WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.360 --> 00:00:03.799 Oh hey, it's just the podcast host that calls herself 2 00:00:03.879 --> 00:00:04.719 your Internet dad. 3 00:00:04.759 --> 00:00:05.320 Ali Ward. 4 00:00:05.559 --> 00:00:08.800 Back from the holidays and my first work break in 5 00:00:09.240 --> 00:00:11.919 many years. I have a cold right now, but my 6 00:00:12.000 --> 00:00:15.240 heart's burning, ready to deliver a year's worth of brand 7 00:00:15.240 --> 00:00:19.440 new episodes of Ologies. Hello again, y'all, it's twenty twenty. 8 00:00:19.719 --> 00:00:23.079 We are no longer dabbling in the two thousands, like 9 00:00:23.199 --> 00:00:26.960 poking a gnarl toe in the waters of tomorrow. We're 10 00:00:27.079 --> 00:00:30.359 shinned deep in the century. The world is burning, New 11 00:00:30.440 --> 00:00:33.759 wars are a bloom. Drones deliver our lunches. 12 00:00:33.880 --> 00:00:35.039 We're in this, bitch. 13 00:00:35.280 --> 00:00:39.039 It's officially the future, So what better time to talk 14 00:00:39.320 --> 00:00:42.880 about futurology, the study of what happens next. It's a thing. 15 00:00:43.119 --> 00:00:46.079 But before we move forward, let's pause a quick second 16 00:00:46.079 --> 00:00:48.640 to thank every single patron who's ever supported the show 17 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:51.119 and allowed me to do things like take the last 18 00:00:51.119 --> 00:00:54.960 two weeks off without sponsors. Thanks to everyone who's wearing 19 00:00:55.280 --> 00:00:59.200 fresh ologieswag from ologiesmarch dot com. Thanks to everyone who's 20 00:00:59.399 --> 00:01:01.719 telling friends about the show, keeping it in the top 21 00:01:01.840 --> 00:01:06.799 science podcast on iTunes, what rating and subscribing and reviewing 22 00:01:07.480 --> 00:01:10.560 You know, I tenderly creep your reviews it's true, so 23 00:01:10.640 --> 00:01:12.599 I can pull out a fresh one. Let's have at it. 24 00:01:12.760 --> 00:01:13.079 Okay. 25 00:01:13.079 --> 00:01:16.480 This week is from killen Kel's who said Ali is 26 00:01:16.519 --> 00:01:18.760 my dad, my mom, my weird classmate who has really 27 00:01:18.799 --> 00:01:21.599 good points, and my best friend all in one. The 28 00:01:21.599 --> 00:01:24.799 Pantatology episode with Cole and Perry changed my life, and 29 00:01:24.840 --> 00:01:27.040 now I'm trying to open my own business helping people 30 00:01:27.079 --> 00:01:29.480 plan the last party of their life the way they want. 31 00:01:29.680 --> 00:01:32.879 Let's do end of life parties instead of funerals. Okay, okay, cool, anyways, 32 00:01:32.959 --> 00:01:35.040 give it a listen. Okay, bye bye dang. That's a 33 00:01:35.079 --> 00:01:38.159 good idea. There is no better situation in which to 34 00:01:38.239 --> 00:01:40.120 be the end of the life of the party. And 35 00:01:40.239 --> 00:01:43.359 I say, we're at Tiara, We're all gonna die. Okay. 36 00:01:43.480 --> 00:01:46.879 Futurology very much a thing in a scholarly sense, and 37 00:01:47.000 --> 00:01:50.959 it's also called future studies sometimes futurism, although we're going 38 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:53.400 to talk more with this week's guests about that. But 39 00:01:53.519 --> 00:01:58.560 it's a study of possible, probable, and preferable futures. So 40 00:01:58.599 --> 00:02:02.079 it's a social science like history, but the gearshift goes 41 00:02:02.280 --> 00:02:06.920 forward rather than in reverse. And this guest studied ecology, 42 00:02:07.120 --> 00:02:10.759 behavior and evolution at UC San Diego has a master's 43 00:02:10.840 --> 00:02:16.560 in Journalism science and has investigated topics like bionic human 44 00:02:16.680 --> 00:02:22.560 exoskeletons and sex, robots and tech progress, facial recognition, some 45 00:02:22.800 --> 00:02:26.800 Uncanny Valleys, and space travel for publications like the BBC 46 00:02:26.919 --> 00:02:31.759 and Scientific, American, Vice, Vox, The Atlantic Motherboard and more. 47 00:02:31.879 --> 00:02:35.800 And she's also produced, hosted, and edited over one hundred 48 00:02:35.840 --> 00:02:39.479 episodes of the very highly lauded podcast flash Forward, which 49 00:02:39.520 --> 00:02:43.960 is just pure auditory futurology, and in each episode she 50 00:02:44.039 --> 00:02:46.759 looks at possible future scenarios and then she talks to 51 00:02:46.800 --> 00:02:51.960 these experts about the trajectory that we squishy humans may 52 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:55.199 take just marching toward tomorrow. So she's also just a 53 00:02:55.240 --> 00:02:59.360 badass advocate and a creative soul. I am a fan lady. 54 00:02:59.439 --> 00:03:02.039 She was lee reading a seminar at zycom camp in November, 55 00:03:02.080 --> 00:03:04.520 and so I nabbed her for an hour to ask 56 00:03:04.639 --> 00:03:07.919 all about her full time job studying and examining and 57 00:03:07.960 --> 00:03:11.319 forecasting the future. And we talked about everything from crouches 58 00:03:11.639 --> 00:03:14.919 to the Jetsons, What scares her the most, what gives 59 00:03:14.960 --> 00:03:18.439 her hope, the many types of technology that she has 60 00:03:18.560 --> 00:03:22.000 buried in her own body. Why some futurists don't want 61 00:03:22.039 --> 00:03:24.919 things to change, and if your phone is spying on you, 62 00:03:25.120 --> 00:03:29.360 and also why amid all of this technology and chaos, 63 00:03:29.520 --> 00:03:32.439 She considers herself an optimist. So cuddle up in your 64 00:03:32.439 --> 00:03:35.360 space blanket and have your cyborg butler brew you a 65 00:03:35.400 --> 00:03:38.680 goblet of the good stuff. Fulls to yourself for the 66 00:03:38.719 --> 00:03:42.719 friendliness and the forecasting. A flash forward host and professional 67 00:03:43.280 --> 00:03:47.439 literal futureologist, the Rose eveleth. 68 00:04:05.759 --> 00:04:09.560 Now you are a futurologist. I am a futurologist. What 69 00:04:09.680 --> 00:04:09.960 is that? 70 00:04:10.840 --> 00:04:11.080 Yes? 71 00:04:11.159 --> 00:04:14.199 Okay, So the futurelogist is not like a super common 72 00:04:14.280 --> 00:04:15.800 term but it is the one that I like to 73 00:04:15.879 --> 00:04:17.519 use for what I do because I kind of sit 74 00:04:17.560 --> 00:04:20.680 in between a bunch of different things that have other terms. 75 00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:23.199 So futurists is something that people probably have heard of. 76 00:04:24.040 --> 00:04:27.360 Futurists generally are people who are working in industry, so 77 00:04:27.360 --> 00:04:29.680 it's sort of like a vocation. There are degrees you 78 00:04:29.720 --> 00:04:32.839 can get in Strategic Foresight to become a futurist, which 79 00:04:32.879 --> 00:04:36.959 is very cool. Strategic Force Site. There are like various 80 00:04:36.959 --> 00:04:39.959 programs that have these schools that have these programs, and 81 00:04:40.040 --> 00:04:42.399 those people tend to like kind of work as consultants, right, 82 00:04:42.399 --> 00:04:44.279 they'll go into a company and be like, Okay, let 83 00:04:44.319 --> 00:04:47.079 me help you project out you know, five, ten, fifteen 84 00:04:47.120 --> 00:04:48.680 years and kind of think about the future of like 85 00:04:48.920 --> 00:04:51.279 Coca Cola or Nike or whatever it is. There's like 86 00:04:51.319 --> 00:04:55.720 professional groups for those futurists, and that's one bucket, and 87 00:04:55.759 --> 00:04:58.000 then there's this sort of like science fiction writer's bucket, 88 00:04:58.240 --> 00:05:00.279 and many of them sort of consider themselves future And 89 00:05:00.319 --> 00:05:02.439 there's overlap between all of these, right, Like they're sci 90 00:05:02.439 --> 00:05:05.319 fi writers who are also futurists, but those folks are 91 00:05:05.319 --> 00:05:07.839 like imagining fictional futures and thinking about the future in 92 00:05:07.879 --> 00:05:09.800 that way. And then they are sort of like critical 93 00:05:09.800 --> 00:05:12.160 future studies people or like future studies people, and they're 94 00:05:12.199 --> 00:05:14.399 on the academic side of like what we talk about 95 00:05:14.399 --> 00:05:15.680 when we talk about futurism. 96 00:05:15.959 --> 00:05:17.680 And I kind of like straddle all. 97 00:05:17.600 --> 00:05:19.519 Of those, okay, And so I think of myself as 98 00:05:19.519 --> 00:05:21.759 someone who like sort of studies futurists and someone who 99 00:05:21.839 --> 00:05:23.759 like studies science fiction writers, and someone who like thinks 100 00:05:23.759 --> 00:05:26.360 about these like academic fields. And so I like futurerologists 101 00:05:26.360 --> 00:05:28.079 because it kind of like is that nice umbrella term? 102 00:05:28.279 --> 00:05:29.439 And also people laugh when. 103 00:05:29.319 --> 00:05:29.680 I say it. 104 00:05:30.560 --> 00:05:32.399 That's all I can ask have you been using it 105 00:05:33.000 --> 00:05:35.199 about two years now, I would say I've been using 106 00:05:35.199 --> 00:05:36.480 it there, or I don't mind if people call me 107 00:05:36.480 --> 00:05:38.439 a futurist, but I do like futurologists better. 108 00:05:38.560 --> 00:05:40.519 I like it better too. I should thought you would, 109 00:05:40.680 --> 00:05:41.120 of course. 110 00:05:41.519 --> 00:05:44.040 I mean here we are, so yeah, if you were 111 00:05:44.079 --> 00:05:47.439 not a futurologist, would we be sitting on this couch today. 112 00:05:47.639 --> 00:05:50.439 I would have invented the word for you if. 113 00:05:50.279 --> 00:05:52.079 I could, because I've been wanting to talk to you 114 00:05:52.160 --> 00:05:54.800 for so long about what you do and about how 115 00:05:54.920 --> 00:05:57.240 you got kind of captivated by it because you have 116 00:05:57.279 --> 00:05:59.920 a journalism background. Yeah, and so when did you start 117 00:06:00.240 --> 00:06:02.680 studying journalism? When did you know that you wanted to 118 00:06:03.199 --> 00:06:04.399 tell stories? Yeah? 119 00:06:04.439 --> 00:06:05.680 So I thought I would be a scientist for a 120 00:06:05.680 --> 00:06:06.279 really long time. 121 00:06:07.040 --> 00:06:08.959 When I was a kid, I dressed up as Jane 122 00:06:08.959 --> 00:06:10.920 Goodall for like many years in a row as Halloween 123 00:06:10.959 --> 00:06:13.439 for Halloween, like many years in a row, enough for 124 00:06:13.439 --> 00:06:14.800 people to be like, this is weird, this is a 125 00:06:14.839 --> 00:06:18.680 cute anymore, you know, Like and then and then I 126 00:06:18.759 --> 00:06:21.519 learned that like there's Jack Custeau and there was this 127 00:06:21.600 --> 00:06:22.199 underwater world. 128 00:06:22.240 --> 00:06:23.160 So I was like, great, I'm going to be the 129 00:06:23.240 --> 00:06:25.000 Jangle all the sea. This is great. I have my 130 00:06:25.040 --> 00:06:26.199 career plan, like I'm ready. 131 00:06:26.240 --> 00:06:28.839 I made my dad get me scuba certification when I 132 00:06:28.839 --> 00:06:30.639 was twelve, which is the youngest age you're allowed to 133 00:06:30.680 --> 00:06:32.959 do it. I got certified through NAWI, which was run 134 00:06:33.000 --> 00:06:34.680 by this like ex marine, and I was like this 135 00:06:34.800 --> 00:06:37.959 scrawny twelve year old among like former Navy seals to 136 00:06:38.000 --> 00:06:41.519 getting this training. So it was like extremely brutal, but 137 00:06:41.560 --> 00:06:42.920 I was like committed to it. So I was like, 138 00:06:42.959 --> 00:06:44.319 I'm going to be a scuba diver. I'm going to 139 00:06:44.360 --> 00:06:46.160 like study the ocean. This is gonna be my thing. 140 00:06:46.720 --> 00:06:48.680 I went to college in San Diego. I worked at 141 00:06:48.680 --> 00:06:50.160 scrips and Studoshtography, and I. 142 00:06:50.120 --> 00:06:51.120 Was like, this is great. I'm going to be the 143 00:06:51.199 --> 00:06:52.879 Jacq Coustauv of ocean excellent. 144 00:06:53.319 --> 00:06:56.800 Turns out I love science and actually doing science is 145 00:06:56.839 --> 00:06:59.279 not the thing I'm the best at. And so I 146 00:06:59.319 --> 00:07:02.160 had a PI who I worked for, who was great 147 00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:05.639 and was like, what about this thing called science journalism, 148 00:07:05.720 --> 00:07:08.560 which was like like I'd never occurred to me that 149 00:07:08.560 --> 00:07:11.600 that was like a job someone could have, you can 150 00:07:11.639 --> 00:07:13.800 do it, and so that was really it. Like I 151 00:07:13.839 --> 00:07:16.360 had no journalism training, I had no journalism background. I 152 00:07:16.399 --> 00:07:19.120 applied to this program at NYU that's a master's program 153 00:07:19.120 --> 00:07:22.160 in science journalism specifically Oh Wow, which is like there's 154 00:07:22.199 --> 00:07:25.639 not that many programs like that, and I did not 155 00:07:25.720 --> 00:07:28.560 get in because I was not a very good student 156 00:07:28.600 --> 00:07:30.959 in school, and like my application was like all over 157 00:07:31.040 --> 00:07:33.680 the place. I had written this like speculative fiction thing 158 00:07:33.720 --> 00:07:36.079 about like a researcher who got obsessed with this squid 159 00:07:36.120 --> 00:07:37.639 and then like was like traveling the world that like 160 00:07:37.639 --> 00:07:39.680 put that in my application for journalism school, which it's 161 00:07:39.680 --> 00:07:43.279 like makes no sense. It was like all over the place. 162 00:07:43.319 --> 00:07:45.720 And so the program coordinator, who I'm now close friends with, 163 00:07:45.759 --> 00:07:47.079 I didn't get in. I was on the wait list 164 00:07:47.480 --> 00:07:48.959 and he I teased him all the time about it 165 00:07:48.959 --> 00:07:52.240 because but he's he was like, yeah, your application was bizarre. 166 00:07:53.360 --> 00:07:55.759 I was like, who is this person? And by chance, 167 00:07:55.759 --> 00:07:58.079 and it almost never happens at that program, somebody decided 168 00:07:58.079 --> 00:08:00.560 not to go and so I got to go. So 169 00:08:00.600 --> 00:08:02.160 it was like, you know, a luck of the universe. 170 00:08:02.240 --> 00:08:03.519 And so I got to go to this program and 171 00:08:03.720 --> 00:08:05.279 and that's really where I learned everything. I didn't know 172 00:08:05.319 --> 00:08:07.319 anything about journalism, and so I got thrown in with 173 00:08:07.319 --> 00:08:08.639 all these people who had like worked at their student 174 00:08:08.639 --> 00:08:10.600 newspapers and like had wanted to be journalists since they 175 00:08:10.600 --> 00:08:12.639 were kids. And I was like, what, it's a headline, 176 00:08:12.720 --> 00:08:13.879 Like I don't know what any of this means. 177 00:08:14.079 --> 00:08:15.120 So I'd like, really was a. 178 00:08:15.040 --> 00:08:16.920 Crash course and it was great and it was I'm 179 00:08:17.040 --> 00:08:19.279 very lucky to have gone to that program. And that's 180 00:08:19.360 --> 00:08:20.959 kind of like how I got into journalism. And I 181 00:08:20.959 --> 00:08:22.959 thought I would write about ocean. I thought I write 182 00:08:22.959 --> 00:08:26.360 about like environmental science, and I just happened to start 183 00:08:26.360 --> 00:08:29.560 writing about prosthetics. Actually, as like the first couple of 184 00:08:29.560 --> 00:08:32.519 stories I wrote that were published were about the first 185 00:08:32.559 --> 00:08:34.759 big feature I wrote was about whether Oscar Pistorius has 186 00:08:34.799 --> 00:08:37.519 an unfair advantage as a person with like bionic legs, 187 00:08:37.679 --> 00:08:40.039 and this is like a huge scientific debate, and I 188 00:08:40.039 --> 00:08:42.000 wrote about for Scientific American and then sort of like 189 00:08:42.039 --> 00:08:43.919 from there started writing more about like bionics, and that 190 00:08:43.960 --> 00:08:46.960 kind of like led me into body hacking and like 191 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:49.759 this sort of like weird world of futurism. And at 192 00:08:49.759 --> 00:08:53.039 the time, everyone was covering it so badly that I 193 00:08:53.120 --> 00:08:54.679 was like, there had like someone has to. 194 00:08:54.639 --> 00:08:57.120 Do a better job of doing this, And so that's 195 00:08:57.159 --> 00:08:58.840 kind of like how I wound up starting to do it. 196 00:08:59.240 --> 00:09:01.360 What is a bad way of covering it? 197 00:09:01.840 --> 00:09:04.399 A lot of just like breathless coverage of technology companies 198 00:09:04.440 --> 00:09:06.960 being like, Wow, look at this amazing thing that's gonna 199 00:09:06.960 --> 00:09:08.879 like be on our shelves in a year and solve 200 00:09:08.879 --> 00:09:11.440 all our problems, and like that's not how anything works. 201 00:09:11.600 --> 00:09:11.799 You know. 202 00:09:12.000 --> 00:09:14.279 No critical coverage. Now it's much better, But a lot 203 00:09:14.320 --> 00:09:16.120 of technology coverage at the time was literally just like 204 00:09:16.399 --> 00:09:18.320 the latest iPhone, how does it work? 205 00:09:18.480 --> 00:09:18.679 You know? 206 00:09:18.720 --> 00:09:21.120 And there was nothing that was like analyzing like should 207 00:09:21.120 --> 00:09:22.879 you be giving Apple your data? Like, you know, none 208 00:09:22.919 --> 00:09:25.080 of that stuff was really happening, and it was like 209 00:09:25.120 --> 00:09:27.559 early facial recognition, and I remember being like, are we 210 00:09:27.559 --> 00:09:29.799 we should probably I don't know, talk about this, and 211 00:09:30.120 --> 00:09:32.279 no one was talking about it. So it was really, 212 00:09:32.320 --> 00:09:34.360 honestly like easy to kind of be a person who 213 00:09:34.360 --> 00:09:36.080 could make a name as someone who was like an 214 00:09:36.120 --> 00:09:38.159 interesting person in that field because there were so few 215 00:09:38.159 --> 00:09:41.039 people talking about that stuff in the journalism world. In 216 00:09:41.120 --> 00:09:43.559 academics and other places. People were but in sort of 217 00:09:43.600 --> 00:09:46.200 like technology journalism about the future, I mean, it was 218 00:09:46.240 --> 00:09:48.840 like pretty pretty like slim pickings. 219 00:09:49.240 --> 00:09:51.360 How often do people come to you to ask you 220 00:09:51.440 --> 00:09:53.120 like Should I get an Alexa? 221 00:09:53.240 --> 00:09:55.039 Should I do all the time, all the time, all 222 00:09:55.080 --> 00:09:55.960 the time. And I love it. 223 00:09:56.000 --> 00:09:59.000 Actually, I'm really glad that people ask because it's it 224 00:09:59.080 --> 00:10:01.120 is kind of one of my bug where like I 225 00:10:02.000 --> 00:10:05.039 know it's convenient, but I'm just like, it's so it's 226 00:10:05.080 --> 00:10:07.159 actually really hard. I think one of my jobs honestly 227 00:10:07.240 --> 00:10:09.399 is to help people understand like what the risks actually 228 00:10:09.480 --> 00:10:11.639 are because sort of like I think this is less 229 00:10:11.679 --> 00:10:13.559 true of climate change now. I think people more are 230 00:10:13.559 --> 00:10:15.639 more aware that like climate change is important and a thing. 231 00:10:16.000 --> 00:10:17.960 I think a lot of people with privacy and surveillance, 232 00:10:18.000 --> 00:10:20.879 they're like, like Google already has all my information, Like 233 00:10:21.240 --> 00:10:23.679 what I didn't I'm not a serial killer, Like why 234 00:10:23.720 --> 00:10:25.360 do I care if they're scanning my face. It's really 235 00:10:25.440 --> 00:10:28.159 hard to kind of like conceptualize the risk because it 236 00:10:28.200 --> 00:10:29.879 sort of feels nebulous. It sort of feels like, oh, 237 00:10:30.000 --> 00:10:32.320 like whatever, and it's convenient. I can ask Alexa, like 238 00:10:32.320 --> 00:10:33.480 what the temperature is or whatever? 239 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:34.720 Are we friends? 240 00:10:34.960 --> 00:10:37.159 The most common question I get actually is is my 241 00:10:37.240 --> 00:10:38.120 phone listening to me? 242 00:10:38.440 --> 00:10:40.120 Oh? Yes, it's not? 243 00:10:40.399 --> 00:10:40.480 What? 244 00:10:40.799 --> 00:10:43.120 No, come on, It's it's mostly not. 245 00:10:43.159 --> 00:10:45.320 So there have been tons of studies that academics have done, 246 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:47.159 and there are some really shady apps that you can 247 00:10:47.200 --> 00:10:48.679 install on your phone that might be doing this, but 248 00:10:48.759 --> 00:10:50.759 like for the vast majority of people, it's just that 249 00:10:50.840 --> 00:10:54.320 we're like really predictable as humans, and like figuring out 250 00:10:54.320 --> 00:10:56.399 what you want to buy is actually like really easy 251 00:10:56.960 --> 00:10:59.360 based on all the other data that you've given Google already. 252 00:11:00.559 --> 00:11:02.320 But yeah, and I think also it's the confirmation bias 253 00:11:02.360 --> 00:11:04.519 thing where it's like you only notice the times when 254 00:11:04.960 --> 00:11:06.679 you know you were just talking to somebody about like 255 00:11:06.759 --> 00:11:08.159 some product, and then all of a sudden it shows up. 256 00:11:08.200 --> 00:11:10.120 You don't notice all the times when that doesn't it 257 00:11:10.159 --> 00:11:12.080 doesn't happen. So that's the most common question I get, 258 00:11:12.440 --> 00:11:13.399 is my phone listening to me? 259 00:11:13.759 --> 00:11:18.679 Well, when did you decide to take your futurism journalism 260 00:11:19.080 --> 00:11:23.720 in futurology career and make it into podcast format? At 261 00:11:23.720 --> 00:11:27.679 what point? Because you're killing the kid, thank you? And 262 00:11:28.159 --> 00:11:30.200 when did you decide to do flashboard? 263 00:11:30.679 --> 00:11:32.840 Yeah? So I had worked in podcasts for a bit. 264 00:11:32.879 --> 00:11:33.799 I worked at Radio Lab. 265 00:11:33.840 --> 00:11:35.679 I helped the New York Times launch there Now and 266 00:11:35.759 --> 00:11:37.879 No Longer Science podcast, So I knew I was like 267 00:11:37.919 --> 00:11:41.320 really interested in audio and radio and these things and actually, 268 00:11:41.320 --> 00:11:44.159 like an editor, Annelie Knwitz, who was an amazing writer, 269 00:11:44.639 --> 00:11:46.720 came to me because she was the founder of Io nine, 270 00:11:46.799 --> 00:11:48.120 and she came to me and was like, Hey, we 271 00:11:48.159 --> 00:11:50.399 really want to do a podcast. Do you have any ideas? 272 00:11:50.399 --> 00:11:52.159 And I was like, boy, do I have ideas to 273 00:11:52.279 --> 00:11:54.240 a podcast? And so we talked about it, and this 274 00:11:54.279 --> 00:11:55.679 was the one that we were both really excited about 275 00:11:55.679 --> 00:11:58.679 because Flashboard blends sort of like science fiction and these 276 00:11:58.720 --> 00:12:00.759 sort of like audio dramas and then journalism, and that's 277 00:12:00.759 --> 00:12:01.759 what Ion nine did too. 278 00:12:01.960 --> 00:12:04.840 Okay, so if you haven't heard it yet, every episode 279 00:12:04.879 --> 00:12:08.080 of flash Forward starts with this short radio play to 280 00:12:08.120 --> 00:12:11.360 set the scene, which kind of normalizes and humanizes what 281 00:12:11.600 --> 00:12:14.679 might be on the horizon for us all. But before 282 00:12:14.720 --> 00:12:17.039 we get ahead of ourselves, let's just take a step 283 00:12:17.080 --> 00:12:21.720 back in time and see how our elders saw art today's. 284 00:12:21.879 --> 00:12:22.600 Does that make sense? 285 00:12:22.720 --> 00:12:26.919 So when it comes to the history of futurology, what 286 00:12:26.960 --> 00:12:32.159 did futurology look like at different points? Didn't people even 287 00:12:32.320 --> 00:12:36.440 fathom or try to predict or draw the future before 288 00:12:36.480 --> 00:12:37.799 like the Industrial Revolution? 289 00:12:38.039 --> 00:12:39.799 That's a great question and it's actually something that like 290 00:12:39.840 --> 00:12:42.600 academics debate a lot so I mean, obviously prophecy has 291 00:12:42.639 --> 00:12:44.480 been around for really long time, right, like looking to 292 00:12:44.519 --> 00:12:46.200 the stars trying to figure out what's going to happen. 293 00:12:47.159 --> 00:12:49.279 But you know this question of like when did it 294 00:12:49.360 --> 00:12:51.679 become the case that we sort of assume that the 295 00:12:51.679 --> 00:12:52.960 future will be different, like. 296 00:12:53.000 --> 00:12:55.080 Really different than it is now. Yeah, because for a 297 00:12:55.080 --> 00:12:55.559 long time. 298 00:12:55.399 --> 00:12:57.399 In human history, like the future was kind of you know, 299 00:12:57.440 --> 00:12:58.799 like still did your thing. You were like in your 300 00:12:58.840 --> 00:13:00.240 cave or you were in your house, or like you 301 00:13:00.320 --> 00:13:02.200 farmed or you did this thing. The idea that like 302 00:13:02.279 --> 00:13:05.200 your future, even within your lifetime, would be like radically different, 303 00:13:06.279 --> 00:13:10.480 is not like that old. And there are debates about 304 00:13:10.600 --> 00:13:14.279 when this happened. Some people point to the Victorian era, 305 00:13:14.440 --> 00:13:16.720 when a lot of social norms actually started really changing 306 00:13:16.759 --> 00:13:19.919 and you had people sort of questioning, you know, family structures, 307 00:13:19.919 --> 00:13:21.159 you had people questioning sort of like. 308 00:13:21.120 --> 00:13:23.080 High society, you had all of that stuff, and that. 309 00:13:23.000 --> 00:13:24.399 Was sort of a gateway into being like, well, wait 310 00:13:24.399 --> 00:13:27.200 a minute, why couldn't things be totally different. Some people 311 00:13:27.240 --> 00:13:29.679 point to electricity as being like the thing where like 312 00:13:29.759 --> 00:13:32.759 the literal light bulb moment where like, you know, things happen. 313 00:13:33.480 --> 00:13:35.600 Some people point to the Industrial Revolution, where like all 314 00:13:35.600 --> 00:13:37.440 of a sudden, all of industry changes. 315 00:13:37.600 --> 00:13:39.039 It sort of depends on who you ask. 316 00:13:39.799 --> 00:13:43.000 So while now it's pretty commonplace to point a tiny 317 00:13:43.240 --> 00:13:46.720 handheld computer at our face and use an image filter 318 00:13:46.879 --> 00:13:49.679 that changes us into a cat and then beam that 319 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:52.759 to millions of people across the world, just for Fonzis, 320 00:13:53.120 --> 00:13:56.399 it wasn't until the mid eighteen hundreds that we even 321 00:13:56.440 --> 00:13:59.360 had flushing toilets or light switches. 322 00:14:00.039 --> 00:14:00.320 Life. 323 00:14:00.360 --> 00:14:01.759 Man, it comes at you fast. 324 00:14:01.919 --> 00:14:04.279 But yeah, it's not like people have had people talk 325 00:14:04.320 --> 00:14:07.080 about futurism and prophecy and religion and all that stuff. 326 00:14:07.120 --> 00:14:09.600 But this idea that you know, we kind of have 327 00:14:09.759 --> 00:14:12.240 where like you know, in a hundred years, like who 328 00:14:12.279 --> 00:14:15.000 even knows, you know, like there's that feeling and that 329 00:14:15.039 --> 00:14:16.000 wasn't always the case. 330 00:14:16.559 --> 00:14:19.440 But like when exactly that started is actually up for debate. 331 00:14:20.519 --> 00:14:23.639 What do you think about tomorrow Land When Disneyland opened 332 00:14:23.639 --> 00:14:26.120 in nineteen fifty five, tomorrow Land. 333 00:14:25.919 --> 00:14:29.039 The world of the future see more science fiction. 334 00:14:28.840 --> 00:14:30.840 Than actual fact in Disneyland. 335 00:14:30.879 --> 00:14:33.200 I love it, Oh really I do, because like I 336 00:14:33.240 --> 00:14:35.759 love nostalgic future stuff, right, because you can kind of 337 00:14:35.759 --> 00:14:36.519 be like, oh, like. 338 00:14:36.559 --> 00:14:38.320 Remember when we thought this was going to happen. I 339 00:14:38.360 --> 00:14:39.320 remember when we thought that. 340 00:14:39.519 --> 00:14:41.120 I think also the cool thing, one of the cool 341 00:14:41.120 --> 00:14:43.799 things about being a futurologist is that, like a lot 342 00:14:43.840 --> 00:14:46.480 of futurism, especially looking back on it, it says a lot 343 00:14:46.519 --> 00:14:48.840 more about the time that it was created than it 344 00:14:48.840 --> 00:14:49.600 says about the future. 345 00:14:49.679 --> 00:14:51.000 Right, And this is the same thing with science fiction. 346 00:14:51.080 --> 00:14:51.200 Right. 347 00:14:51.279 --> 00:14:53.080 Yes, in theory we're talking about the future, but a 348 00:14:53.080 --> 00:14:54.960 lot of the time you're really kind of talking about now. 349 00:14:55.399 --> 00:14:57.840 So you know, you could see this in the ways 350 00:14:57.879 --> 00:15:00.879 that the Kitchens of the future were presented the nineteen fifties, 351 00:15:01.200 --> 00:15:04.240 where you have all of these companies sort of realizing that, 352 00:15:04.320 --> 00:15:08.000 like housewives are no longer complacent to be at home 353 00:15:08.080 --> 00:15:10.159 and be cooking all the time. They got jobs during 354 00:15:10.240 --> 00:15:12.240 the war, they don't really want to stop having jobs. 355 00:15:12.279 --> 00:15:13.279 They want to be able to kind of like have 356 00:15:13.320 --> 00:15:16.320 it all, quote unquote, And you see all of these 357 00:15:16.360 --> 00:15:20.080 different companies presenting these like kitchens of the future to 358 00:15:20.159 --> 00:15:23.320 sort of like basically appease women and make it like 359 00:15:23.320 --> 00:15:25.120 oh no, no, no, you can still like do all the 360 00:15:25.120 --> 00:15:27.399 housework and stuff and like not really you don't need 361 00:15:27.440 --> 00:15:29.159 you don't need to go and you could stay you 362 00:15:29.200 --> 00:15:32.039 don't need to go anywhere, you know, And like I 363 00:15:32.080 --> 00:15:33.240 think a lot of the time when I see those 364 00:15:33.279 --> 00:15:35.679 like sort of like retro future things, it's really fun 365 00:15:35.720 --> 00:15:38.440 because it's a reminder of like, oh, that's how we 366 00:15:38.480 --> 00:15:40.200 thought about the future, and that's how I thought about 367 00:15:40.200 --> 00:15:40.799 the present then. 368 00:15:41.240 --> 00:15:42.159 And we still see that. 369 00:15:42.200 --> 00:15:44.399 I mean in kitchen designs of today, you still see 370 00:15:44.399 --> 00:15:47.480 some of those ideas of like who is who's depicted 371 00:15:47.519 --> 00:15:51.039 in those promotional images. It's always women still, and you're like, Okay, 372 00:15:51.080 --> 00:15:52.799 we can like land a rover on Mars, but like 373 00:15:52.799 --> 00:15:54.639 you can't imagine a man in the kitchen. 374 00:15:54.399 --> 00:15:58.120 You know, Like, oh my gosh, I get a real 375 00:15:58.159 --> 00:16:01.600 bug in my bonnet. When I see so many house 376 00:16:01.639 --> 00:16:05.840 cleaning products just for women, just only women are cleaning toilets, yeah, 377 00:16:05.919 --> 00:16:06.720 drives me a little crazy. 378 00:16:06.759 --> 00:16:08.840 There's a great book called More Work for Mother about 379 00:16:08.840 --> 00:16:11.440 how automation in homes has always been marketed to women 380 00:16:11.440 --> 00:16:12.720 as like, oh, it's going to be a timesaveror it's 381 00:16:12.720 --> 00:16:14.600 going to be a timesaver, and every single study shows 382 00:16:14.600 --> 00:16:16.799 that it just puts more work on women every time. 383 00:16:17.200 --> 00:16:19.399 Okay, quick aside, I look this up and there's a 384 00:16:19.639 --> 00:16:23.120 nineteen eighty five book by Ruth Schwartz. Cohen called More 385 00:16:23.159 --> 00:16:27.000 Work for Mother the ironies of household technology, from the 386 00:16:27.039 --> 00:16:30.039 open hearth to the microwave, and it has a ton 387 00:16:30.200 --> 00:16:33.240 of data to support that the role of the homemaker 388 00:16:33.559 --> 00:16:36.960 has not, in fact gotten easier. And this was before 389 00:16:37.039 --> 00:16:40.559 people pinterested their kids lunch every day. And granted it 390 00:16:40.679 --> 00:16:43.639 was written thirty five years ago when people still smoked 391 00:16:43.679 --> 00:16:47.440 on airplanes. But every time nowadays you see a commercial 392 00:16:47.679 --> 00:16:50.679 for home janitorial products, just keep an eye on what 393 00:16:50.840 --> 00:16:54.240 gender is usually doing the scrubbing. Also side note on 394 00:16:54.320 --> 00:16:59.200 Amazon More Work for Mother, the book has mostly favorable responses, 395 00:16:59.440 --> 00:17:02.960 but there is one one star review, which I of 396 00:17:03.039 --> 00:17:06.279 course read, and this person, who identifies themselves only as 397 00:17:06.359 --> 00:17:09.359 Avid Reader said, More Work for Mother give me a break. 398 00:17:09.680 --> 00:17:12.160 The book we need is modern marriage. What's in it 399 00:17:12.240 --> 00:17:16.680 for father? Apparently Avid Reader is often dissatisfied with their purchases, 400 00:17:16.720 --> 00:17:20.519 because another Amazon reviewer posted the response, every book you've 401 00:17:20.519 --> 00:17:22.759 reviewed received one star? Are you just really bad at 402 00:17:22.799 --> 00:17:24.680 picking books? I'll put the link up to this in 403 00:17:24.680 --> 00:17:26.960 case you want to read this bloodthirsty book drama while 404 00:17:26.960 --> 00:17:29.880 you're like killing time on your phone waiting for a 405 00:17:29.960 --> 00:17:32.319 robot to bring you up, Panini, Now, why do you 406 00:17:32.400 --> 00:17:37.880 think that at no point in history people realized that 407 00:17:37.960 --> 00:17:38.720 we were all going to be. 408 00:17:38.720 --> 00:17:41.400 Staring at phones at some point? Oh, I think people did. 409 00:17:41.480 --> 00:17:42.319 I think people did. 410 00:17:42.400 --> 00:17:44.680 I think, you know, maybe not in the exact version 411 00:17:44.720 --> 00:17:47.440 of this, but people have been predicting sort of like 412 00:17:47.519 --> 00:17:50.079 video conferencing and video calling and sort of like screen 413 00:17:50.119 --> 00:17:53.240 based interactions for a long time. I think that the 414 00:17:53.319 --> 00:17:56.119 exact form of these like little glass boxes in our 415 00:17:56.160 --> 00:17:59.039 pockets might be slightly different. But you can look at 416 00:17:59.039 --> 00:18:02.279 some of the world fair stuff in like the early 417 00:18:02.359 --> 00:18:05.960 nineteen hundreds, and you see people predicting video like basically 418 00:18:06.000 --> 00:18:09.039 FaceTime and so like, you know, the exact details of 419 00:18:09.039 --> 00:18:10.119 how what it looks like are different. 420 00:18:10.119 --> 00:18:12.240 But people have kind of thought about this a lot. 421 00:18:12.279 --> 00:18:15.400 I mean, as soon as you have things like yellow journalism, 422 00:18:15.440 --> 00:18:17.279 like the attention economy that we talk about now, where 423 00:18:17.279 --> 00:18:18.119 it's like everyone is. 424 00:18:18.200 --> 00:18:19.680 You know, Facebook is competing for your eyeballs. 425 00:18:19.680 --> 00:18:21.839 They're not really competing for your money necessarily, because what 426 00:18:21.880 --> 00:18:23.359 they want is for you to look at stuff so 427 00:18:23.359 --> 00:18:24.640 that they can track what you're looking at and then 428 00:18:24.680 --> 00:18:28.440 sell add information to other people. Like that idea I 429 00:18:28.519 --> 00:18:31.319 think is actually relatively old, and that kind of plays 430 00:18:31.359 --> 00:18:34.279 into the phone thing as well. So I think actually 431 00:18:34.359 --> 00:18:36.160 that kind of concept has been around for longer than 432 00:18:36.200 --> 00:18:36.880 we might expect. 433 00:18:37.559 --> 00:18:42.160 Okay, so quick aside. Yellow journalism essentially means tabloid fodder 434 00:18:42.519 --> 00:18:47.119 like big exaggerated headlines and sensationalized crime stories and just 435 00:18:47.319 --> 00:18:51.759 hot hot celeb goss aka pretty much the whole Internet now. 436 00:18:51.960 --> 00:18:55.920 But the term yellow journalism arose during the late eighteen 437 00:18:56.000 --> 00:19:00.480 hundred's New York newspaper wars between Joseph Pulitzer and William 438 00:19:00.559 --> 00:19:03.799 Randolph Hurst, and these two rag magnets had a tug 439 00:19:03.799 --> 00:19:06.279 of war for the rights to publish this comic strip 440 00:19:06.319 --> 00:19:09.720 called Hogan's Alley, featuring a character called the Yellow Kid, 441 00:19:09.960 --> 00:19:12.640 a child from a rough part of the city wearing 442 00:19:12.720 --> 00:19:16.039 a mustard colored nightgown and depicted with two big front 443 00:19:16.039 --> 00:19:19.720 teeth and a shaved head from a rice infestation. According 444 00:19:19.720 --> 00:19:21.920 to its creator, he looks kind of like Dope from 445 00:19:21.960 --> 00:19:24.920 the Seven Dwarfs. And the Yellow Kid was everywhere in 446 00:19:24.960 --> 00:19:28.079 the late eighteen hundreds, and these two rival newspapers competed 447 00:19:28.400 --> 00:19:31.599 to run Hogan's Ally in their dailies. And if you're like, wait, 448 00:19:31.799 --> 00:19:34.640 isn't Hogan's Aali the name of the FBI Tactical Training 449 00:19:34.680 --> 00:19:37.720 Center and also a Nintendo game. It is and it's 450 00:19:37.799 --> 00:19:40.839 named after this same strip. So now you can drop 451 00:19:40.839 --> 00:19:45.000 some ancient newspaper drama and comic trivia on your unsuspecting friends, 452 00:19:45.279 --> 00:19:48.359 or maybe you can break the ice with your FBI interrogator. 453 00:19:48.519 --> 00:19:51.920 You're welcome. Oh, speaking of cartoons, what about the Jetsons? 454 00:19:51.920 --> 00:19:53.480 What did they get right on the Jetsons? 455 00:19:53.839 --> 00:19:55.920 The Jetsons, I mean, there's it's so funny. 456 00:19:55.920 --> 00:19:57.519 The Jetsons is the one is the thing that people 457 00:19:57.519 --> 00:19:59.440 always talking about, like, oh, flying cars or what butlers 458 00:19:59.440 --> 00:20:01.079 blah blah blah, and. 459 00:20:01.119 --> 00:20:02.680 Like super regressive family dynamics. 460 00:20:02.839 --> 00:20:05.640 Although you still have you have like you have your 461 00:20:05.759 --> 00:20:08.680 Jane Jetson goes to work, you know, and I was like, yay, 462 00:20:08.799 --> 00:20:10.400 that was a big deal at the time. You know, 463 00:20:10.759 --> 00:20:12.759 you have your robot Butler who falls in love with 464 00:20:12.799 --> 00:20:14.759 another robot, which I love is one of my favorites. 465 00:20:16.559 --> 00:20:18.680 They have their food machine, which I think is really 466 00:20:18.720 --> 00:20:21.119 interesting because that's been a common thing in science fiction 467 00:20:21.160 --> 00:20:23.440 that we don't see, like why don't there they obviously 468 00:20:23.480 --> 00:20:24.920 vending machines, but like why aren't there like push a 469 00:20:24.920 --> 00:20:25.960 button and food comes out. 470 00:20:26.000 --> 00:20:27.759 How'd you make it raw? 471 00:20:28.200 --> 00:20:31.319 And your eggs? I don't get it. 472 00:20:31.319 --> 00:20:33.359 When we first got married, you could punch out a 473 00:20:33.359 --> 00:20:34.839 breakfast like mother used to make. 474 00:20:35.480 --> 00:20:38.359 In the opening credits, a perky Jane Jutson is also 475 00:20:38.400 --> 00:20:41.680 shown taking George Jutson's wallet to go shopping in a 476 00:20:41.720 --> 00:20:44.599 floating sky mall, as so many of us do these days. 477 00:20:45.519 --> 00:20:50.119 Gross Anyway, when you are looking at the future, how 478 00:20:50.200 --> 00:20:52.720 much do you think about yourself in those situations? 479 00:20:53.799 --> 00:20:55.960 I try to think of my about myself in those situations, 480 00:20:55.960 --> 00:20:57.799 but I also try to remember that like my experience 481 00:20:57.880 --> 00:21:00.279 is like singular, and like I am a like sis 482 00:21:00.319 --> 00:21:03.839 white lady born into the United States, and like all 483 00:21:03.880 --> 00:21:05.680 of those things. And so one of the big things 484 00:21:05.720 --> 00:21:07.880 I tried to do in my work with flash Forward 485 00:21:07.880 --> 00:21:09.920 and Elsewhere is think about, like, okay, but what if 486 00:21:09.960 --> 00:21:11.839 I was somebody else, and what if I, like had 487 00:21:11.920 --> 00:21:13.640 less privilege than I have now, and how does this 488 00:21:13.680 --> 00:21:16.640 impact these people? So, for example, in the episode I 489 00:21:16.640 --> 00:21:18.759 did about Crisper sort of like gene editing of human 490 00:21:18.799 --> 00:21:21.039 babies and stuff like that, which I was working on. 491 00:21:21.079 --> 00:21:23.000 It had basically done, and then the news broke about 492 00:21:23.000 --> 00:21:25.200 the Chinese scientist with the Chris Rabis and I was like. 493 00:21:25.319 --> 00:21:27.680 Nah, I just finished this episode and I have to 494 00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:28.920 go back and READO stuff. 495 00:21:29.200 --> 00:21:32.319 But that episode, most of the interviewees was the guests 496 00:21:32.319 --> 00:21:34.359 on that episode were disabled people and sort of about 497 00:21:34.359 --> 00:21:36.279 like what is it like to hear all these scientists 498 00:21:36.319 --> 00:21:37.400 talk about eliminating you? 499 00:21:37.480 --> 00:21:39.559 Basically, like how does that feel? 500 00:21:39.640 --> 00:21:39.720 Like? 501 00:21:39.759 --> 00:21:40.960 What is that? Like? What would it be like to 502 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:42.440 be the last deaf person on earth? 503 00:21:42.480 --> 00:21:44.240 You know? And like is that something we actually want? 504 00:21:44.400 --> 00:21:46.440 So I think I try really hard actually to think 505 00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:50.359 about how people who are not like me might might 506 00:21:50.960 --> 00:21:52.920 feel or find themselves in those futures. And I try 507 00:21:52.920 --> 00:21:54.440 to interview a lot of people on the show that 508 00:21:54.519 --> 00:21:56.039 are not like me, so I can kind of be like, 509 00:21:56.039 --> 00:21:57.759 how do you feel about this? Like what do you 510 00:21:57.759 --> 00:22:01.960 think about this? For the episode about body swapping, everybody 511 00:22:02.039 --> 00:22:04.599 on that episode almost except for one, is a transperson. 512 00:22:04.720 --> 00:22:07.160 It's like, Okay, how does this correlate with your experiences 513 00:22:07.160 --> 00:22:08.839 and your feelings about bodies and stuff like that, because 514 00:22:08.880 --> 00:22:10.960 like I don't know what that's like. So yeah, like 515 00:22:11.000 --> 00:22:12.839 thinking through like who are the people who are going 516 00:22:12.920 --> 00:22:15.279 to be most impacted by this? And like it's probably 517 00:22:15.279 --> 00:22:17.640 not me, and like trying to find those people is 518 00:22:17.680 --> 00:22:18.160 really important. 519 00:22:18.200 --> 00:22:22.119 I think, how much anxiety do you feel about the future. 520 00:22:22.559 --> 00:22:24.400 I feel I feel like I feel like a healthy 521 00:22:24.440 --> 00:22:26.519 amount of anxiety like the future, which is to say, 522 00:22:26.519 --> 00:22:30.000 I feel anxious about the future. But I also I 523 00:22:30.039 --> 00:22:34.359 think that you can't get buried in it because otherwise, 524 00:22:34.680 --> 00:22:36.839 like what do you It's really hard to do anything. 525 00:22:37.640 --> 00:22:39.160 A lot of the future is scary. 526 00:22:39.240 --> 00:22:41.079 But also the future isn't written yet, and I think 527 00:22:41.079 --> 00:22:43.799 that's like something that we need to remember, like, yes, 528 00:22:43.839 --> 00:22:45.559 certain things are in motion, and yes, like all of 529 00:22:45.599 --> 00:22:47.640 us are kind of like one person, but in fact, 530 00:22:47.640 --> 00:22:49.680 like the future has not happened yet, like there are 531 00:22:49.759 --> 00:22:51.640 things that we can do and like things that you 532 00:22:51.640 --> 00:22:53.839 can try, and also ways to kind of mentally think 533 00:22:53.839 --> 00:22:55.680 about the future. I've been thinking a lot about There's 534 00:22:55.720 --> 00:22:58.119 a concept in psychology called mental time travel, which is 535 00:22:58.160 --> 00:23:00.799 basically that you can kind of imagine yourself and fee situations, 536 00:23:01.440 --> 00:23:03.680 and certain people with certain forms of amnesia actually cannot 537 00:23:03.720 --> 00:23:06.400 do that, which is like kind of hard to even fathom. 538 00:23:06.680 --> 00:23:08.799 They talk about being marooned in the moment, which is 539 00:23:08.839 --> 00:23:11.359 like really terrifying sounding, but also they know that people 540 00:23:11.400 --> 00:23:13.200 with depression actually have a really hard time with this, 541 00:23:13.240 --> 00:23:15.000 where it's like you're depressed, it's really hard for you 542 00:23:15.039 --> 00:23:18.759 to imagine yourself in the future. But they also find 543 00:23:18.839 --> 00:23:21.039 in these studies that if you can and when you 544 00:23:21.079 --> 00:23:23.759 do imagine yourself in the future, specifically imagine what you're 545 00:23:23.759 --> 00:23:26.480 going to do, imagine your next steps, people are happier, 546 00:23:26.519 --> 00:23:28.400 People tend to be more productive, people tend to like 547 00:23:28.519 --> 00:23:30.200 just feel better because they can actually be like, Okay, 548 00:23:30.200 --> 00:23:32.440 here's my plan, here's are going to do. So I 549 00:23:32.480 --> 00:23:34.200 always say that when people are like, how do I 550 00:23:34.240 --> 00:23:36.559 cope with this like horrible anxiety that I'm feeling about 551 00:23:36.559 --> 00:23:40.400 the future, which is totally normal given like what's happening 552 00:23:40.440 --> 00:23:43.880 in the world, is like actually thinking through like imagining 553 00:23:43.880 --> 00:23:45.920 yourself and what you can do can be really like 554 00:23:45.960 --> 00:23:48.920 calming because it's specific and it's you. It's not just like, 555 00:23:48.960 --> 00:23:51.839 oh my god, like I don't know, like climate change 556 00:23:51.839 --> 00:23:53.519 is in the hands of nine companies, you know, which 557 00:23:53.519 --> 00:23:56.000 is like really terrifying, unless you're one of those companies, 558 00:23:56.039 --> 00:23:57.759 I guess, in which case it's just. 559 00:23:58.039 --> 00:24:00.559 She's really yes, money, money, money. 560 00:24:00.319 --> 00:24:04.440 Yeah, exactly, it's the world birds and literally, what do 561 00:24:04.480 --> 00:24:07.039 you think based on all the episodes you've done, like 562 00:24:07.079 --> 00:24:10.759 one hundred, what do you think is going to change 563 00:24:11.119 --> 00:24:12.799 the most in like the next decade. 564 00:24:14.079 --> 00:24:18.400 I think that and this is like an unpopular answer 565 00:24:18.519 --> 00:24:20.559 given that I live in Berkeley, which is like in 566 00:24:20.880 --> 00:24:22.279 tech central kind of area. 567 00:24:22.319 --> 00:24:24.279 But I think it's social stuff that's going to change 568 00:24:24.319 --> 00:24:24.559 the most. 569 00:24:24.599 --> 00:24:26.680 I think right now we're seeing a really awesome moment 570 00:24:26.720 --> 00:24:28.920 with like gender, for example, where like people are sort 571 00:24:28.920 --> 00:24:32.920 of like finally realizing in the more popular culture that 572 00:24:33.000 --> 00:24:35.359 like gender is not binary, and like that people have 573 00:24:35.680 --> 00:24:37.759 different options, and like it's more acceptable to kind of 574 00:24:37.759 --> 00:24:40.640 talk about those questions. I always say that, like trans 575 00:24:40.680 --> 00:24:43.640 people are the original body hackers, because like they actually 576 00:24:43.640 --> 00:24:45.480 do all this stuff that the body hackers talk about 577 00:24:45.519 --> 00:24:49.160 doing and are doing like really amazing stuff. I mean, 578 00:24:49.200 --> 00:24:52.240 like you're seeing people question like the value of capitalism, 579 00:24:52.240 --> 00:24:55.319 which was probably was unfathomable to people twenty years ago 580 00:24:55.559 --> 00:24:58.319 to even say, like, I mean people did say this, 581 00:24:58.400 --> 00:25:00.359 but to have like it be a more common thing 582 00:25:00.359 --> 00:25:02.480 you see on Twitter being like, oh, capitalism the worst, 583 00:25:02.799 --> 00:25:04.240 Like you did not see that for a long time. 584 00:25:04.279 --> 00:25:05.319 So I think a lot of it is going to 585 00:25:05.319 --> 00:25:07.960 be more social change than technological change. I think people 586 00:25:08.680 --> 00:25:10.359 assume when we talk about the future that we're always 587 00:25:10.359 --> 00:25:12.319 talking about like flying cars and jetpacks and like these 588 00:25:12.319 --> 00:25:12.880 tech things. 589 00:25:13.319 --> 00:25:16.000 But I think that a lot of this, especially. 590 00:25:15.599 --> 00:25:17.599 Coming out of these climate change conversations, it's going to 591 00:25:17.640 --> 00:25:19.960 be people asking like why have we made the decisions 592 00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:22.640 we've made culturally and sort of like sociopolitically, and like 593 00:25:22.759 --> 00:25:25.160 are they actually the right decisions? And can we change 594 00:25:25.480 --> 00:25:28.119 the way that this whole thing works? And like should 595 00:25:28.119 --> 00:25:29.839 we have prisons? Like that's a question that I think 596 00:25:29.880 --> 00:25:31.880 is getting a lot more attention now that like you 597 00:25:31.960 --> 00:25:33.720 didn't see twenty years ago as much. 598 00:25:33.839 --> 00:25:34.759 So Yeah, I think those are. 599 00:25:34.720 --> 00:25:36.440 The questions that people are going to be asking more 600 00:25:36.480 --> 00:25:39.079 of as opposed to like you know, which app stiond 601 00:25:39.079 --> 00:25:41.039 I get? Or like, you know, is there going to 602 00:25:41.039 --> 00:25:42.799 be the next iPhone? Which is I think people love 603 00:25:42.799 --> 00:25:43.400 to ask and it's. 604 00:25:43.319 --> 00:25:44.680 Like who cares? That's like not important? 605 00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:48.319 You know, Like, well, how do you reconcile some of 606 00:25:48.359 --> 00:25:52.160 the regressions it seems that are happening socially, Like we're 607 00:25:52.160 --> 00:25:55.079 in a moment that is so progressive in some right 608 00:25:55.119 --> 00:25:57.319 areas and so not in others. 609 00:25:57.359 --> 00:25:58.880 What the fuck's going on? Yeah. 610 00:25:58.880 --> 00:26:00.799 I mean I think that like different people have said 611 00:26:00.799 --> 00:26:03.599 this where you know this is common right, you make 612 00:26:03.640 --> 00:26:05.160 progress and then you move back. I should say that 613 00:26:05.160 --> 00:26:07.359 I do not actually believe that, like the arc of 614 00:26:07.480 --> 00:26:09.640 justice been, the arc of history bends towards justice. Which 615 00:26:09.680 --> 00:26:11.359 is a quote from doctor Martin Luther King that I'm 616 00:26:11.359 --> 00:26:12.519 probably butchering. 617 00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:16.440 Rhen on nights become darker than a thousand midnights. Let 618 00:26:16.519 --> 00:26:21.279 us remember that is a creative force in this universe 619 00:26:21.839 --> 00:26:26.880 working to pull down the gigantic mountings of evil. Power 620 00:26:26.920 --> 00:26:29.599 that is able to make a way out of no way, 621 00:26:30.680 --> 00:26:36.559 transform dark yesterday's and to break tomorrows. Let us realize 622 00:26:36.880 --> 00:26:40.279 at the dark of the Marrow universe is long, but 623 00:26:40.400 --> 00:26:41.680 it bends toward justice. 624 00:26:42.039 --> 00:26:44.319 But I do think that like you're seeing, you know, 625 00:26:44.359 --> 00:26:46.160 you are seeing some huge aggression out You're seeing like 626 00:26:46.200 --> 00:26:48.599 the rise of populism and sort of the rise of 627 00:26:48.720 --> 00:26:53.759 fascism in countries like the United States, and that's hugely problematic. 628 00:26:53.799 --> 00:26:55.720 You're also seeing people kind of like come show up 629 00:26:55.880 --> 00:26:58.440 to say like no to that. So I think that like, yes, 630 00:26:58.440 --> 00:27:00.599 we're seeing a lot of bad, bad things, but we're 631 00:27:00.599 --> 00:27:02.880 also I think seeing a lot of people sort of 632 00:27:02.920 --> 00:27:04.799 like realize that they need to actually show up and 633 00:27:04.880 --> 00:27:07.000 like to do something to stop those things from happening, 634 00:27:07.240 --> 00:27:09.519 whether that's about like populism or just like climate change, 635 00:27:09.519 --> 00:27:11.319 which is the thing that a lot of people ask 636 00:27:11.359 --> 00:27:13.000 me about and are like, well, why should I have 637 00:27:13.079 --> 00:27:15.720 kids if we're all gonna be on fire underwater in 638 00:27:15.720 --> 00:27:18.319 the next like three years, which is not true, but 639 00:27:18.319 --> 00:27:20.400 but yeah, I think, like that's the thing. I'm sort 640 00:27:20.440 --> 00:27:23.400 of muddling this answer, but like to to remember that, 641 00:27:23.480 --> 00:27:25.640 like you can do something, and we can do something, 642 00:27:25.680 --> 00:27:27.400 and it's not like predetermined, like. 643 00:27:27.359 --> 00:27:32.160 They haven't won yet, right, you know. Well, I have 644 00:27:32.200 --> 00:27:36.079 another question is why should I have kids? The world 645 00:27:36.200 --> 00:27:37.839 is gonna be a fire and water? 646 00:27:39.839 --> 00:27:41.640 I mean, I cannot tell anyone to or to not 647 00:27:41.720 --> 00:27:42.559 have kids, Okay. 648 00:27:43.920 --> 00:27:47.640 At the same time, like, I think that it's a 649 00:27:47.680 --> 00:27:49.680 really interesting question, and there is a whole movement of 650 00:27:49.680 --> 00:27:52.079 people right who believe that, like we just shouldn't have 651 00:27:52.160 --> 00:27:53.680 kids and we shouldn't put them into the situation. 652 00:27:54.240 --> 00:27:54.480 Okay. 653 00:27:54.519 --> 00:27:57.920 Side note, as discussed in the Exchatology episode from last 654 00:27:57.920 --> 00:28:01.480 November about the apocalypse, which is really more relevant than 655 00:28:01.519 --> 00:28:05.279 ever this week, the choice to nope babies is called 656 00:28:05.519 --> 00:28:09.839 voluntary childlessness or a child free lifestyle. And a more 657 00:28:10.079 --> 00:28:14.319 scholastic term is anti natalism, which includes the philosophy that 658 00:28:14.359 --> 00:28:17.440 you can't get the consent of a child to exist, 659 00:28:17.720 --> 00:28:21.240 therefore it's immoral to procreate. So do you have a 660 00:28:21.319 --> 00:28:23.880 child who, when told to do a chore, has screamed 661 00:28:23.920 --> 00:28:27.640 whatever I didn't ask to be born? Well, congratulations, you 662 00:28:27.680 --> 00:28:31.559 have engaged in philosophical discourse about anti natalism. Oh and 663 00:28:31.599 --> 00:28:35.240 if your child free, but your relatives insist you should 664 00:28:35.359 --> 00:28:37.960 pop out some shorties, here's an idea. You can present 665 00:28:38.039 --> 00:28:41.119 them with the data that one American child has the 666 00:28:41.200 --> 00:28:45.400 same carbon impact per year as seventy five round trip 667 00:28:45.480 --> 00:28:48.799 transatlantic flights, or that it would take one hundred and 668 00:28:48.799 --> 00:28:51.839 fifty meat eaters going vegan to offset a kiddo. But 669 00:28:51.920 --> 00:28:54.640 on the flip side, babies are cute and their heads 670 00:28:54.640 --> 00:28:57.759 smell like powder and milk, and they turn into adults 671 00:28:57.759 --> 00:29:00.880 that keep hospitals and government in the world. So to 672 00:29:00.920 --> 00:29:03.799 all the smug child free folks who have dogs instead, 673 00:29:03.920 --> 00:29:06.960 and I'm talking to myself right now, bad news or 674 00:29:07.000 --> 00:29:11.160 meat hungry hairy children have substantial carbon pop prints too. 675 00:29:11.440 --> 00:29:12.240 So what to do? 676 00:29:12.599 --> 00:29:15.039 I don't know, Go with your heartband. Rose says that 677 00:29:15.200 --> 00:29:19.200 having kids or dogs is just a deeply personal decision. 678 00:29:19.440 --> 00:29:22.880 So cut banks, text your crush and decide on your 679 00:29:22.880 --> 00:29:24.880 own terms if you want to have babies with them 680 00:29:24.960 --> 00:29:26.480 and if the babies will have banks. 681 00:29:26.880 --> 00:29:29.079 If you really want to have children and you are 682 00:29:29.079 --> 00:29:31.480 not having them because you think climate change is scary, 683 00:29:31.680 --> 00:29:33.960 then you should do something about climate change. You should 684 00:29:33.960 --> 00:29:35.559 like actually get off your butt and do something about 685 00:29:35.559 --> 00:29:38.920 climate change. And that's hard to do, right, Like, as 686 00:29:39.039 --> 00:29:41.920 we've said, like you know, climate change is largely in 687 00:29:41.960 --> 00:29:45.720 the hands of like very huge companies. But like I mean, 688 00:29:45.880 --> 00:29:47.920 there are protests you can go to, Like, there are 689 00:29:48.000 --> 00:29:50.039 local politics you can get involved in. There are like 690 00:29:50.079 --> 00:29:53.160 local issues you can work on. I mean, I can't 691 00:29:53.240 --> 00:29:55.599 tell people to or to not have children. I do 692 00:29:55.680 --> 00:29:57.160 not have children myself. 693 00:29:57.319 --> 00:30:00.319 Or nor am I planning to. Yeah myself, that's right. 694 00:30:00.440 --> 00:30:03.720 I've been worried about overpopulation. Don't worry about it, okay, 695 00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:06.400 really because I've been worried about it since like high school. 696 00:30:06.519 --> 00:30:08.680 Yeah, so this is a huge topic in the nineteen eighties, 697 00:30:08.680 --> 00:30:09.799 which is maybe when you and I. 698 00:30:09.720 --> 00:30:10.519 Are both in high school. 699 00:30:10.640 --> 00:30:15.839 Yes, and I guess in nineties and it was largely 700 00:30:15.960 --> 00:30:19.079 a lot of it came out of, honestly just racism 701 00:30:19.160 --> 00:30:21.680 of like, oh, all of these countries like India and 702 00:30:21.759 --> 00:30:25.559 China and places in Africa are suddenly have all these 703 00:30:25.599 --> 00:30:28.680 people and they're going to like want rights and they're 704 00:30:28.720 --> 00:30:29.960 not going to want us to just tell them what 705 00:30:30.000 --> 00:30:32.759 to do, and like, oh, suddenly they have an overpopulation issue. 706 00:30:33.079 --> 00:30:34.920 And I think that like a lot of that. 707 00:30:35.200 --> 00:30:37.160 There's a lot of really good work done by researchers 708 00:30:37.160 --> 00:30:39.319 and scholars that basically say that like that is like 709 00:30:39.640 --> 00:30:43.200 not the problem. The problem is racism, you know, or 710 00:30:43.240 --> 00:30:46.559 the problem is like you know, distribution of resources among 711 00:30:46.599 --> 00:30:47.440 the people on Earth. 712 00:30:47.519 --> 00:30:48.680 There are a lot of people on Earth. 713 00:30:48.680 --> 00:30:50.400 But if you want to talk about, like what's the 714 00:30:50.480 --> 00:30:53.000 problem with climate change, overpopulation is pretty. 715 00:30:52.759 --> 00:30:54.720 Low on the actual list. 716 00:30:54.880 --> 00:30:57.720 Like if we also have having children right now, the 717 00:30:57.720 --> 00:31:00.200 climate will still warm. You know, Like there's nothing like 718 00:31:00.200 --> 00:31:01.960 that's not you know, necessarily what's happening. 719 00:31:02.000 --> 00:31:03.039 I mean, so, yeah, I. 720 00:31:03.000 --> 00:31:04.359 Think that like a lot of there's been a lot 721 00:31:04.359 --> 00:31:06.240 of really interesting stuff. Mother Jones had a big series 722 00:31:06.240 --> 00:31:08.119 about this, I think a couple of years ago, about 723 00:31:08.119 --> 00:31:10.319 like trying to push back on this narrative of overpopulation 724 00:31:10.359 --> 00:31:11.759 and sort of revealed that a lot of people who 725 00:31:12.000 --> 00:31:15.519 first posited this as like the problem were basically just racists. 726 00:31:15.599 --> 00:31:19.400 Wow oh man, because I remember looking at population density 727 00:31:19.400 --> 00:31:23.400 curves of like deer and mice and certain populations and 728 00:31:23.440 --> 00:31:25.880 looking at the human population density curve and I was like, well, 729 00:31:25.920 --> 00:31:27.359 something's going to give. 730 00:31:27.839 --> 00:31:29.839 And it's already leveling off too, right, Like we are 731 00:31:29.880 --> 00:31:33.119 not still in the like highest highest upswing, Like you know, 732 00:31:33.319 --> 00:31:36.240 humans are having less children generally, like as I think 733 00:31:36.240 --> 00:31:36.960 a global trend. 734 00:31:37.160 --> 00:31:40.440 I hear millennials are having fewer Yeah right, I'm getting 735 00:31:40.480 --> 00:31:42.480 dogs instead, is what I hear. That's what I got 736 00:31:42.599 --> 00:31:43.920 on your dog, by the way, thank you. 737 00:31:44.000 --> 00:31:47.440 Okay, quick aside, population curves can make a shape like 738 00:31:47.440 --> 00:31:51.039 a J or really more like a backwards L, which 739 00:31:51.079 --> 00:31:53.480 is when the head count for a species kind of 740 00:31:53.519 --> 00:31:56.079 lopes along steady for a long time and then has 741 00:31:56.119 --> 00:31:59.599 a huge upswing and goes up sharply in a really 742 00:31:59.640 --> 00:32:02.160 short matter of time. So, for instance, in the year 743 00:32:02.319 --> 00:32:06.000 nineteen hundred, Earth's population was one point six billion, but 744 00:32:06.039 --> 00:32:09.640 we just hit seven point seven billion in twenty nineteen, 745 00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:14.440 partly oddly because of better agriculture and just figuring out 746 00:32:14.480 --> 00:32:18.359 how to make ammonia from airborne nitrogen. How weird is that? Anyway, 747 00:32:18.440 --> 00:32:20.880 there's a bunch of us, and when a population hits 748 00:32:20.960 --> 00:32:24.440 what's called a carrying capacity, it tends to level off 749 00:32:24.960 --> 00:32:27.920 rather than continuing to shoot up. So think of that 750 00:32:28.160 --> 00:32:30.720 Jay kind of taking a rite in forming an. 751 00:32:30.720 --> 00:32:31.720 S shaped curve. 752 00:32:32.079 --> 00:32:35.839 It doesn't necessarily plunge downward into extinction. It's not like 753 00:32:35.880 --> 00:32:39.839 a good party that is so lit, so off the chain, 754 00:32:40.160 --> 00:32:42.640 as your children say that it suddenly gets shut down 755 00:32:42.640 --> 00:32:46.079 by the cops. In the great mysterious Kegger that is life, 756 00:32:46.160 --> 00:32:49.599 we're so worried about the apocalypse of a squad car 757 00:32:49.759 --> 00:32:52.000 we forget that some parties just kind of peter out 758 00:32:52.079 --> 00:32:54.839 because they suck. When it comes to topics to explore 759 00:32:54.920 --> 00:32:58.599 in the future, how do you decide which ones are 760 00:32:58.599 --> 00:32:59.559 worthy of exploring? 761 00:33:00.039 --> 00:33:00.880 Yeah, that's a great question. 762 00:33:01.960 --> 00:33:04.920 I feel like for flash forward, I always want to 763 00:33:04.960 --> 00:33:07.000 do something that's like interesting and surprising that like people 764 00:33:07.000 --> 00:33:09.200 haven't heard before. So there's certain topics that I just 765 00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:10.680 like part of me is like I just don't know 766 00:33:10.680 --> 00:33:12.559 what I'm going to say about this. Like self driving cars, 767 00:33:12.839 --> 00:33:15.200 I feel like they've been just like everyone writes about them. 768 00:33:15.240 --> 00:33:17.359 People know, I've always struggled with, like, what is the 769 00:33:17.440 --> 00:33:19.200 like version of this that I can do that like 770 00:33:19.240 --> 00:33:21.480 no one thought of before. People aren't talking about. There 771 00:33:21.559 --> 00:33:23.920 was one that I did that people had asked people. 772 00:33:24.000 --> 00:33:26.319 One of the most requested episodes always is Living Forever, 773 00:33:27.000 --> 00:33:28.759 which is the future that I'm like not particularly interested 774 00:33:28.759 --> 00:33:30.559 in because really just the purview of the rich basically, 775 00:33:31.119 --> 00:33:33.279 And it's like, oh, living Forever's great if you are 776 00:33:33.279 --> 00:33:37.279 making compound interest, you know, like wonderful, and so it's 777 00:33:37.319 --> 00:33:39.759 just like a thing that like really really rich white 778 00:33:39.759 --> 00:33:41.799 guys are obsessed with, and for me, I'm like, I 779 00:33:41.799 --> 00:33:43.519 just feel there's so many other things that are more interesting. 780 00:33:43.559 --> 00:33:45.160 But so it was requested so often, and finally I 781 00:33:45.240 --> 00:33:46.839 sort of figured out like how to do it, and 782 00:33:46.920 --> 00:33:49.640 I did it as an episode about what would happen 783 00:33:49.680 --> 00:33:51.319 if we had that technology and applied it to the 784 00:33:51.319 --> 00:33:53.599 criminal justice system and prisoners could be sentenced to like 785 00:33:53.640 --> 00:33:55.400 three hundred years in prison, and like, how does that? 786 00:33:55.440 --> 00:33:56.799 What does that look like? You know, we already have 787 00:33:56.839 --> 00:33:58.960 issues when people get out of prison and they like 788 00:33:59.279 --> 00:34:01.119 don't have never seen a cell phone before, right, and 789 00:34:01.160 --> 00:34:01.920 like what does that look like? 790 00:34:01.960 --> 00:34:04.599 Times? You know, three hundred So that was kind of. 791 00:34:04.519 --> 00:34:06.200 My way into that episode of like, Okay, what's the 792 00:34:06.240 --> 00:34:07.960 interesting thing that I can say about this that people 793 00:34:07.960 --> 00:34:08.800 aren't talking about? 794 00:34:09.239 --> 00:34:12.719 What about the way that we'll look at animal rights 795 00:34:12.719 --> 00:34:14.320 in the future. It's one of my favorite topics. 796 00:34:14.880 --> 00:34:18.199 I mean, it's something that is just yeah, it's something 797 00:34:18.239 --> 00:34:20.559 that you do, and there's a lot of somethings that 798 00:34:20.599 --> 00:34:24.000 you do in the past that are egregious totally. 799 00:34:24.360 --> 00:34:26.920 What is going to happen with that? What's your stance? 800 00:34:27.039 --> 00:34:29.280 I'm so fascinated by this because I think, you know, 801 00:34:29.480 --> 00:34:33.840 the more you look into animals and their intelligence, everything 802 00:34:33.840 --> 00:34:36.239 we ever thought about them and how smart they are 803 00:34:36.320 --> 00:34:38.400 has been wrong because they're smarter, right, They're just like 804 00:34:38.800 --> 00:34:43.119 we've consistently underestimated non human animals, just over and over 805 00:34:43.119 --> 00:34:44.960 and over again. And so yeah, this question of like 806 00:34:45.039 --> 00:34:47.719 at what point do we start to decide like actually, 807 00:34:47.760 --> 00:34:49.519 like we can't do it, we should not do this. 808 00:34:49.559 --> 00:34:51.400 I mean, there are people who believe we shouldn't have pets. 809 00:34:51.760 --> 00:34:54.280 There are people that believe that zoos are unethical, and 810 00:34:54.280 --> 00:34:56.159 then there's this question of like what is the point 811 00:34:56.320 --> 00:34:58.320 of some of these things? And like some pets, right, 812 00:34:58.360 --> 00:35:00.920 like dogs and cats, evolved with hu in a way 813 00:35:00.960 --> 00:35:03.159 that like I don't I mean, most people's dogs would 814 00:35:03.199 --> 00:35:05.159 not survive out in the wild. 815 00:35:05.840 --> 00:35:07.920 Some cats would not all cats. 816 00:35:08.840 --> 00:35:11.199 But so like this question of like what are what 817 00:35:11.400 --> 00:35:14.679 are our obligations to these animals and what, you know, 818 00:35:14.760 --> 00:35:16.639 what should we be doing? Like should we be training 819 00:35:16.679 --> 00:35:19.679 dolphins to do tricks in zoos? Like, you know, it's 820 00:35:19.719 --> 00:35:21.960 hard to say I'm obsessed with this question and I 821 00:35:22.039 --> 00:35:24.360 should say, like, I don't know what I think still 822 00:35:24.360 --> 00:35:26.800 about it. It's really hard, like, you know, on the 823 00:35:26.840 --> 00:35:30.599 one hand, you know, it's not something you know, I'm 824 00:35:30.639 --> 00:35:33.760 not totally comfortable coming in particularly as like you know, 825 00:35:33.800 --> 00:35:35.440 a western white lady being like you have to stop 826 00:35:35.480 --> 00:35:38.760 eating meat, you know where it's like okay, Like that's 827 00:35:38.840 --> 00:35:40.920 like a hard proposition to make. At the same time, 828 00:35:41.079 --> 00:35:44.119 like the more you learn about what these animals are 829 00:35:44.159 --> 00:35:44.880 capable of, the. 830 00:35:44.800 --> 00:35:47.800 More it's like, oh, should we really be doing this? 831 00:35:47.920 --> 00:35:49.360 Like is this really okay? 832 00:35:49.440 --> 00:35:51.360 You know, what do we owe to these creatures that 833 00:35:51.400 --> 00:35:53.079 we've like destroyed their habitats? 834 00:35:53.119 --> 00:35:54.480 Like you know, all this stuff. 835 00:35:54.519 --> 00:35:57.000 So I'm I'm like obsessed with this question of like 836 00:35:57.039 --> 00:35:59.559 the future of animal rights if we could actually communicate 837 00:35:59.559 --> 00:35:59.800 with them. 838 00:35:59.840 --> 00:36:00.760 How would that change things? 839 00:36:00.840 --> 00:36:02.679 Or like if we could understand what they were saying 840 00:36:02.760 --> 00:36:04.320 or they could understand what we were saying better, Like 841 00:36:04.320 --> 00:36:05.800 how would that change things? And I've done a bunch 842 00:36:05.840 --> 00:36:08.199 of episodes about that and sort of like this question 843 00:36:08.280 --> 00:36:10.119 of like what where do we draw the line? 844 00:36:10.159 --> 00:36:11.559 I think it's really hard. 845 00:36:11.719 --> 00:36:12.840 Can we talk to dogs? 846 00:36:13.360 --> 00:36:15.519 Certain places have have come passed laws. 847 00:36:15.559 --> 00:36:18.760 So last year India passed a law I think it 848 00:36:18.800 --> 00:36:20.800 was actually just a region of India pastor law that 849 00:36:20.840 --> 00:36:24.840 basically said that human animals had human rights basically, and 850 00:36:24.880 --> 00:36:25.519 then when you get. 851 00:36:25.360 --> 00:36:26.360 Into it, like what does that actually mean? 852 00:36:26.400 --> 00:36:27.840 Because like if that's the case, then like you can't 853 00:36:27.840 --> 00:36:31.199 eat meat right because they'd be murdering someone. But the 854 00:36:31.239 --> 00:36:32.960 details of the law are actually kind of confusing and 855 00:36:32.960 --> 00:36:34.519 it's unclear if it's actually going to change anything. 856 00:36:34.519 --> 00:36:35.079 But yeah, these. 857 00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:37.920 Questions of like what should we do about these like 858 00:36:37.960 --> 00:36:40.199 other creatures that we share the planet with that like 859 00:36:40.239 --> 00:36:42.360 are actually like way smarter than we thought they were. 860 00:36:43.039 --> 00:36:45.559 Okay, real quick, I look this up. And recently the 861 00:36:45.559 --> 00:36:48.960 Indian High Court of Punjab and Harryana has determined that 862 00:36:49.079 --> 00:36:52.679 all animals are persons and that humans in Haryana are 863 00:36:52.840 --> 00:36:56.840 de facto parents to all the animals, giving animals rights 864 00:36:56.840 --> 00:36:57.199 in the. 865 00:36:57.239 --> 00:36:58.840 Courts and the eyes of the law. 866 00:36:59.119 --> 00:37:02.840 Also in India, the Ganzas and the Yumana rivers, plus 867 00:37:02.880 --> 00:37:06.079 all of their streams and all of their little tributaries 868 00:37:06.400 --> 00:37:10.679 are also considered persons. And side note, I'm the youngest 869 00:37:10.719 --> 00:37:14.119 of three daughters, and by default I was usually just 870 00:37:14.159 --> 00:37:17.480 a dirty faced rug rat, tagging along with older siblings 871 00:37:17.559 --> 00:37:20.760 and their friends and my mom, your grandpadma Fancy. Nancy 872 00:37:20.880 --> 00:37:23.920 taught me to respond to any bullying by saying, I'm 873 00:37:23.960 --> 00:37:27.239 a person with rights and feelings, and I hope that 874 00:37:27.280 --> 00:37:30.039 when you're feeling down, whether you're a turtle or a 875 00:37:30.119 --> 00:37:33.360 stream or a hairless ape, and remember that you're a 876 00:37:33.400 --> 00:37:37.519 person with rights and feelings. So take that into the future. 877 00:37:37.760 --> 00:37:40.559 What about What are some other things that you are 878 00:37:40.679 --> 00:37:43.039 looking forward to in the future. 879 00:37:43.280 --> 00:37:46.719 What are you most stoked about? Ooh, most stoked about? 880 00:37:47.960 --> 00:37:50.119 I'm like, this makes me feel kind of old, but 881 00:37:50.119 --> 00:37:51.159 I'm stoked about the youth. 882 00:37:51.679 --> 00:37:53.400 And and they're. 883 00:37:53.199 --> 00:37:56.079 Like they're obsession with climate change, Like, honestly, I think 884 00:37:56.639 --> 00:37:58.440 like I feel like the last couple of years there's 885 00:37:58.440 --> 00:38:01.800 been such a huge change in the way that younger 886 00:38:01.840 --> 00:38:03.400 people are talking about climate change. 887 00:38:03.440 --> 00:38:05.000 I did a series recently. 888 00:38:04.719 --> 00:38:06.519 On flash Forward where I had a bunch of teen 889 00:38:06.639 --> 00:38:08.679 actors come in and do some stuff, and then I 890 00:38:08.760 --> 00:38:11.440 was asking them, you know, how do you feel about privacy? 891 00:38:12.000 --> 00:38:14.559 And they were basically like, I don't care about privacy. 892 00:38:14.719 --> 00:38:16.719 I care about climate change. Like literally, they were like, 893 00:38:17.159 --> 00:38:19.280 privacy is not going to end the human race. And 894 00:38:19.320 --> 00:38:21.199 I was like whoa, And they were like very intense 895 00:38:21.239 --> 00:38:23.559 about it. And just to see that like them be 896 00:38:23.679 --> 00:38:25.519 like no, like this is a thing that we care about, 897 00:38:25.559 --> 00:38:27.159 Like we are out in the streets, like we are 898 00:38:27.159 --> 00:38:29.599 doing this. I think, like that's honestly quite exciting to me, 899 00:38:29.760 --> 00:38:31.840 as like someone who has watched people sort of be 900 00:38:31.840 --> 00:38:35.119 apathetic about climate change for so long, so I think, 901 00:38:35.159 --> 00:38:37.960 like that is really exciting. I'm excited by like the 902 00:38:38.039 --> 00:38:41.599 advances in like health services for trans people, and like 903 00:38:41.639 --> 00:38:43.920 the way that like that has advanced the ways that 904 00:38:43.960 --> 00:38:45.400 we talk about gender. 905 00:38:45.159 --> 00:38:47.519 Is like cooler now. I think in general that's great. 906 00:38:47.599 --> 00:38:50.440 I generally don't get excited about like technology stuff because 907 00:38:50.519 --> 00:38:53.119 like so much of it it's like is it really 908 00:38:53.159 --> 00:38:55.320 going to happen? First of all, and also like is 909 00:38:55.360 --> 00:38:57.079 it only going to be available to like super rich people. 910 00:38:57.159 --> 00:39:01.199 M M question. Probably you know, A yeah, the kids 911 00:39:01.239 --> 00:39:01.880 these days. 912 00:39:01.719 --> 00:39:05.199 And these kids are doing such good things, so great 913 00:39:05.639 --> 00:39:09.880 sci fi movies. Ooh, do you avoid them because it's 914 00:39:10.159 --> 00:39:12.840 your work or do you see every single sci fi 915 00:39:12.880 --> 00:39:13.760 movie said in the future. 916 00:39:14.039 --> 00:39:16.480 I feel like I'm in between. I do not avoid them. 917 00:39:16.639 --> 00:39:20.239 I like them, but I also like I just sometimes 918 00:39:20.280 --> 00:39:22.400 don't get to find time to watch them. It's not 919 00:39:22.440 --> 00:39:25.039 like an on purpose thing, but I watch a lot 920 00:39:25.039 --> 00:39:27.039 of sci fi movies. I am not someone who like 921 00:39:27.079 --> 00:39:29.320 gets caught up in like that's not realistic or like 922 00:39:29.360 --> 00:39:31.360 warp drive doesn't work like that. Like I just like 923 00:39:31.440 --> 00:39:34.079 don't care. I'm like totally happy to suspend us belief 924 00:39:34.079 --> 00:39:36.280 and like have a good time in a movie. I'm 925 00:39:36.360 --> 00:39:38.320 much more like I get much more annoyed if like 926 00:39:38.320 --> 00:39:40.159 the character development is bad, you know, and like the 927 00:39:40.159 --> 00:39:42.719 women just like are only there to suffer or whatever 928 00:39:42.760 --> 00:39:44.320 it is, Like that's what I care about. I don't 929 00:39:44.360 --> 00:39:47.440 care if like whatever technology thing doesn't make sense, Like 930 00:39:47.480 --> 00:39:48.360 that doesn't bother me. 931 00:39:48.519 --> 00:39:51.119 Yeah, do you say that there are any sci fi 932 00:39:51.159 --> 00:39:54.519 movies that predicted this time and history? Right? 933 00:39:55.880 --> 00:39:57.360 I mean two thousand and one got a lot of 934 00:39:57.360 --> 00:39:59.320 stuff right about the way we were going to communicate 935 00:39:59.360 --> 00:40:02.559 with one another, like the sort of way that space 936 00:40:02.719 --> 00:40:04.599 has no sound, just kind of like I mean, that 937 00:40:04.639 --> 00:40:07.519 movie is like really interesting. The movie that I always 938 00:40:07.559 --> 00:40:09.360 talk about that like no one has seen is called 939 00:40:09.360 --> 00:40:13.639 Born in Flames and it's this old movie from the 940 00:40:13.920 --> 00:40:15.599 I want to say, early nineties. 941 00:40:15.880 --> 00:40:18.239 Been puzzled in the past week by what they described 942 00:40:18.280 --> 00:40:21.360 as well organized bands of fifteen to twenty women on 943 00:40:21.440 --> 00:40:23.199 bicycles attack in. 944 00:40:23.119 --> 00:40:26.559 That a history and it has Catherine Bigelow in it, 945 00:40:26.599 --> 00:40:29.199 who was zero dark thirty Catherine Bigelow, Oh, she's an 946 00:40:29.239 --> 00:40:30.400 actress in it. 947 00:40:30.400 --> 00:40:32.360 It's very weird. It's this indie movie. 948 00:40:33.079 --> 00:40:35.719 It's so interesting and like some of it has not 949 00:40:35.760 --> 00:40:38.000 aged well because it's about like these dueling feminist radio 950 00:40:38.000 --> 00:40:39.000 stations in New York City. 951 00:40:39.480 --> 00:40:44.000 So Rose explained that the plot involves a futuristic socialist state, 952 00:40:44.039 --> 00:40:47.400 but there's a lot of police brutality feminism that is 953 00:40:47.440 --> 00:40:51.760 not intersectional, and she says it's eurally prescient. Also good news. 954 00:40:52.000 --> 00:40:54.400 You can stream Born in Flames on Vimeo for three 955 00:40:54.400 --> 00:40:56.360 bucks and I'll put a link on my site at 956 00:40:56.400 --> 00:40:59.920 alleywar dot com. Slash ologies slash futurology, and I asked 957 00:41:00.159 --> 00:41:04.199 Rose if at the heart of futurology is just wanting 958 00:41:04.199 --> 00:41:06.679 to believe that things will be better than they are today, 959 00:41:06.719 --> 00:41:09.320 and she said that one reason she uses the term 960 00:41:09.440 --> 00:41:13.000 futurologist for herself as someone who studies the future is 961 00:41:13.039 --> 00:41:17.039 because a lot of professional futurists are people hired by 962 00:41:17.119 --> 00:41:20.320 Big Fortune five hundred companies who have an interest in 963 00:41:20.440 --> 00:41:23.480 maintaining the status quo because it's how those corporations make 964 00:41:23.519 --> 00:41:26.599 their money, and ethically, she doesn't feel aligned with that. 965 00:41:26.920 --> 00:41:32.519 So the future not everyone has the shiniest, most gleaming intentions. Now, 966 00:41:32.559 --> 00:41:34.599 on that note, why do you think our visions of 967 00:41:34.639 --> 00:41:37.840 the future involve so much metal, so much shiny silver. 968 00:41:37.719 --> 00:41:40.039 Metal, Shinese lillar metter. Yeah, I mean they're like the 969 00:41:40.119 --> 00:41:43.519 techno utopianism is like it's so alluring. We love like 970 00:41:43.960 --> 00:41:47.840 the robots with their like beautiful shiny shiny I mean, 971 00:41:48.360 --> 00:41:53.519 in nineteen oh nine ish, the Italian art movement called futurism. 972 00:41:54.320 --> 00:41:58.679 The main guy They're published a manifesto about futurism. It's 973 00:41:58.679 --> 00:42:00.639 not the same futurism what we're talking abot, but I 974 00:42:00.639 --> 00:42:04.360 think is deeply connected because basically his manifesto was like, 975 00:42:04.639 --> 00:42:06.960 I mean they were fascists. His manifesto was like, we 976 00:42:07.000 --> 00:42:08.679 don't care about what's happened in the past, like we 977 00:42:08.719 --> 00:42:09.639 only care about the future. 978 00:42:09.639 --> 00:42:11.559 We like speed, we like youth, we like disruption. 979 00:42:11.679 --> 00:42:14.639 It's like kind of eerie how much it sounds like 980 00:42:14.760 --> 00:42:19.039 the way that people talk about Silicon Valley and the Futurists, 981 00:42:19.039 --> 00:42:22.360 the Italian Futurists' art movement. They were really into like 982 00:42:22.480 --> 00:42:25.800 shiny gold, smooth, like that kind of aesthetic, and you 983 00:42:25.880 --> 00:42:28.119 see it still in some of this future imagining. 984 00:42:28.159 --> 00:42:29.679 So I think some of it has to do with that. 985 00:42:29.840 --> 00:42:31.840 I'm not an art historian, but like, I feel like 986 00:42:31.840 --> 00:42:34.119 there's a shared aesthetic among some of this where it's 987 00:42:34.159 --> 00:42:38.360 like this beautiful, perfect, shiny chrome and that's like not 988 00:42:38.400 --> 00:42:39.519 the future I'm interested in. 989 00:42:39.719 --> 00:42:39.960 Right. 990 00:42:41.320 --> 00:42:45.519 Do you think that that in the future will just 991 00:42:46.159 --> 00:42:49.960 kind of lose control over our own lives more and more? 992 00:42:50.280 --> 00:42:52.880 Or do you think that we have more control of 993 00:42:52.920 --> 00:42:56.280 our voices because social media has democratized things like where 994 00:42:56.280 --> 00:42:57.719 does the control lie? 995 00:42:57.960 --> 00:43:00.800 Yeah, I think that we are seeing a lot of 996 00:43:00.840 --> 00:43:03.000 control to algorithms right now. 997 00:43:03.079 --> 00:43:05.199 That kind of tell us what we want, right. 998 00:43:05.079 --> 00:43:08.440 And there's some really interesting work right now going on 999 00:43:08.480 --> 00:43:12.920 about the ways that suggestion algorithms kind of like create 1000 00:43:12.960 --> 00:43:16.159 a monoculture. So when you go into Spotify and it 1001 00:43:16.280 --> 00:43:18.119 recommends what you should listen to, we're all kind of 1002 00:43:18.159 --> 00:43:19.360 getting recommended the same stuff. 1003 00:43:19.360 --> 00:43:22.000 You're not. You're not finding these new interesting things. 1004 00:43:22.039 --> 00:43:23.559 You're not kind of like stumbling upon a book in 1005 00:43:23.599 --> 00:43:26.159 a bookstore because Amazon is telling you what you should 1006 00:43:26.159 --> 00:43:28.639 read basic what you've read before. And those recommendations can 1007 00:43:28.679 --> 00:43:30.119 be really useful. But I think a lot of people 1008 00:43:30.159 --> 00:43:32.559 really worry that we're kind of like collapsing everything down 1009 00:43:32.599 --> 00:43:35.719 into like one taste, like that you wouldn't have, you know, 1010 00:43:35.800 --> 00:43:38.840 you have your people don't have their own aesthetic anymore. 1011 00:43:38.840 --> 00:43:39.639 They don't have their taste. 1012 00:43:39.639 --> 00:43:42.039 They have whatever taste sort of fits within the Spotify 1013 00:43:42.079 --> 00:43:45.360 algorithm or fits within the Amazon algorithm. And I think, 1014 00:43:45.400 --> 00:43:47.199 you know a lot of people have written about like 1015 00:43:47.199 --> 00:43:49.400 the attention economy, this idea that like we are all 1016 00:43:49.480 --> 00:43:52.880 kind of our eyeballs are sort of like what all 1017 00:43:52.920 --> 00:43:55.039 of these apps want, and we're all kind of looking 1018 00:43:55.079 --> 00:43:56.960 at the same couple of apps all the time, you know, 1019 00:43:57.039 --> 00:44:00.519 many of which are owned by Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, all 1020 00:44:00.559 --> 00:44:02.000 of that, and so I think, like that's the thing 1021 00:44:02.000 --> 00:44:04.239 that I worry about, is that like all of our 1022 00:44:04.239 --> 00:44:06.519 communication and all the cool creative stuff that people do 1023 00:44:06.559 --> 00:44:08.360 in group text, right, Like when you think about like 1024 00:44:08.480 --> 00:44:10.239 the jokes you make and like the gifts and whatever 1025 00:44:10.280 --> 00:44:13.480 and all that stuff that is constrained by the the 1026 00:44:13.519 --> 00:44:15.440 technology that is constrained by what they allow you to do, 1027 00:44:15.519 --> 00:44:17.840 Like you only get a certain number of like reactions 1028 00:44:17.840 --> 00:44:19.920 on the like I message thing, right, So it's sort 1029 00:44:19.920 --> 00:44:22.360 of like collapsing down what we can do and what 1030 00:44:22.360 --> 00:44:24.800 we can say and the ways we can communicate. And 1031 00:44:24.840 --> 00:44:26.880 that's why when people complain about there being too many emoji, 1032 00:44:26.960 --> 00:44:29.639 I'm like, no unlimited emoji, Like give me all the emoji, right, 1033 00:44:29.639 --> 00:44:32.000 because like you want like this ability to be able 1034 00:44:32.000 --> 00:44:35.320 to like pick and choose emoticons and emoji that are 1035 00:44:35.360 --> 00:44:37.840 like not just the like six smiley faces or the 1036 00:44:37.880 --> 00:44:39.880 like the four reactions that Facebook gives you, and because 1037 00:44:39.880 --> 00:44:42.039 which it kind of collapses to emotion and reaction and 1038 00:44:42.039 --> 00:44:43.599 the way that we talk to each other, the ways 1039 00:44:43.599 --> 00:44:45.400 that we are allowed to kind of react to each 1040 00:44:45.440 --> 00:44:47.679 other and like interact with each other are constrained by 1041 00:44:47.719 --> 00:44:51.199 these design choices that I think, like we aren't interrogating enough. 1042 00:44:52.400 --> 00:44:55.280 That's such a good point. I mean, someone also wants 1043 00:44:55.760 --> 00:44:57.880 said to me, forget where this quote comes comes from, 1044 00:44:57.880 --> 00:45:01.679 but if the app is free, then you you're the product. Yeah, yeah, 1045 00:45:01.679 --> 00:45:04.559 I don't know who said that, but it's yeah, yeah, 1046 00:45:04.679 --> 00:45:06.719 chilling and like so obvious. 1047 00:45:07.440 --> 00:45:07.800 PS. 1048 00:45:07.840 --> 00:45:09.360 I needed to know who said that, and I did 1049 00:45:09.400 --> 00:45:12.440 a little digging, and nine years ago, on the website metaphilter, 1050 00:45:12.719 --> 00:45:16.199 the user blue Beetle aka a guy named Andrew Lewis 1051 00:45:16.320 --> 00:45:19.519 wrote this regarding the internet quote, if you're not paying 1052 00:45:19.559 --> 00:45:22.519 for it, you're not the customer. You are the product 1053 00:45:22.599 --> 00:45:25.000 being sold, and he later said that he wasn't quoting 1054 00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:28.599 anyone directly, but merely restating a fairly common sentiment, and 1055 00:45:28.599 --> 00:45:30.320 for some reason, the Internet just seems to have. 1056 00:45:30.400 --> 00:45:31.679 Picked it up and ran with it. 1057 00:45:31.760 --> 00:45:33.880 If you're like, damn, that should go on a T shirt, 1058 00:45:33.960 --> 00:45:36.159 don't worry. Andrew Lewis has set up a Cafe Press 1059 00:45:36.159 --> 00:45:38.159 store and you could get a T shirt bearing that 1060 00:45:38.199 --> 00:45:41.400 wisdom for fourteen ninety five, which honestly seems pretty fair. 1061 00:45:41.599 --> 00:45:44.079 And since you'd be paying for it, you're not the product. 1062 00:45:44.239 --> 00:45:47.559 Totally yeah, righted, Yeah, your data like all that stuff. 1063 00:45:47.599 --> 00:45:49.760 I mean, it's it's definitely something I think about it. 1064 00:45:49.800 --> 00:45:51.400 And even if the app isn't free, you still might 1065 00:45:51.400 --> 00:45:54.039 be the product. I mean, like Alexa is not free, 1066 00:45:54.119 --> 00:45:56.440 but you are absolutely still the product, right, So, like 1067 00:45:56.920 --> 00:45:59.679 it's definitely something that I think about a lot where 1068 00:45:59.679 --> 00:46:01.679 it's like and it's hard also, like I want to 1069 00:46:01.679 --> 00:46:03.480 talk to my friends and they all we all use 1070 00:46:03.519 --> 00:46:05.880 these same apps and whenever, and like I'm not gonna 1071 00:46:05.880 --> 00:46:07.039 be able to commit all my friends to use an 1072 00:46:07.079 --> 00:46:08.199 encrypted messaging app that. 1073 00:46:08.199 --> 00:46:10.400 I want to use, you know, like I'm that friend. 1074 00:46:10.559 --> 00:46:12.199 Just like if we can use the signal, that would 1075 00:46:12.199 --> 00:46:12.440 be great. 1076 00:46:12.480 --> 00:46:16.280 And everyone's like, no, I love that about You're like 1077 00:46:16.400 --> 00:46:19.320 I want to be like on your plot of Land 1078 00:46:19.360 --> 00:46:20.360 during the apocalypse. 1079 00:46:20.679 --> 00:46:21.159 Trust me. 1080 00:46:21.280 --> 00:46:23.199 I literally look at Land. I literally I'm like I 1081 00:46:23.239 --> 00:46:24.400 could build a compound. 1082 00:46:24.559 --> 00:46:27.480 Yeah. What do you think about doomsday preppers? Oh? I 1083 00:46:27.480 --> 00:46:30.519 mean they're funny, Like it's silly. I enjoy it because 1084 00:46:30.559 --> 00:46:31.960 it's like why not think about it? 1085 00:46:32.000 --> 00:46:33.639 But yeah, I mean like a lot of it is 1086 00:46:33.679 --> 00:46:35.480 like really rich people buying land in New Zealand for 1087 00:46:35.880 --> 00:46:36.840 that and they'll be fine. 1088 00:46:36.880 --> 00:46:38.519 But like I don't know. I think. 1089 00:46:38.559 --> 00:46:41.199 I mean, you've talked about this on the Disastrology episode 1090 00:46:41.199 --> 00:46:43.280 about like we're actually more pro social during these kinds 1091 00:46:43.320 --> 00:46:44.960 of things than we think we're gonna be. 1092 00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:47.000 So like, I'm ready, I'm ready to fight with everybody else. 1093 00:46:47.559 --> 00:46:51.519 It's so sweet. Just get solar powers and dehydrated potatoes. Yeah, yeah, 1094 00:46:51.559 --> 00:46:53.199 oh that was you know what? 1095 00:46:53.599 --> 00:46:56.519 Uh message just popped up on my computer off work 1096 00:46:56.639 --> 00:46:58.559 in ten minutes because I've tried to put a thing 1097 00:46:58.599 --> 00:47:00.519 for myself that I'm off work at seven of you. 1098 00:47:00.719 --> 00:47:02.639 So what happens is every night at seven o'clock, I say, 1099 00:47:02.639 --> 00:47:03.599 if you shut the fuck up. 1100 00:47:04.239 --> 00:47:07.320 A funny joke, I like, not today, I'm going to 1101 00:47:07.320 --> 00:47:10.000 ask you questions for patrons. Yeah I did. I did peak. 1102 00:47:10.159 --> 00:47:12.480 I did peak. Good for you. This is because you're 1103 00:47:12.519 --> 00:47:15.519 prepared for the future, and I if I can't prepare. 1104 00:47:15.599 --> 00:47:16.280 It's funny. I was. 1105 00:47:16.480 --> 00:47:18.360 I was talking to a psychologist recently about this mental 1106 00:47:18.360 --> 00:47:20.480 time travel things. I'm really interested in it, and I 1107 00:47:20.480 --> 00:47:22.639 think that it actually is like very meta, like what 1108 00:47:22.679 --> 00:47:24.159 I'm in, what I want to talk about with and 1109 00:47:24.239 --> 00:47:26.559 I talk about the future where I'm sort of like no, no, 1110 00:47:26.639 --> 00:47:29.119 like if we think collectively about the future. It actually 1111 00:47:29.119 --> 00:47:30.800 makes us more prepared, makes us happier, it makes us 1112 00:47:30.840 --> 00:47:32.679 less freaked out. But there is a fine line right 1113 00:47:32.679 --> 00:47:34.559 where if you think too much about the future, you're like, 1114 00:47:34.559 --> 00:47:37.079 oh god, and you're like, imagine every possible terrible scenario, 1115 00:47:37.079 --> 00:47:38.039 which I do sometimes. 1116 00:47:38.159 --> 00:47:39.559 So yeah, it's a fine line. 1117 00:47:39.880 --> 00:47:43.000 Would you say that in general you're a prepared person, 1118 00:47:43.159 --> 00:47:44.760 like do you prepare for the future? 1119 00:47:44.920 --> 00:47:47.119 Well, like, what do you pack well for trips? Do 1120 00:47:47.199 --> 00:47:50.360 you pay your your tax as well before they're due quarterly? 1121 00:47:50.440 --> 00:47:52.599 Things like that? Yes, and no. 1122 00:47:52.840 --> 00:47:55.280 I find that I'm very prepared if I think it's important. 1123 00:47:55.280 --> 00:47:57.199 But if I don't, then I'm not. And so like 1124 00:47:57.360 --> 00:47:59.599 things that fall into my like eh, bucket, like are 1125 00:47:59.599 --> 00:48:01.559 probably that are in fact important, like paying dixst. 1126 00:48:01.679 --> 00:48:02.639 Now I do pay my taxes. 1127 00:48:02.679 --> 00:48:05.320 Do not audit me, please, But yeah, there are certain 1128 00:48:05.360 --> 00:48:07.079 things I'm good at and certain things that I like. 1129 00:48:07.320 --> 00:48:08.880 At some point I just have to be like it's 1130 00:48:08.880 --> 00:48:11.880 gonna be fine, like but packing and very particular about Oh. 1131 00:48:12.079 --> 00:48:14.480 Yes, when there's someone who is very smart and knowledgeable 1132 00:48:14.480 --> 00:48:16.760 and prepared, I like to just parasite onto them and 1133 00:48:16.760 --> 00:48:18.440 ask them advice about everything, which is what. 1134 00:48:18.440 --> 00:48:20.239 I do with you a lot like roads. What are 1135 00:48:20.239 --> 00:48:20.519 we doing? 1136 00:48:21.360 --> 00:48:25.920 What's happening? Yeah? Okay, so patron questions. But before we 1137 00:48:26.000 --> 00:48:28.719 dive into your questions, to your patrons, a few words 1138 00:48:28.719 --> 00:48:31.400 from sponsors who make it possible for us to donate 1139 00:48:31.440 --> 00:48:34.519 to a charity of the ologists choosing, and this week 1140 00:48:34.679 --> 00:48:37.360 Rose chose the Gender Reveal Grant, which she says is 1141 00:48:37.400 --> 00:48:40.079 a grant program run by the amazing Molly Woodstock through 1142 00:48:40.119 --> 00:48:43.119 their podcast Gender Reveal, which is a super good, funny 1143 00:48:43.159 --> 00:48:47.119 and informational podcast about gender. Gender Reveal describes itself as 1144 00:48:47.119 --> 00:48:50.199 a podcast for non binary folks, for people who don't 1145 00:48:50.239 --> 00:48:53.599 know what non binary means, and everyone in between. Rose 1146 00:48:53.679 --> 00:48:56.400 is a huge proponent of direct giving, and the Gender 1147 00:48:56.440 --> 00:49:00.679 Reveal Grant goes directly to trans artists, activists, and educators 1148 00:49:00.719 --> 00:49:03.480 around the world doing rad shit in her words, So 1149 00:49:03.519 --> 00:49:06.800 more info is up at gender podcast dot com slash 1150 00:49:06.960 --> 00:49:09.480 grant and now you may hear some words about sponsors 1151 00:49:09.519 --> 00:49:14.360 zoologies who make that possible. Okay, on to your questions. 1152 00:49:14.559 --> 00:49:17.440 Sabine Deschauzo wants to know how do we remain optimistic 1153 00:49:17.480 --> 00:49:19.480 about the future when it feels like things are going 1154 00:49:19.559 --> 00:49:21.599 badly on a global scale. 1155 00:49:21.880 --> 00:49:23.400 So just how screwed are we? 1156 00:49:23.559 --> 00:49:26.719 Yeah, that's a great question, Okay, And I think like, 1157 00:49:26.800 --> 00:49:30.039 first of all, uh, that's a really like honestly, probably 1158 00:49:30.039 --> 00:49:32.079 actually the most common question I get. I said earlier 1159 00:49:32.079 --> 00:49:33.480 that it was about like phones or whatever. I think 1160 00:49:33.480 --> 00:49:36.960 that's probably the most common question I get, which is like, uh, yeah, 1161 00:49:37.960 --> 00:49:39.679 and I feel that, and that's totally normal. And if 1162 00:49:39.679 --> 00:49:41.840 you don't feel that, then like you weren't paying attention, right, 1163 00:49:41.880 --> 00:49:45.360 so like a normal regular you're a regular person. But 1164 00:49:45.400 --> 00:49:47.000 I think a lot of it does come down to 1165 00:49:47.960 --> 00:49:49.400 this thing that I've been thinking a lot about, which 1166 00:49:49.440 --> 00:49:51.800 is if we can stop, like pause for a second 1167 00:49:52.159 --> 00:49:54.079 and actually think about specific things we can do, like 1168 00:49:54.079 --> 00:49:56.719 get involved with community, local community stuff and that you know, 1169 00:49:56.880 --> 00:50:00.280 we joked about preppers earlier, but I do I think 1170 00:50:00.280 --> 00:50:02.920 actually that like in our climate change future, in our 1171 00:50:02.960 --> 00:50:05.119 future where things might get kind of dicey, if that's 1172 00:50:05.159 --> 00:50:07.159 where we're going, like being a part of your local 1173 00:50:07.159 --> 00:50:09.199 community is actually the best thing you can do, because 1174 00:50:09.199 --> 00:50:10.239 that's those are the people. 1175 00:50:09.960 --> 00:50:11.039 That you're gonna want to rely on. 1176 00:50:11.400 --> 00:50:13.280 And whether that's because there's like an extreme weather event 1177 00:50:13.320 --> 00:50:15.440 in your area because of climate change, or that's because 1178 00:50:15.559 --> 00:50:17.679 like the global economy collapses, like whatever it is that 1179 00:50:17.679 --> 00:50:20.519 you're worried about, Like, those are the people that you're 1180 00:50:20.519 --> 00:50:21.920 gonna rely on. So I think the first step I 1181 00:50:21.920 --> 00:50:24.400 would say is like small local community stuff can make 1182 00:50:24.440 --> 00:50:26.719 you feel like plugged in and connected to people who 1183 00:50:26.760 --> 00:50:29.039 genuinely care about the future, and that makes a huge 1184 00:50:29.039 --> 00:50:31.199 difference if you feel like you're not going it alone. 1185 00:50:31.280 --> 00:50:33.599 We are a social species. As much as I joke 1186 00:50:33.639 --> 00:50:36.119 about hating people, like, we all like want to be 1187 00:50:36.320 --> 00:50:39.280 with other people. And so the biggest thing I say, 1188 00:50:39.280 --> 00:50:41.559 and like, you're not going to necessarily like fix climate 1189 00:50:41.639 --> 00:50:43.960 change by getting involved with a local community group, but 1190 00:50:44.440 --> 00:50:46.840 you will feel better about it, and also you will 1191 00:50:46.880 --> 00:50:47.719 be able to move us. 1192 00:50:47.920 --> 00:50:48.840 You can move the needle. 1193 00:50:48.880 --> 00:50:52.400 I think, like local community politics is so overlooked and 1194 00:50:52.480 --> 00:50:55.440 so important, and yeah, just like getting in touch with 1195 00:50:55.480 --> 00:50:57.639 people and like talking about it and figuring out like 1196 00:50:57.679 --> 00:51:00.280 what are specific things that we can do is is 1197 00:51:00.320 --> 00:51:02.559 really important. The other thing I'll say is like, like 1198 00:51:02.599 --> 00:51:04.119 I've sort of been going on and on about this 1199 00:51:04.119 --> 00:51:06.599 mental time travel thing, but I think it's the studies 1200 00:51:06.639 --> 00:51:09.360 I'm reading about it are really interesting because they do 1201 00:51:09.400 --> 00:51:13.199 show students who mentally visualize doing well on an exam, 1202 00:51:13.320 --> 00:51:16.119 tend to actually do better on the exam, and obviously, 1203 00:51:16.159 --> 00:51:17.840 like to a point, right, like this is not like 1204 00:51:17.880 --> 00:51:21.519 it's not magic like the secret and like, but you 1205 00:51:21.599 --> 00:51:23.719 can kind of like if you think abo like Okay, 1206 00:51:23.840 --> 00:51:25.199 what do I want the future to look like, and 1207 00:51:25.199 --> 00:51:27.039 actually being specific about what that is, like what do 1208 00:51:27.079 --> 00:51:29.119 you want to see? And then thinking about like, okay, 1209 00:51:29.159 --> 00:51:30.880 if that's what I want, like how do I get that? 1210 00:51:30.920 --> 00:51:33.079 Like where do I go? What do I do? Sort 1211 00:51:33.079 --> 00:51:35.800 of like really visualizing what you want out of the 1212 00:51:35.800 --> 00:51:38.119 future in specifics where it's like if you have kids, 1213 00:51:38.119 --> 00:51:39.920 like I want my kid to have a world where 1214 00:51:39.960 --> 00:51:42.360 blank happens, and then you can kind of work back 1215 00:51:42.360 --> 00:51:44.280 from there and figure out, like what are the organizations 1216 00:51:44.280 --> 00:51:46.000 that are getting that are trying to work towards that. 1217 00:51:46.039 --> 00:51:47.360 Who are the people that I can even if you 1218 00:51:47.360 --> 00:51:49.800 can't donate your time, donate your money, or like do 1219 00:51:49.920 --> 00:51:51.480 something where you kind of spread the word about it 1220 00:51:51.519 --> 00:51:53.639 like that those little things I think actually make you 1221 00:51:53.639 --> 00:51:55.519 feel a little bit like you're in more control and 1222 00:51:55.559 --> 00:51:58.199 can actually kind of try to push towards the future. 1223 00:51:58.239 --> 00:52:00.320 So that's what I would say to that, that's. 1224 00:52:00.239 --> 00:52:04.719 A great advice. Okay, side note. Humans obviously mentally time travel, 1225 00:52:04.800 --> 00:52:08.760 and there's great debate among ethologists folks who study animal 1226 00:52:08.800 --> 00:52:12.639 behavior as to whether other apes and ravens and crows 1227 00:52:12.760 --> 00:52:16.440 and jays can imagine their futures. And for more on 1228 00:52:16.760 --> 00:52:21.480 bird brains, listen to the Halloween twenty eighteen Corvid Thanatology 1229 00:52:21.519 --> 00:52:26.039 episode about crow funerals with expert doctor Kaylee Swift, Dead 1230 00:52:26.039 --> 00:52:29.079 Birds Band Who It's a wild world, I promise, also 1231 00:52:29.280 --> 00:52:34.119 fun tidbit. Another word for mental time travel is chronosthesia. 1232 00:52:34.559 --> 00:52:37.599 So if your boss is not the googling type and 1233 00:52:37.679 --> 00:52:41.639 you envision a day off work eating corn dogs on 1234 00:52:41.679 --> 00:52:45.400 a beach, just call in sick with chronosthesia. You won't 1235 00:52:45.440 --> 00:52:48.119 even be a liar, You'll be a hero. My hero 1236 00:52:48.480 --> 00:52:49.840 Ja X Barnett wants to know what do you think 1237 00:52:49.880 --> 00:52:53.079 has been the biggest misstep in future technology? Examples might 1238 00:52:53.079 --> 00:52:55.679 include the Ford Deedzel, Crystal Pepsi, or Friendster. 1239 00:52:58.000 --> 00:53:02.960 I would say that, I would sort of say, like 1240 00:53:03.079 --> 00:53:07.559 broadly surveillance culture, and like our our willingness to seed 1241 00:53:07.880 --> 00:53:11.760 so much of our personal space to devices and companies, 1242 00:53:13.159 --> 00:53:16.320 and that's like facial recognition, that's the always on listening devices. 1243 00:53:17.119 --> 00:53:19.360 I can hear you shit? Okay. 1244 00:53:19.400 --> 00:53:23.440 Also, this next part is really interesting from a future 1245 00:53:23.480 --> 00:53:25.960 logical legal perspective. 1246 00:53:25.760 --> 00:53:28.679 And I think that's important and we you know, because. 1247 00:53:29.760 --> 00:53:31.639 Yes, you might think, like, oh, well, Google aready knows 1248 00:53:31.679 --> 00:53:33.800 everything about me, Like what's why not just add Google 1249 00:53:33.840 --> 00:53:36.360 Home into my house? And my answer to that is 1250 00:53:36.400 --> 00:53:40.199 that there is this idea in law that you are 1251 00:53:40.320 --> 00:53:44.400 protected from unreasonable surveillance, right, and so that means that 1252 00:53:44.480 --> 00:53:47.159 like in certain states you can't record somebody without them knowing, 1253 00:53:47.360 --> 00:53:49.440 or you know, you're really not supposed to wire tap 1254 00:53:49.440 --> 00:53:53.280 people like in general, you know, like and that's because 1255 00:53:53.320 --> 00:53:55.840 we have a reasonable expectation of privacy and that's sort 1256 00:53:55.840 --> 00:53:58.039 of what the term is that they use. And so 1257 00:53:58.320 --> 00:54:00.000 you know, if I were to sneak into this room 1258 00:54:00.239 --> 00:54:02.639 and put a recorder here and leave and record you, 1259 00:54:02.719 --> 00:54:05.280 that would be a violation of your privacy because you 1260 00:54:05.280 --> 00:54:07.360 have a reasonable expectation of being in your hotel room 1261 00:54:07.360 --> 00:54:11.079 and not having a recording device. If we all accept 1262 00:54:11.320 --> 00:54:13.000 that we are going to put these devices into our 1263 00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:15.280 homes and let them listen all the time, we are 1264 00:54:15.320 --> 00:54:17.679 basically telling a court in the future that like, actually, 1265 00:54:17.719 --> 00:54:19.760 I don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy in my 1266 00:54:19.800 --> 00:54:22.519 house anymore. And that also means that anybody who walks 1267 00:54:22.559 --> 00:54:24.519 through the door no longer has a reasonable expectation of 1268 00:54:24.519 --> 00:54:27.599 privacy in your home, and that I think is scary 1269 00:54:27.719 --> 00:54:31.280 because that means basically that law enforcement can subpoena. We 1270 00:54:31.360 --> 00:54:34.000 know that Amazon and Google both have worked with law 1271 00:54:34.079 --> 00:54:36.840 enforcement to give over certain records. We know that like 1272 00:54:37.320 --> 00:54:40.480 law enforcement targets certain individuals more than they target other individuals. 1273 00:54:40.920 --> 00:54:43.480 We know like Ice for example, can sometimes use facial 1274 00:54:43.480 --> 00:54:45.920 recognition systems to try to find people they're looking for. 1275 00:54:46.079 --> 00:54:47.559 And so those of us who like maybe don't have 1276 00:54:47.559 --> 00:54:49.920 to worry about those things are making it much harder 1277 00:54:49.920 --> 00:54:51.840 in the future for other folks who do have those 1278 00:54:51.880 --> 00:54:53.960 concerns because they no longer can be protected in their 1279 00:54:54.000 --> 00:54:56.599 own homes from surveillance. And so I think that's the 1280 00:54:56.639 --> 00:54:59.639 big thing that I worry about. Obviously, like fossil fuels 1281 00:54:59.679 --> 00:55:01.679 is probably the better answer to this question that I'm 1282 00:55:01.679 --> 00:55:04.000 thinking about it, like you know, burning dinosaur bones that 1283 00:55:04.039 --> 00:55:06.840 have been liquified. But I think that's the the other 1284 00:55:06.840 --> 00:55:08.519 big one I think a lot about. Is this like 1285 00:55:09.079 --> 00:55:12.159 sort of like we throw our hands up and say, like, oh, well, 1286 00:55:12.199 --> 00:55:13.639 like there's nothing we can do at this point. 1287 00:55:13.679 --> 00:55:15.719 And I think actually we are still at a point. 1288 00:55:15.519 --> 00:55:19.159 Before we have completely lost the battle for privacy, but 1289 00:55:19.280 --> 00:55:21.320 like we're getting there and so like that's my like 1290 00:55:21.360 --> 00:55:24.519 big treatise against the like always on listening devices, Like 1291 00:55:24.559 --> 00:55:26.159 at some point there will be a case in the 1292 00:55:26.159 --> 00:55:29.159 future in which a judge has to decide did that 1293 00:55:29.199 --> 00:55:32.000 person have a reasonable expectation of privacy? And if everybody 1294 00:55:32.000 --> 00:55:34.400 has these devices, it's possible that judge will be like, Nope, 1295 00:55:34.519 --> 00:55:35.000 not anymore. 1296 00:55:35.559 --> 00:55:38.000 And there is no such thing as it's not listening 1297 00:55:38.079 --> 00:55:39.159 to me unless I say it's. 1298 00:55:39.039 --> 00:55:41.320 Name, correct. I mean, in theory that is how it works. 1299 00:55:41.320 --> 00:55:43.920 But there have been so many documents that employees at 1300 00:55:43.920 --> 00:55:47.480 these companies are listening in on conversations as part of 1301 00:55:47.519 --> 00:55:50.239 either testing or by accident or whatever it is. Like 1302 00:55:50.840 --> 00:55:52.880 I would say that, correct, You are sort of like 1303 00:55:52.920 --> 00:55:54.800 you should expect that they can hear anything you say. 1304 00:55:56.280 --> 00:55:57.000 Yeah, do not. 1305 00:55:57.280 --> 00:56:00.880 Like Jessica Jansen wants to know what do you foresee 1306 00:56:00.920 --> 00:56:03.440 for the future of healthcare, like using our own immune 1307 00:56:03.440 --> 00:56:07.119 systems and genetics to defend us against the world. 1308 00:56:07.159 --> 00:56:08.239 What do you think about healthcare? 1309 00:56:08.800 --> 00:56:11.639 Yeah, I mean, there's such interesting work going on with 1310 00:56:11.800 --> 00:56:14.440 genetics and with sort of the ways that we are 1311 00:56:14.559 --> 00:56:17.320 using gene editing. I think that is very exciting. My 1312 00:56:18.400 --> 00:56:20.719 worry always is like the way that the healthcare research 1313 00:56:20.760 --> 00:56:22.559 system works is that like a lot of things don't 1314 00:56:22.559 --> 00:56:24.880 get developed because they don't make sense financially for a 1315 00:56:24.880 --> 00:56:27.280 pharmaceutical company, which means that like they're not going to 1316 00:56:27.280 --> 00:56:29.320 make money on a population, even though like that people 1317 00:56:29.400 --> 00:56:31.840 need that stuff. That said, there is some really cool 1318 00:56:31.840 --> 00:56:35.000 stuff going on with like genetic advances, and yeah, like 1319 00:56:35.039 --> 00:56:37.480 personalized genomics is something people have talked about for a 1320 00:56:37.480 --> 00:56:39.639 really long time, but I think actually is like finally 1321 00:56:39.679 --> 00:56:43.239 getting some like real progress. That's a classic one where 1322 00:56:43.320 --> 00:56:45.559 sort of like nuclear fusion, where it's like always ten 1323 00:56:45.639 --> 00:56:47.760 years away, you know, but like I think at this point, 1324 00:56:47.800 --> 00:56:50.719 like there is some really interesting research on that. There's 1325 00:56:50.760 --> 00:56:52.760 another bit of research that I find really interesting about 1326 00:56:53.000 --> 00:56:56.039 biomedical tattoos and sort of like let's say you might 1327 00:56:56.119 --> 00:56:57.960 have like you want to met under your glucose and 1328 00:56:58.000 --> 00:56:59.519 you don't, you can have a tattoo that actually like 1329 00:56:59.519 --> 00:57:01.960 turns a cu when it's time like when you're glucoss low. 1330 00:57:02.000 --> 00:57:03.440 So that kind of stuff is really interesting to me. 1331 00:57:03.719 --> 00:57:05.599 Things that are just like personalized medicine. I think is 1332 00:57:05.639 --> 00:57:07.519 like really interesting and it's kind of a buzzword and 1333 00:57:07.920 --> 00:57:09.360 it can get kind of like pseudoscience. 1334 00:57:09.400 --> 00:57:09.639 Okay. 1335 00:57:09.639 --> 00:57:11.480 Side note if you're like, what is the deal with 1336 00:57:11.599 --> 00:57:14.280 nuclear fusion? Don't worry. I look this up for us 1337 00:57:14.280 --> 00:57:17.599 because I wasn't sure either. So the gist is nuclear 1338 00:57:17.639 --> 00:57:21.119 power we're using now is fission, where we split uranium 1339 00:57:21.119 --> 00:57:23.719 atoms and it generates a ton of power, but also 1340 00:57:24.079 --> 00:57:25.360 some radioactive waste. 1341 00:57:25.400 --> 00:57:25.800 Woops. 1342 00:57:26.039 --> 00:57:30.840 Now nuclear fusion would instead jam two hydrogen atoms together 1343 00:57:31.239 --> 00:57:34.480 into a helium and would theoretically give off more power 1344 00:57:34.639 --> 00:57:38.119 than fission without the waste. Now, there is one giant 1345 00:57:38.360 --> 00:57:42.039 proof of concept already in use, and it's the sun. 1346 00:57:42.400 --> 00:57:45.320 Same shit happens in the sun. But when Rose said that, 1347 00:57:45.400 --> 00:57:48.559 everyone keeps saying it's ten years off, she's not whistling. 1348 00:57:48.639 --> 00:57:52.159 Dixie News articles from twenty fourteen promise it'll be a 1349 00:57:52.199 --> 00:57:54.960 reality by twenty twenty five, and in a report that 1350 00:57:55.039 --> 00:57:57.280 was out just last week, two labs in the UK 1351 00:57:57.400 --> 00:57:59.840 are apparently neck and neck to get it figured out 1352 00:58:00.079 --> 00:58:04.800 in YEP, the next decade, using deuterium and tritium, which 1353 00:58:04.800 --> 00:58:08.559 are two isotopes or forms of hydrogen. And I want 1354 00:58:08.599 --> 00:58:10.519 to say that if I had a pair of hamsters, 1355 00:58:10.960 --> 00:58:13.280 I would like to name them Dutes and trit. I 1356 00:58:13.320 --> 00:58:15.480 know you don't care, but this is my podcast, and 1357 00:58:15.519 --> 00:58:17.519 I'll say what I want to. Katie Coast wants to 1358 00:58:17.559 --> 00:58:19.440 know if there was one thing that we currently don't 1359 00:58:19.519 --> 00:58:21.960 know about the future that you could be magically gifted 1360 00:58:22.159 --> 00:58:23.400 with the full understanding. 1361 00:58:23.719 --> 00:58:26.239 What would it be? What do you want to know? 1362 00:58:26.719 --> 00:58:28.840 What do I want to know? What I want to know? 1363 00:58:29.639 --> 00:58:31.199 That's such a good question. I wish I had read 1364 00:58:31.199 --> 00:58:34.360 that one in advance and thought of an answer. What 1365 00:58:34.360 --> 00:58:36.000 do I want to know? I mean, what would I 1366 00:58:36.039 --> 00:58:37.719 want to know about the future? 1367 00:58:37.760 --> 00:58:39.280 I mean I think that like what I would love 1368 00:58:39.440 --> 00:58:41.880 is to just like be able to teleport one hundred 1369 00:58:41.960 --> 00:58:44.039 years from now just to kind of like look around, 1370 00:58:44.199 --> 00:58:45.960 and I think like there'd be so many It's not 1371 00:58:46.000 --> 00:58:47.920 like one thing. There'd be so many pieces of information 1372 00:58:47.920 --> 00:58:50.079 I'd be getting from being how the cities are laid out, 1373 00:58:50.119 --> 00:58:52.000 like what people are wearing, like what people are using, 1374 00:58:52.000 --> 00:58:54.000 what people are doing, if we exist at all, Yeah, 1375 00:58:54.159 --> 00:58:56.719 like it for still year. I think that would be 1376 00:58:56.760 --> 00:58:58.880 like one hundred years is a cool time. Not because 1377 00:58:58.880 --> 00:59:00.840 it's just like a you know, nice round number, but 1378 00:59:00.960 --> 00:59:03.760 because it does feel like enough time that like it's 1379 00:59:03.840 --> 00:59:05.559 really hard to know what's going to happen, but not 1380 00:59:05.599 --> 00:59:07.960 so much time that it's like, you know, we might 1381 00:59:08.000 --> 00:59:10.320 be Primordials line somewhere else in the other planet. 1382 00:59:10.400 --> 00:59:12.639 Like you know, I have a picture. 1383 00:59:12.800 --> 00:59:15.880 Like coming out of the teleporter and it's just smoldering 1384 00:59:15.920 --> 00:59:17.159 ashes and they. 1385 00:59:17.119 --> 00:59:18.079 Turn around and get back in. 1386 00:59:18.159 --> 00:59:21.400 Yeah, and it's just like ooh, yikes, yeip, we did it. 1387 00:59:21.800 --> 00:59:24.119 I Mean I always think and this is maybe this 1388 00:59:24.159 --> 00:59:26.760 is terrible, but I feel like it's just logical that 1389 00:59:26.880 --> 00:59:29.960 like we're going to get wiped out and that's. 1390 00:59:29.840 --> 00:59:31.440 Fine, Like you're ready for it. 1391 00:59:31.519 --> 00:59:33.360 I'm ready for Like I don't feel like we need 1392 00:59:33.400 --> 00:59:35.440 to put ourselves. 1393 00:59:34.880 --> 00:59:37.360 On any other planet. Like like we had our shot. 1394 00:59:37.519 --> 00:59:39.639 We had our shot, Like ninety is a good run. Yeah, 1395 00:59:39.639 --> 00:59:41.559 it was a good run. Bye bye. Yeah, even the 1396 00:59:41.559 --> 00:59:44.639 Sopranos had to end, right, I get the shack, let's 1397 00:59:44.639 --> 00:59:45.280 get out of here. 1398 00:59:45.360 --> 00:59:47.840 Like ninety nine point nine percent of all species that 1399 00:59:47.880 --> 00:59:50.960 have existed are extinct, and like if we fuck ourselves 1400 00:59:51.079 --> 00:59:54.199 up beyond the ability to survive, that is how the game. 1401 00:59:54.000 --> 00:59:57.360 Works like like feeling no, no, not there. 1402 00:59:57.719 --> 01:00:00.280 Yeah No, it's like you did this to yourself and 1403 01:00:00.400 --> 01:00:03.480 you took a bunch of species with you and bye bye. 1404 01:00:03.599 --> 01:00:06.639 We're gonna take your atoms and make them into new 1405 01:00:07.159 --> 01:00:07.960 interesting animals. 1406 01:00:08.119 --> 01:00:08.320 Yeah. 1407 01:00:08.320 --> 01:00:09.760 I think that, like on a long enough time skill 1408 01:00:09.800 --> 01:00:12.440 that's absolutely true, Like humans are not forever, Like nothing 1409 01:00:12.519 --> 01:00:15.599 is forever, right, like not even James Bond, and so 1410 01:00:15.800 --> 01:00:17.960 like you, yes, we will absolutely But the question is like, 1411 01:00:18.320 --> 01:00:20.320 is it in one hundred years or is it in 1412 01:00:20.360 --> 01:00:21.159 like ten thousands? 1413 01:00:21.199 --> 01:00:24.079 Right, I feel like it's in twelve but twelve years 1414 01:00:24.159 --> 01:00:24.960 or twelve twelve years? 1415 01:00:25.000 --> 01:00:27.119 Twelve years, that's what? Okay? Why twelve? 1416 01:00:27.159 --> 01:00:29.199 Because I was recently with some teens and they were like, 1417 01:00:29.280 --> 01:00:30.719 is it true that climate change is going to kill 1418 01:00:30.760 --> 01:00:31.480 us all in twelve years? 1419 01:00:31.519 --> 01:00:33.159 And I was like, where did you get that number from? 1420 01:00:33.719 --> 01:00:36.360 That seems a little conservative, But I just was thinking, 1421 01:00:36.440 --> 01:00:40.480 like enough time where like I still have a house payment, 1422 01:00:41.000 --> 01:00:44.159 you know, like enough time where you wouldn't definitely wouldn't 1423 01:00:44.159 --> 01:00:45.760 be ready for people still have student loans I had 1424 01:00:45.800 --> 01:00:48.639 to pay, Yeah, like still be like fuck, you know, 1425 01:00:48.760 --> 01:00:50.840 like I brought I'm sure there are still boxes in 1426 01:00:50.880 --> 01:00:53.119 the garage I won't have unpacked. 1427 01:00:52.679 --> 01:00:55.519 Right, yeah, mail, I have not opened since I like 1428 01:00:55.599 --> 01:00:56.760 moved to more houses ago. 1429 01:00:56.880 --> 01:00:57.119 Yeah. 1430 01:00:57.199 --> 01:01:00.239 I mean I feel like I have had spices is 1431 01:01:00.880 --> 01:01:02.639 for over twelve years, you know, I know that. 1432 01:01:02.639 --> 01:01:04.400 I'm like, how long have I had this garlic powder? 1433 01:01:04.480 --> 01:01:07.679 Like you moved it between every Yes, totally thrown away. 1434 01:01:08.199 --> 01:01:10.000 It's not garlic powder. So I feel bad. 1435 01:01:10.239 --> 01:01:12.079 Yeah, I feel like it's the same where it's just 1436 01:01:12.119 --> 01:01:13.519 like just where it catches you off guard. 1437 01:01:13.599 --> 01:01:16.599 Yeah. Twelve is good. Yeah, okay, yeah, but is climate 1438 01:01:16.679 --> 01:01:18.039 change can to kill us in twelve years? 1439 01:01:18.400 --> 01:01:20.000 No, it will kill a lot of things in twelve years, 1440 01:01:20.039 --> 01:01:24.280 potentially all the insects. Oh no, oh no, twelve years No, 1441 01:01:24.400 --> 01:01:25.840 I don't think so. But I mean things like twelve 1442 01:01:25.880 --> 01:01:27.199 years is long enough for us to kind of really 1443 01:01:27.239 --> 01:01:29.199 I mean, we're already seeing impacts of climate change, right, 1444 01:01:29.400 --> 01:01:31.760 there are already things happening. I think twelve years it 1445 01:01:31.760 --> 01:01:34.559 will start to become like very clear to everybody that 1446 01:01:34.719 --> 01:01:38.960 like this is happening, and you know, like things are changing. 1447 01:01:39.719 --> 01:01:41.639 Is there anything that you do in your personal life 1448 01:01:43.320 --> 01:01:49.360 differently because of climate change? I don't eat meat. I 1449 01:01:50.280 --> 01:01:51.000 feel terrible. 1450 01:01:51.039 --> 01:01:52.920 I fly a lot, which I don't like, but I 1451 01:01:52.960 --> 01:01:55.239 do pay for carbon offset stuff. 1452 01:01:55.400 --> 01:01:55.800 Nice. 1453 01:01:57.039 --> 01:02:01.039 I try to do as much usable, non plastic kind 1454 01:02:01.039 --> 01:02:04.239 of things, and I just like, I donate a lot. 1455 01:02:04.039 --> 01:02:06.440 Of money good for you. Yeah, that's what I mean, 1456 01:02:06.519 --> 01:02:07.079 a lot of money. 1457 01:02:07.119 --> 01:02:09.400 I'm not Bill Gates, you know, I donate as much 1458 01:02:09.400 --> 01:02:10.079 money as I can. 1459 01:02:11.079 --> 01:02:13.679 Right now, you're you have an open briefcase full of 1460 01:02:13.960 --> 01:02:15.840 one hundred dollars. Well, listeners can't see this, but I'm 1461 01:02:15.880 --> 01:02:19.679 just rolling around in cash right now. Your overalls are 1462 01:02:19.800 --> 01:02:24.280 just brimming. Yeah, just nowhere else to put it. Yeah. 1463 01:02:24.519 --> 01:02:26.920 Casey Wright says, my dream has finally come true. Flash 1464 01:02:26.960 --> 01:02:30.719 Forward was my first podcast. Rose anyway, onto the question, 1465 01:02:30.760 --> 01:02:34.320 do you think true equality across race, gender, sexuality is 1466 01:02:34.360 --> 01:02:35.280 actually possible? 1467 01:02:35.280 --> 01:02:42.000 To pature I can see, I love you. Possible. Possible? 1468 01:02:42.320 --> 01:02:45.920 Yes, very very difficult, Okay, I mean I don't want 1469 01:02:45.920 --> 01:02:49.440 to say it's impossible. I think that's like two defeatists. 1470 01:02:49.679 --> 01:02:52.320 But I think it's really hard. There will always be 1471 01:02:52.360 --> 01:02:56.519 people who I mean, power corrupts absolutely, right, absolute power 1472 01:02:56.519 --> 01:02:58.519 crops absolutely. Anybody who's at like a top of a 1473 01:02:58.639 --> 01:03:01.840 chain should it is always going to want to maintain that. 1474 01:03:02.000 --> 01:03:04.320 And so I think it's really hard, but I want 1475 01:03:04.360 --> 01:03:07.360 to believe that it's possible, because otherwise I think it's 1476 01:03:07.440 --> 01:03:11.039 hard to push forward. But yeah, I think it's possible, 1477 01:03:11.039 --> 01:03:13.519 but very very hard, and we all literally. 1478 01:03:13.239 --> 01:03:15.039 Every person has to be working towards it all the time, 1479 01:03:15.440 --> 01:03:18.360 every person. Yeah, or put the ones that we don't 1480 01:03:18.440 --> 01:03:20.760 like on an eyelon. Yeah, they can go to Mars now. 1481 01:03:20.840 --> 01:03:24.159 This next great question was also asked by patron Ron 1482 01:03:24.280 --> 01:03:27.519 dagdec great question, Lindsay Beasley. With the high frequency of 1483 01:03:27.639 --> 01:03:30.960 robots replacing the human workforce, what changes do you predict 1484 01:03:31.000 --> 01:03:34.559 for our society? How will the vocational options available to 1485 01:03:34.639 --> 01:03:35.159 us change? 1486 01:03:35.199 --> 01:03:37.840 That's such a good question. I know, yes, Okay, so 1487 01:03:38.079 --> 01:03:40.599 two things I will say. Number one is I'm just 1488 01:03:40.639 --> 01:03:44.199 because this is like a bugbear of mine. Robots are 1489 01:03:44.199 --> 01:03:47.280 not replacing us, managers are replacing us with robots, right, 1490 01:03:47.360 --> 01:03:50.159 It's a specific choice that like people who are making 1491 01:03:50.199 --> 01:03:51.960 money are making it, like the robots are not doing 1492 01:03:51.960 --> 01:03:52.559 this on their own. 1493 01:03:52.880 --> 01:03:53.559 That's a good point. 1494 01:03:53.800 --> 01:03:57.280 Brian Merchant, who works for or what used to work for, Gizmoto, 1495 01:03:57.320 --> 01:03:58.960 has written a bunch of really great pieces about this, 1496 01:03:59.000 --> 01:04:01.440 basically being like stopsying that the robots are taking our jobs. 1497 01:04:01.599 --> 01:04:03.840 It's managers that are doing this. At CEOs. It's like 1498 01:04:03.880 --> 01:04:06.599 specific people were making the decision to hire or to 1499 01:04:07.280 --> 01:04:10.199 fire employees and replace them with these sorts of machines. 1500 01:04:10.559 --> 01:04:12.679 Honestly, we don't even want your jobs. 1501 01:04:13.239 --> 01:04:15.480 And often that's not necessarily because the machines are going 1502 01:04:15.519 --> 01:04:17.559 to save them more money in the long run. It's 1503 01:04:17.599 --> 01:04:21.039 because machines don't unionize, machines don't complain, machines don't need 1504 01:04:21.679 --> 01:04:22.519 labor protections. 1505 01:04:22.519 --> 01:04:24.159 There's no OSHA protection for machines. 1506 01:04:24.320 --> 01:04:27.280 So it is a specific choice that human beings are making. 1507 01:04:27.800 --> 01:04:30.360 That said, it is happening lots and lots of places. 1508 01:04:30.440 --> 01:04:34.679 There are always reports about automation. Depending on who you ask, 1509 01:04:35.119 --> 01:04:38.599 automation is killing jobs and making a lot of people unemployed. 1510 01:04:38.840 --> 01:04:41.159 Some people believe that those people are finding work elsewhere. 1511 01:04:41.360 --> 01:04:44.400 There was recently a study that looked at this and 1512 01:04:44.440 --> 01:04:47.480 found that people who had been sort of like automated 1513 01:04:47.519 --> 01:04:49.800 out of their jobs wound up with I think eleven 1514 01:04:49.880 --> 01:04:53.320 percent lower income where they wherever they moved on to. 1515 01:04:53.519 --> 01:04:57.159 There's an interesting problem with automation, which is that a 1516 01:04:57.199 --> 01:04:59.519 lot of the actual kind of like quote unquote good jobs, 1517 01:04:59.559 --> 01:05:03.159 of mid lay level jobs, things like accounting and even 1518 01:05:03.199 --> 01:05:06.039 like car manufacturing assembly lines, which you know blue collar, 1519 01:05:06.119 --> 01:05:09.599 but like union jobs have good worker protections. Those are 1520 01:05:09.599 --> 01:05:11.679 the things that are pretty easy to automate, and the 1521 01:05:11.760 --> 01:05:13.599 jobs that are hard to automate are often the ones 1522 01:05:13.599 --> 01:05:17.480 that are we consider quote unquote low skill jobs. I 1523 01:05:17.480 --> 01:05:19.199 think there's no such thing as a low skill job. 1524 01:05:19.280 --> 01:05:22.360 Working at McDonald's is very challenging, but things like working 1525 01:05:22.360 --> 01:05:25.199 at McDonald's being a waiter, those sorts of jobs where 1526 01:05:25.199 --> 01:05:26.920 it requires kind of being able to process a lot 1527 01:05:26.960 --> 01:05:28.280 of information at once and kind of like do a 1528 01:05:28.280 --> 01:05:30.039 lot of things that wants. Machines are really bad at that. 1529 01:05:30.079 --> 01:05:33.800 Machines are really bad at picking vegetables. So, like you know, 1530 01:05:33.840 --> 01:05:36.000 in a field, because it's like in a car plant, 1531 01:05:36.039 --> 01:05:38.559 it's all on anensembly line. The environment is completely regulated. 1532 01:05:38.599 --> 01:05:41.000 Everything looks the same, Every windshield is the same size. 1533 01:05:41.360 --> 01:05:43.199 If you're out in the field, every pepper is not 1534 01:05:43.199 --> 01:05:44.800 the same size, every apple is not the same size, 1535 01:05:44.840 --> 01:05:47.280 every tree is slightly different. And so a lot of 1536 01:05:47.480 --> 01:05:49.800 agriculture is really hard to mate. It is hard to automate. 1537 01:05:49.880 --> 01:05:52.199 And that's like a place where there is a labor shortage, 1538 01:05:52.199 --> 01:05:53.920 where people don't want to do those jobs because those 1539 01:05:54.000 --> 01:05:54.760 jobs fucking suck. 1540 01:05:54.960 --> 01:05:55.159 You know. 1541 01:05:55.280 --> 01:05:58.400 There's a name for this, It's called Pollenni's paradox, which 1542 01:05:58.400 --> 01:06:01.519 is basically that like, the jobs that people kind of 1543 01:06:01.559 --> 01:06:03.679 want are the ones that are getting automated, and the 1544 01:06:03.760 --> 01:06:06.000 jobs that people don't want are the ones that can't 1545 01:06:06.000 --> 01:06:06.440 be automated. 1546 01:06:06.599 --> 01:06:07.199 It's really hard. 1547 01:06:07.239 --> 01:06:09.800 And if you're like, who is Polyanni and why does 1548 01:06:09.840 --> 01:06:13.559 he have a paradox? Okay, quick cliffs notes. So Carl 1549 01:06:13.679 --> 01:06:17.840 Polyianni was a Hungarian born and British based chemist and 1550 01:06:17.880 --> 01:06:21.920 a philosopher and a professor who essentially posited that we 1551 01:06:22.039 --> 01:06:25.440 know way more than we can explain, so we can 1552 01:06:25.480 --> 01:06:30.039 perform some duties so intuitively that they're just hard to describe, 1553 01:06:30.159 --> 01:06:34.199 let alone map out for artificial intelligence to then replicate. 1554 01:06:34.480 --> 01:06:39.079 So things like advanced facial recognition, or driving a car 1555 01:06:39.239 --> 01:06:42.800 on windy roads or picking out the most magical pumpkin 1556 01:06:43.079 --> 01:06:46.199 on the farm. See the q Crepatology episode about pumpkins 1557 01:06:46.199 --> 01:06:48.639 to know what the hell I'm talking about now. Pollyanni 1558 01:06:48.760 --> 01:06:52.320 explained this whole theory in his book The Tacit Dimension, 1559 01:06:52.519 --> 01:06:55.800 which came out in nineteen sixty six, but did a 1560 01:06:55.800 --> 01:06:58.400 little look in and perhaps some credit should go to 1561 01:06:58.440 --> 01:07:01.800 the US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stuart, because just two 1562 01:07:01.920 --> 01:07:05.159 years prior, in a famous case about the First Amendment 1563 01:07:05.480 --> 01:07:08.280 and obscenity in an art house film, just to Stuart 1564 01:07:08.400 --> 01:07:12.599 legendarily addressed hardcore pornography by saying, I shall not today 1565 01:07:12.639 --> 01:07:16.679 attempt further to define the kind of material I understand 1566 01:07:16.679 --> 01:07:19.599 to be embraced within that shorthand description. And perhaps I 1567 01:07:19.599 --> 01:07:23.000 could never succeed in intelligibly doing so, but I know 1568 01:07:23.079 --> 01:07:25.239 it when I see it. We know more than we 1569 01:07:25.280 --> 01:07:27.400 can tell. Sometimes robots just don't get it. 1570 01:07:28.000 --> 01:07:30.480 Yeah, so neither of those things. The answer is a question. 1571 01:07:31.159 --> 01:07:33.000 But I think the answer is that we're going to 1572 01:07:33.039 --> 01:07:36.679 see a lot of those sorts of jobs that are 1573 01:07:36.679 --> 01:07:39.480 really hard for robots to do. So that's like food service, 1574 01:07:39.599 --> 01:07:41.840 customer service, anything where you're kind of like really having 1575 01:07:41.880 --> 01:07:42.920 to think. 1576 01:07:42.760 --> 01:07:45.760 Across a range of disciplines. Those will see more of. 1577 01:07:45.920 --> 01:07:48.119 I mean, this is why like unions are really important, 1578 01:07:48.119 --> 01:07:50.760 because like is it does help buffer against some of this, 1579 01:07:50.840 --> 01:07:52.400 some of the automation. I think we'll see a lot 1580 01:07:52.480 --> 01:07:55.800 of creative jobs. I mean, like robots can be creative 1581 01:07:55.840 --> 01:07:57.079 in their own way, but they're not going to be 1582 01:07:57.119 --> 01:07:59.119 able to do a lot of the stuff that we 1583 01:07:59.719 --> 01:08:02.920 currently think of as sort of like uniquely human creative work. 1584 01:08:03.079 --> 01:08:04.719 But the thing this is why, like social safety nets 1585 01:08:04.719 --> 01:08:06.599 are so important, because like there will be a period 1586 01:08:06.639 --> 01:08:08.199 of time where a lot of people are kind of like, 1587 01:08:08.239 --> 01:08:11.920 I don't know what to do because again, like managers 1588 01:08:11.920 --> 01:08:14.599 and CEOs have made a decision to automate a process. 1589 01:08:14.760 --> 01:08:17.720 The future, the future of work Unfortunately right now looks 1590 01:08:17.760 --> 01:08:19.199 like a lot of freelancing, which I think is not 1591 01:08:19.279 --> 01:08:21.560 good for stability and for a lot of people. Yeah, 1592 01:08:21.560 --> 01:08:22.800 it'll be a lot of sort of like what are 1593 01:08:22.800 --> 01:08:24.520 the things that robots are really bad at? Things where 1594 01:08:24.520 --> 01:08:27.680 we have to kind of like generalize information across domains, 1595 01:08:27.720 --> 01:08:30.239 Like those are the jobs that are going to take 1596 01:08:30.319 --> 01:08:31.439 longer to automate. 1597 01:08:31.840 --> 01:08:35.399 What's your take when you see really advanced robots that 1598 01:08:35.439 --> 01:08:38.720 are like running and jumping that are so black mirror like, 1599 01:08:39.000 --> 01:08:40.720 how because I know that all of us are, like 1600 01:08:40.920 --> 01:08:42.880 I have a fear deep in the core of my 1601 01:08:43.000 --> 01:08:44.640 being that turned like icy. 1602 01:08:44.880 --> 01:08:46.920 How the heck? 1603 01:08:47.039 --> 01:08:50.159 Yeah, war robots are very scary and that's what those are, right. 1604 01:08:50.199 --> 01:08:53.039 Boston Dynamics, like they are creating robots for DARPA. 1605 01:08:53.119 --> 01:08:56.159 Basically, Okay, heads up if you're like DARPA, that's also 1606 01:08:56.199 --> 01:08:58.560 a great hamster name, cool your jets. It stands for 1607 01:08:58.600 --> 01:09:01.840 the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and it's part of 1608 01:09:01.880 --> 01:09:04.960 the Department of Defense. It makes new war toys like 1609 01:09:05.079 --> 01:09:09.880 insect spies and submarine drones and computer brain implants and 1610 01:09:10.000 --> 01:09:13.760 robots that could probably tear our limbs off like rose petals. 1611 01:09:13.880 --> 01:09:16.119 And the one thing I will say, and this doesn't 1612 01:09:16.119 --> 01:09:18.560 necessarily make me feel better or worse, but the video 1613 01:09:18.640 --> 01:09:19.600 you see, you don't see. 1614 01:09:19.479 --> 01:09:20.359 All the failures. 1615 01:09:20.439 --> 01:09:21.760 You don't see all the times that the robot just 1616 01:09:21.760 --> 01:09:23.960 fell on its face, which is like ninety nine percent 1617 01:09:23.960 --> 01:09:24.359 of the time. 1618 01:09:26.680 --> 01:09:28.439 It's really hard to get robots to run and jump. 1619 01:09:28.560 --> 01:09:31.800 That said, like, yeah, it's terrifying, right, like, especially given 1620 01:09:31.840 --> 01:09:34.640 what we know about the ways that the military industrial 1621 01:09:34.680 --> 01:09:37.039 complex treats certain kinds of people. And like, imagine Ice 1622 01:09:37.079 --> 01:09:39.479 having that robot, right, Like, that's scary to me, don't. 1623 01:09:39.600 --> 01:09:40.159 I don't like that? 1624 01:09:40.239 --> 01:09:42.399 And I think, you know, there's a lot of conversations 1625 01:09:42.479 --> 01:09:46.319 right now among technologists about like what are the ethical 1626 01:09:46.399 --> 01:09:49.119 questions that people who work at places like Amazon or 1627 01:09:49.359 --> 01:09:52.600 you know, whatever it is, like what should they be 1628 01:09:52.720 --> 01:09:55.000 thinking about? Like the bunch of workers at gethub recently 1629 01:09:55.079 --> 01:09:57.199 quit because they were working gethub was working with ice, 1630 01:09:57.319 --> 01:09:59.479 Like where do you draw the line? And a lot 1631 01:09:59.520 --> 01:10:02.199 of people go into technology, and especially go into like 1632 01:10:02.479 --> 01:10:06.159 robotics and engineering, like they don't have any kind of 1633 01:10:06.159 --> 01:10:08.840 training and ethics and sort of like thinking through these questions. 1634 01:10:08.880 --> 01:10:10.560 You know, they when I ask them. You know, I 1635 01:10:10.560 --> 01:10:11.920 did an episode about. 1636 01:10:13.159 --> 01:10:16.239 Deep fakes a couple of years ago, and my question 1637 01:10:16.359 --> 01:10:19.079 was like, okay, like what about you know, people who 1638 01:10:19.159 --> 01:10:23.039 create these videos of their exes and it's like sort 1639 01:10:23.039 --> 01:10:25.960 of a revenge porn situation. And I asked the engineer. 1640 01:10:25.960 --> 01:10:27.079 I was like, do you ever think about that? And 1641 01:10:27.119 --> 01:10:29.319 it had not occurred to me, So like this is 1642 01:10:29.359 --> 01:10:31.680 just like I think there's a wall sometimes between people 1643 01:10:31.680 --> 01:10:33.840 who are technical and people who like think about like, oh, 1644 01:10:33.840 --> 01:10:36.039 how do I make this robot's legs work really well? 1645 01:10:36.279 --> 01:10:38.800 And then this bigger like okay, but like should I 1646 01:10:38.840 --> 01:10:40.920 write this? I just didn't stop to ask if they should. 1647 01:10:40.960 --> 01:10:44.760 They should yeah, you know, in the words of cold Bloom. 1648 01:10:45.239 --> 01:10:47.239 So right, Like, I think there is that question, and 1649 01:10:47.279 --> 01:10:50.880 I think more and more it's becoming common for technologists 1650 01:10:50.920 --> 01:10:52.640 to start thinking about that. But many of them don't 1651 01:10:52.640 --> 01:10:54.199 have the training, they don't have the background, they don't 1652 01:10:54.239 --> 01:10:56.079 have like the sort of like framework to even ask 1653 01:10:56.199 --> 01:10:58.319 like okay, but like why are we doing this and 1654 01:10:58.319 --> 01:10:59.920 should we be doing it? And like what is the 1655 01:11:00.039 --> 01:11:02.039 and a fit here and you know who wins and 1656 01:11:02.079 --> 01:11:02.640 who loses. 1657 01:11:02.720 --> 01:11:05.439 So we can look forward to a future that might 1658 01:11:05.479 --> 01:11:08.119 have war robots. Oh, we already have war robots. 1659 01:11:08.199 --> 01:11:09.960 We do have them. Yeah, well I guess we have 1660 01:11:10.079 --> 01:11:11.600 drones right, So right. 1661 01:11:11.439 --> 01:11:15.880 Okay, here's a really big important question. Sarah Ayannucci wants 1662 01:11:15.920 --> 01:11:19.159 to know. Will Brad asked me out for the spring flaning? Uh? 1663 01:11:19.600 --> 01:11:21.920 I mean if you want him to, I hope. So 1664 01:11:22.279 --> 01:11:26.479 if not, fuck Brad, okay, or don't fuck Brad or 1665 01:11:26.520 --> 01:11:28.520 don't if you do, please use protection. 1666 01:11:30.119 --> 01:11:31.960 Always thinking about the future. You know what I just 1667 01:11:32.039 --> 01:11:33.840 let you know. Family planning very important? 1668 01:11:34.159 --> 01:11:37.520 Okay, speaking of kids and populations, these patrons and a 1669 01:11:37.600 --> 01:11:41.680 Valerie Jamie Pickles, Vanessa Frey, and Tara McNee asked about 1670 01:11:41.800 --> 01:11:43.439 family sizes in the future. 1671 01:11:43.600 --> 01:11:44.920 Family planning very important. 1672 01:11:44.920 --> 01:11:47.039 Do you think anything's going to change family planning wise 1673 01:11:47.039 --> 01:11:47.600 in the future. 1674 01:11:48.279 --> 01:11:49.119 Yes? Absolutely. 1675 01:11:49.159 --> 01:11:51.520 I mean, like this is a male birth control has 1676 01:11:51.560 --> 01:11:53.359 been like on the horizon for a really long time. 1677 01:11:53.640 --> 01:11:55.640 Whether it will ever actually happen, I think is like 1678 01:11:55.680 --> 01:11:57.800 open to debate. It sort of feels like nuclear fusion 1679 01:11:57.840 --> 01:12:00.000 in that like theoretically possible, will it happen? 1680 01:12:00.239 --> 01:12:00.600 Don't know? 1681 01:12:01.359 --> 01:12:04.520 I mean, there are people who believe that birth control 1682 01:12:04.560 --> 01:12:06.960 is actually the most impactful technology that has ever kind 1683 01:12:06.960 --> 01:12:10.840 of come up post industrial revolution. Some people argue that 1684 01:12:10.840 --> 01:12:13.359 that's refrigeration, so sort of like those are the two camps. 1685 01:12:14.439 --> 01:12:16.680 It's like birth control or fridges. You know, I'm both 1686 01:12:16.680 --> 01:12:19.920 actually were like incredibly important. But birth control is huge 1687 01:12:20.000 --> 01:12:22.680 in the way that has changed how we think about 1688 01:12:22.760 --> 01:12:25.439 the future and how our social structures and like, you know, 1689 01:12:25.439 --> 01:12:27.720 people who can have babies are now like free to 1690 01:12:27.920 --> 01:12:29.840 not have babies if they don't want to, which is like. 1691 01:12:29.920 --> 01:12:31.319 A giant shift. 1692 01:12:31.439 --> 01:12:35.279 I often say that that the IUD is the original, 1693 01:12:35.319 --> 01:12:38.239 sort of like body hacking. I write about how I 1694 01:12:38.279 --> 01:12:41.079 have an IUD and an RFID chip in my hand. 1695 01:12:41.359 --> 01:12:47.319 Wait, what Rose futurologist has a radio frequency identification chip 1696 01:12:47.479 --> 01:12:49.840 in her body? Before we all lose our shit, it's 1697 01:12:49.840 --> 01:12:51.600 pretty much the same thing my dog g Remy has, 1698 01:12:51.800 --> 01:12:55.920 But unlike Gmy, Rose also has an IUD or an 1699 01:12:55.920 --> 01:12:59.800 intra uterine device, which, although it's fully analogue, she says, 1700 01:12:59.840 --> 01:13:01.760 is way more powerful technology. 1701 01:13:01.960 --> 01:13:04.000 I talk about how like anybody who has an ID 1702 01:13:04.119 --> 01:13:06.520 is basically a cyborg and you should like own it. Yeah. 1703 01:13:06.520 --> 01:13:08.119 The RFID chip is just like a party trick in 1704 01:13:08.159 --> 01:13:09.720 the ID. Actually, like it makes my life better. 1705 01:13:10.199 --> 01:13:14.159 So you have an IUD and you have an RFID chip, 1706 01:13:14.319 --> 01:13:16.000 correct implanted? 1707 01:13:16.479 --> 01:13:18.520 Okay, I'd like to know. 1708 01:13:18.479 --> 01:13:21.159 More, yes, Okay, So if you have a dogg or 1709 01:13:21.159 --> 01:13:23.199 a cat that is micro chipped, it's basically the same 1710 01:13:23.199 --> 01:13:26.439 exact technology. It's like a small glass bead that is 1711 01:13:26.479 --> 01:13:27.920 in my hand. If you would like to feel it, 1712 01:13:27.960 --> 01:13:29.560 you can't. I would like to feel it, Okay, So 1713 01:13:29.600 --> 01:13:32.039 if you touch, like right there, how big is the 1714 01:13:32.039 --> 01:13:32.800 band right here? 1715 01:13:33.119 --> 01:13:36.000 It's right there, bug. 1716 01:13:36.079 --> 01:13:37.880 Yeah, it's like a little mug. It's like smaller than 1717 01:13:37.920 --> 01:13:39.319 a pill. It's kind of the size of a tic 1718 01:13:39.439 --> 01:13:41.600 tac yeah, or a grain of rice maybe, yeah, like 1719 01:13:41.640 --> 01:13:42.199 a grain of rice. 1720 01:13:42.279 --> 01:13:42.520 Yeah. 1721 01:13:42.680 --> 01:13:45.000 And inside of it is an RFID chip which cannot 1722 01:13:45.000 --> 01:13:47.239 communicate with satellites. There's no power source in here. It 1723 01:13:47.239 --> 01:13:49.359 can only contain a very small amount of information. So 1724 01:13:49.520 --> 01:13:51.880 if you like have ever used a fob to get 1725 01:13:51.880 --> 01:13:54.319 into a door or like an Apple pay. It's like that, 1726 01:13:54.359 --> 01:13:56.159 so you would swipe it your touch it to something 1727 01:13:56.159 --> 01:13:58.239 so I can either to unlock my car door orunlock 1728 01:13:58.239 --> 01:13:58.920 my house door. 1729 01:13:59.079 --> 01:13:59.960 It's really kind of a part. 1730 01:14:00.319 --> 01:14:02.119 At one point, I had it set to be a 1731 01:14:02.199 --> 01:14:04.039 geocaching site, so if you found it, you could get 1732 01:14:04.039 --> 01:14:05.479 a little gift that would pop up when you would 1733 01:14:05.479 --> 01:14:08.439 scan it and like dance. Yeah, that's that's my little 1734 01:14:08.520 --> 01:14:10.479 well hand thing. When I wrote about it. I got 1735 01:14:10.479 --> 01:14:12.239 this years ago. When I wrote about it, I got 1736 01:14:12.279 --> 01:14:13.880 a lot of emails from people who believe that I 1737 01:14:13.880 --> 01:14:15.399 am now like cursed by the devil. 1738 01:14:16.119 --> 01:14:18.720 So there's that which might be true. Who knows? 1739 01:14:19.159 --> 01:14:21.079 Do you have to have like a some sort of 1740 01:14:21.119 --> 01:14:23.479 receiving site to open your car door? 1741 01:14:23.520 --> 01:14:24.199 Like what I know that? 1742 01:14:24.319 --> 01:14:26.399 Yeah, so it's like anything like you would have an office. 1743 01:14:26.479 --> 01:14:28.319 If you have like a little black box on your 1744 01:14:28.319 --> 01:14:30.359 office to like touch your card to, you have to 1745 01:14:30.399 --> 01:14:32.439 install that on your car or on your house. But yeah, 1746 01:14:32.439 --> 01:14:33.880 it's like, I mean, these are easy to buy. You 1747 01:14:33.880 --> 01:14:35.119 can buy them meant best buy. 1748 01:14:35.239 --> 01:14:37.920 So you can buy the receiver at like best Buy 1749 01:14:38.359 --> 01:14:41.439 or online. A whole door handle with a chip reader 1750 01:14:41.479 --> 01:14:43.680 will set you back around one hundred bucks, or a 1751 01:14:43.680 --> 01:14:47.319 simple reader is three dollars on Wish. But the chip itself, 1752 01:14:47.520 --> 01:14:51.039 the part that lives all snugly in your flesh, is 1753 01:14:51.079 --> 01:14:54.000 not an electronics store like sold in a kit with 1754 01:14:54.000 --> 01:14:54.640 a syringe. 1755 01:14:54.760 --> 01:14:57.479 You cannot buy an RFID chip to implant into yourself 1756 01:14:57.520 --> 01:14:58.119 at best Buy. 1757 01:14:58.159 --> 01:15:00.079 You can buy it at a website called Dangerous Thing. 1758 01:15:00.600 --> 01:15:02.920 If you would like to do that, obviously, like you 1759 01:15:02.960 --> 01:15:04.600 should probably if you want to do it, you can 1760 01:15:04.640 --> 01:15:06.800 purchase it there. I would suggest taking it to a 1761 01:15:06.840 --> 01:15:08.880 piercer who actually knows what they're doing and don't try 1762 01:15:08.880 --> 01:15:09.399 to do it yourself. 1763 01:15:10.159 --> 01:15:11.720 But yeah, I mean you can. You can buy them. 1764 01:15:12.079 --> 01:15:13.960 So all of the talk about like oh one day 1765 01:15:14.000 --> 01:15:17.000 we're just kind of microchips in o're like you're living 1766 01:15:17.079 --> 01:15:17.680 that dream. 1767 01:15:17.880 --> 01:15:19.439 Yeah, people like me have them. And there is a 1768 01:15:19.479 --> 01:15:21.479 company that sort of as almost a stunt, did this 1769 01:15:21.560 --> 01:15:23.840 and they offered it to all their employees as actually 1770 01:15:23.880 --> 01:15:25.640 a way to get in and out of the building. 1771 01:15:26.039 --> 01:15:28.600 I would say, like, don't do that, okay, in part 1772 01:15:28.600 --> 01:15:32.199 because like your employer should never have access to something 1773 01:15:32.399 --> 01:15:34.439 that is like physically inside of your body. 1774 01:15:34.479 --> 01:15:37.600 In my opinion. But yeah, that's that's how I feel 1775 01:15:37.600 --> 01:15:40.680 about Does that freak people out? Do you think more 1776 01:15:40.720 --> 01:15:42.720 than it should? The RFID chip? 1777 01:15:42.800 --> 01:15:44.560 Yeah, I think as soon as people understand what it 1778 01:15:44.600 --> 01:15:47.039 actually is, they're less freaked out. Some people are. The 1779 01:15:47.079 --> 01:15:48.680 first question I always get is like, so are you 1780 01:15:48.680 --> 01:15:50.520 being tracked right now? And it's no, Like it can't 1781 01:15:50.520 --> 01:15:52.920 communicate with satellites, It is not powerful enough to do that. 1782 01:15:53.119 --> 01:15:55.159 It's really truly just like a silly thing that I have. 1783 01:15:55.279 --> 01:15:56.840 And once they kind of understand what it can and 1784 01:15:56.880 --> 01:15:58.520 can't do, they're like, oh, okay, that's cool. It is 1785 01:15:58.560 --> 01:16:00.760 interesting when I am in body hacking spaces like this 1786 01:16:00.880 --> 01:16:03.000 is totally normal. But when I try to talk about 1787 01:16:03.039 --> 01:16:06.039 my IUD as a body hacking these there are definitely 1788 01:16:06.079 --> 01:16:07.079 dudes who are like munths. 1789 01:16:07.199 --> 01:16:08.359 That makes me uncomfortable. 1790 01:16:09.319 --> 01:16:15.319 Where Why do you think that, like contraception isn't regarded 1791 01:16:15.399 --> 01:16:18.479 the same way that like I have way more concentration 1792 01:16:18.560 --> 01:16:20.319 when I put coconut oil in my coffee. 1793 01:16:20.520 --> 01:16:23.479 Yeah, I mean, I think it's because it's largely the 1794 01:16:23.520 --> 01:16:25.880 domain of women. I mean, in the same way that 1795 01:16:25.960 --> 01:16:29.119 like soilent is just slim fast marketed to men. Right, 1796 01:16:29.239 --> 01:16:32.640 Like this is like there when you repackage something as 1797 01:16:32.640 --> 01:16:35.199 like a disruptive technology that like is cool and that 1798 01:16:35.319 --> 01:16:37.319 men do, then as soon as you start to try 1799 01:16:37.359 --> 01:16:39.520 to say like actually, like all this other stuff then 1800 01:16:39.560 --> 01:16:41.760 also counts like that like it makes it less cool 1801 01:16:42.119 --> 01:16:42.600 to men. 1802 01:16:43.239 --> 01:16:48.279 Please see diet Coke versus Coke zero or Pepsi Max, 1803 01:16:48.560 --> 01:16:52.119 which actually used images of a Playboy bunny in its 1804 01:16:52.159 --> 01:16:54.800 ad campaigns like why not just shape the bottle like 1805 01:16:54.840 --> 01:16:55.159 a dong? 1806 01:16:55.359 --> 01:16:57.640 So I think that's mostly part of it. There are 1807 01:16:57.680 --> 01:16:59.560 people in the body hacking space that are totally on board. 1808 01:16:59.560 --> 01:17:01.560 Was talking about i uds as like body hacking. I 1809 01:17:01.560 --> 01:17:03.159 think that it's not all of them, but they're definitely. 1810 01:17:03.199 --> 01:17:04.439 I have had moments. I mean I go to these 1811 01:17:04.439 --> 01:17:06.640 like body hacking conferences, and I've had moments where men 1812 01:17:06.680 --> 01:17:08.720 have been like, oh that's gross. 1813 01:17:09.119 --> 01:17:12.399 You know it's a period. Oh I guess like you 1814 01:17:12.439 --> 01:17:17.479 came out of one of those. I mean, what could 1815 01:17:17.560 --> 01:17:20.000 be more disruptive literally than that? 1816 01:17:20.159 --> 01:17:23.640 I truly literally the NID where like people who bare 1817 01:17:23.720 --> 01:17:27.119 children no longer have to have just unlimited children until 1818 01:17:27.119 --> 01:17:27.920 they die. 1819 01:17:27.600 --> 01:17:30.000 Like whoa, that's like changes a lot, you know. 1820 01:17:30.399 --> 01:17:34.680 Yeah, yeah, yeah, my grandma had eleven man thirty. It's 1821 01:17:34.720 --> 01:17:37.039 like that's a lot. 1822 01:17:37.159 --> 01:17:37.600 That's a lot. 1823 01:17:37.680 --> 01:17:41.199 Oh no, okay, the worst thing about being a futurologist 1824 01:17:41.359 --> 01:17:45.119 what sucks the most? Is it people trying to force 1825 01:17:45.159 --> 01:17:48.199 gadgets on you? Is it depression? 1826 01:17:50.359 --> 01:17:53.159 I would say the worst thing about being a futurologist 1827 01:17:53.399 --> 01:17:55.600 is men on the internet telling me that I'm being 1828 01:17:55.640 --> 01:17:56.520 too pessimistic. 1829 01:17:56.800 --> 01:18:00.399 Oh smiles sweetie, exactly, or like, oh, I just don't 1830 01:18:00.439 --> 01:18:02.159 understand the benefits that this is going to happen. 1831 01:18:02.199 --> 01:18:05.439 I'm like, I do actually, and I don't actually think 1832 01:18:05.479 --> 01:18:08.039 of myself as particularly pessimistic. I think of myself as 1833 01:18:08.079 --> 01:18:10.560 kind of like a skeptical optimist. I actually do think that, 1834 01:18:10.600 --> 01:18:12.199 like there are lots of people who are doing really 1835 01:18:12.239 --> 01:18:15.359 amazing things and that are making the future better as 1836 01:18:15.359 --> 01:18:15.640 we go. 1837 01:18:15.760 --> 01:18:16.720 I think there's a lot to do. 1838 01:18:16.800 --> 01:18:18.960 I'm not like naive about like how much fucked up 1839 01:18:19.000 --> 01:18:22.079 stuff there's out there, like children are engages, like you know, 1840 01:18:22.079 --> 01:18:24.319 we like there's a lot of work to do. But 1841 01:18:24.479 --> 01:18:27.600 I think that sometimes I get people who are like, oh, 1842 01:18:27.640 --> 01:18:30.640 you're being overly dramatic, or like, oh, you're overstating you 1843 01:18:30.640 --> 01:18:31.680 know how important. 1844 01:18:31.359 --> 01:18:33.479 This is, or like oh, why should I care or 1845 01:18:33.520 --> 01:18:34.119 whatever it is. 1846 01:18:34.199 --> 01:18:36.560 I mean, you know, I have a lot of conversations 1847 01:18:36.560 --> 01:18:39.119 with people about Alexa and Google and like the always 1848 01:18:39.119 --> 01:18:42.319 on operating systems and people being like, well, you know. 1849 01:18:43.399 --> 01:18:45.239 It's it's so convenient. Why should I care? You're just 1850 01:18:45.239 --> 01:18:45.880 being a downer? 1851 01:18:45.920 --> 01:18:47.439 Like why are you being such a downer about this 1852 01:18:47.479 --> 01:18:49.520 like amazing technology? And you know, I have my ol 1853 01:18:49.560 --> 01:18:52.720 shpiel that I give about like, well, if you allow 1854 01:18:52.760 --> 01:18:55.039 these always on listening devices into your house, there you're 1855 01:18:55.079 --> 01:18:58.520 setting a court precedent to be like no longer have privacy, 1856 01:18:58.600 --> 01:19:00.600 and like that is an important thing, and that's something 1857 01:19:00.640 --> 01:19:02.079 I care a lot about. And I think that's like 1858 01:19:02.119 --> 01:19:04.600 a thing that scares me is like this this willingness 1859 01:19:04.640 --> 01:19:08.600 to kind of just seed control to these companies that 1860 01:19:08.640 --> 01:19:10.000 do not have our best interests in mind. 1861 01:19:10.720 --> 01:19:14.000 Do you think that what was once paranoia is now 1862 01:19:14.039 --> 01:19:15.520 just becoming fact? 1863 01:19:16.399 --> 01:19:17.840 Well, I think this is the challenge, right, Like I 1864 01:19:18.159 --> 01:19:20.880 joke that I am a tidfoil hat person, right, I'm 1865 01:19:20.920 --> 01:19:23.600 always you know, I'm also very very careful about like 1866 01:19:23.680 --> 01:19:25.239 my home address and my phone number. 1867 01:19:25.279 --> 01:19:26.399 I was docs during. 1868 01:19:26.279 --> 01:19:27.960 Gamer Gate and like they came to my house and 1869 01:19:27.960 --> 01:19:31.000 we're like we're gonna kill you. So like I am 1870 01:19:31.159 --> 01:19:33.800 very careful about those things. So I am definitely the 1871 01:19:33.840 --> 01:19:36.760 person who's like constantly get your two factor authentication, use 1872 01:19:37.079 --> 01:19:39.880 encrypted services, like don't put your home address places, don't 1873 01:19:39.880 --> 01:19:42.560 post where you are, and like my threat model is different, 1874 01:19:42.600 --> 01:19:45.600 right than other people's. But I do think that it's 1875 01:19:45.640 --> 01:19:47.520 hard because like, yes, there are certain things to worry about. 1876 01:19:47.560 --> 01:19:50.840 But then because we're so we sort of we know 1877 01:19:51.000 --> 01:19:53.800 these companies are so powerful, we kind of almost over 1878 01:19:53.840 --> 01:19:56.600 index on what they think they can do. So like 1879 01:19:56.880 --> 01:19:58.640 this idea that like, oh, our phones are always listening. 1880 01:19:58.680 --> 01:20:00.560 I think most people I talk to you believe that 1881 01:20:00.600 --> 01:20:02.159 their phone is listening to them all the time, and 1882 01:20:02.239 --> 01:20:04.520 like that's actually probably not true, right, So it's like 1883 01:20:04.720 --> 01:20:07.039 it's hard to sometimes know because like, yes, the Alexa 1884 01:20:07.119 --> 01:20:08.880 is listening to you, but your phone isn't. And like 1885 01:20:09.079 --> 01:20:12.039 so you should be worried and kind of like you know, 1886 01:20:12.239 --> 01:20:14.319 not paranoid, but you shouldn't be worried. But it's hard 1887 01:20:14.319 --> 01:20:16.720 sometimes to know what to actually worry about, yeah, because 1888 01:20:16.720 --> 01:20:18.600 it's like which one of these things is spying on me? 1889 01:20:18.800 --> 01:20:22.000 You know, all that stuff, So many things to be 1890 01:20:22.079 --> 01:20:24.760 paranoid and cautious about but yeah, but it's also like 1891 01:20:24.800 --> 01:20:26.920 I understand people being exhausted by it, where you're just 1892 01:20:26.960 --> 01:20:28.720 like I know, I know I shouldn't do this and 1893 01:20:28.720 --> 01:20:31.279 I shouldn't do that. You know, Like I totally get that, 1894 01:20:31.319 --> 01:20:33.279 and you just have to like make whatever reasonable decision 1895 01:20:33.279 --> 01:20:35.880 for yourself that makes sense, right, we I do see 1896 01:20:35.920 --> 01:20:38.199 more and more people just giving up totally and I 1897 01:20:38.239 --> 01:20:39.640 get it, Like I get it, Like I mean, I 1898 01:20:39.680 --> 01:20:41.720 have a PO box because I don't ever use my 1899 01:20:41.720 --> 01:20:43.520 home address, and that costs money to have a peobox 1900 01:20:43.640 --> 01:20:45.159 R Like it is, like it is a lot of 1901 01:20:45.199 --> 01:20:46.479 time and a lot of money and a lot of 1902 01:20:46.479 --> 01:20:48.159 effort to make sure that you like have X, Y 1903 01:20:48.199 --> 01:20:50.520 and Z. And I want to say, I don't think 1904 01:20:50.520 --> 01:20:52.880 it should be the user's responsibility. I think it should 1905 01:20:52.880 --> 01:20:55.640 be on these companies to not constantly take as much 1906 01:20:55.720 --> 01:20:58.239 land grab like as much as they can and not 1907 01:20:58.359 --> 01:20:59.960 of like, oh, well you didn't read the privacy Paula. 1908 01:21:00.000 --> 01:21:02.560 See It's like who can read every privacy policy. They're 1909 01:21:02.560 --> 01:21:04.239 also written in a way that there's no way a 1910 01:21:04.279 --> 01:21:06.399 regular person would understand them, so like it's not on 1911 01:21:06.439 --> 01:21:08.159 you and me to fix this. So like the companies 1912 01:21:08.199 --> 01:21:10.000 need to be held accountable for like all the shady 1913 01:21:10.039 --> 01:21:10.640 shit they're doing. 1914 01:21:10.680 --> 01:21:13.159 Oh what about your favorite thing? About favorite thing? I 1915 01:21:13.199 --> 01:21:15.760 get to talk to such cool people all the time? 1916 01:21:15.920 --> 01:21:17.840 Yeah, I mean, like being a journalist, do you have 1917 01:21:17.880 --> 01:21:20.840 the excuse of literally calling anybody? Yeah too, and most 1918 01:21:20.840 --> 01:21:22.199 of the time they talk to you, which is like 1919 01:21:22.279 --> 01:21:24.439 wild right, and you're like, you don't have to do this, 1920 01:21:24.560 --> 01:21:27.079 but like it's so fun. I get to talk to 1921 01:21:27.159 --> 01:21:29.359 like just also, And I think this is why I don't. 1922 01:21:29.920 --> 01:21:32.520 I often feel like I am maybe more optimistic about 1923 01:21:32.520 --> 01:21:34.239 the future than a lot of people, is that I 1924 01:21:34.399 --> 01:21:36.319 get to talk to people every day who are doing 1925 01:21:36.399 --> 01:21:38.359 stuff that is going to make the future better, that 1926 01:21:38.439 --> 01:21:40.319 are like commit it and working really hard at making 1927 01:21:40.319 --> 01:21:40.960 the future better. 1928 01:21:41.000 --> 01:21:42.279 And that's like a balm. 1929 01:21:42.479 --> 01:21:43.800 It's not that I don't wake up some days and 1930 01:21:43.840 --> 01:21:46.159 I'm just like, oh my god, like I can't you know, 1931 01:21:46.279 --> 01:21:48.600 like I definitely have those days where you're just like ugh, 1932 01:21:49.199 --> 01:21:51.920 it just feels totally hopeless and like there's nothing we 1933 01:21:51.960 --> 01:21:54.119 can do. But then I get to go call people 1934 01:21:54.439 --> 01:21:56.439 and listen to people and talk to people who are 1935 01:21:56.600 --> 01:21:58.720 like in their small communities and their small ways, like 1936 01:21:58.760 --> 01:22:01.279 making a change. So I often like to point to 1937 01:22:01.319 --> 01:22:04.600 this woman, Aisha Nandoro, who is working on a universal 1938 01:22:04.640 --> 01:22:07.720 basic income program specifically with black mothers in the South. 1939 01:22:08.119 --> 01:22:09.920 And it's a small program, but like they're giving money 1940 01:22:09.960 --> 01:22:12.039 away and they're like helping people in this very specific 1941 01:22:12.079 --> 01:22:15.880 way and this very specific context, and like they're working 1942 01:22:15.880 --> 01:22:19.199 really hard and it's having these impacts and it's not 1943 01:22:19.239 --> 01:22:22.039 going to solve like the nation's problem, but it is 1944 01:22:22.079 --> 01:22:24.159 like a small thing that is making a difference locally. 1945 01:22:24.520 --> 01:22:27.319 So this program is called the Magnolia Mother's Trust through 1946 01:22:27.359 --> 01:22:30.279 the Springboard to Opportunities program, and there's more info on 1947 01:22:30.319 --> 01:22:34.000 that at Springboard two dot org. And an additional donation 1948 01:22:34.239 --> 01:22:36.159 went their way as well with this episode. So it's 1949 01:22:36.199 --> 01:22:39.279 a future ology too, fer because damn it, let's turn 1950 01:22:39.319 --> 01:22:41.439 this boat around make the world a little better if 1951 01:22:41.439 --> 01:22:41.760 we can. 1952 01:22:42.039 --> 01:22:44.159 I think that's like why I can sometimes be a 1953 01:22:44.199 --> 01:22:47.760 little bit more not optimistic, but like hopeful about the 1954 01:22:47.800 --> 01:22:49.720 future because I get to talk to all those people 1955 01:22:49.760 --> 01:22:52.279 every day and it's such a joy, and I'm like 1956 01:22:52.319 --> 01:22:54.560 so thankful that they give me their time and like 1957 01:22:54.920 --> 01:22:56.920 or make time to like have me talk to them. 1958 01:22:56.920 --> 01:22:58.279 But it's so fun to talk to people who are 1959 01:22:58.319 --> 01:23:00.560 smart and interesting and like working really hard on something 1960 01:23:00.600 --> 01:23:01.479 and really care about it. 1961 01:23:01.960 --> 01:23:03.840 Yeah, if you if you're not a journalist or don't 1962 01:23:03.880 --> 01:23:05.439 have a podcast, it's hard just to call someone and 1963 01:23:05.479 --> 01:23:07.439 be like, Hi, I think you're cool to talk to me. 1964 01:23:08.039 --> 01:23:09.079 Yeah, I mean. 1965 01:23:09.000 --> 01:23:10.720 I will say, like Twitter is good for that, right, 1966 01:23:11.000 --> 01:23:13.640 people like love like especially people who are working really 1967 01:23:13.680 --> 01:23:15.720 hard on making the future better, like they want to 1968 01:23:15.720 --> 01:23:17.520 talk to people. I mean, they also feel like they 1969 01:23:17.560 --> 01:23:20.319 are toiling away at like a hopeless problem a lot 1970 01:23:20.319 --> 01:23:22.079 at the time. So if you find someone who's doing 1971 01:23:22.079 --> 01:23:23.800 something cool, like literally just being like hey, I think 1972 01:23:23.840 --> 01:23:26.159 you're doing something cool, it's like that like keeps people going. 1973 01:23:26.239 --> 01:23:28.479 So I would say, like, if you admire somebody's work, 1974 01:23:28.560 --> 01:23:31.239 like absolutely say something, because it truly doesn't make a difference. 1975 01:23:31.399 --> 01:23:35.079 That's very good advice because probably people think that it 1976 01:23:35.079 --> 01:23:37.760 would be weird to know compliments. 1977 01:23:37.279 --> 01:23:39.560 Someone Compliments are never weird. I mean that's not true. 1978 01:23:39.640 --> 01:23:42.359 Compliments can absolutely be weird, But like in general, if 1979 01:23:42.359 --> 01:23:43.840 you're like, hey, I just love what you're doing. And 1980 01:23:43.880 --> 01:23:45.319 also like often if you are like I don't know 1981 01:23:45.359 --> 01:23:47.560 how to get involved, is there something I can do 1982 01:23:47.760 --> 01:23:49.359 just like reach out to people, I mean people, and 1983 01:23:49.359 --> 01:23:51.039 they won't always be able to reply because a lot 1984 01:23:51.039 --> 01:23:52.720 of them are, you know, strapped for time and stuff. 1985 01:23:52.720 --> 01:23:56.239 But yeah, people like community building and like making a difference, 1986 01:23:56.279 --> 01:23:58.560 like we all want to make the world better, I think, 1987 01:23:58.800 --> 01:24:02.279 and especialologies listen ologits, so yeah, like reaching out to 1988 01:24:02.319 --> 01:24:03.600 people and being like how can I help? Like what 1989 01:24:03.600 --> 01:24:04.920 can I do? 1990 01:24:05.119 --> 01:24:08.800 Any kind of words of wisdom or anything stick with you, 1991 01:24:08.840 --> 01:24:09.600 like on the day to day. 1992 01:24:09.640 --> 01:24:10.560 That kind of keeps you going. 1993 01:24:10.760 --> 01:24:10.960 Yeah. 1994 01:24:11.000 --> 01:24:12.960 There's a quote by Octavia Butler that I come back 1995 01:24:12.960 --> 01:24:14.479 to you over and over again, and I'll just like 1996 01:24:14.520 --> 01:24:16.600 read it to you because I always forget that I worry. 1997 01:24:16.720 --> 01:24:18.800 She's like such a pillar an important person that I 1998 01:24:18.800 --> 01:24:20.800 don't want to like butcher her words because she's so 1999 01:24:20.880 --> 01:24:21.319 good at them. 2000 01:24:21.359 --> 01:24:24.479 Okay, how prepared for the future is Rose? She had 2001 01:24:24.479 --> 01:24:27.039 this quote readily available on her phone. 2002 01:24:26.880 --> 01:24:27.600 So I'm going to read it to you. 2003 01:24:27.600 --> 01:24:30.600 It says, there's no single answer that will solve all 2004 01:24:30.600 --> 01:24:34.079 of our future problems. There's no magic bullet. Instead, there 2005 01:24:34.079 --> 01:24:36.960 are thousands of answers. At least you can be one 2006 01:24:37.000 --> 01:24:38.119 of them if you choose to be. 2007 01:24:38.560 --> 01:24:40.760 Oh, goose bumps. 2008 01:24:40.520 --> 01:24:41.840 Yeah, I know, it's like, that's the thing I think 2009 01:24:41.880 --> 01:24:43.399 about a lot, where it's like you can, you can, 2010 01:24:43.600 --> 01:24:44.880 you can be a part of the solution. 2011 01:24:45.079 --> 01:24:47.399 You don't. It doesn't have to be hopeless. Mm hm. 2012 01:24:47.439 --> 01:24:50.800 So you just have to figure out what your priorities are. Yeah, 2013 01:24:50.880 --> 01:24:53.359 figure out what kind of future you want, work backwards 2014 01:24:53.359 --> 01:24:55.920 from there, and then kind of get to work. Yeah, 2015 01:24:56.239 --> 01:25:00.119 get on it, get on it. So the future is ours, 2016 01:25:00.640 --> 01:25:02.840 whether we would like it or not, and so we 2017 01:25:02.920 --> 01:25:04.039 might as well try to make it better. 2018 01:25:04.119 --> 01:25:06.199 Yeah. The future is not set yet, it hasn't happened. 2019 01:25:06.359 --> 01:25:07.920 It can be what you wanted to be. Oh that's 2020 01:25:07.960 --> 01:25:13.920 so exciting. Yeah, I know we can fix this. Yeah, 2021 01:25:14.359 --> 01:25:16.439 so much better. Yeah. Okay. 2022 01:25:16.520 --> 01:25:18.560 Sometimes I feel like people's therapists or they're like, I 2023 01:25:18.560 --> 01:25:19.520 need to talk to about the future. 2024 01:25:19.680 --> 01:25:23.399 It's gonna be okay. Oh my gosh. Thank you so 2025 01:25:23.520 --> 01:25:25.159 much for doing this. We thank you for having me. 2026 01:25:25.199 --> 01:25:26.960 I'm a huge fan. I love this. Oh I'm a 2027 01:25:27.039 --> 01:25:28.880 huge fan. No you. 2028 01:25:30.640 --> 01:25:33.520 So, if you are now a huge fan of professional 2029 01:25:33.600 --> 01:25:37.399 future ologist Rose Evelyth, feel free to board your internet 2030 01:25:37.439 --> 01:25:41.119 space car and just zoom over to Roseevelith dot com. 2031 01:25:41.279 --> 01:25:44.840 She's at Twitter dot com, slash Rosevealith Instagram dot com, 2032 01:25:44.880 --> 01:25:48.279 slash rose Evelyth and of course listen to her wonderful 2033 01:25:48.319 --> 01:25:52.239 podcast flash Forward that's at flashforward pod dot com. She's 2034 01:25:52.279 --> 01:25:55.920 on Facebook at flash forward Pod Twitter same handle flash 2035 01:25:55.920 --> 01:25:59.039 forward Pod on Instagram too. We are at Ologies on 2036 01:25:59.119 --> 01:26:02.479 Instagram and I'm at ali Ward with one l on 2037 01:26:02.560 --> 01:26:05.119 both and more links about all the things we talked about. 2038 01:26:05.279 --> 01:26:09.119 We'll be up at Aliward dot com slash ologies slash Futurology. 2039 01:26:09.479 --> 01:26:12.000 There's a link to that and to the causes and 2040 01:26:12.039 --> 01:26:15.039 the sponsors for this episode in the show notes. And 2041 01:26:15.159 --> 01:26:17.640 for merch, you can head to ologiesmirch dot com or 2042 01:26:17.680 --> 01:26:20.840 Alleyward dot com. Thank you Shannon Feldas and Bonnie Dutch 2043 01:26:20.960 --> 01:26:23.399 of the comedy podcast You Are that they handle all 2044 01:26:23.399 --> 01:26:26.279 the merch. Thanks to Aaron Talbert and Hannahlipo for admitting 2045 01:26:26.319 --> 01:26:28.520 the Facebook group. Thank you to Emily White and all 2046 01:26:28.640 --> 01:26:33.039 the Facebook transcriptionists who make transcripts available at Alleyward dot 2047 01:26:33.039 --> 01:26:36.079 com slash ologies, dash Extras. We're getting through all the 2048 01:26:36.119 --> 01:26:39.399 past episodes still. Thank you as always to Jared Sleeper, 2049 01:26:39.439 --> 01:26:42.399 host of the podcast My Good Bad Brain about Mental Health, 2050 01:26:42.640 --> 01:26:45.960 for assistant editing, and to the man whose mustache resides 2051 01:26:46.239 --> 01:26:49.760 in both the past and the future. It wants Stevenry Morris, 2052 01:26:49.840 --> 01:26:52.760 host of the Cat podcast, The Percast and the Dinosaur 2053 01:26:52.840 --> 01:26:55.960 Pods Jurassic Right, for piecing all these clips together for 2054 01:26:56.000 --> 01:26:56.600 me each week. 2055 01:26:56.680 --> 01:26:57.279 He is a hero. 2056 01:26:57.800 --> 01:27:00.840 Nick Thorburn of the very good band Islands wrote and 2057 01:27:00.880 --> 01:27:04.399 performed the theme music. And if you stick around to 2058 01:27:04.439 --> 01:27:06.520 the end, you know I tell you a secret. This 2059 01:27:06.560 --> 01:27:08.960 week's secret it's going to be threefold because I just 2060 01:27:09.000 --> 01:27:11.880 took two weeks off. I'm just like a chicken holding 2061 01:27:11.920 --> 01:27:14.039 eggs over here, so okay. One is that I've been 2062 01:27:14.039 --> 01:27:17.119 trying to use mental time travel before things that stressed 2063 01:27:17.119 --> 01:27:19.479 me out to imagine a good outcome, and it's helped 2064 01:27:19.479 --> 01:27:23.680 me shake off the jitters a bunch, so thanks Chronothesia. Also, 2065 01:27:23.880 --> 01:27:27.399 since the Chronobiology episode, I've been sleeping in a bed 2066 01:27:27.520 --> 01:27:30.680 with the lights off way more and it's glorious. But 2067 01:27:30.800 --> 01:27:33.680 also I think I'm getting sick more and my doctor 2068 01:27:33.720 --> 01:27:36.119 said that that can happen when you finally rest, So yes, 2069 01:27:36.600 --> 01:27:40.039 we need an immunology episode. Stat Also, I have a 2070 01:27:40.079 --> 01:27:43.079 potato for a brain and I used way too harsh 2071 01:27:43.119 --> 01:27:46.479 to cleaner on an engineered quartz countertop, and now it's 2072 01:27:46.520 --> 01:27:49.880 spotty and dull. And if anyone has done this or 2073 01:27:50.000 --> 01:27:54.039 fixed this, please tell me your secret, because wow, it 2074 01:27:54.119 --> 01:27:57.039 looks real bad and it's my fault. Okay, let's meet 2075 01:27:57.079 --> 01:27:59.760 back here next week. In the future, we have a 2076 01:27:59.800 --> 01:28:02.640 whole whole year of brand new episodes now that I'm 2077 01:28:02.680 --> 01:28:05.359 all rested up, So twenty twenty, let's make this ding 2078 01:28:05.439 --> 01:28:06.600 dank future better together. 2079 01:28:06.720 --> 01:28:07.039 Okay. 2080 01:28:07.479 --> 01:28:15.800 Good Bye, pacodermatology, hombiology, ydo zoology, lithology, new technology, meteorology, 2081 01:28:16.279 --> 01:28:25.680 al pedatology, ethology, seriology, elenology. 2082 01:28:27.560 --> 01:28:32.239 Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on 2083 01:28:32.479 --> 01:28:35.600 in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future.