.470 maybe not a direct 02:25:16.470 --> 02:25:18.470 determinative effect 02:25:18.470 --> 02:25:20.470 but we can't really say what the outcome will be 02:25:20.470 --> 02:25:22.470 but what we 02:25:22.470 --> 02:25:24.470 do has some influence 02:25:24.470 --> 02:25:26.470 on the creation of the future more than 02:25:26.470 --> 02:25:28.470 other times in history and the bigger 02:25:28.470 --> 02:25:30.470 the jump the bigger 02:25:30.470 --> 02:25:32.470 the leverage where 02:25:32.470 --> 02:25:34.470 Archimedes said give me a lever and I'll move 02:25:34.470 --> 02:25:36.470 the world 02:25:36.470 --> 02:25:38.470 we have a lever 02:25:38.470 --> 02:25:40.470 now and we care 02:25:40.470 --> 02:25:42.470 about what's coming next so 02:25:42.470 --> 02:25:44.470 that's why the edge 02:25:44.470 --> 02:25:46.470 of the millennium 02:25:46.470 --> 02:25:48.470 any edge of 02:25:48.470 --> 02:25:50.470 any of the millennia 02:25:50.470 --> 02:25:52.470 is particularly important 02:25:52.470 --> 02:25:54.470 to those revolutionary souls 02:25:54.470 --> 02:25:56.470 who want to make a change in things 02:25:56.470 --> 02:25:58.470 it's a special time 02:25:58.470 --> 02:26:00.470 a century or two centuries ago 02:26:00.470 --> 02:26:02.470 you could struggle for the creation 02:26:02.470 --> 02:26:04.470 of a chaos revolution and it would be 02:26:04.470 --> 02:26:06.470 impossible because there were no computers 02:26:06.470 --> 02:26:08.470 around or there were no 02:26:08.470 --> 02:26:10.470 movie makers in Hollywood or something 02:26:10.470 --> 02:26:12.470 I don't know 02:26:12.470 --> 02:26:14.470 it takes more than we 02:26:14.470 --> 02:26:16.470 know about to create these special 02:26:16.470 --> 02:26:18.470 opportunities and anyway that's what I mean 02:26:18.470 --> 02:26:20.470 by millennium and that's what I mean 02:26:20.470 --> 02:26:22.470 by at the edge of the millennium 02:26:22.470 --> 02:26:24.470 and now this is only a hypothesis 02:26:24.470 --> 02:26:26.470 for the sake of discussion but I kind of 02:26:26.470 --> 02:26:28.470 think that this is very 02:26:28.470 --> 02:26:30.470 credible that we are now 02:26:30.470 --> 02:26:32.470 at the edge of a millennium 02:26:32.470 --> 02:26:34.470 therefore 02:26:34.470 --> 02:26:36.470 we have to 02:26:36.470 --> 02:26:38.470 discuss this and the question 02:26:38.470 --> 02:26:40.470 that I'm going to pose 02:26:40.470 --> 02:26:42.470 to you Rupin Ter 02:26:42.470 --> 02:26:45.780 if this isn't too 02:26:45.780 --> 02:26:47.780 radical is 02:26:47.780 --> 02:26:49.780 to what degree 02:26:49.780 --> 02:26:51.780 do you think 02:26:51.780 --> 02:26:53.780 actually that what we are doing now matters 02:26:53.780 --> 02:26:55.780 in the creation of the future 02:26:55.780 --> 02:26:57.780 and if 02:26:57.780 --> 02:26:59.780 there is any possibility 02:26:59.780 --> 02:27:01.780 that what we do matters 02:27:01.780 --> 02:27:03.780 in the creation of the future 02:27:03.780 --> 02:27:05.780 what kind of future or 02:27:05.780 --> 02:27:07.780 what kind of change are we trying 02:27:07.780 --> 02:27:09.780 to create 02:27:09.780 --> 02:27:11.780 and to what degree 02:27:11.780 --> 02:27:13.780 what we are actually doing for example 02:27:13.780 --> 02:27:15.780 what we are talking about today 02:27:15.780 --> 02:27:17.780 what we are doing today 02:27:17.780 --> 02:27:19.780 to what degree could that possibly be 02:27:19.780 --> 02:27:21.780 a real effect 02:27:21.780 --> 02:27:23.780 a real benefit in 02:27:23.780 --> 02:27:25.780 creating the future that we want to create 02:27:25.780 --> 02:27:27.780 in contrast 02:27:27.780 --> 02:27:29.780 to other things 02:27:29.780 --> 02:27:31.780 that we might do 02:27:31.780 --> 02:27:33.780 like go to the beach and pray or whatever 02:27:37.780 --> 02:27:39.780 and 02:27:39.780 --> 02:27:41.780 particularly 02:27:43.780 --> 02:27:45.780 should I stop here 02:27:45.780 --> 02:27:47.780 well that's what I'm not sure 02:27:47.780 --> 02:27:49.780 yes well I'm 02:27:49.780 --> 02:27:51.780 trying to make this easier for you because 02:27:51.780 --> 02:27:53.780 I think this might be too difficult 02:27:53.780 --> 02:27:55.780 as we 02:27:55.780 --> 02:27:57.780 well I mean I think I 02:27:57.780 --> 02:27:59.780 said this morning or maybe I didn't 02:27:59.780 --> 02:28:01.780 but I believe it and have said 02:28:01.780 --> 02:28:03.780 it many times salvation 02:28:03.780 --> 02:28:05.780 is an act of cognitive 02:28:05.780 --> 02:28:07.780 apprehension so we do 02:28:07.780 --> 02:28:09.780 matter because to the 02:28:09.780 --> 02:28:11.780 degree that we are ignorant 02:28:11.780 --> 02:28:13.780 avidya 02:28:13.780 --> 02:28:15.780 in the Buddhist lexicon 02:28:15.780 --> 02:28:17.780 we retard universal 02:28:17.780 --> 02:28:19.780 progress towards some kind of 02:28:19.780 --> 02:28:21.780 enlightenment but the doctrine of avidya 02:28:21.780 --> 02:28:23.780 this is standing for all 02:28:23.780 --> 02:28:25.780 time since 1800 02:28:25.780 --> 02:28:27.780 BC do you agree 02:28:27.780 --> 02:28:29.780 that this is a special moment 02:28:29.780 --> 02:28:31.780 yes I think 02:28:31.780 --> 02:28:33.780 so not only a special moment 02:28:33.780 --> 02:28:35.780 but the other thing I would call people's 02:28:35.780 --> 02:28:37.780 attention to is the fact that 02:28:37.780 --> 02:28:39.780 no matter whether you scan 02:28:39.780 --> 02:28:41.780 your way in here today 02:28:41.780 --> 02:28:43.780 and no matter whether you're going to go back to 02:28:43.780 --> 02:28:45.780 a 02:28:45.780 --> 02:28:47.780 appliance box that you live 02:28:47.780 --> 02:28:49.780 in under a bridge 02:28:49.780 --> 02:28:51.780 the odds are 02:28:51.780 --> 02:28:53.780 that you 02:28:53.780 --> 02:28:55.780 are 02:28:55.780 --> 02:28:57.780 very close to the top of the 02:28:57.780 --> 02:28:59.780 pyramid of global 02:28:59.780 --> 02:29:01.780 empowerment 02:29:01.780 --> 02:29:03.780 you are mostly white 02:29:03.780 --> 02:29:05.780 mostly well 02:29:05.780 --> 02:29:07.780 educated mostly 02:29:07.780 --> 02:29:09.780 have enough disposable income 02:29:09.780 --> 02:29:11.780 to come to an event like this 02:29:11.780 --> 02:29:13.780 it's worth pointing out that 02:29:13.780 --> 02:29:15.780 all that rides on the backs 02:29:15.780 --> 02:29:17.780 of those who do not have 02:29:17.780 --> 02:29:19.780 such privilege 02:29:19.780 --> 02:29:21.780 and so yeah this is 02:29:21.780 --> 02:29:23.780 a moment of enormous opportunity 02:29:23.780 --> 02:29:25.780 and those who find themselves 02:29:25.780 --> 02:29:27.780 in this moment with 02:29:27.780 --> 02:29:29.780 power defined however 02:29:29.780 --> 02:29:31.780 you care to define it 02:29:31.780 --> 02:29:33.780 have a moral obligation 02:29:33.780 --> 02:29:35.780 to act 02:29:35.780 --> 02:29:37.780 and I don't 02:29:37.780 --> 02:29:39.780 advocate a certain political agenda 02:29:39.780 --> 02:29:41.780 not that we must become Marxists 02:29:41.780 --> 02:29:43.780 or that we must become anything 02:29:43.780 --> 02:29:45.780 what we must become is clear 02:29:45.780 --> 02:29:47.780 we 02:29:47.780 --> 02:29:49.780 have the technologies 02:29:49.780 --> 02:29:51.780 and the informational 02:29:51.780 --> 02:29:53.780 structures and 02:29:53.780 --> 02:29:55.780 all the necessary abilities 02:29:55.780 --> 02:29:57.780 to create paradise on earth 02:29:57.780 --> 02:29:59.780 to lift up the least 02:29:59.780 --> 02:30:01.780 among us to at least 02:30:01.780 --> 02:30:03.780 an acceptable 02:30:03.780 --> 02:30:05.780 level of comfort 02:30:05.780 --> 02:30:07.780 and freedom 02:30:07.780 --> 02:30:09.780 why do we not do that? 02:30:09.780 --> 02:30:11.780 what stands in our way is 02:30:11.780 --> 02:30:13.780 our own minds 02:30:13.780 --> 02:30:15.780 our own habits 02:30:15.780 --> 02:30:17.780 we must change our minds 02:30:17.780 --> 02:30:19.780 that's the most powerful 02:30:19.780 --> 02:30:21.780 political work 02:30:21.780 --> 02:30:23.780 people in this room could do 02:30:23.780 --> 02:30:25.780 and there is nobody who is so enlightened 02:30:25.780 --> 02:30:27.780 that they don't need 02:30:27.780 --> 02:30:29.780 to work on themselves 02:30:29.780 --> 02:30:31.780 and do this 02:30:31.780 --> 02:30:33.780 to the degree that we can change our minds 02:30:33.780 --> 02:30:35.780 we will escape 02:30:35.780 --> 02:30:37.780 extinction marginality 02:30:37.780 --> 02:30:39.780 and so forth and so on 02:30:39.780 --> 02:30:41.780 if we agree that we cannot 02:30:41.780 --> 02:30:43.780 change our minds 02:30:43.780 --> 02:30:45.780 we will prolong the agony 02:30:45.780 --> 02:30:47.780 perhaps unto death and extinction 02:30:47.780 --> 02:30:49.780 perhaps only making 02:30:49.780 --> 02:30:51.780 the struggle more difficult 02:30:51.780 --> 02:30:53.780 but yes 02:30:53.780 --> 02:30:55.780 this is a moment of enormous opportunity 02:30:55.780 --> 02:30:57.780 a yes 02:30:57.780 --> 02:31:03.080 we have a yes 02:31:03.080 --> 02:31:05.080 so you agree 02:31:05.080 --> 02:31:07.080 that it's a moment of special opportunity 02:31:07.080 --> 02:31:09.080 over the long and short 02:31:09.080 --> 02:31:11.080 scales of time 02:31:11.080 --> 02:31:13.080 according to either mathematics 02:31:13.080 --> 02:31:15.080 or novelty theory 02:31:15.080 --> 02:31:17.080 yes 02:31:17.080 --> 02:31:19.080 and you 02:31:19.080 --> 02:31:21.080 agree that we have a responsibility 02:31:21.080 --> 02:31:23.080 to do our best 02:31:23.080 --> 02:31:25.080 yes 02:31:25.080 --> 02:31:27.080 and what you have to tell us is 02:31:27.080 --> 02:31:29.080 that if the 200 of us here 02:31:29.080 --> 02:31:31.080 change our minds 02:31:31.080 --> 02:31:33.080 that that would somehow 02:31:33.080 --> 02:31:35.080 have an immediate effect 02:31:35.080 --> 02:31:37.080 on the rest of the world 02:31:37.080 --> 02:31:39.080 and our creation of the future 02:31:39.080 --> 02:31:41.080 yes 02:31:41.080 --> 02:31:43.080 how? 02:31:43.080 --> 02:31:45.080 by means? 02:31:45.080 --> 02:31:47.080 by the romance of photons? 02:31:47.080 --> 02:31:49.080 no, I think by 02:31:49.080 --> 02:31:53.540 the spread of clarity 02:31:53.540 --> 02:31:55.540 the spread of clarity 02:31:55.540 --> 02:31:57.540 the elimination of redundancy 02:31:57.540 --> 02:31:59.540 in the system 02:31:59.540 --> 02:32:01.540 and 02:32:01.540 --> 02:32:03.540 the spreading of a sense 02:32:03.540 --> 02:32:05.540 of shared purpose 02:32:05.540 --> 02:32:07.540 and the possibility of achieving 02:32:07.540 --> 02:32:09.540 that purpose 02:32:09.540 --> 02:32:11.540 it doesn't matter what you do beyond 02:32:11.540 --> 02:32:13.540 changing your mind 02:32:13.540 --> 02:32:15.540 for a better clarity? 02:32:15.540 --> 02:32:17.540 well, I don't want to say 02:32:17.540 --> 02:32:19.540 absolutely it doesn't matter 02:32:19.540 --> 02:32:21.540 but I think that's the first obligation 02:32:21.540 --> 02:32:23.540 if you charge off with some 02:32:23.540 --> 02:32:25.540 political agenda that is not 02:32:25.540 --> 02:32:27.540 informed by clarity 02:32:27.540 --> 02:32:29.540 you're going to end up with business as usual 02:32:29.540 --> 02:32:31.540 the road to hell is paved 02:32:31.540 --> 02:32:33.540 with good intentions 02:32:33.540 --> 02:32:35.540 but it is not paved 02:32:35.540 --> 02:32:37.540 with clarity 02:32:39.540 --> 02:32:46.790 so you're, for example 02:32:46.790 --> 02:32:48.790 what you do in life 02:32:48.790 --> 02:32:50.790 you barnstorm giving lectures 02:32:50.790 --> 02:32:52.790 you write books 02:32:52.790 --> 02:32:54.790 and you create a website 02:32:54.790 --> 02:32:56.790 and the effect of this 02:32:56.790 --> 02:32:58.790 hopefully will be to promote clarity 02:32:58.790 --> 02:33:05.430 correct 02:33:05.430 --> 02:33:07.430 first of all I certainly agree 02:33:07.430 --> 02:33:09.430 that for me personally 02:33:09.430 --> 02:33:11.430 psychedelic experience has enhanced clarity 02:33:11.430 --> 02:33:13.430 where some people think the opposite 02:33:13.430 --> 02:33:15.430 well let us have 02:33:15.430 --> 02:33:17.430 vigorous debate by 02:33:17.430 --> 02:33:19.430 informed parties 02:33:19.430 --> 02:33:30.070 on this subject 02:33:30.070 --> 02:33:32.070 don't forget 02:33:32.070 --> 02:33:34.070 I've given over 300 calculus lectures 02:33:34.070 --> 02:33:36.070 in this room 02:33:36.070 --> 02:33:38.070 it boggles my mind 02:33:38.070 --> 02:33:40.070 to look out and think 02:33:40.070 --> 02:33:42.070 yeah this is Santa Cruz 02:33:42.070 --> 02:33:44.070 this must be Santa Cruz 02:33:44.070 --> 02:33:46.070 this is real Santa Cruz 02:33:46.070 --> 02:33:48.070 what do you think Rupert? 02:33:48.070 --> 02:33:50.070 the question really is 02:33:50.070 --> 02:33:52.070 I mean changing minds 02:33:52.070 --> 02:33:54.070 you were talking about 02:33:54.070 --> 02:33:56.070 the butterfly wing effect 02:33:56.070 --> 02:33:58.070 the question is if we change our minds 02:33:58.070 --> 02:34:00.070 can it have a larger effect 02:34:00.070 --> 02:34:02.070 on other people's minds 02:34:02.070 --> 02:34:04.070 because if we decide to recycle 02:34:04.070 --> 02:34:06.070 paper and so on 02:34:06.070 --> 02:34:08.070 it's not going to have that much effect 02:34:08.070 --> 02:34:10.070 the changing mind thing 02:34:10.070 --> 02:34:12.070 the butterfly wing analogy 02:34:12.070 --> 02:34:14.070 suggests some major change of mind 02:34:14.070 --> 02:34:16.070 spreading through our culture 02:34:16.070 --> 02:34:18.070 now I suspect 02:34:18.070 --> 02:34:20.070 that you think the medium for this 02:34:20.070 --> 02:34:22.070 transformation is the world wide web 02:34:22.070 --> 02:34:24.070 I suspect that Terence thinks 02:34:24.070 --> 02:34:26.070 the medium is 02:34:26.070 --> 02:34:28.070 well I think telepathy is equally powerful 02:34:28.070 --> 02:34:30.070 yes but 02:34:30.070 --> 02:34:32.070 wait I want to hear his suspicion 02:34:32.070 --> 02:34:34.070 of me 02:34:34.070 --> 02:34:36.070 the world wide web? 02:34:36.070 --> 02:34:38.070 no no psychedelic drugs 02:34:38.070 --> 02:34:40.070 world wide web psychedelic drugs 02:34:44.070 --> 02:34:46.070 I still haven't understood 02:34:46.070 --> 02:34:48.070 the psychedelic drug agenda 02:34:48.070 --> 02:34:50.070 Britain has the highest percentage 02:34:50.070 --> 02:34:52.070 of psychedelic drug consumption 02:34:52.070 --> 02:34:54.070 in the western world at the moment 02:34:54.070 --> 02:34:56.070 and it's not entirely clear 02:34:56.070 --> 02:34:58.070 that this has resulted in clarity 02:34:58.070 --> 02:35:02.560 spreading through the world 02:35:02.560 --> 02:35:04.560 Britain is the source 02:35:04.560 --> 02:35:06.560 and the fountain head 02:35:06.560 --> 02:35:08.560 of a new culture 02:35:08.560 --> 02:35:10.560 that is creating the new music 02:35:10.560 --> 02:35:12.560 the new dance 02:35:12.560 --> 02:35:14.560 the new forms of community 02:35:14.560 --> 02:35:16.560 and the new resistance 02:35:16.560 --> 02:35:18.560 to consumerist values 02:35:18.560 --> 02:35:20.560 so don't sell the old UK short 02:35:20.560 --> 02:35:22.560 come to the rave tonight 02:35:22.560 --> 02:35:24.560 and see clarity created 02:35:24.560 --> 02:35:26.560 yes yes 02:35:26.560 --> 02:35:28.560 a crucible of clarity 02:35:28.560 --> 02:35:30.560 is home at last place 02:35:30.560 --> 02:35:32.560 and Terence takes the microphone 02:35:32.560 --> 02:35:34.560 and 02:35:34.560 --> 02:35:36.560 well it's not always perfectly clear 02:35:36.560 --> 02:35:38.560 what's going on 02:35:38.560 --> 02:35:40.560 when you have your nose in it 02:35:40.560 --> 02:35:42.560 you know 02:35:42.560 --> 02:35:44.560 I mean my own agenda 02:35:44.560 --> 02:35:46.560 relies partly 02:35:46.560 --> 02:35:48.560 on the world wide web 02:35:48.560 --> 02:35:50.560 not as strongly as yours 02:35:50.560 --> 02:35:52.560 and here in this room 02:35:52.560 --> 02:35:54.560 is Matthew Clapp 02:35:54.560 --> 02:35:56.560 who kindly runs my world wide web site 02:35:56.560 --> 02:35:58.560 shellbreak.org 02:35:58.560 --> 02:36:00.560 yes 02:36:00.560 --> 02:36:02.560 so 02:36:02.560 --> 02:36:04.560 but my own view is that 02:36:04.560 --> 02:36:06.560 this clarity involves 02:36:06.560 --> 02:36:08.560 breaking the spell 02:36:08.560 --> 02:36:10.560 of rationalism 02:36:10.560 --> 02:36:12.560 Cartesianism 02:36:12.560 --> 02:36:14.560 a spell woven more powerfully than ever before 02:36:14.560 --> 02:36:16.560 this morning by Terence 02:36:16.560 --> 02:36:18.560 I mean it took on a new 02:36:18.560 --> 02:36:20.560 level of spell binding 02:36:20.560 --> 02:36:22.560 in the way you described it 02:36:22.560 --> 02:36:24.560 it's to recognize that 02:36:24.560 --> 02:36:26.560 we're far more interconnected 02:36:26.560 --> 02:36:28.560 we're far more participatory 02:36:28.560 --> 02:36:30.560 in our relation with the world 02:36:30.560 --> 02:36:32.560 than this cognitive 02:36:32.560 --> 02:36:34.560 kind of science and cognitive model of the mind 02:36:34.560 --> 02:36:36.560 would tell us 02:36:36.560 --> 02:36:38.560 and so I think the secret to 02:36:38.560 --> 02:36:40.560 waking us up 02:36:40.560 --> 02:36:42.560 one of the secrets is psychic pets 02:36:42.560 --> 02:36:44.560 as you know this is one of my particular themes 02:36:46.560 --> 02:36:48.560 and 02:36:48.560 --> 02:36:50.560 the purpose of 02:36:50.560 --> 02:36:52.560 I wrote a book which some of you may have seen 02:36:52.560 --> 02:36:54.560 called seven experiments that could change the world 02:36:54.560 --> 02:36:56.560 the purpose of this was to find 02:36:56.560 --> 02:36:58.560 simple experiments 02:36:58.560 --> 02:37:00.560 that could give us clarity on issues 02:37:00.560 --> 02:37:02.560 that we know about already 02:37:02.560 --> 02:37:04.560 which could actually have a transformative effect 02:37:04.560 --> 02:37:06.560 on our view of the world 02:37:06.560 --> 02:37:08.560 they're to do with changing our scientific view of the world 02:37:08.560 --> 02:37:10.560 and the scientific view of the world 02:37:10.560 --> 02:37:12.560 is a particularly 02:37:12.560 --> 02:37:14.560 important part of the spell 02:37:14.560 --> 02:37:16.560 that binds us all 02:37:16.560 --> 02:37:18.560 and that affects our whole 02:37:18.560 --> 02:37:20.560 civilization 02:37:20.560 --> 02:37:22.560 our whole industrial culture 02:37:22.560 --> 02:37:24.560 and it's an exceptionally narrow 02:37:24.560 --> 02:37:26.560 and dissociated view of the world at the moment 02:37:26.560 --> 02:37:28.560 the reason I think psychic pets 02:37:28.560 --> 02:37:30.560 could play this part is 02:37:30.560 --> 02:37:32.560 first of all there's more of them 02:37:32.560 --> 02:37:34.560 than psychedelics 02:37:34.560 --> 02:37:36.560 I mean they're everywhere 02:37:36.560 --> 02:37:38.560 there are lots and lots of dogs and cats 02:37:38.560 --> 02:37:40.560 that have telepathic bonds with their owners 02:37:40.560 --> 02:37:42.560 about 50% of Americans 02:37:42.560 --> 02:37:44.560 feel that they've had 02:37:44.560 --> 02:37:46.560 a telepathic bond with an animal 02:37:46.560 --> 02:37:48.560 now to recognize 02:37:48.560 --> 02:37:50.560 what so many people already know 02:37:50.560 --> 02:37:52.560 through experiments to test these 02:37:52.560 --> 02:37:54.560 to see if they're real 02:37:54.560 --> 02:37:56.560 and so far the experiments suggest they are real 02:37:56.560 --> 02:37:58.560 this can give permission 02:37:58.560 --> 02:38:00.560 for people to recognize 02:38:00.560 --> 02:38:02.560 what they already know 02:38:02.560 --> 02:38:04.560 because closet holists 02:38:04.560 --> 02:38:06.560 most of us are closet holists 02:38:06.560 --> 02:38:08.560 can come out 02:38:08.560 --> 02:38:10.560 and recognize 02:38:10.560 --> 02:38:12.560 that there's this kind of interconnection 02:38:12.560 --> 02:38:14.560 with other species 02:38:14.560 --> 02:38:16.560 and with each other 02:38:16.560 --> 02:38:18.560 that's been going on all the time 02:38:18.560 --> 02:38:20.560 but which has been suppressed 02:38:20.560 --> 02:38:22.560 from the level of supposedly rational discourse 02:38:22.560 --> 02:38:24.560 by the idea that this is all superstition 02:38:24.560 --> 02:38:26.560 it's not scientific 02:38:26.560 --> 02:38:28.560 it's irrational and so forth 02:38:28.560 --> 02:38:30.560 I think that one of the big difficulties 02:38:30.560 --> 02:38:32.560 in our culture is the split 02:38:32.560 --> 02:38:34.560 between the educated part of our minds 02:38:34.560 --> 02:38:36.560 which we put on in public 02:38:36.560 --> 02:38:38.560 and the participatory sense of connection 02:38:38.560 --> 02:38:40.560 which we have at home 02:38:40.560 --> 02:38:42.560 with gardens, plants, children, animals 02:38:42.560 --> 02:38:44.560 lovers 02:38:44.560 --> 02:38:46.560 and our nearest and dearest 02:38:46.560 --> 02:38:48.560 and these are so dissociated 02:38:48.560 --> 02:38:50.560 that it's very hard for people to recognize 02:38:50.560 --> 02:38:52.560 that they're related in any way 02:38:52.560 --> 02:38:54.560 lots of dogs 02:38:54.560 --> 02:38:56.560 know when their owners are coming home 02:38:56.560 --> 02:38:58.560 in a kind of telepathic manner 02:38:58.560 --> 02:39:00.560 and wait at the door for them 02:39:00.560 --> 02:39:02.560 while they're on the way home 02:39:02.560 --> 02:39:04.560 thousands of American scientists 02:39:04.560 --> 02:39:06.560 have dogs waiting at the door for them 02:39:06.560 --> 02:39:08.560 when they get home from the laboratory 02:39:08.560 --> 02:39:10.560 even if they come at unusual times 02:39:10.560 --> 02:39:12.560 and in an unusual way 02:39:12.560 --> 02:39:14.560 yet this phenomenon has been so subject to taboo 02:39:14.560 --> 02:39:18.560 that it's never been investigated scientifically at all 02:39:18.560 --> 02:39:20.560 it could have been investigated at any time 02:39:20.560 --> 02:39:22.560 in the last 500 or 5000 years 02:39:22.560 --> 02:39:24.560 but the fact is 02:39:24.560 --> 02:39:26.560 the first investigations are happening 02:39:26.560 --> 02:39:28.560 at present 02:39:28.560 --> 02:39:30.560 here in the room is David Brown 02:39:30.560 --> 02:39:32.560 who works with me 02:39:32.560 --> 02:39:34.560 in Santa Cruz 02:39:34.560 --> 02:39:36.560 and is doing experiments with psychic dogs 02:39:36.560 --> 02:39:38.560 cats and cockatiels 02:39:38.560 --> 02:39:40.560 in Santa Cruz County 02:39:40.560 --> 02:39:42.560 and if any of you have such animals 02:39:42.560 --> 02:39:44.560 please let him or me know at the end 02:39:44.560 --> 02:39:46.560 because we'd love to investigate your animals 02:39:46.560 --> 02:39:48.560 and you can take part in this research 02:39:48.560 --> 02:39:50.560 so I think that 02:39:50.560 --> 02:39:52.560 grassroots research 02:39:52.560 --> 02:39:54.560 based on phenomena 02:39:54.560 --> 02:39:56.560 that are actually common sense 02:39:56.560 --> 02:39:58.560 that are part of everyday life 02:39:58.560 --> 02:40:00.560 for many people 02:40:00.560 --> 02:40:02.560 could help to wake us up 02:40:02.560 --> 02:40:04.560 and make us recognize 02:40:04.560 --> 02:40:06.560 that there's far more interconnection 02:40:06.560 --> 02:40:08.560 between us and other species 02:40:08.560 --> 02:40:10.560 and us and other people 02:40:10.560 --> 02:40:12.560 than is admitted in the scientific view of things 02:40:12.560 --> 02:40:14.560 which is the world view 02:40:14.560 --> 02:40:16.560 which most people feel they have permission 02:40:16.560 --> 02:40:18.560 to talk about in public 02:40:18.560 --> 02:40:20.560 so I think that this transition 02:40:20.560 --> 02:40:22.560 a butterfly wing effect 02:40:22.560 --> 02:40:24.560 would be a few dogs and cats 02:40:24.560 --> 02:40:26.560 that do this 02:40:26.560 --> 02:40:28.560 being proved scientifically to be able to do it 02:40:28.560 --> 02:40:30.560 shown on TV 02:40:30.560 --> 02:40:32.560 would probably overnight 02:40:32.560 --> 02:40:34.560 give millions of people permission 02:40:34.560 --> 02:40:36.560 to recognize and talk about these events 02:40:36.560 --> 02:40:38.560 in their own lives 02:40:38.560 --> 02:40:40.560 and never again would the subject 02:40:40.560 --> 02:40:42.560 be able to be stuffed back into the closet 02:40:42.560 --> 02:40:44.560 I think these could lead to a great change 02:40:44.560 --> 02:40:46.560 in the way we think about the world 02:40:46.560 --> 02:40:48.560 now it's not of course 02:40:48.560 --> 02:40:50.560 it's several steps from that 02:40:50.560 --> 02:40:52.560 to solving the ecological problems of the world 02:40:52.560 --> 02:40:54.560 to dealing with the problem 02:40:54.560 --> 02:40:56.560 of multinational corporations and so on 02:40:56.560 --> 02:40:58.560 but it's a step towards clarity 02:40:58.560 --> 02:41:00.560 and it's one that could spread very quickly 02:41:00.560 --> 02:41:02.560 well it seems to me 02:41:02.560 --> 02:41:04.560 that the overarching theme here 02:41:04.560 --> 02:41:06.560 that unites all three of our positions 02:41:06.560 --> 02:41:08.560 is boundary dissolution 02:41:08.560 --> 02:41:10.560 psychedelic drugs 02:41:10.560 --> 02:41:12.560 dissolve boundaries 02:41:12.560 --> 02:41:14.560 the world wide web dissolves boundaries 02:41:14.560 --> 02:41:16.560 and certainly the discovery 02:41:16.560 --> 02:41:18.560 that our pets are communicating 02:41:18.560 --> 02:41:20.560 anticipating and understanding us 02:41:20.560 --> 02:41:22.560 is a boundary dissolving 02:41:22.560 --> 02:41:24.560 perception 02:41:24.560 --> 02:41:26.560 so really what we're saying is 02:41:26.560 --> 02:41:28.560 we must dissolve 02:41:28.560 --> 02:41:30.560 the artificial boundaries 02:41:30.560 --> 02:41:32.560 that confine our perception 02:41:32.560 --> 02:41:34.560 someone once said 02:41:34.560 --> 02:41:36.560 if we could feel 02:41:36.560 --> 02:41:38.560 what we are doing to the earth 02:41:38.560 --> 02:41:40.560 we would stop immediately 02:41:40.560 --> 02:41:42.560 because a man hitting himself 02:41:42.560 --> 02:41:44.560 on the head with a ball peen hammer 02:41:44.560 --> 02:41:46.560 stops immediately 02:41:46.560 --> 02:41:48.560 the feedback loop 02:41:48.560 --> 02:41:50.560 is very short 02:41:50.560 --> 02:41:52.560 so we have compartmentalized 02:41:52.560 --> 02:41:54.560 our lives 02:41:54.560 --> 02:41:56.560 and this allows us 02:41:56.560 --> 02:41:58.560 to do the fateful 02:41:58.560 --> 02:42:00.560 and lethal work 02:42:00.560 --> 02:42:02.560 that is destroying the planet 02:42:02.560 --> 02:42:04.560 so forth and so on 02:42:04.560 --> 02:42:06.560 so maybe 02:42:06.560 --> 02:42:08.560 three answers as diverse 02:42:08.560 --> 02:42:10.560 as you've just heard here 02:42:10.560 --> 02:42:12.560 you might search your own soul 02:42:12.560 --> 02:42:14.560 and ask 02:42:14.560 --> 02:42:16.560 what obsession or interest of mine 02:42:16.560 --> 02:42:18.560 would contribute 02:42:18.560 --> 02:42:20.560 to the grand project 02:42:20.560 --> 02:42:22.560 of boundary dissolution 02:42:22.560 --> 02:42:24.560 certainly 02:42:24.560 --> 02:42:26.560 it is not the affirmation 02:42:26.560 --> 02:42:28.560 of cultural values 02:42:28.560 --> 02:42:30.560 culture is a scheme 02:42:30.560 --> 02:42:32.560 for maintaining and creating 02:42:32.560 --> 02:42:34.560 boundaries 02:42:34.560 --> 02:42:36.560 it replaces reality 02:42:36.560 --> 02:42:38.560 with a linguistically supported 02:42:38.560 --> 02:42:40.560 delusion 02:42:40.560 --> 02:42:42.560 and behind that delusion 02:42:42.560 --> 02:42:44.560 then pogroms 02:42:44.560 --> 02:42:46.560 programs of genocide 02:42:46.560 --> 02:42:48.560 arms races 02:42:48.560 --> 02:42:50.560 sexism 02:42:50.560 --> 02:42:52.560 racism 02:42:52.560 --> 02:42:54.560 all can operate 02:42:54.560 --> 02:42:56.560 very very comfortably 02:42:56.560 --> 02:42:58.560 Ralph earlier mentioned love 02:42:58.560 --> 02:43:00.560 generally speaking 02:43:00.560 --> 02:43:02.560 love is a boundary dissolving enterprise 02:43:02.560 --> 02:43:04.560 and I think all of you 02:43:04.560 --> 02:43:06.560 in our way 02:43:06.560 --> 02:43:08.560 should find ways 02:43:08.560 --> 02:43:10.560 to express love 02:43:10.560 --> 02:43:12.560 and it's not treacly 02:43:12.560 --> 02:43:14.560 it's not woo woo 02:43:14.560 --> 02:43:16.560 it's a very practical matter 02:43:16.560 --> 02:43:18.560 that has thousands of expressions 02:43:18.560 --> 02:43:20.560 as long as we believe 02:43:20.560 --> 02:43:22.560 in mind and matter 02:43:22.560 --> 02:43:24.560 rich and poor 02:43:24.560 --> 02:43:26.560 living and dead 02:43:26.560 --> 02:43:28.560 aboriginal and advanced 02:43:28.560 --> 02:43:30.560 black and white 02:43:30.560 --> 02:43:32.560 man and woman 02:43:32.560 --> 02:43:34.560 and we're going to produce 02:43:34.560 --> 02:43:36.560 incomplete agendas 02:43:36.560 --> 02:43:38.560 and answers 02:43:40.560 --> 02:43:46.180 well this is 02:43:46.180 --> 02:43:48.180 this is good 02:43:48.180 --> 02:43:50.180 I agree with everything 02:43:50.180 --> 02:43:52.180 I admire you both for your revolutionary efforts 02:43:52.180 --> 02:43:54.180 nevertheless 02:43:54.180 --> 02:43:56.180 I can't help having a sinking feeling 02:43:56.180 --> 02:43:58.180 here we are 02:43:58.180 --> 02:44:00.180 in the University of California 02:44:00.180 --> 02:44:02.180 naturally my thoughts turn 02:44:02.180 --> 02:44:04.180 to the educational system 02:44:04.180 --> 02:44:06.180 now we have here 02:44:06.180 --> 02:44:08.180 I know there are actually a few 02:44:08.180 --> 02:44:10.180 undergraduates of the University of California 02:44:10.180 --> 02:44:12.180 at Santa Cruz are here 02:44:12.180 --> 02:44:14.180 by accident as it were 02:44:14.180 --> 02:44:16.180 and that's cool 02:44:16.180 --> 02:44:18.180 but we have not yet taken over 02:44:18.180 --> 02:44:20.180 one regularly offered course 02:44:20.180 --> 02:44:22.180 of the University 02:44:22.180 --> 02:44:24.180 to enable students 02:44:24.180 --> 02:44:26.180 to learn science 02:44:26.180 --> 02:44:28.180 by doing research projects 02:44:28.180 --> 02:44:30.180 with psychic pets 02:44:30.180 --> 02:44:32.180 Ralph the University is the last place 02:44:32.180 --> 02:44:34.180 where you would look for this 02:44:34.180 --> 02:44:36.180 the University is the manufacturer 02:44:36.180 --> 02:44:38.180 of these cultural values 02:44:38.180 --> 02:44:40.180 that increase in value 02:44:40.180 --> 02:44:42.180 well that's why I'm bringing up this 02:44:42.180 --> 02:44:44.180 subject of education at this time 02:44:44.180 --> 02:44:46.180 I think we've discussed the problem of education 02:44:46.180 --> 02:44:48.180 before but my experience is 02:44:48.180 --> 02:44:50.180 that no amount of clarity 02:44:50.180 --> 02:44:52.180 in this group of two hundred 02:44:52.180 --> 02:44:54.180 and other like groups 02:44:54.180 --> 02:44:56.180 is going to matter one whit 02:44:56.180 --> 02:44:58.180 when we are all adults 02:44:58.180 --> 02:45:00.180 the next generation 02:45:00.180 --> 02:45:02.180 will have to face the same 02:45:02.180 --> 02:45:04.180 butterfly problem 02:45:04.180 --> 02:45:06.180 with the same lever 02:45:06.180 --> 02:45:08.180 because the majority of people 02:45:08.180 --> 02:45:10.180 will have their paradigm set 02:45:10.180 --> 02:45:12.180 in a K through 12 02:45:12.180 --> 02:45:14.180 in some archaic school system 02:45:14.180 --> 02:45:16.180 that sees its primary business 02:45:16.180 --> 02:45:18.180 to work against 02:45:18.180 --> 02:45:20.180 a worldwide cultural revolution 02:45:20.180 --> 02:45:22.180 so the inertia 02:45:22.180 --> 02:45:24.180 we have to overcome inertia 02:45:24.180 --> 02:45:26.180 and we can talk about religion 02:45:26.180 --> 02:45:28.180 and psychedelics and getting clarity 02:45:28.180 --> 02:45:30.180 and so on 02:45:30.180 --> 02:45:32.180 we know that the scientific establishment 02:45:32.180 --> 02:45:34.180 is a big obstacle as far as 02:45:34.180 --> 02:45:36.180 environmental problems are concerned 02:45:36.180 --> 02:45:38.180 the ultimate effect will be 02:45:38.180 --> 02:45:40.180 to deconstruct or revolutionize science 02:45:40.180 --> 02:45:42.180 is very important in making 02:45:42.180 --> 02:45:44.180 a transformation among adult scientists 02:45:44.180 --> 02:45:46.180 worldwide 02:45:46.180 --> 02:45:48.180 how can this matter at all 02:45:48.180 --> 02:45:50.180 if there is no change in the educational system 02:45:50.180 --> 02:45:52.180 K through 12, pre-K, pre-pre-K 02:45:52.180 --> 02:45:54.180 and back to 02:45:54.180 --> 02:45:56.180 the womb, the parents 02:45:56.180 --> 02:45:58.180 and so on 02:45:58.180 --> 02:46:00.180 that this chicken and egg loop 02:46:00.180 --> 02:46:02.180 has got to be somewhere 02:46:02.180 --> 02:46:04.180 in a more sensitive spot 02:46:04.180 --> 02:46:06.180 than the adult community 02:46:06.180 --> 02:46:08.180 and what do you propose 02:46:08.180 --> 02:46:10.180 well you work with 02:46:10.180 --> 02:46:12.180 youth I guess 02:46:12.180 --> 02:46:14.180 you're interested in talking with 02:46:14.180 --> 02:46:16.180 younger people 02:46:16.180 --> 02:46:18.180 Rupert I know that you're particularly 02:46:18.180 --> 02:46:20.180 active in education through 02:46:20.180 --> 02:46:22.180 the existence of your children 02:46:22.180 --> 02:46:24.180 who are now subject to the 02:46:24.180 --> 02:46:26.180 educational system 02:46:26.180 --> 02:46:28.180 that does this 02:46:28.180 --> 02:46:30.180 criminal brainwashing 02:46:30.180 --> 02:46:32.180 that I'm talking about 02:46:32.180 --> 02:46:34.180 so I'm just 02:46:34.180 --> 02:46:36.180 posing this now, do you have any idea 02:46:36.180 --> 02:46:38.180 as to the transformation 02:46:38.180 --> 02:46:40.180 of our school system by a change of 02:46:40.180 --> 02:46:42.180 curriculum or the 02:46:42.180 --> 02:46:44.180 entrance of any 02:46:44.180 --> 02:46:46.180 weird idea 02:46:46.180 --> 02:46:48.180 into the actual program 02:46:48.180 --> 02:46:50.180 which trains most children 02:46:50.180 --> 02:46:52.180 worldwide 02:46:52.180 --> 02:46:54.180 well I ought to have 02:46:54.180 --> 02:46:56.180 there's a story that perhaps not everyone here is 02:46:56.180 --> 02:46:58.180 familiar with which is 02:46:58.180 --> 02:47:00.180 when I was in New York a couple of years ago 02:47:00.180 --> 02:47:02.180 I was asked to visit a school in 02:47:02.180 --> 02:47:04.180 Long Island 02:47:04.180 --> 02:47:06.180 I was particularly urged to go there 02:47:06.180 --> 02:47:08.180 a private helicopter was sent 02:47:08.180 --> 02:47:10.180 to take me and I was asked to address 02:47:10.180 --> 02:47:12.180 the board and the 02:47:12.180 --> 02:47:14.180 teachers of the school 02:47:14.180 --> 02:47:16.180 and when I asked them what they'd like me to 02:47:16.180 --> 02:47:18.180 speak about they said 02:47:18.180 --> 02:47:20.180 they wanted me to speak about the 02:47:20.180 --> 02:47:22.180 rectified Sheldrake principle 02:47:22.180 --> 02:47:24.180 on which their entire curriculum was based 02:47:24.180 --> 02:47:26.180 so when I said 02:47:26.180 --> 02:47:28.180 what is the rectified Sheldrake principle 02:47:32.180 --> 02:47:34.180 they said that that was the very question 02:47:34.180 --> 02:47:36.180 they were asking and hoping 02:47:36.180 --> 02:47:38.180 that I would explain 02:47:38.180 --> 02:47:40.180 I then asked 02:47:40.180 --> 02:47:42.180 who had invented 02:47:42.180 --> 02:47:44.180 the rectified Sheldrake principle 02:47:44.180 --> 02:47:46.180 on which the curriculum was based 02:47:46.180 --> 02:47:48.180 and they soon revealed that the author 02:47:48.180 --> 02:47:50.180 of this principle or at least the author of the 02:47:50.180 --> 02:47:52.180 documents on which their entire curriculum 02:47:52.180 --> 02:47:54.180 was based was Ralph Abraham 02:48:00.180 --> 02:48:02.180 by careful questioning I was able 02:48:02.180 --> 02:48:04.180 to find out that the rectified Sheldrake 02:48:04.180 --> 02:48:06.180 principle meant that because of morphic 02:48:06.180 --> 02:48:08.180 resonance and habits of learning 02:48:08.180 --> 02:48:10.180 the sequence of events 02:48:10.180 --> 02:48:12.180 in which people should learn things 02:48:12.180 --> 02:48:14.180 in school should follow the historical process 02:48:14.180 --> 02:48:16.180 so in history 02:48:16.180 --> 02:48:18.180 you learn first about the 02:48:18.180 --> 02:48:20.180 Sumerians, Egyptians, etc 02:48:20.180 --> 02:48:22.180 then you move on to the 02:48:22.180 --> 02:48:24.180 ancient Greeks, the Romans, the dark 02:48:24.180 --> 02:48:26.180 ages, etc that it follows 02:48:26.180 --> 02:48:28.180 the principle and they 02:48:28.180 --> 02:48:30.180 start in grade one with 02:48:30.180 --> 02:48:32.180 ancient Egypt 02:48:32.180 --> 02:48:34.180 I calculated on this basis that 02:48:34.180 --> 02:48:36.180 the invention of the 02:48:36.180 --> 02:48:38.180 domestication of fire which 02:48:38.180 --> 02:48:40.180 occurred between 400 to 700 02:48:40.180 --> 02:48:42.180 thousand years ago should mean 02:48:42.180 --> 02:48:44.180 that in the toddler 02:48:44.180 --> 02:48:46.180 playgroups they should be playing 02:48:46.180 --> 02:48:48.180 with fire 02:48:56.180 --> 02:48:58.180 I pointed this out but it didn't 02:48:58.180 --> 02:49:00.180 that wasn't part of the curriculum I was 02:49:00.180 --> 02:49:02.180 suggesting I discovered that there was 02:49:02.180 --> 02:49:04.180 in fact an entire process 02:49:04.180 --> 02:49:06.180 of educational reform afoot 02:49:06.180 --> 02:49:08.180 in this country behind which 02:49:08.180 --> 02:49:10.180 is the guiding genius 02:49:10.180 --> 02:49:12.180 of Ralph Abraham 02:49:12.180 --> 02:49:14.180 so I think we should ask you this 02:49:14.180 --> 02:49:16.180 question Ralph since you have more experience 02:49:16.180 --> 02:49:18.180 than most of us 02:49:18.180 --> 02:49:20.180 well I'd rather that people with less 02:49:20.180 --> 02:49:22.180 experience speak about it 02:49:24.180 --> 02:49:26.180 because my experience has been 02:49:26.180 --> 02:49:28.180 very disappointing 02:49:28.180 --> 02:49:30.180 oh no 02:49:36.520 --> 02:49:38.520 here is the problem as I perceive it 02:49:38.520 --> 02:49:40.520 maybe you can help me get through 02:49:40.520 --> 02:49:42.520 this one 02:49:42.520 --> 02:49:44.520 the children are 02:49:44.520 --> 02:49:46.520 innocent and trusting and will try 02:49:46.520 --> 02:49:48.520 any curricular reform experiment 02:49:48.520 --> 02:49:50.520 they'll try anything which 02:49:50.520 --> 02:49:52.520 they have done in different schools around the world 02:49:52.520 --> 02:49:54.520 with great effect 02:49:54.520 --> 02:49:56.520 it was only a couple days 02:49:56.520 --> 02:49:58.520 ago I was at the 02:49:58.520 --> 02:50:00.520 the Intel 02:50:00.520 --> 02:50:02.520 farm they call it 02:50:02.520 --> 02:50:04.520 in Oregon where 10,000 02:50:04.520 --> 02:50:06.520 people work on realizing Terence's 02:50:06.520 --> 02:50:08.520 dream and 02:50:08.520 --> 02:50:12.520 making psychedelic drugs 02:50:12.520 --> 02:50:14.520 available to everyone 02:50:16.520 --> 02:50:18.520 oh a different dream 02:50:20.520 --> 02:50:22.520 they know what I mean 02:50:22.520 --> 02:50:24.520 chips not hits 02:50:26.520 --> 02:50:28.520 casually over lunch I 02:50:28.520 --> 02:50:30.520 revealed my 02:50:30.520 --> 02:50:32.520 revolutionary program for the schools 02:50:32.520 --> 02:50:34.520 to a software engineer 02:50:34.520 --> 02:50:36.520 who was sitting there and he said oh well 02:50:36.520 --> 02:50:38.520 this historical 02:50:38.520 --> 02:50:40.520 curriculum he said I'm an Armenian 02:50:40.520 --> 02:50:42.520 and Armenian I went not 02:50:42.520 --> 02:50:44.520 Algeria he says I'm from Algeria 02:50:44.520 --> 02:50:46.520 and my school was 02:50:46.520 --> 02:50:48.520 exactly what you it was wonderful 02:50:48.520 --> 02:50:50.520 so there are places in the world 02:50:50.520 --> 02:50:52.520 where even my experiment has 02:50:52.520 --> 02:50:54.520 been tried 02:50:54.520 --> 02:50:56.520 the problem is this 02:50:56.520 --> 02:50:58.520 the children the owners of the school 02:50:58.520 --> 02:51:00.520 the people everything is fine 02:51:00.520 --> 02:51:02.520 the problem is 02:51:02.520 --> 02:51:04.520 with the teachers and parents 02:51:04.520 --> 02:51:06.520 the teachers have been trained 02:51:06.520 --> 02:51:08.520 that's one problem 02:51:08.520 --> 02:51:10.520 and 02:51:10.520 --> 02:51:12.520 and the parents 02:51:12.520 --> 02:51:14.520 have been frightened I guess 02:51:14.520 --> 02:51:16.520 so the parents 02:51:16.520 --> 02:51:18.520 absolutely refuse any experiments 02:51:18.520 --> 02:51:20.520 that would affect their children because 02:51:20.520 --> 02:51:22.520 the danger of a failure you see that they 02:51:22.520 --> 02:51:24.520 they consider the 02:51:24.520 --> 02:51:26.520 current system which is guaranteed to 02:51:26.520 --> 02:51:28.520 fail is somehow safer than 02:51:28.520 --> 02:51:30.520 an experimental system that might fail 02:51:30.520 --> 02:51:32.520 the insecurity itself is a source 02:51:32.520 --> 02:51:34.520 of anxiety well 02:51:34.520 --> 02:51:36.520 I'm just analyzing I don't 02:51:36.520 --> 02:51:38.520 really know what goes through their mind but 02:51:38.520 --> 02:51:40.520 what I have discovered is that 02:51:40.520 --> 02:51:42.520 groups of parents come in and 02:51:42.520 --> 02:51:44.520 physically attack the 02:51:44.520 --> 02:51:46.520 teachers the administrators and so on 02:51:46.520 --> 02:51:48.520 to guarantee that 02:51:48.520 --> 02:51:50.520 the time worn 02:51:50.520 --> 02:51:52.520 failure 02:51:52.520 --> 02:51:54.520 proved system 02:51:54.520 --> 02:51:56.520 is performed 02:51:56.520 --> 02:51:58.520 as it always has been 02:52:00.520 --> 02:52:02.520 you see the problem older people 02:52:02.520 --> 02:52:04.520 that's why Terence 02:52:04.520 --> 02:52:06.520 has recommended mushrooms 02:52:06.520 --> 02:52:08.520 that's why 02:52:08.520 --> 02:52:10.520 Rupert has suggested psychic 02:52:10.520 --> 02:52:12.520 pets you see how revolutionary is psychic 02:52:12.520 --> 02:52:14.520 pets we're talking about the parents 02:52:14.520 --> 02:52:16.520 here after they it's proof 02:52:16.520 --> 02:52:18.520 to them that what they already know 02:52:18.520 --> 02:52:20.520 is true by somebody in the authority 02:52:20.520 --> 02:52:22.520 of the scientific establishment 02:52:22.520 --> 02:52:24.520 then their truth will become true for them 02:52:24.520 --> 02:52:26.520 for the first time due to the fact that 02:52:26.520 --> 02:52:28.520 they trust authority more than they trust their 02:52:28.520 --> 02:52:30.520 own experience 02:52:30.520 --> 02:52:36.960 so I 02:52:36.960 --> 02:52:38.960 I haven't given up 02:52:38.960 --> 02:52:40.960 yet 02:52:40.960 --> 02:52:42.960 with the educational 02:52:42.960 --> 02:52:44.960 system but I'm still 02:52:44.960 --> 02:52:46.960 seeking some little way 02:52:46.960 --> 02:52:48.960 around this 02:52:48.960 --> 02:52:50.960 very 02:52:50.960 --> 02:52:52.960 deeply ingrained habit 02:52:52.960 --> 02:52:54.960 and part 02:52:54.960 --> 02:52:56.960 of the problem is as the stakes 02:52:56.960 --> 02:52:58.960 rise the clenching 02:52:58.960 --> 02:53:00.960 on the part of the 02:53:00.960 --> 02:53:02.960 geriatric establishment 02:53:02.960 --> 02:53:04.960 becomes even more 02:53:04.960 --> 02:53:06.960 intensified so for 02:53:06.960 --> 02:53:08.960 example right now 02:53:08.960 --> 02:53:10.960 the worldwide 02:53:10.960 --> 02:53:12.960 epidemic of youth 02:53:12.960 --> 02:53:14.960 bashing is the most 02:53:14.960 --> 02:53:16.960 counterproductive 02:53:16.960 --> 02:53:18.960 thing we could possibly generate 02:53:18.960 --> 02:53:20.960 I mean we're leaning 02:53:20.960 --> 02:53:22.960 on the very people 02:53:22.960 --> 02:53:24.960 who are going to have to save 02:53:24.960 --> 02:53:26.960 the situation 02:53:26.960 --> 02:53:28.960 why not admit the 02:53:28.960 --> 02:53:30.960 obsolescence and bankruptcy 02:53:30.960 --> 02:53:32.960 of the old models 02:53:32.960 --> 02:53:34.960 and take our foot 02:53:34.960 --> 02:53:36.960 off the neck of youth 02:53:36.960 --> 02:53:38.960 and honor 02:53:38.960 --> 02:53:40.960 an interest in 02:53:40.960 --> 02:53:42.960 psychedelic experimentalism 02:53:42.960 --> 02:53:44.960 sexual redefining 02:53:44.960 --> 02:53:46.960 of roles a new 02:53:46.960 --> 02:53:48.960 look at how we relate to work 02:53:48.960 --> 02:53:50.960 a new look at how we 02:53:50.960 --> 02:53:52.960 relate to community instead of 02:53:52.960 --> 02:53:54.960 marginalizing youth culture 02:53:54.960 --> 02:53:56.960 and defining it as a phase 02:53:56.960 --> 02:53:58.960 misguided naive foolish 02:53:58.960 --> 02:54:00.960 we should say these are 02:54:00.960 --> 02:54:02.960 the uncorrupted people 02:54:02.960 --> 02:54:04.960 in society who have not 02:54:04.960 --> 02:54:06.960 yet felt the hammer 02:54:06.960 --> 02:54:08.960 of the programming 02:54:08.960 --> 02:54:10.960 and the guilt and the 02:54:10.960 --> 02:54:12.960 creodes of economic 02:54:12.960 --> 02:54:14.960 necessity and try to build 02:54:14.960 --> 02:54:16.960 upward and outward 02:54:16.960 --> 02:54:18.960 from youth culture rather than 02:54:18.960 --> 02:54:20.960 suppressing it 02:54:20.960 --> 02:54:22.960 for this reason I will be appearing 02:54:22.960 --> 02:54:24.960 at a rave tonight that starts 02:54:24.960 --> 02:54:26.960 after my bedtime 02:54:32.960 --> 02:54:34.960 I wish I could 02:54:34.960 --> 02:54:36.960 be persuaded 02:54:36.960 --> 02:54:38.960 by your persuasive rhetoric 02:54:38.960 --> 02:54:40.960 my 02:54:40.960 --> 02:54:42.960 experience of youth culture is 02:54:42.960 --> 02:54:44.960 that there are people who 02:54:44.960 --> 02:54:46.960 from the age of two have been 02:54:46.960 --> 02:54:48.960 watching hours a day of television 02:54:48.960 --> 02:54:50.960 shaped by commercials 02:54:50.960 --> 02:54:52.960 cunningly designed to introduce 02:54:52.960 --> 02:54:54.960 toddlers to the consumer society 02:54:54.960 --> 02:54:56.960 whose music is dominated by 02:54:56.960 --> 02:54:58.960 a music industry run by 02:54:58.960 --> 02:55:00.960 cynical interests manipulative 02:55:00.960 --> 02:55:02.960 people public relations operations 02:55:02.960 --> 02:55:04.960 and large corporations 02:55:04.960 --> 02:55:06.960 so to see this as uncontaminated 02:55:06.960 --> 02:55:08.960 pure the spirit of tomorrow 02:55:08.960 --> 02:55:10.960 untarnished 02:55:10.960 --> 02:55:12.960 by the vices of today 02:55:12.960 --> 02:55:14.960 seems to me to beg a number of questions 02:55:14.960 --> 02:55:16.960 however 02:55:16.960 --> 02:55:18.960 I'll be there at the rave tonight 02:55:18.960 --> 02:55:20.960 too Terence and there I'll be able to 02:55:20.960 --> 02:55:22.960 see this paradise that's 02:55:22.960 --> 02:55:26.210 unfolding before us 02:55:26.210 --> 02:55:28.210 your point about television 02:55:28.210 --> 02:55:30.210 is well taken I totally 02:55:30.210 --> 02:55:32.210 agree I think this is the most pernicious 02:55:32.210 --> 02:55:34.210 programming and propaganda 02:55:34.210 --> 02:55:36.210 device around 02:55:36.210 --> 02:55:38.210 it's about to be strangled by the 02:55:38.210 --> 02:55:40.210 world wide web well and you know 02:55:40.210 --> 02:55:42.210 you can just turn off your 02:55:42.210 --> 02:55:44.210 TV and I don't I say that as 02:55:44.210 --> 02:55:46.210 someone who did I raised my children 02:55:46.210 --> 02:55:48.210 without television because rather 02:55:48.210 --> 02:55:50.210 than just giving lip service to the 02:55:50.210 --> 02:55:52.210 idea that it's stupid we actually 02:55:52.210 --> 02:55:54.210 acted on the perception 02:55:54.210 --> 02:55:56.210 that it's stupid yes and we do too 02:55:56.210 --> 02:55:58.210 but your other point about the 02:55:58.210 --> 02:56:00.210 youth cultures music being 02:56:00.210 --> 02:56:02.210 in the hands of capitalists 02:56:02.210 --> 02:56:04.210 and record companies is 02:56:04.210 --> 02:56:06.210 slightly out of touch with what's 02:56:06.210 --> 02:56:08.210 actually happening for five hundred 02:56:08.210 --> 02:56:10.210 dollars you can buy a CDR 02:56:10.210 --> 02:56:12.210 burner bands do 02:56:12.210 --> 02:56:14.210 this and most youth 02:56:14.210 --> 02:56:16.210 culture music is now put out 02:56:16.210 --> 02:56:18.210 in editions of under a thousand 02:56:18.210 --> 02:56:20.210 pressings and really 02:56:20.210 --> 02:56:22.210 the corporate middle men have all 02:56:22.210 --> 02:56:24.210 been gone around 02:56:24.210 --> 02:56:26.210 and the big record corporations 02:56:26.210 --> 02:56:28.210 are not at all in touch with 02:56:28.210 --> 02:56:30.210 real tastes and 02:56:30.210 --> 02:56:32.210 real creativity in the music business 02:56:32.210 --> 02:56:34.210 they recycle garbage 02:56:34.210 --> 02:56:36.210 that they support with massive 02:56:36.210 --> 02:56:38.210 public relations programs 02:56:38.210 --> 02:56:40.210 at the same time that real 02:56:40.210 --> 02:56:42.210 creativity is alive and 02:56:42.210 --> 02:56:44.210 well and thriving on a 02:56:44.210 --> 02:56:46.210 fractalized micro scale 02:56:46.210 --> 02:56:48.210 that goes right around 02:56:48.210 --> 02:56:50.210 the desires of mass consumerism 02:56:52.210 --> 02:56:58.500 sorry to interrupt 02:57:00.500 --> 02:57:02.500 I don't I just 02:57:02.500 --> 02:57:04.500 it would be good if there could be an 02:57:04.500 --> 02:57:06.500 experiment carried out perhaps with you 02:57:06.500 --> 02:57:08.500 as the cheerleader 02:57:08.500 --> 02:57:10.500 for this 02:57:10.500 --> 02:57:12.500 youth culture of tomorrow actually 02:57:12.500 --> 02:57:14.500 to be able to be permitted rather 02:57:14.500 --> 02:57:16.500 than suppressed and so on to see what 02:57:16.500 --> 02:57:18.500 happens in my I mean there are 02:57:18.500 --> 02:57:20.500 quite a number of experiments in this 02:57:20.500 --> 02:57:22.500 I would have thought going on spontaneously 02:57:22.500 --> 02:57:24.500 it's not as if all these people 02:57:24.500 --> 02:57:26.500 involved in this culture are totally 02:57:26.500 --> 02:57:28.500 controlled by parents teachers etc 02:57:28.500 --> 02:57:30.500 many of them are not under direct control 02:57:30.500 --> 02:57:32.500 in this way at all 02:57:32.500 --> 02:57:34.500 so 02:57:34.500 --> 02:57:36.500 but you're still going to have to have 02:57:36.500 --> 02:57:38.500 educational systems 02:57:38.500 --> 02:57:40.500 school systems of one kind 02:57:40.500 --> 02:57:42.500 or another and it's not 02:57:42.500 --> 02:57:44.500 clear to me that 02:57:44.500 --> 02:57:46.500 more raves and psychedelics are going 02:57:46.500 --> 02:57:48.500 automatically to generate that 02:57:48.500 --> 02:57:50.500 well I would offer as an example 02:57:50.500 --> 02:57:52.500 I think the place on the planet 02:57:52.500 --> 02:57:54.500 where youth culture is most 02:57:54.500 --> 02:57:56.500 in control of the social agenda 02:57:56.500 --> 02:57:58.500 in other words 02:57:58.500 --> 02:58:00.500 where youth's preference for psychedelic 02:58:00.500 --> 02:58:02.500 drugs is honored 02:58:02.500 --> 02:58:04.500 where youth's music is honored 02:58:04.500 --> 02:58:06.500 where microeconomic systems 02:58:06.500 --> 02:58:08.500 built by youth are honored 02:58:08.500 --> 02:58:10.500 is the Netherlands 02:58:10.500 --> 02:58:12.500 Holland 02:58:12.500 --> 02:58:14.500 lowest AIDS infection rate in Europe 02:58:14.500 --> 02:58:16.500 lowest heroin 02:58:16.500 --> 02:58:18.500 addiction rate in Europe 02:58:18.500 --> 02:58:20.500 heroin is legal 02:58:20.500 --> 02:58:22.500 prostitution is legal 02:58:22.500 --> 02:58:24.500 there are actually very large scale 02:58:24.500 --> 02:58:26.500 social experiments going on 02:58:26.500 --> 02:58:28.500 that embody the values 02:58:28.500 --> 02:58:30.500 of youth culture and they're producing 02:58:30.500 --> 02:58:32.500 saner less stressful 02:58:32.500 --> 02:58:34.500 more life affirming 02:58:34.500 --> 02:58:36.500 in human societies than anything 02:58:36.500 --> 02:58:38.500 going on inside the high tech 02:58:38.500 --> 02:58:40.500 industrial democracies 02:58:40.500 --> 02:58:42.500 that set the global agenda 02:58:42.500 --> 02:58:44.500 I think 02:58:44.500 --> 02:58:46.500 well 02:58:46.500 --> 02:58:48.500 I often visit Holland and I must say 02:58:48.500 --> 02:58:50.500 quite late is such a striking 02:58:50.500 --> 02:58:52.500 difference between them and the rest 02:58:52.500 --> 02:58:54.500 of Western Europe 02:58:54.500 --> 02:58:56.500 well but that's really because you come from London 02:58:56.500 --> 02:58:58.500 where also these things are happening 02:58:58.500 --> 02:59:00.500 but if you lived 02:59:00.500 --> 02:59:02.500 in Berlin 02:59:02.500 --> 02:59:04.500 or Rio de Janeiro 02:59:04.500 --> 02:59:06.500 or Houston 02:59:06.500 --> 02:59:08.500 I think the contrast with the Netherlands 02:59:08.500 --> 02:59:10.500 is quite astonishing 02:59:10.500 --> 02:59:15.640 didn't mean to stop the show folks 02:59:19.640 --> 02:59:21.640 Ralph you're not saying enough 02:59:21.640 --> 02:59:23.640 oh 02:59:23.640 --> 02:59:25.640 am I guilty then 02:59:25.640 --> 02:59:27.640 of too much self indulgence 02:59:27.640 --> 02:59:29.640 no you posed important 02:59:29.640 --> 02:59:31.640 problems 02:59:31.640 --> 02:59:33.640 you've shown how on the edge of the millennium 02:59:33.640 --> 02:59:35.640 great steps 02:59:35.640 --> 02:59:37.640 or small steps are needed 02:59:37.640 --> 02:59:39.640 that magnify through butterfly effects 02:59:39.640 --> 02:59:41.640 you've asked me in turns what you think they should be 02:59:41.640 --> 02:59:43.640 you've told us you're disappointed 02:59:43.640 --> 02:59:45.640 by your own experiments 02:59:45.640 --> 02:59:47.640 with the reform of the educational system 02:59:47.640 --> 02:59:49.640 so what next 02:59:49.640 --> 02:59:51.640 well 02:59:51.640 --> 02:59:53.640 as I say 02:59:53.640 --> 02:59:55.640 I think that we're 02:59:55.640 --> 02:59:57.640 at the edge of a millennium 02:59:57.640 --> 02:59:59.640 we're at a turning point 02:59:59.640 --> 03:00:01.640 what may be coming down the pike 03:00:01.640 --> 03:00:03.640 could be two or three 03:00:03.640 --> 03:00:05.640 miracles 03:00:05.640 --> 03:00:07.640 that will decidedly change 03:00:07.640 --> 03:00:09.640 the definition of the problem 03:00:09.640 --> 03:00:11.640 and in the meanwhile 03:00:11.640 --> 03:00:13.640 I think that we're more or less stuck 03:00:13.640 --> 03:00:15.640 in the situation 03:00:15.640 --> 03:00:17.640 where we keep trying 03:00:17.640 --> 03:00:19.640 what we're doing 03:00:19.640 --> 03:00:21.640 and believing that it has 03:00:21.640 --> 03:00:23.640 at least some chance of having 03:00:23.640 --> 03:00:25.640 an effect 03:00:25.640 --> 03:00:27.640 I think that 03:00:27.640 --> 03:00:29.640 the 03:00:29.640 --> 03:00:31.640 the educational 03:00:31.640 --> 03:00:33.640 system might change itself 03:00:33.640 --> 03:00:35.640 by a miracle for example 03:00:35.640 --> 03:00:37.640 and it could do that in a way 03:00:37.640 --> 03:00:39.640 that had nothing whatsoever 03:00:39.640 --> 03:00:41.640 to do with any of our efforts 03:00:41.640 --> 03:00:43.640 or in fact it may be that some little thing 03:00:43.640 --> 03:00:45.640 that we did mattered 03:00:45.640 --> 03:00:47.640 I think that your work 03:00:47.640 --> 03:00:49.640 in the revolution of science 03:00:49.640 --> 03:00:51.640 is very important and very 03:00:51.640 --> 03:00:53.640 promising and it's 03:00:53.640 --> 03:00:55.640 proceeded with essentially 03:00:55.640 --> 03:00:57.640 without funding because 03:00:57.640 --> 03:00:59.640 the genius of the program 03:00:59.640 --> 03:01:01.640 that you've evolved 03:01:01.640 --> 03:01:03.640 is that it has this enormous 03:01:03.640 --> 03:01:05.640 leverage and at every 03:01:05.640 --> 03:01:07.640 crossing of the 03:01:07.640 --> 03:01:09.640 road you've made the right 03:01:09.640 --> 03:01:11.640 choice to get more 03:01:11.640 --> 03:01:13.640 leverage 03:01:13.640 --> 03:01:15.640 and Terence 03:01:15.640 --> 03:01:17.640 I think that your 03:01:17.640 --> 03:01:19.640 program also is a good one 03:01:19.640 --> 03:01:21.640 in that it's over the years 03:01:21.640 --> 03:01:23.640 changed in the direction of younger 03:01:23.640 --> 03:01:25.640 people and that you've been 03:01:25.640 --> 03:01:27.640 you know changed your 03:01:27.640 --> 03:01:29.640 approach to 03:01:29.640 --> 03:01:31.640 maximize and 03:01:31.640 --> 03:01:33.640 I don't see in either case 03:01:33.640 --> 03:01:35.640 that there's an enormous backlash 03:01:35.640 --> 03:01:37.640 working against you 03:01:37.640 --> 03:01:39.640 that 03:01:39.640 --> 03:01:41.640 other revolutionary movements 03:01:41.640 --> 03:01:43.640 have been stopped by a backlash 03:01:43.640 --> 03:01:45.640 and although you don't have funding 03:01:45.640 --> 03:01:47.640 you don't have groups 03:01:47.640 --> 03:01:49.640 calling you up and threatening 03:01:49.640 --> 03:01:51.640 your life and so on 03:01:51.640 --> 03:01:53.640 in my own case I have 03:01:53.640 --> 03:01:55.640 felt 03:01:55.640 --> 03:01:57.640 I've written about this endlessly 03:01:57.640 --> 03:01:59.640 besides writing mathematics I write 03:01:59.640 --> 03:02:01.640 that mathematics is important 03:02:01.640 --> 03:02:03.640 and through 03:02:03.640 --> 03:02:05.640 the microscopic analysis 03:02:05.640 --> 03:02:07.640 of the hinges of history 03:02:07.640 --> 03:02:09.640 the edges of millennia past 03:02:09.640 --> 03:02:11.640 I have 03:02:11.640 --> 03:02:13.640 pointed out 03:02:13.640 --> 03:02:15.640 exactly where in each case 03:02:15.640 --> 03:02:17.640 mathematics had a key 03:02:17.640 --> 03:02:19.640 role in the miracle 03:02:19.640 --> 03:02:21.640 and the bifurcation that happened 03:02:21.640 --> 03:02:23.640 I think that 03:02:23.640 --> 03:02:25.640 society that rejects mathematics 03:02:25.640 --> 03:02:27.640 cannot actually successfully 03:02:27.640 --> 03:02:29.640 deal with these problems 03:02:29.640 --> 03:02:31.640 and therefore I have activated 03:02:31.640 --> 03:02:33.640 myself against 03:02:33.640 --> 03:02:35.640 the problem especially 03:02:35.640 --> 03:02:37.640 prevalent in the United States 03:02:37.640 --> 03:02:39.640 and concomitant with other problems 03:02:39.640 --> 03:02:41.640 that are especially prevalent in the United States 03:02:41.640 --> 03:02:43.640 the problem of math 03:02:43.640 --> 03:02:45.640 anxiety, avoidance 03:02:45.640 --> 03:02:48.880 and misunderstanding 03:02:48.880 --> 03:02:50.880 and 03:02:50.880 --> 03:02:52.880 here I would say 03:02:52.880 --> 03:02:54.880 that there is a huge 03:02:54.880 --> 03:02:56.880 institution 03:02:56.880 --> 03:02:58.880 more or less equivalent to 03:02:58.880 --> 03:03:00.880 the scientific community that is 03:03:00.880 --> 03:03:02.880 arrayed against this 03:03:02.880 --> 03:03:04.880 information that somehow 03:03:04.880 --> 03:03:06.880 the educational system 03:03:06.880 --> 03:03:08.880 has been particularly 03:03:08.880 --> 03:03:10.880 persistent in 03:03:10.880 --> 03:03:12.880 the destruction of mathematics 03:03:12.880 --> 03:03:14.880 in the destruction of mathematical 03:03:14.880 --> 03:03:16.880 capability of youth and therefore 03:03:16.880 --> 03:03:18.880 in disempowerment of the society 03:03:18.880 --> 03:03:20.880 with its critical faculty to change 03:03:20.880 --> 03:03:22.880 I do not believe 03:03:22.880 --> 03:03:24.880 you can have any clarity of view 03:03:24.880 --> 03:03:26.880 in the progress of history 03:03:26.880 --> 03:03:28.880 with no mathematical training on the part 03:03:28.880 --> 03:03:30.880 of any of the participants 03:03:30.880 --> 03:03:32.880 I have seen in this society 03:03:32.880 --> 03:03:34.880 that even Nobel Prize winners in physics 03:03:34.880 --> 03:03:36.880 have math anxiety to a very 03:03:36.880 --> 03:03:38.880 severe degree 03:03:38.880 --> 03:03:40.880 I am able to detect this because it is 03:03:40.880 --> 03:03:42.880 something that is 03:03:42.880 --> 03:03:44.880 amplified, it is behavior that emerges 03:03:44.880 --> 03:03:46.880 as soon as I walk into a room 03:03:50.880 --> 03:03:52.880 so 03:03:52.880 --> 03:03:54.880 I guess I feel in some 03:03:54.880 --> 03:03:56.880 that my own efforts 03:03:56.880 --> 03:03:58.880 have been rather less successful 03:03:58.880 --> 03:04:00.880 or maybe I haven't been as 03:04:00.880 --> 03:04:02.880 clever in turning to the left or right 03:04:02.880 --> 03:04:04.880 at the crossings 03:04:04.880 --> 03:04:06.880 of the road 03:04:08.880 --> 03:04:10.880 the problem is already much less 03:04:10.880 --> 03:04:12.880 severe in other countries 03:04:12.880 --> 03:04:14.880 so it seems like we needn't worry too much 03:04:14.880 --> 03:04:16.880 in Europe, throughout Europe 03:04:16.880 --> 03:04:18.880 for example the 03:04:18.880 --> 03:04:20.880 problem of the destruction of mathematical 03:04:20.880 --> 03:04:22.880 capability is far less severe 03:04:22.880 --> 03:04:24.880 the only thing really disturbing 03:04:24.880 --> 03:04:26.880 there is that it is growing 03:04:26.880 --> 03:04:28.880 at an alarming rate 03:04:28.880 --> 03:04:30.880 they are inheriting the disease 03:04:30.880 --> 03:04:32.880 from the United States 03:04:32.880 --> 03:04:34.880 a spreading disease based on 03:04:34.880 --> 03:04:36.880 standardized examinations like the SAT 03:04:36.880 --> 03:04:38.880 and equivalent 03:04:38.880 --> 03:04:40.880 movements 03:04:40.880 --> 03:04:42.880 so 03:04:42.880 --> 03:04:44.880 there you have it, a problem that is so bad 03:04:44.880 --> 03:04:46.880 that the very mention of the word 03:04:46.880 --> 03:04:48.880 mathematics produces 03:04:48.880 --> 03:04:50.880 aversion 03:04:50.880 --> 03:04:52.880 reaction that is 03:04:52.880 --> 03:04:54.880 paralyzing so that 03:04:54.880 --> 03:04:56.880 much as I hate to 03:04:56.880 --> 03:04:58.880 and you have seen this today 03:04:58.880 --> 03:05:00.880 that I can go through an entire day 03:05:00.880 --> 03:05:02.880 without mentioning mathematics 03:05:02.880 --> 03:05:04.880 mentioning mathematics but not the word mathematics 03:05:04.880 --> 03:05:06.880 in the hopes of tricking people into recognizing 03:05:06.880 --> 03:05:08.880 some ideas like this 03:05:08.880 --> 03:05:10.880 that have to do with 03:05:10.880 --> 03:05:12.880 perception of space time 03:05:12.880 --> 03:05:14.880 patterns in the abstract 03:05:14.880 --> 03:05:16.880 that these skills are 03:05:16.880 --> 03:05:18.880 useful 03:05:18.880 --> 03:05:20.880 Can I add to that 03:05:20.880 --> 03:05:22.880 I mean I don't think what Ralph means 03:05:22.880 --> 03:05:24.880 is that it's a tragedy 03:05:24.880 --> 03:05:26.880 that most people can't factor 03:05:26.880 --> 03:05:28.880 a quadratic equation 03:05:28.880 --> 03:05:30.880 I think he speaks 03:05:30.880 --> 03:05:32.880 as he does because he is so 03:05:32.880 --> 03:05:34.880 professionally immersed in these 03:05:34.880 --> 03:05:36.880 issues 03:05:36.880 --> 03:05:38.880 as someone somewhat more distant 03:05:38.880 --> 03:05:40.880 from all of this but in agreement 03:05:40.880 --> 03:05:42.880 from Ralph 03:05:42.880 --> 03:05:44.880 the failure to teach mathematics 03:05:44.880 --> 03:05:46.880 in practical 03:05:46.880 --> 03:05:48.880 social and political terms 03:05:48.880 --> 03:05:50.880 boils down to 03:05:50.880 --> 03:05:52.880 a failure to teach 03:05:52.880 --> 03:05:54.880 logic 03:05:54.880 --> 03:05:56.880 and discriminating 03:05:56.880 --> 03:05:58.880 understanding 03:05:58.880 --> 03:06:00.880 the great evil in my 03:06:00.880 --> 03:06:02.880 humble opinion which 03:06:02.880 --> 03:06:04.880 haunts our enterprise 03:06:04.880 --> 03:06:06.880 and I say this realizing 03:06:06.880 --> 03:06:08.880 I'm setting the fox among 03:06:08.880 --> 03:06:10.880 the chickens the great evil 03:06:10.880 --> 03:06:12.880 that has been allowed 03:06:12.880 --> 03:06:14.880 to flourish in the absence of 03:06:14.880 --> 03:06:16.880 mathematical understanding 03:06:16.880 --> 03:06:18.880 is relativism 03:06:18.880 --> 03:06:20.880 and what is relativism 03:06:20.880 --> 03:06:22.880 it's the idea 03:06:22.880 --> 03:06:24.880 that there is no distinction 03:06:24.880 --> 03:06:26.880 between shit and shinola 03:06:26.880 --> 03:06:28.880 that all ideas 03:06:28.880 --> 03:06:30.880 are somehow 03:06:30.880 --> 03:06:32.880 operating on 03:06:32.880 --> 03:06:34.880 equal footing 03:06:34.880 --> 03:06:36.880 so one person is 03:06:36.880 --> 03:06:38.880 a chaos theorist 03:06:38.880 --> 03:06:40.880 another is 03:06:40.880 --> 03:06:42.880 a follower of the revelations 03:06:42.880 --> 03:06:44.880 of this or that new age 03:06:44.880 --> 03:06:46.880 guru someone else is channeling 03:06:46.880 --> 03:06:48.880 information from the Pleiades 03:06:48.880 --> 03:06:50.880 and we have been 03:06:50.880 --> 03:06:52.880 taught that political 03:06:52.880 --> 03:06:54.880 correctness demands that 03:06:54.880 --> 03:06:56.880 we treat all these things 03:06:56.880 --> 03:06:58.880 with equal weight 03:06:58.880 --> 03:07:00.880 because we have no mathematical 03:07:00.880 --> 03:07:02.880 ability no logical 03:07:02.880 --> 03:07:04.880 ability we don't know how 03:07:04.880 --> 03:07:06.880 to ask the questions that 03:07:06.880 --> 03:07:08.880 expose some positions as 03:07:08.880 --> 03:07:10.880 preposterous 03:07:10.880 --> 03:07:12.880 trivial insulting to the 03:07:12.880 --> 03:07:14.880 intelligence and unworthy 03:07:14.880 --> 03:07:16.880 of repetition 03:07:16.880 --> 03:07:18.880 so we all are very 03:07:18.880 --> 03:07:20.880 comfortable bashing science 03:07:20.880 --> 03:07:22.880 and flailing away 03:07:22.880 --> 03:07:24.880 at that 03:07:24.880 --> 03:07:26.880 but that isn't our enemy 03:07:26.880 --> 03:07:28.880 science is capable of 03:07:28.880 --> 03:07:30.880 undertaking its own 03:07:30.880 --> 03:07:32.880 reformation and critique 03:07:32.880 --> 03:07:34.880 and has been engaged in that 03:07:34.880 --> 03:07:36.880 fairly vigorously for some time 03:07:36.880 --> 03:07:38.880 the enemy that will really 03:07:38.880 --> 03:07:40.880 subvert the enterprise 03:07:40.880 --> 03:07:42.880 of building a world 03:07:42.880 --> 03:07:44.880 based on clarity 03:07:44.880 --> 03:07:46.880 is the belief that we cannot 03:07:46.880 --> 03:07:48.880 point out the pernicious 03:07:48.880 --> 03:07:50.880 forms of idiocy 03:07:50.880 --> 03:07:52.880 that flourish in our own community 03:07:52.880 --> 03:07:54.880 the problem is growing worse 03:07:54.880 --> 03:07:56.880 all the time 03:07:56.880 --> 03:07:58.880 just pick up a copy of 03:07:58.880 --> 03:08:00.880 Magical Blend or Shaman's Drum 03:08:00.880 --> 03:08:02.880 and you will discover an appeal 03:08:02.880 --> 03:08:04.880 to the level of intellect 03:08:04.880 --> 03:08:06.880 that makes what's going on 03:08:06.880 --> 03:08:08.880 with television advertising 03:08:08.880 --> 03:08:10.880 look like a meeting of the 03:08:10.880 --> 03:08:12.880 Princeton Institute of Advanced Study 03:08:14.880 --> 03:08:16.880 we have tolerated 03:08:16.880 --> 03:08:18.880 too many loose heads 03:08:18.880 --> 03:08:20.880 in our 03:08:20.880 --> 03:08:22.880 community 03:08:22.880 --> 03:08:24.880 we are not willing to take on 03:08:24.880 --> 03:08:26.880 the karma 03:08:26.880 --> 03:08:28.880 involved in argument 03:08:28.880 --> 03:08:30.880 and discourse 03:08:30.880 --> 03:08:32.880 that actually gores somebody's 03:08:32.880 --> 03:08:34.880 ox so that 03:08:34.880 --> 03:08:36.880 at the end of the day 03:08:36.880 --> 03:08:38.880 iridology or mormonism 03:08:38.880 --> 03:08:40.880 or some other 03:08:40.880 --> 03:08:42.880 form of institutionally supported 03:08:42.880 --> 03:08:44.880 foolishness lies in 03:08:44.880 --> 03:08:46.880 shreds on the floor 03:08:46.880 --> 03:08:48.880 we consider this politically incorrect 03:08:48.880 --> 03:08:50.880 I can feel the tension 03:08:50.880 --> 03:08:52.880 in this room because people 03:08:52.880 --> 03:08:54.880 since I might gore 03:08:54.880 --> 03:08:56.880 their particular ox 03:08:56.880 --> 03:08:58.880 if we had learned 03:08:58.880 --> 03:09:00.880 mathematical logic 03:09:00.880 --> 03:09:02.880 or reason 03:09:02.880 --> 03:09:04.880 or rules of evidence 03:09:04.880 --> 03:09:06.880 when someone approaches us 03:09:06.880 --> 03:09:08.880 excited to inform us 03:09:08.880 --> 03:09:10.880 that the ruins of Lemuria 03:09:10.880 --> 03:09:12.880 have been spotted 03:09:12.880 --> 03:09:14.880 in the deep sea 03:09:14.880 --> 03:09:16.880 off Big Sur 03:09:16.880 --> 03:09:18.880 or something like that 03:09:18.880 --> 03:09:20.880 we would be able to respond 03:09:20.880 --> 03:09:22.880 to that with the contempt 03:09:22.880 --> 03:09:24.880 I had a conversation 03:09:24.880 --> 03:09:26.880 about this recently 03:09:26.880 --> 03:09:28.880 with someone who if I had to 03:09:28.880 --> 03:09:30.880 describe their job category 03:09:30.880 --> 03:09:32.880 I would describe them 03:09:32.880 --> 03:09:34.880 as mafiosa 03:09:34.880 --> 03:09:36.880 and I said 03:09:36.880 --> 03:09:38.880 what do you think of the 03:09:38.880 --> 03:09:40.880 abduction phenomenon 03:09:40.880 --> 03:09:42.880 and without hesitation 03:09:42.880 --> 03:09:44.880 this person said 03:09:44.880 --> 03:09:46.880 there are just so many foolish 03:09:46.880 --> 03:09:48.880 people in the world 03:09:48.880 --> 03:09:50.880 and to me 03:09:50.880 --> 03:09:52.880 all of these things are intelligence tests 03:09:52.880 --> 03:09:54.880 and the people who pass 03:09:54.880 --> 03:09:56.880 the intelligence test 03:09:56.880 --> 03:09:58.880 are not worrying about 03:09:58.880 --> 03:10:00.880 pro bono proctologists 03:10:00.880 --> 03:10:02.880 from other star systems 03:10:04.880 --> 03:10:06.880 in their bedrooms 03:10:06.880 --> 03:10:08.880 so 03:10:08.880 --> 03:10:10.880 you know 03:10:10.880 --> 03:10:12.880 we have perfected 03:10:12.880 --> 03:10:14.880 politeness 03:10:14.880 --> 03:10:16.880 we have perfected 03:10:16.880 --> 03:10:18.880 the ability to listen 03:10:18.880 --> 03:10:20.880 to damn foolishness 03:10:20.880 --> 03:10:22.880 without betraying by so much as 03:10:22.880 --> 03:10:24.880 an eyebrow that we realize 03:10:24.880 --> 03:10:26.880 what we're in the presence of 03:10:26.880 --> 03:10:28.880 now I think 03:10:28.880 --> 03:10:30.880 it's time to refine 03:10:30.880 --> 03:10:32.880 our mathematical skills 03:10:32.880 --> 03:10:34.880 learn to think straight 03:10:34.880 --> 03:10:36.880 and not be afraid to 03:10:36.880 --> 03:10:38.880 denounce 03:10:38.880 --> 03:10:40.880 the pernicious forms of foolishness 03:10:40.880 --> 03:10:42.880 which are vitiating the energies 03:10:42.880 --> 03:10:44.880 of our community 03:10:44.880 --> 03:10:46.880 and making us appear 03:10:46.880 --> 03:10:48.880 marginal and absurd 03:10:48.880 --> 03:10:50.880 in the discourse about 03:10:50.880 --> 03:10:52.880 truly transforming 03:10:52.880 --> 03:10:54.880 society 03:11:06.550 --> 03:11:08.550 well I can't wait to see 03:11:08.550 --> 03:11:10.550 this laboratory of clarity 03:11:10.550 --> 03:11:12.550 unfold before me tonight 03:11:14.550 --> 03:11:16.550 and as all nonsense is dispelled 03:11:18.550 --> 03:11:20.550 the scalpel of reason 03:11:22.550 --> 03:11:24.550 is brought out by Terence 03:11:24.550 --> 03:11:26.550 yes well it is an 03:11:26.550 --> 03:11:28.550 ambiguous enterprise 03:11:28.550 --> 03:11:30.550 and fraught with contradiction 03:11:30.550 --> 03:11:32.550 but forward 03:11:32.550 --> 03:11:34.550 it's not going to work