English subtitles for clip: File:George Whitesides on the world of chemistry shaping our future-VPRO-The Mind of the Universe.ogv
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1 00:00:00,28 --> 00:00:05,27 I'll just thank so much for getting to do this interview and I don't want to embarrass you 2 00:00:05,28 --> 00:00:10,00 but I know you're one of the distinguished successful scientists 3 00:00:10,01 --> 00:00:14,86 and that you also always know you wanted to be assigned. 4 00:00:14,86 --> 00:00:21,3 To Regina going to be a mathematician you were turned out I didn't have the release you see brains to do that I was 5 00:00:21,43 --> 00:00:21,88 cured 6 00:00:22,11 --> 00:00:29,78 and I was really good at washing dishes so I become a chemist How early did you know you were of on to be a mathematician 7 00:00:30,61 --> 00:00:37,45 Oh that was part of the sort of adolescent feeling that the closer you got to mathematics the better off you were so 8 00:00:37,55 --> 00:00:39,9 there were mathematicians and there were physicists 9 00:00:40,2 --> 00:00:44,75 and then somewhere down the road there were the rest of us it was OK or hard 10 00:00:44,76 --> 00:00:51,27 or scientist in your family my father was a chemical engineer so my first introduction to Sciences there were was 11 00:00:51,28 --> 00:00:56,28 pouring coal tar through a little hole how to measure the viscosity of coal tar black 12 00:00:56,64 --> 00:01:03,13 and I was a technician he was a chemical engineer who made concrete repair compounds so it was a happy doesn't end here 13 00:01:03,14 --> 00:01:05,23 because. 14 00:01:05,23 --> 00:01:11,68 I came from the Midwest in the Midwest what real men do is they go into business or they go into the army 15 00:01:12,23 --> 00:01:17,42 and as a absolute worst thing just before you go into the street you go in teaching at university 16 00:01:18,13 --> 00:01:24,12 but it was sort of OK because I was at MIT and their engineers advice there wasn't that. 17 00:01:24,12 --> 00:01:30,87 Are you who yourself surprised by kind of the way your career has developed to be honest I've never thought about it 18 00:01:30,88 --> 00:01:35,51 but I'm happy with the way my career in developed because I've reached my geriatric whatever 19 00:01:35,84 --> 00:01:42,99 and I wake up in the morning I love it it's great stuff what what what are you looking forward to every day. 20 00:01:42,99 --> 00:01:48,3 It's a combination of things what what's interesting about science is that you have the opportunity to do things that 21 00:01:48,31 --> 00:01:52,81 are important to people and you have the opportunity of following your curiosity and it's fun 22 00:01:52,85 --> 00:01:59,98 and you can actually make a living doing it when working you and so as a chemist I mean I would kind of not know. 23 00:02:00,01 --> 00:02:04,13 A better person to ask and of of the nature of molecules I have to think about I think it was fine 24 00:02:04,14 --> 00:02:07,86 when who said it I suppose that all signs disappeared 25 00:02:07,92 --> 00:02:15,65 and it was like one bit of knowledge that we could transfer to future generations he would do was say something like 26 00:02:15,79 --> 00:02:19,43 All matter is made out of very small particles 27 00:02:19,48 --> 00:02:29,25 but that perhaps is the best clue give Do you agree with that the thing about chemistry is that's chemistry that's 28 00:02:29,26 --> 00:02:35,18 chemistry everything you see is chemistry so that if you really want something that has the characteristic that 29 00:02:35,19 --> 00:02:43,41 universal it's molecules and how you construct reality based on atoms now there is a little business of the mind 30 00:02:43,87 --> 00:02:48,13 and what happens in between matter and mind is a different story but that's molecules too 31 00:02:48,17 --> 00:02:54,86 but going to have to matter this moment to something so what do we learn a fact that things are made out of little 32 00:02:54,87 --> 00:03:01,24 building blocks what does that tell us it tells us about the enormous variety that one can get from a pretty limited 33 00:03:01,25 --> 00:03:05,11 set of things moves in the periodic table of this are pretty substantial list 34 00:03:05,38 --> 00:03:11,5 but most of them don't show up very much in the number of occasions during the day in which you see Promethea her 35 00:03:11,51 --> 00:03:17,24 something like that it's a very small Yes On the other hand if you just imagine the variety of the comes out of carbon 36 00:03:17,25 --> 00:03:22,56 and hydrogen nitrogen oxygen it's what we call life and that's truly phenomenal 37 00:03:22,94 --> 00:03:31,96 and so the idea of the the almost almost infinite variability of forms of matter and function 38 00:03:32,00 --> 00:03:37,86 and use that you can get by taking a pretty simple collection of starting materials I think is one of the most 39 00:03:37,87 --> 00:03:45,12 remarkable things that I know if you think about that right you know mind that's where you think about all the 40 00:03:45,13 --> 00:03:52,36 materials we find you know rocks and lifeforms explore as we discover. 41 00:03:52,36 --> 00:03:59,35 But I guess we're also now in a phase where we kind of kind of starts to build things that happened existed before. 42 00:04:00,38 --> 00:04:03,6 You can build many things that haven't existed before 43 00:04:03,61 --> 00:04:11,75 and for which there has been no imaginable use I mean a perfectly good example is so we can and transistors 44 00:04:11,79 --> 00:04:14,75 and the Internet but you take a perfectly ordinary 45 00:04:14,76 --> 00:04:20,27 and fairly commonly available element which usually in nature occurs in a slightly different form 46 00:04:20,28 --> 00:04:24,17 but it isn't on the list silicon and you take it and you clean it up 47 00:04:24,48 --> 00:04:27,69 and then you write lines in it in interesting ways 48 00:04:27,97 --> 00:04:33,83 and all of a sudden it starts doing computation for you how on earth does that happen and of course we understand it 49 00:04:33,98 --> 00:04:39,75 but that's a combination of just the particles we were talking about but also electrons 50 00:04:39,76 --> 00:04:42,81 and then this other intangible stuff called information 51 00:04:43,22 --> 00:04:51,54 and it's the mixing of the three that produces such interesting and remarkable results do you feel that it's the. 52 00:04:51,54 --> 00:04:59,81 Purpose that come up let's do the material or did the material that is kind of an expected. 53 00:04:59,81 --> 00:05:10,05 Useful purpose and there's a very interesting book that's appeared recently called The Idea Factory which is the. 54 00:05:10,05 --> 00:05:13,21 A history there are many history of Bell Labs but this is 55 00:05:13,25 --> 00:05:20,95 when history of believes many histories of Bell Labs go along the following narrative that is they say brilliant 56 00:05:20,96 --> 00:05:27,94 physicist unconstrained by reality produced condensed matter physics and the Internet it turns history 57 00:05:28,01 --> 00:05:32,39 and the Internet and all the rest of that laser wonderful example of how the rivet get it 58 00:05:32,84 --> 00:05:33,96 and it's a good story anything 59 00:05:34,12 --> 00:05:41,19 but according to the guy who is running Bell Labs at that point it is unrelated to reality because in fact Shannon 60 00:05:41,2 --> 00:05:45,18 and try for inviting the rest of the one billion physicists that's not the issue 61 00:05:45,38 --> 00:05:49,66 but they were basically making a more efficient and profitable telephone system 62 00:05:50,19 --> 00:05:56,73 and so you know the thing about utilities of us all focused there was fighting improving telecommunications 63 00:05:56,77 --> 00:05:59,98 but there was a function yet people wanted to talk to the. 64 00:06:00,01 --> 00:06:02,47 Or brokers in New York or whatever that might be 65 00:06:02,79 --> 00:06:09,34 and so since that function couldn't be accomplished by anything that existed they had to make up something new 66 00:06:09,35 --> 00:06:12,68 and they tried other things and ended up inventing reinventing the world 67 00:06:12,85 --> 00:06:19,38 but it was the desire to do something new not the desire to invent per se that I think made it happen so this is a 68 00:06:19,39 --> 00:06:26,66 great laugh that makes all these products which is called Nature right and evolution is how can you say something how. 69 00:06:26,66 --> 00:06:33,53 How does nature operates and how do this technology operates hard to differences or perhaps similarities. 70 00:06:33,53 --> 00:06:41,74 In a sense there's a similarity because if you believe Darwin and I'm a great admirer of Mr Darwin. 71 00:06:41,74 --> 00:06:48,71 Nature operates by the idea of fit this what does fitness mean you get into wonderful arguments about what fitness 72 00:06:48,72 --> 00:06:55,15 means but it basically ends up with the idea that whatever process he's got us here got us here rather than purposes 73 00:06:55,16 --> 00:06:57,16 or snails or something that kind 74 00:06:57,77 --> 00:07:05,18 and part of the reason we got here is that we are able to invent things that do not otherwise exist to accomplish 75 00:07:05,19 --> 00:07:13,46 purposes some good some bad which other creatures have been able to do so well so what got us here was the ability our 76 00:07:13,47 --> 00:07:20,65 ability the ability of our particular evolutionary experiment to do something that's going to us as human beings 77 00:07:21,05 --> 00:07:26,89 and the interesting thing about that of course is that if you say that what accounts what counts is experimentation 78 00:07:26,95 --> 00:07:27,97 and new ideas 79 00:07:27,98 --> 00:07:33,92 and adaptability Republik not the only thing that's ever going to be able to do that so there will be other kinds of 80 00:07:33,93 --> 00:07:40,53 adaptation evolution and so if one looks in the future and ask are we necessarily the end of the line 81 00:07:40,54 --> 00:07:44,4 and the best thing will ever happened I don't think there's much evidence that that's true 82 00:07:44,66 --> 00:07:47,11 but you're making the point that if you look at our technology 83 00:07:47,12 --> 00:07:51,96 and how develop it that the some sense it's evolution that brought us to that point and evolution 84 00:07:51,97 --> 00:07:58,62 but it's evolution in a funny sense because you can make an argument that one of the golden arrows of science was the 85 00:07:58,63 --> 00:07:59,88 period between. 86 00:08:00,1 --> 00:08:00,69 The fifty's 87 00:08:00,7 --> 00:08:06,77 and now there's an enormous amount of stuff that happened a lot of that happened because of World War two I mean the 88 00:08:06,93 --> 00:08:14,18 the inventiveness that went into winning the war or not losing the war produced enormous benefits at the same time 89 00:08:14,52 --> 00:08:17,88 and you know many of the things that happened earlier can be associated with good 90 00:08:17,89 --> 00:08:25,89 and bad motives Yes So it's a question of how we use things in the argument is that science is is Ignacio about this 91 00:08:25,9 --> 00:08:28,38 and a more I'm not sure any of that's necessarily true 92 00:08:28,39 --> 00:08:34,37 but there are good med uses for most of technology so I said it was some kind of selection mechanism operative 93 00:08:34,42 --> 00:08:40,65 operating the point too because we were really fighting for survival and what will we do with nuclear X. Yet where X. 94 00:08:40,66 --> 00:08:41,68 Is power X. 95 00:08:41,69 --> 00:08:42,34 Is weapons 96 00:08:42,35 --> 00:08:47,44 and exists who knows what it's going to be if you think particular let's first focus on what the more kind of material 97 00:08:47,45 --> 00:09:01,02 science part if you look at the. Coming of new materials now it's what we know and what is still out there to explore. 98 00:09:01,02 --> 00:09:08,22 I think safe to say that the Vost for the majority of forms of matter we haven't discovered yet. 99 00:09:08,22 --> 00:09:09,76 How do you see this process going 100 00:09:09,77 --> 00:09:16,23 and how do we find our ways in this kind of infinity of possibilities Well the question is what do we want to do 101 00:09:16,73 --> 00:09:20,35 because it's the function that drives invention Yes 102 00:09:20,39 --> 00:09:27,8 and one characteristic which is not always clear from the outside is that invention has a kind of ramped quality about 103 00:09:27,81 --> 00:09:34,55 it that is coming up with an idea can be fairly easy there are lots of good ideas demonstrating an application a little 104 00:09:34,56 --> 00:09:40,42 bit more challenging where you have to new something you know something but the actual process of taking the idea 105 00:09:40,43 --> 00:09:43,35 and taking it all the way to what we call a product 106 00:09:43,36 --> 00:09:48,24 but even more so to him work that you know where lots of people want it is very expensive 107 00:09:48,25 --> 00:09:56,62 and very difficult in fact so that at the end science becomes technology if people want the function that it provides 108 00:09:56,8 --> 00:09:59,73 Now what function do we walked right and. 109 00:10:00,23 --> 00:10:04,96 I think you can make an argument for example that the functions are probably the same in some sense that they always 110 00:10:04,97 --> 00:10:12,2 were we want to be fed we want to have our children raised in reasonable ways we want to be safe we want to communicate 111 00:10:12,21 --> 00:10:16,69 we want to be amused and each one of those will be served in different ways 112 00:10:17,01 --> 00:10:24,76 but one of the interesting changes now is I think we've become accustomed the idea that information is probably as 113 00:10:24,77 --> 00:10:31,59 important as things and we are growing accustomed the idea that machines may be as capable 114 00:10:31,6 --> 00:10:37,62 or more capable than we in certain tasks and so you put together. 115 00:10:37,62 --> 00:10:41,44 Other parts of life machines and information 116 00:10:41,62 --> 00:10:46,23 and you start having a world which doesn't look very much like the world of just one hundred years ago 117 00:10:46,79 --> 00:10:53,99 and you feel that it is this coronation of factors that will becomes a driving force too for exploration you know Will 118 00:10:54,00 --> 00:11:00,02 machines for instance help us explore maybe the fourteen's can only do the exploration 119 00:11:00,03 --> 00:11:01,97 but of course what they learn we can use 120 00:11:02,38 --> 00:11:09,55 but we do we want to go in blend ourselves on Pluto certainly not in the near term we have a problem so you mentioned 121 00:11:09,66 --> 00:11:16,62 also kind of the whole I mean biology the life sciences are our own bodies are part of that kind of nexus of how do you 122 00:11:16,63 --> 00:11:23,55 see from your point of view and I think as a chemist you're like perfectly positions the material world and I 123 00:11:23,56 --> 00:11:31,16 and life and Howard eight hour days two worlds interacting at this moment of what will bring the future. 124 00:11:31,16 --> 00:11:38,72 Well that question is I think one of the more interesting questions around right now because there is a fundamentally 125 00:11:38,73 --> 00:11:41,59 interesting issue there which is. 126 00:11:41,59 --> 00:11:46,47 There is matter and there is life and are they different or is life just matter 127 00:11:46,97 --> 00:11:50,96 and I have a prejudice in this which is. 128 00:11:50,96 --> 00:11:55,94 Hypothesis let's say and that is we have matter like this which is stationary 129 00:11:56,93 --> 00:11:59,98 and then we have matter of a different sort and. 130 00:12:00,22 --> 00:12:04,82 The example I like is a flame which is matter but it's doing something 131 00:12:04,83 --> 00:12:12,9 and it only really exists because it's doing something it's generating energy and you mix you mix methane and error 132 00:12:12,91 --> 00:12:15,91 and you let it burn and you get a flame. 133 00:12:15,91 --> 00:12:23,89 What's life and one argument is that life is a very complicated sort of flame you mix glucose for breakfast 134 00:12:24,18 --> 00:12:28,62 or in my case caffeine with air and you burn it 135 00:12:28,78 --> 00:12:34,97 and by a very complicated process you end up with a behavior which is not giving off heat and light 136 00:12:35,12 --> 00:12:41,13 but it's giving off Beethoven in this conversation that we're having Yes And is that is that all there is 137 00:12:41,14 --> 00:12:43,64 or is there something else there that we don't understand 138 00:12:43,94 --> 00:12:51,59 and I think that's the great question Is there something we say emergent something that is not anticipated by existing 139 00:12:51,6 --> 00:12:54,65 science that distinguishes life from everything else 140 00:12:54,74 --> 00:13:01,67 or is it simply a marvelously balanced by some set of processes that we don't understand set of molecular processes 141 00:13:02,02 --> 00:13:07,67 could imagine that you know again as from the chemical point of view you might be perhaps biased to think the latter 142 00:13:07,85 --> 00:13:14,44 and I do think that it's just a very complicated process I don't know the just is the right word because you know it 143 00:13:14,45 --> 00:13:20,85 just is a way of being a little bit dismissive that what to me is so interesting is the idea that if you can have 144 00:13:20,89 --> 00:13:24,09 static matter you can have dynamic matter you can have living matter 145 00:13:24,1 --> 00:13:29,54 and you can have thinking matter then this whole process leads you to the idea of how on earth 146 00:13:29,55 --> 00:13:35,02 and why on earth would you arrive at something that was dynamic in the sense of being alive anymore 147 00:13:35,03 --> 00:13:40,42 or even more so being dynamic and thinking intelligent and I was an intelligent matter 148 00:13:40,94 --> 00:13:47,65 but the importance of the question I think is that if you can have intelligent matter based on parts and Lud 149 00:13:47,66 --> 00:13:53,39 and whatever then there's no reason why you couldn't have intelligent matter of a number of different sorts if you if 150 00:13:53,4 --> 00:13:59,67 you think and perhaps more kind of a gray scale or you have various. Kind of gradations of his life. 151 00:14:00,27 --> 00:14:01,16 Matter is a life 152 00:14:01,17 --> 00:14:09,9 or intelligence my discretion is beyond sense soon in terms of real objects appearing past producing of oratory that 153 00:14:09,91 --> 00:14:18,51 are kind of exploring that intermediate area there are I think two questions there one question is. 154 00:14:18,51 --> 00:14:24,07 Is there are there examples in which that line is already blurred Yes And I think there are many of them 155 00:14:24,11 --> 00:14:31,46 and it one that I think is worth thinking about is simply a frozen AIG if you're going to dig. 156 00:14:31,46 --> 00:14:36,98 There's no chemistry going on is doing absolutely nothing there is nothing in that that would suggest it's any 157 00:14:36,99 --> 00:14:43,01 different from a rock but you were made up and all of a sudden it's able to do something different 158 00:14:43,53 --> 00:14:50,3 and you see in the same in the sense the same thing at the thought perspective because a human egg 159 00:14:50,36 --> 00:14:57,42 when fertilized isn't thinking there's nothing think with us and when the baby's born it's not thinking much 160 00:14:57,58 --> 00:15:00,86 and there's thought going on but it's probably certainly not self-aware 161 00:15:00,98 --> 00:15:04,08 and then you end up with all of the semantic problems that you 162 00:15:04,09 --> 00:15:10,79 and I have in trying to understand what thinking is about is a continuum both of these are continuing so what that says 163 00:15:10,8 --> 00:15:18,17 to me is that you can go from something that is not alive to something to live in from something it's not thinking to 164 00:15:18,18 --> 00:15:20,55 something it's thinking in a continuous way 165 00:15:20,93 --> 00:15:28,63 and to think of a continuum is that they usually go on yes so there is not the end point of that curve where not the 166 00:15:28,64 --> 00:15:33,91 end point in the curve that's right and so you say isn't it dismissive to think that we're just a flame 167 00:15:33,92 --> 00:15:39,26 and the answer is no absolutely not because what you want is more complicated flames right now 168 00:15:39,27 --> 00:15:44,97 and that gives me a great deal of optimism that whatever we are a thousand years from now is not going to be what we 169 00:15:44,98 --> 00:15:47,12 are right now so I could imagine it 170 00:15:47,13 --> 00:15:54,25 or at least two kinds we can kind of have objects which are more kind of in between life and. 171 00:15:54,25 --> 00:15:59,66 Comfort that matter but we can also think of that these things will start to kind of and Khalid's. 172 00:16:00,16 --> 00:16:08,19 Is that something that you see happening so well is a self driving car fundamentally different in its function from a 173 00:16:08,2 --> 00:16:15,22 cab with a really bored taxi driver I mean the word taxi driver is it's almost certainly safe 174 00:16:15,65 --> 00:16:20,99 but the board taxi driver is probably not thinking about a lot including driving the car yes 175 00:16:21,04 --> 00:16:28,68 and whatever set of systems is driving the car in and in the vehicle that's unmanned is something quite different 176 00:16:28,97 --> 00:16:37,43 but it they're both sort of operating on a low key so yeah why not why can't we have many variations on complexity 177 00:16:37,44 --> 00:16:44,93 and why can't we more interesting we begin to combine them are you envisioning seriously that you know artificial 178 00:16:44,94 --> 00:16:51,37 intelligence or deep learning processes will start to cut things have not only our lives 179 00:16:51,38 --> 00:16:59,72 but perhaps also the way we kind of do science and discovery but isn't it already happening because after all the. 180 00:16:59,72 --> 00:17:05,81 We have had our the pleasure of having our younger son home with us and. 181 00:17:05,81 --> 00:17:13,74 It's very clear that he is thinking about things in a way that's fundamentally different from the way that I've ever 182 00:17:13,75 --> 00:17:18,25 thought about things I mean the Internet has rewired his brain let's assume for the better 183 00:17:18,43 --> 00:17:20,01 but I don't know that to be true 184 00:17:20,8 --> 00:17:28,66 but it has to do with the fact that for him the idea of all information is available you just assume it of course all 185 00:17:28,67 --> 00:17:31,14 information is available now what you do with it 186 00:17:31,21 --> 00:17:42,15 and how your intuition works it works along different veins so it seems almost guaranteed that this process of us as 187 00:17:42,33 --> 00:17:47,87 adaptable creatures adapting to an environment which now has all this other stuff going on which wasn't there before 188 00:17:47,92 --> 00:17:53,13 you know it has to happen is there's some new competitor coming or something the temperature is changed 189 00:17:53,14 --> 00:17:59,98 or whatever has happened and so after use an escape kicking in again evolution is kicking it well how do you feel as. 190 00:18:00,01 --> 00:18:05,7 Particularly I think you mention the Internet in a way their communication it's not only operating at the individual 191 00:18:05,71 --> 00:18:13,74 level but also need a kind of amount of connectivity to way where your connecting to other people and other order. 192 00:18:13,74 --> 00:18:16,01 But it's really all that it's it's really it's amazing 193 00:18:16,02 --> 00:18:23,25 and well you are you have give a different perspective on a means to be human being feel. 194 00:18:23,25 --> 00:18:29,91 What's a human being well instead of just looking at this as individuals that are so sensitive you should really as a 195 00:18:30,51 --> 00:18:33,62 as more as a collective. 196 00:18:33,62 --> 00:18:35,43 Process what I think you can argue 197 00:18:35,78 --> 00:18:40,41 and we will see how it works out is that the Internet has rewired the brains of our children 198 00:18:40,42 --> 00:18:45,05 and grandchildren in such a fashion that they are part of a collective as opposed to being isolated 199 00:18:45,58 --> 00:18:49,95 and they're good teachers and bad features but the integration is very much a work in progress 200 00:18:50,37 --> 00:18:55,36 and what will come of something in which not only is all information available 201 00:18:55,37 --> 00:18:58,95 but all opinions are available in general beginning to see yes plus 202 00:18:58,96 --> 00:19:06,34 or minus who knows what wild oscillation in the system is we begin to shake down in trying to understand what it is a 203 00:19:06,35 --> 00:19:11,53 collective intelligence is life but a collective intelligence could be a next step 204 00:19:11,54 --> 00:19:16,38 and it would certainly be very different from we're doing now if you kind of try to have a kind of a broader 205 00:19:16,39 --> 00:19:17,04 perspective 206 00:19:17,05 --> 00:19:22,05 and you see discover developmental technology which you just said you know is really speeding up the last say fifty 207 00:19:22,06 --> 00:19:24,02 years. 208 00:19:24,02 --> 00:19:30,35 I do have to feel feeling that we're kind of entering a new age in terms of technology what the role of technology will 209 00:19:30,36 --> 00:19:37,23 be. Something like perhaps comparable to when we had like the Industrial Revolution or something. 210 00:19:37,23 --> 00:19:45,71 Thinking is that is absolutely yes the question that I struggle with is what's the form going to be what's the 211 00:19:45,72 --> 00:19:51,96 characteristic What's the characteristic because if we have anough matter of this sort to do many things 212 00:19:52,33 --> 00:19:59,68 but we're just beginning to explore the intersection of this with this was information yes you end up with a very 213 00:19:59,69 --> 00:19:59,98 different. 214 00:20:00,01 --> 00:20:03,38 Kind of picture and it's not clear that I 215 00:20:03,39 --> 00:20:08,11 or even you will live long enough to have a sense for what direction this is going 216 00:20:08,15 --> 00:20:13,22 but I think the direction is going to be different if you're speculating nothing to kill you know machines 217 00:20:13,23 --> 00:20:17,55 and technology are becoming more and more important. 218 00:20:17,55 --> 00:20:19,61 In the end will it be about us the story 219 00:20:19,62 --> 00:20:25,26 or are we just kind of an intermediate phase that kind of passes the torch to perhaps the smart machine 220 00:20:25,27 --> 00:20:28,26 or something else we know there is the argument 221 00:20:28,27 --> 00:20:35,96 and I think you may have heard about this for murder Reese that we're just a little glimpse in between a period in 222 00:20:35,97 --> 00:20:38,17 which you don't have sent him on the one hand 223 00:20:38,45 --> 00:20:42,84 and then you have the real thing which last for a very long time is based in Silicon 224 00:20:42,85 --> 00:20:47,07 or does something else I don't think it's easy to see the answer to that 225 00:20:47,11 --> 00:20:53,46 but it certainly is true that you can understand that there are things that the Internet. 226 00:20:53,46 --> 00:20:59,86 Can do that we can never do because I've spent a lifetime learning stuff a very brief lifetime learning stuff I doubt 227 00:20:59,87 --> 00:21:04,27 it's gone but that won't happen with with other forms of memory 228 00:21:04,28 --> 00:21:09,55 and intelligence that will be there forever well your scientific achievements will definitely live on 229 00:21:09,56 --> 00:21:16,94 and be carried to homes. And to me in science and some sense also part of the much longer chain. 230 00:21:16,94 --> 00:21:22,64 We are I know that we all like to have the idea that there is some residue 231 00:21:22,81 --> 00:21:29,64 and if there isn't you know what happens is if you understand stuff it's incorporated into things 232 00:21:29,65 --> 00:21:34,12 and then immediately is taken for granted so it's not that we don't contribute 233 00:21:34,48 --> 00:21:40,04 but there isn't much residue it's flame it's not that I turned off it's gone but well it's there it's hot 234 00:21:40,05 --> 00:21:49,79 and useful talking about machines you know you think that in the future to will be more machines around us for instance 235 00:21:49,8 --> 00:21:58,45 robots. Will you know there's an interesting word that you just use which is machine yes is a. 236 00:21:58,45 --> 00:21:59,98 Structure that thinks is. 237 00:22:00,25 --> 00:22:00,99 As we do 238 00:22:01,03 --> 00:22:06,55 and can do things that we can't do all that operates on different principles aren't we dismissing it a little bit to 239 00:22:06,56 --> 00:22:14,93 call it a machine my lawn more as a machine I'm thinking about something rather different yes anyway robots. 240 00:22:14,93 --> 00:22:24,87 Robots were developed of course originally to replace people in tasks that were not doable or difficult 241 00:22:24,88 --> 00:22:31,75 or unpleasant than lifting body panels into an automobile assembly line or working in a minor things of that sort 242 00:22:32,62 --> 00:22:34,28 and that's were really very well 243 00:22:34,67 --> 00:22:40,13 and there are a series of what our machines which have the unpleasant characteristic that if you happen to be standing 244 00:22:40,14 --> 00:22:42,21 too close to one of them when it swings its arms 245 00:22:42,22 --> 00:22:48,95 or simply because you haven't doesn't notice so one of the things is beginning to happen now is the development of 246 00:22:48,96 --> 00:22:58,63 what's known in the trade as collaborative robotics meaning robots by which I mean very broadly almost anything that's 247 00:22:58,64 --> 00:23:03,31 a machine that interacts in a dynamic way with its environment. 248 00:23:03,31 --> 00:23:07,26 Robots that are designed and do work cooperatively 249 00:23:07,27 --> 00:23:16,78 and safely with people it's a very important kind of distinction because with cooperative robotics one can imagine. 250 00:23:16,78 --> 00:23:24,49 The step in which on the one hand we already have us thinking together with machines computers I think all the time 251 00:23:24,5 --> 00:23:30,35 we're very happy with that and if we can now add to this something in which we interact with machines 252 00:23:30,58 --> 00:23:37,21 and maybe even machines that look like a saw though I don't think that's necessary as a part of this then you fuse the 253 00:23:37,22 --> 00:23:40,5 two together with the with the corporeal self 254 00:23:40,51 --> 00:23:47,3 and the information thinking self in ways that you can't tell the difference then all of a sudden we've done something 255 00:23:47,31 --> 00:23:55,58 which is really remarkable which is depending upon your point of view creating a living or thinking pure competitor 256 00:23:55,9 --> 00:23:59,98 or cooperative species and how we make that out will. 257 00:24:00,01 --> 00:24:06,66 Depend upon how things go I can't answer the question are you in any way worried that. 258 00:24:06,66 --> 00:24:12,37 These corporatist new species will kind of dominate us or take over in the short term though 259 00:24:12,8 --> 00:24:14,55 and we have a wonderful example 260 00:24:15,16 --> 00:24:20,41 when people bring up the issue of aren't robots taking jobs yes of course robots are taking jobs 261 00:24:20,85 --> 00:24:23,15 but in the one nine hundred thirty S. 262 00:24:23,16 --> 00:24:29,41 There was a very important class of robots introduced not called a robot but it was a washing machine 263 00:24:29,42 --> 00:24:35,76 and a dishwasher Yes And what these did was to take fifty percent of the population otherwise known as women who were 264 00:24:35,77 --> 00:24:40,63 spending their time basically washing things get rid of all that allow them to go on 265 00:24:40,64 --> 00:24:49,37 and do all the other things that people yes women men do so liberating liberating what it did was to create 266 00:24:49,41 --> 00:24:56,08 opportunities to do more interesting things and so if we assume that what will happen with. 267 00:24:56,08 --> 00:25:03,14 Revanche information systems artificial intelligence robotics whatever it might be if we assume that that will take 268 00:25:03,15 --> 00:25:05,68 over some of the less interesting jobs 269 00:25:06,00 --> 00:25:14,02 and there are many of those then the question is will we be clever enough to have other things that need to be done in 270 00:25:14,03 --> 00:25:15,51 which this yes can work 271 00:25:15,95 --> 00:25:23,86 and the answer that of course in a kind of I don't know ethical sense is yes because picture number seventy percent of 272 00:25:23,87 --> 00:25:30,35 the world's population still lives if not in poverty in difficult circumstances 273 00:25:30,64 --> 00:25:38,5 and one could go about basically improving the standard of living Hell us and I was in education for everybody 274 00:25:38,89 --> 00:25:44,41 or we could do something else and we'll probably try books and. 275 00:25:44,41 --> 00:25:48,24 I just want to also kind of come back to evolution you know 276 00:25:48,28 --> 00:25:54,98 and as you said you know now this point here at this phase or technology and toes and becomes part of it 277 00:25:54,99 --> 00:26:03,33 but if you trace back in the other direction I wouldn't talk about to you kind of. Mysterious properties of. 278 00:26:03,33 --> 00:26:09,41 Matter that has come alive I know you also think about the origin of life right. 279 00:26:09,41 --> 00:26:15,52 Because that's somehow to be a central question that might be the point where we go from wild wild face to the other 280 00:26:15,84 --> 00:26:18,7 what are your thoughts about. 281 00:26:18,7 --> 00:26:25,63 Me the origin of life is the most interesting question I know in science right now I mean absolutely the origin of the 282 00:26:25,64 --> 00:26:28,29 universe in space and time these are wonderful questions 283 00:26:28,8 --> 00:26:35,21 but we don't actually have very much contact with the origin the universe is not an everyday event for me yes on the 284 00:26:35,22 --> 00:26:41,56 other hand you and your colleagues are everyday events and where could they have come from because I have no idea 285 00:26:42,14 --> 00:26:46,94 and the characteristic of a good scientific problem is you don't know the answer before you start yes 286 00:26:46,98 --> 00:26:50,26 but it's all well and good to say that you have a flame 287 00:26:50,88 --> 00:26:58,61 but how a flame becomes the remarkable set of things that represent it does represent it by life is not at all obvious 288 00:26:58,92 --> 00:27:05,48 and there are two parts to this question there's a there's a park which is Darwinian evolution so once you have a cell 289 00:27:05,49 --> 00:27:11,38 how does the cell become over many many many generations how does it become Beethoven in they'd way we understand how 290 00:27:11,39 --> 00:27:17,57 that could happen how how do you take random sludge being a radiated by a U.V. 291 00:27:17,58 --> 00:27:24,4 Rich sun and boiled by volcanoes and things like that and have that turn out to be the first cell I have no clue 292 00:27:24,86 --> 00:27:30,61 and so what's wonderful about it is that I have a feeling there that at least in the detail we don't understand what's 293 00:27:30,62 --> 00:27:32,21 going on at all but 294 00:27:32,5 --> 00:27:39,26 but in the bud is interesting what it does say is that it's possible to take things that seem totally disorganized 295 00:27:39,59 --> 00:27:40,54 but have energy 296 00:27:40,73 --> 00:27:46,7 and have them by some process bootstrap themselves into something is totally different in terms of its characteristics 297 00:27:46,71 --> 00:27:51,03 Yes we don't understand really how that happens in very vague terms yes 298 00:27:51,04 --> 00:27:57,14 but how does it really happen I don't know all mean if you wonder about the origin of the universe itself it was 299 00:27:57,18 --> 00:27:59,69 intellectually course very still in question and. 300 00:28:00,08 --> 00:28:05,53 The same is true for asking what happened four billion years ago our planet Earth 301 00:28:06,16 --> 00:28:11,82 but I could imagine a few that the question of the origin of life is also quite relevant. 302 00:28:11,82 --> 00:28:17,69 Now studying complicated processes etc something it's not only it's something that you could possibly replicate 303 00:28:17,7 --> 00:28:22,81 or could show processes that we weren't aware of perhaps 304 00:28:23,02 --> 00:28:31,93 but that implies that if we're going to do it now it implies that we sort of know how it happened because if you look 305 00:28:31,94 --> 00:28:38,24 at what seems to be required to make the simplest cell it is so complicated that it doesn't seem likely to have 306 00:28:38,25 --> 00:28:44,4 happened by accident there has to have been some direction in terms of going downhill in energy 307 00:28:44,41 --> 00:28:46,58 or something we don't know what that might be 308 00:28:46,92 --> 00:28:52,39 and I don't think we know what that is there's a real difference in the opinion of the community that thinks about this 309 00:28:52,4 --> 00:28:59,06 and I happen to think we don't have a clue there are people who think we're almost there we can go from pond scum to 310 00:28:59,07 --> 00:29:03,36 the first cell Yes And then there are people who think that once you've got to the first cell you don't have to worry 311 00:29:03,37 --> 00:29:10,23 about the rest of it you just assume it yeah yeah well how do you think that into the satellite question what what kind 312 00:29:10,24 --> 00:29:18,67 of do you at least see a pathway of Investigation guy three ounces Yes I think there pathways of investigation so from 313 00:29:18,71 --> 00:29:26,57 the kind of approach that we take not knowing how to do it we asked the question of how do you take reactions 314 00:29:26,58 --> 00:29:31,33 and how would reactions begin to interact with one of the cooperatively how would the a self assemble 315 00:29:31,97 --> 00:29:38,34 and if you could do that if you could find out principles which would suggest that then you might be able to think that 316 00:29:38,38 --> 00:29:46,28 maybe in this environment that set of things might have been and have become a group not of five separate reactions 317 00:29:46,29 --> 00:29:49,87 but five reactions that are somehow working together and talking to one another 318 00:29:50,45 --> 00:29:55,62 but what I just said how the reactions talk to one another we know how it happens in life now 319 00:29:55,82 --> 00:29:59,98 but we don't have any idea how it could have happened to the life there and so it's a wonderful problem. 320 00:30:00,54 --> 00:30:06,26 George we're talking about origin of life credit just want to make a little detour what you feel about life in the 321 00:30:06,27 --> 00:30:09,07 universe all. 322 00:30:09,07 --> 00:30:18,22 Alone we don't know yes I mean the issue there is that if you're in the model I'm in which says I can't see how it 323 00:30:18,23 --> 00:30:26,72 happens if it happens by accident it's so improbable that I have no way to get my arms around it but of course. 324 00:30:26,72 --> 00:30:32,72 You know the sort of number as you hold your arm at arm's length and look at the size of a quarter 325 00:30:33,08 --> 00:30:40,36 and in any direction that's a billion galaxies included in that and the billion galaxies has ten billion suns 326 00:30:40,37 --> 00:30:42,2 and most of the Suns have planets 327 00:30:42,48 --> 00:30:48,1 and they're experimenting all the time with everything I have no idea how to think about what's going on several years 328 00:30:48,11 --> 00:30:49,07 of years over billions 329 00:30:49,08 --> 00:30:56,09 and billions of years so there's lots of room for things to happen if I had to bet I would say that it's one of two 330 00:30:56,1 --> 00:31:00,46 possibilities you know there's only one or it happens all the time everywhere 331 00:31:00,54 --> 00:31:07,96 and I don't know what the answer is I think we can find out if we find out somehow the origin of life a little to tell 332 00:31:07,97 --> 00:31:10,68 us something about. 333 00:31:10,68 --> 00:31:14,06 Do what could have happened but can't happen at all 334 00:31:14,07 --> 00:31:20,64 or other planets know it I think it will answer everything if we have an idea that it it actually is not so hard you 335 00:31:20,65 --> 00:31:25,6 know maybe you have to have the right conditions then with all those experiments it's bound to happen over and over 336 00:31:25,61 --> 00:31:26,17 and over again 337 00:31:26,49 --> 00:31:33,01 but there are probably events that are very rare I don't think we have any idea how often the universe firms the ones 338 00:31:33,05 --> 00:31:34,37 how often does nothing 339 00:31:34,38 --> 00:31:41,29 but look into something how often does lifeless bourbon to life I don't know how to estimate that calendar 340 00:31:41,3 --> 00:31:50,15 or to Big Bird the bird a high Big Bang it's a movie that's a good idea purpose much for. 341 00:31:50,15 --> 00:31:54,12 But do you know that the issue of evolution is also interesting in another sense 342 00:31:54,85 --> 00:31:59,37 when Darwin thought about evolution he was thinking about finches and. 343 00:32:00,01 --> 00:32:07,00 And the gloom of those fears all of a ghost hinges and he was thinking about predators and prey 344 00:32:07,01 --> 00:32:12,77 and surviving in competition with other competitors at the beginning if you think about the beginning there were no 345 00:32:12,78 --> 00:32:16,69 competitors and the first cell had no living competitors but as it was 346 00:32:17,67 --> 00:32:22,01 and probably what it had to do more than fight off competitors 347 00:32:22,02 --> 00:32:27,17 and breed fast it had to fight off the consequences of meteor strikes and volcanoes 348 00:32:27,18 --> 00:32:34,5 and things of this sort so that it may well be that what at the beginning was Darwinian evolution was actually 349 00:32:34,51 --> 00:32:38,17 robustness the ability to survive dramatic change 350 00:32:38,53 --> 00:32:45,34 and then that evolved into the ability to run faster than you do what you want to Dieter what each age you 351 00:32:45,77 --> 00:32:54,55 and now the question is for the future yes what is going to be the vector for for for evolution what would we be 352 00:32:54,56 --> 00:33:02,12 running toward or running away from and if I think will be very interesting if we both run away from 353 00:33:02,13 --> 00:33:05,31 and toward something which we have created. 354 00:33:05,31 --> 00:33:10,06 That's interesting idea so we are one of the very few species that likes to be both predator 355 00:33:10,07 --> 00:33:17,95 and prey for ourselves so you're also telling us that we are kind of restarting with many of the issues that we created 356 00:33:17,96 --> 00:33:24,03 ourselves many of the issues we create ourselves one of the things that you worry about what do I worry about I don't 357 00:33:24,04 --> 00:33:26,92 know I don't worry about much because there isn't that much you can do 358 00:33:27,68 --> 00:33:33,43 but the kinds of things that I think in a personal sense one worries about in this. 359 00:33:33,43 --> 00:33:36,71 One has a vector mine happens to be children I care about children 360 00:33:37,69 --> 00:33:47,17 and so as a child you are basically raised in our society to do work and ideally work that makes a difference 361 00:33:47,18 --> 00:33:54,06 and meaningful work whatever meaningful is. If we find that we've handed everything over to. 362 00:33:54,06 --> 00:33:59,98 Some other form of machinery then we've got to figure out what what people do. 363 00:34:00,01 --> 00:34:04,12 What can people do to fill the day and that I think is a little worrisome 364 00:34:04,47 --> 00:34:08,18 but they're not sure even now in Western Europe 365 00:34:08,19 --> 00:34:13,81 and in the United States we have the constituent of problem that there are more people than there are good jobs for 366 00:34:13,82 --> 00:34:17,73 people and when that happens everyone becomes mischievous 367 00:34:18,06 --> 00:34:23,27 and mischievousness amplified with nuclear weapons leads to real trouble. 368 00:34:23,27 --> 00:34:31,53 What do you see as the role of signs a particular technology that is mean you could argue against with technologies 369 00:34:31,66 --> 00:34:36,00 operating on both sides of the equation since now it's creating lots of problems 370 00:34:36,01 --> 00:34:43,17 but often it's also seen as one of the fuse who sions of these there's no shortage of problems I mean just think for a 371 00:34:43,18 --> 00:34:49,1 moment we have the environment and the environment everyone is interested in energy and under it 372 00:34:49,11 --> 00:34:51,6 when there's interest in the C O two we all recognize it's a problem 373 00:34:51,64 --> 00:34:56,56 and we really don't have a good way of solving it the probably the best way is going to be. 374 00:34:56,56 --> 00:35:02,9 The most acceptable way it will be to reduce energy usage yes the other way of course is to reduce people 375 00:35:03,75 --> 00:35:07,91 and the most benign we have solving both of those problems is probably education 376 00:35:07,92 --> 00:35:11,35 and education is very popular so I don't know whether we've got that 377 00:35:12,1 --> 00:35:20,15 but there's that kind of issue we are creating we as human beings are creating a social construct that didn't exist 378 00:35:20,16 --> 00:35:25,93 ever before in history called the Make a city so fifty million or more people living in a small space 379 00:35:26,42 --> 00:35:33,37 and we have no idea how these things operate but they have to operate well for for the people you know 380 00:35:33,47 --> 00:35:40,15 and I think about this is being a purely chemical materials problem you have energy coming in you have food coming in 381 00:35:40,16 --> 00:35:47,15 you have waste going out you think about stuff spreading both information in epidemics you have to do things with the 382 00:35:47,16 --> 00:35:51,65 individual components but that will be done by a distributed system and so wonderful problem 383 00:35:52,38 --> 00:35:58,75 and then you have you see technology in some sense as having a court would let you sort out what is I think that will 384 00:35:58,76 --> 00:35:59,98 happen will happen yes. 385 00:36:00,17 --> 00:36:05,07 And that one has in I think a very interesting construct in Europe called Live exhaustion 386 00:36:05,78 --> 00:36:08,23 and live it's often is the home of B.S.F. 387 00:36:08,24 --> 00:36:12,92 Which is one of the few you know real chemical companies just standing 388 00:36:13,28 --> 00:36:20,45 and it's an enormous plot of land which is basically one factory and a mega city is almost the same thing 389 00:36:20,51 --> 00:36:25,83 and it did the same basic kind of construct stuff comes in energy is used stuff goes out 390 00:36:26,22 --> 00:36:34,13 but we know how to run Linux often because we created it yes we don't have any idea how to construct a megacity because 391 00:36:34,14 --> 00:36:41,29 it created itself there's a very interesting question I think if you look at the usual definitions of life you know 392 00:36:41,91 --> 00:36:53,98 self-aware energy using dissipating food and stuff out so for implicating would you say that the city was alive. 393 00:36:53,98 --> 00:36:59,91 I would yeah I mean it seems to me to have many of the right already rest exist so that's we've talked about the 394 00:36:59,92 --> 00:37:00,37 Internet 395 00:37:00,47 --> 00:37:07,55 but it may be that cities fall in the same category anyway there's the population of the world that is still poor 396 00:37:07,56 --> 00:37:14,24 and hungry I mean an enormous number of problems there there's the basic question of how we deal with the detritus from 397 00:37:14,25 --> 00:37:18,77 the past there's there's just an enormous number of problems how do you ease the pain 398 00:37:18,78 --> 00:37:24,12 and suffering of dying because we're all going to die how do you do this so there's no shortage of problems the 399 00:37:24,13 --> 00:37:32,24 question is how do you provide the education the interest the resources so that people are engaged in solving these 400 00:37:32,25 --> 00:37:39,55 problems which will be what we call jobs as opposed to watching their handheld devices which is not a job 401 00:37:39,71 --> 00:37:42,69 and making things even worse right when I was going to make it worse 402 00:37:42,7 --> 00:37:48,87 but it's a little bit of drawing a blank card is this is not about talking George about the problems in the world I 403 00:37:48,88 --> 00:37:56,13 want to ask you is not motivating your own research if you go into the lab and thinking about. 404 00:37:56,13 --> 00:37:59,98 The cost and some of these big challenges it is a major motivation. 405 00:38:00,54 --> 00:38:08,85 And my argument for it is that my salary and the salary of my students is paid for by people who deliver the mail 406 00:38:08,86 --> 00:38:10,94 and pump gasoline and things like that 407 00:38:11,45 --> 00:38:18,3 and the process you can follow the money the process is that they produce money they in corporations produce money 408 00:38:18,88 --> 00:38:22,86 which they give to the government which we all give to the government not because we're good people 409 00:38:22,87 --> 00:38:24,85 but because we go to jail if we don't 410 00:38:25,46 --> 00:38:30,97 but in the back of our mind is the idea that something comes out of it the government spends it for security 411 00:38:30,98 --> 00:38:31,67 and education 412 00:38:31,68 --> 00:38:38,09 and good things of that kind then the government of course has no way of actually doing anything with money because it 413 00:38:38,31 --> 00:38:46,83 just is sort of a bag man so the government takes the money and gives it to a tiny fraction of it to universities 414 00:38:46,84 --> 00:38:52,35 and sometimes to corporations on the theory that this makes for better outcomes 415 00:38:53,28 --> 00:39:02,84 and then the universities have no way of doing anything either so whatever they come up with knowledge or invention 416 00:39:02,85 --> 00:39:09,8 or whatever it might be has to be handed to another entity which is generally called a company to do something with yes 417 00:39:09,84 --> 00:39:15,96 and all of a sudden that produces something which society recognizes the person who put up the money recognizes his 418 00:39:15,97 --> 00:39:22,3 benefit but if you don't go through that it becomes self-referential it becomes. 419 00:39:22,3 --> 00:39:29,00 Academics saying that we deserve to be supported because basically we're stunningly beautiful 420 00:39:29,47 --> 00:39:35,39 and actually we're not that just like everybody else and so the world is full of problems 421 00:39:35,4 --> 00:39:40,87 and both from the point of view of helping to pay the bill you get the money you should give something in return 422 00:39:41,08 --> 00:39:47,34 and also because it is so immensely stimulating to work on a problem that you have no idea how to solve we should do it 423 00:39:47,76 --> 00:39:55,02 one particular problems that motivate you the one that we work on is we're very interested in health care for the 424 00:39:55,03 --> 00:39:59,98 developing world and in much of Africa some parts. 425 00:40:00,01 --> 00:40:07,41 South America Western China there are lots of places where things have gone wrong actually in much of the Middle East 426 00:40:07,42 --> 00:40:13,21 now for different reasons their people have very little access to health care they have very little access to hospitals 427 00:40:13,25 --> 00:40:18,12 they can't do what we do in the United States which is we feel sick we go to the emergency room 428 00:40:18,36 --> 00:40:24,77 and all of a sudden all the panoply of stuff is available so how do you how do you provide help 429 00:40:24,98 --> 00:40:33,99 and my argument at least in part as a chemist that you can't fix it if you can't measure it so that if you want your 430 00:40:34,00 --> 00:40:38,41 physician you want to help you have no help at what and that's diagnostics 431 00:40:39,08 --> 00:40:43,36 and so it's not much of the body of knowledge of the body and knowledge of the disease or the injury 432 00:40:43,37 --> 00:40:51,45 or whatever it might be so the question is how do you provide information in a way that's excessive all to people who 433 00:40:51,46 --> 00:40:54,58 do not have front end hospitals working with them 434 00:40:54,91 --> 00:41:01,56 and it's a very interesting problem because it actually super imposes almost on problems in animal health that are 435 00:41:01,57 --> 00:41:05,95 probably an environmental monitoring and the problem of the city and other things 436 00:41:06,67 --> 00:41:16,16 and what one asks as I would say more an engineer than a scientist in this regard is taking everything that you know 437 00:41:16,55 --> 00:41:22,25 can you come up with stuff that helps to fix this problem you know a way that it's affordable 438 00:41:22,26 --> 00:41:27,42 and easy enough that anyone can use it and it's simple and you can't really screw it up yes 439 00:41:27,56 --> 00:41:30,34 and I think the answer is yes but it is not straightforward 440 00:41:30,88 --> 00:41:40,7 but on the other hand probably did will involve some very kind of high advanced technology investigations right I mean 441 00:41:40,71 --> 00:41:45,43 it's you're not doing basic stuff you're really I think the answer is surely I think the answer is yes 442 00:41:45,44 --> 00:41:52,77 and no the actual work that we do is to make diagnostic systems that are based on the pieces of paper 443 00:41:53,34 --> 00:41:59,87 and this is the origin of this idea was that we were looking for some way of making. Systems that. 444 00:42:00,01 --> 00:42:07,77 Pump blood around and things of this kind in which we could adapt something that existed before for that purpose 445 00:42:07,78 --> 00:42:10,61 and what we settled on was making comic books 446 00:42:11,2 --> 00:42:18,31 but I was making comic books if you've ever seen a rotary press you know it generates enough pieces that big 447 00:42:18,32 --> 00:42:22,08 or enough area if you think about this way to cover the surface of the earth 448 00:42:22,13 --> 00:42:28,09 and you want to run in thirty miles an hour in a you know a sixty foot web it's amazing so the technology was there you 449 00:42:28,13 --> 00:42:36,72 know we had to do is in a sense think of how to use it and that part is is actually trying to make things low end 450 00:42:36,76 --> 00:42:42,19 and as simple as possible and simple is not easy a transistor is simple but it's not easy 451 00:42:43,00 --> 00:42:52,66 and then the high end part of it is that the assumption is everywhere that healthcare now will not be ever again just 452 00:42:52,7 --> 00:42:55,29 patient and doctor 453 00:42:55,47 --> 00:43:02,89 but rather patient doctor archival patient based database epidemiology that covers you know good fraction of world 454 00:43:03,03 --> 00:43:08,02 history all diseases of that sort we're not there yet you know datasets Hage data sets 455 00:43:08,31 --> 00:43:14,75 and so that's the highest end so putting these things together is what in the sense is interesting how do you take 456 00:43:14,76 --> 00:43:19,41 something which is designed at the level of individuals to be as simple as they can be 457 00:43:19,65 --> 00:43:27,4 but at the level of collectives is more sophisticated than we can really imagine thinking about also the collective So 458 00:43:27,41 --> 00:43:35,38 they're kind of the Man City of daytime for you know perhaps no I put what he's life history and medical history. 459 00:43:35,38 --> 00:43:36,66 It's going into the guts heart 460 00:43:36,67 --> 00:43:42,31 and analyzing this is where the costs of I just know not only doing that if you somehow do this as a species as a 461 00:43:42,32 --> 00:43:43,91 planet. 462 00:43:43,91 --> 00:43:52,39 But you know even there you see it very much just looking around any wrong you can tell if you walk into a room pretty 463 00:43:52,4 --> 00:43:59,67 much even not a doctor who's healthy and who's not and and the big things are weight. 464 00:44:00,88 --> 00:44:07,2 Exercise you can tell that by how people move not smoking and you can tell that by watching them 465 00:44:07,21 --> 00:44:13,34 when they smile their face either breaks up in normal crinkles or in plaques and. 466 00:44:13,34 --> 00:44:16,26 You know they have to look basically slept 467 00:44:16,27 --> 00:44:20,71 and they get to get enough rest it's not all that complicated now lots of other things happen 468 00:44:20,72 --> 00:44:26,65 when stuff begins to go wrong but we have a model in the United States in Europe in Japan 469 00:44:26,66 --> 00:44:29,22 and many places of high end of life medicine 470 00:44:29,79 --> 00:44:36,65 and it comes from this basic idea that life is invaluable so we will spend any amount of money to keep you going to 471 00:44:36,66 --> 00:44:41,28 find us necessary anything is necessary this doesn't make sense to me 472 00:44:41,61 --> 00:44:48,29 but if you take that point of view then you tend to focus on people who are already sick rather than the obvious which 473 00:44:48,3 --> 00:44:49,59 is keeping people healthy 474 00:44:50,31 --> 00:45:00,31 and you know my idea is that drop off the edge of the cliff rather than slowly sink into the swamp like a baby give up 475 00:45:00,32 --> 00:45:03,38 a lot of us and the brain. 476 00:45:03,38 --> 00:45:09,53 Jurors are you for the men to be optimistic I'm out where the world is heading over life is it I'm fundamentally 477 00:45:09,54 --> 00:45:13,72 immensely optimistic but I don't know optimistic about what 478 00:45:14,12 --> 00:45:20,75 but I don't know how it's going to come out do you know why what motivates your optimism. 479 00:45:20,75 --> 00:45:26,65 I think as a species we have tended to get better 480 00:45:27,58 --> 00:45:33,98 and life is not as miserable I spend very little time worrying about whether I'm going to be set upon by robbers 481 00:45:34,29 --> 00:45:42,07 whether I'm going to make it past my thirtieth birthday you know these kinds of things are got probably was not learned 482 00:45:42,08 --> 00:45:49,88 long ago it wasn't very long ago that it's one hundred years ago yet all of this was unknown children died of perfectly 483 00:45:50,12 --> 00:45:59,58 we regard perfectly preventable disease what's happened a little bit is that is the genie out of the bottle problem 484 00:45:59,65 --> 00:45:59,97 we've. 485 00:46:00,16 --> 00:46:07,7 Release the Internet we have nuclear weapons we have the ability to do things which we use for good 486 00:46:08,00 --> 00:46:10,92 but which if we're dumb we will use the wrong way 487 00:46:11,38 --> 00:46:17,51 and so the question is a little bit Are we smart enough to keep the car on the right side of the road 488 00:46:17,52 --> 00:46:24,31 or do we insist on driving in the wrong way I found interesting was an article I wrote there by Jonathan Norman I think 489 00:46:24,59 --> 00:46:29,54 from the mid fifty's the title or can be survive technology. 490 00:46:29,54 --> 00:46:36,92 And his conclusion was that it's like basic human qualities that help us answer that question just decency careful 491 00:46:36,93 --> 00:46:38,82 deliberation I agree with that yeah 492 00:46:39,58 --> 00:46:48,81 and the argument that comes into technology comes into science which I actually quite profoundly disagree with is that 493 00:46:48,82 --> 00:46:52,92 it is a subject which is distinct from ethics 494 00:46:52,93 --> 00:46:59,32 and human values that he thinks in human values do not help you solve problems in quantum mechanics on the other hand 495 00:46:59,36 --> 00:47:03,31 without ethics and human values you don't know what problems to solve or how to solve them 496 00:47:03,32 --> 00:47:10,81 or what to do with the answers once you have them so one of my major problem this with education now at least at the 497 00:47:11,63 --> 00:47:20,81 regular level is that we teach students what to do with enormous skill but we don't teach them why do you do it 498 00:47:21,68 --> 00:47:24,91 and is that the right thing to do and I think not for them 499 00:47:25,00 --> 00:47:34,48 and not for the society you think that we need these kind of moral and ethical dimensions to literally to survive. 500 00:47:34,48 --> 00:47:44,29 I think we need them to survive in a more direct way I think as a student if I were going into a field science would be 501 00:47:44,3 --> 00:47:49,67 one because so interesting and actually has the potential for impact on society 502 00:47:50,18 --> 00:47:55,31 but I would like to have the feeling that I'm doing it because it's important not because it's career advancing 503 00:47:55,79 --> 00:47:59,98 and that's something you can do in science it's not necessarily something. 504 00:48:00,01 --> 00:48:03,45 You can do if you are in other professions some other professions 505 00:48:03,86 --> 00:48:11,22 and to minimize that potential pleasure of doing something is not only interesting and technically challenging 506 00:48:11,23 --> 00:48:18,3 but also helps other people seems to me like a worthwhile thing to do I don't worry that you know. 507 00:48:18,3 --> 00:48:28,26 Our technologies and our insides become so advanced that they basically are understandable to Man Oh we talked about. 508 00:48:28,26 --> 00:48:33,12 Them and quantum mechanics and now many people have not a clue what is this is 509 00:48:33,13 --> 00:48:40,92 and this my death be driving our technology Well yes but I don't do you have a clue of how the Internet works 510 00:48:40,93 --> 00:48:49,69 and I don't know nor do I I mean I know how a transistor works sort of yes but do I really know and one of my. 511 00:48:49,69 --> 00:48:54,87 One of my annoyances in life is that I spend a fair amount of time on airplanes 512 00:48:54,88 --> 00:49:03,24 and on the sides of airplanes of these things called Wings and the wings hold the airplane up how they do so. 513 00:49:03,24 --> 00:49:05,47 That ever quite believe that it works out 514 00:49:05,48 --> 00:49:11,02 and yet there is a security there are those out that's right it's a miracle it's right it's just not itching to face 515 00:49:11,23 --> 00:49:12,91 Yes And you know 516 00:49:12,92 --> 00:49:19,56 when you start talking about the more sort of homey things like watching a baby develop It's unbelievable how does this 517 00:49:19,57 --> 00:49:23,57 happen no it's not technology but if you say that technology 518 00:49:23,58 --> 00:49:30,13 and life are just parts of the same different chapters of the same book then there should be common principles. 519 00:49:30,13 --> 00:49:33,07 GA talked about the wonder of seeing an airplane go up 520 00:49:33,14 --> 00:49:42,14 or a baby develop right is that sense of wonder important for you just as a scientist what I lived for I mean curiosity 521 00:49:42,15 --> 00:49:49,17 is if anomaly useful characteristic for a human being to have because you're never bored because you can never 522 00:49:49,18 --> 00:49:50,79 understand the world around you completely 523 00:49:50,8 --> 00:49:54,14 and so there's always something interesting going on so you're motivated by death 524 00:49:54,15 --> 00:49:59,98 but you don't know motivated I'm amused and interested and then so. 525 00:50:00,15 --> 00:50:05,23 Small parts of that become motivation and some believe in smaller parts become problems to work on so 526 00:50:05,42 --> 00:50:10,39 but you know if you look at anything and say how does that happen you can never answer the question 527 00:50:10,44 --> 00:50:16,78 and so it's an endlessly interesting business yes some kind of intuitive image about how much we don't now know how 528 00:50:16,79 --> 00:50:21,04 much is out there in terms of things to be discovered exploit 529 00:50:21,05 --> 00:50:28,66 but there's also the says there's a certain humility that comes from looking at something recognizing that you 530 00:50:28,67 --> 00:50:34,34 understand finally how it works and then coming back a week later and recognizing the sugar complex problem 531 00:50:34,7 --> 00:50:37,81 and you have a totally off base does and that happens over and over 532 00:50:37,82 --> 00:50:43,26 and over again is that true at the moment in your your early career that you were took the wrong Yeah 533 00:50:43,52 --> 00:50:49,41 and what I mean dissension every moment any time every day any time I say that I understand it I know I'm wrong it's 534 00:50:49,42 --> 00:50:51,66 just a question of how long it's going to take to find out 535 00:50:51,67 --> 00:50:56,77 and what the nature of the wrongnesses is that fundamental to science that you're always going to have are is always 536 00:50:56,78 --> 00:50:57,55 kind of moving 537 00:50:57,56 --> 00:51:05,67 and it has to be because how is the wonderful thing about quantum mechanics in particular is that it describes a world 538 00:51:05,68 --> 00:51:10,58 that we can't really understand let's assume it's right yes which I don't do one hundred percent no 539 00:51:10,59 --> 00:51:13,23 but let's assume it's right and how do I understand it 540 00:51:13,63 --> 00:51:20,18 and it's things like interference for example I used to think this was OK you know yet Ference was OK as it was 541 00:51:20,68 --> 00:51:25,27 when something happened with electrons whatever Alectryon was or if OTOH lot of things like that 542 00:51:25,87 --> 00:51:29,52 but now I find that Mr Zeilinger can take. 543 00:51:29,52 --> 00:51:35,83 Atoms and molecules actually big molecule Yes and run them through two slits 544 00:51:35,84 --> 00:51:42,24 and then does whatever happens behaving like a man like electro like an electron Yes I have no idea how to incorporate 545 00:51:42,25 --> 00:51:44,31 that idea in my universe 546 00:51:44,35 --> 00:51:50,28 and I think I would think quantum mechanics you know whatever the amount of introspection I think he would never come 547 00:51:50,29 --> 00:51:56,29 up with that why did something not be but talk by nature and we were very difficult students 548 00:51:56,51 --> 00:51:59,98 and it took a long time for us to appreciate it and then these are good. 549 00:52:00,05 --> 00:52:05,87 It's that say that perhaps spacetime is quantized. 550 00:52:05,87 --> 00:52:06,89 I mean I have the words 551 00:52:07,26 --> 00:52:15,94 but if you say to me time is quantized then that raises the question of what's going on in between the moment that's it 552 00:52:15,95 --> 00:52:19,17 ah yes and how do I describe that and it's clearly not an interest 553 00:52:19,18 --> 00:52:21,67 and of all notion now it may be that I phrased it wrong 554 00:52:21,68 --> 00:52:26,35 and it's something different if you think about it in a more sophisticated way than I can you can get your grip your 555 00:52:26,36 --> 00:52:27,87 mind around it get a grip on it 556 00:52:28,2 --> 00:52:35,24 but I can't I'm surprised how far we came in terms of understanding the world around us I mean it's soon to be 557 00:52:35,25 --> 00:52:36,53 absolutely spectacular 558 00:52:36,54 --> 00:52:45,39 and soon to be no science like forbidden for human beings Well yes I mean maze because of course. 559 00:52:45,39 --> 00:52:49,9 There's no probably no well it's not relative to it's always relative to what 560 00:52:50,38 --> 00:52:57,64 and if you say that there's some gigantic examination There were involved and there's a score of zero 561 00:52:57,9 --> 00:53:02,14 but clearly not a zero and then there's a score of one hundred in terms of understanding 562 00:53:02,15 --> 00:53:06,58 and I don't know now whether we're at five hundred ninety five in any of these areas 563 00:53:06,59 --> 00:53:12,46 and one of the things about chemistry is that actually the basics of putting together molecules 564 00:53:12,47 --> 00:53:21,31 and matter we understand to an extent we can use it as a tool box as well design what to do is a different issue yes. 565 00:53:21,31 --> 00:53:25,76 When you start talking this all western of basically your designer and what to make right 566 00:53:25,77 --> 00:53:29,24 and I design where you have the materials that's right you understand the materials 567 00:53:29,28 --> 00:53:36,74 but then if you take the next step and say that the problems now are megacities and public health and the poor 568 00:53:36,75 --> 00:53:43,38 and the environment all of those are problems in which you're dealing with collections of things you're dealing with 569 00:53:43,39 --> 00:53:44,11 systems 570 00:53:44,37 --> 00:53:51,57 and the solutions for an individual part of a system are not necessarily the right solutions for the system you know so 571 00:53:51,58 --> 00:53:57,55 we may have to redesign with a totally set of differ different set of design rules which are the systems rules as 572 00:53:57,56 --> 00:53:59,77 opposed to the individual component rules. 573 00:54:00,07 --> 00:54:01,39 That opens the whole book again 574 00:54:01,59 --> 00:54:06,92 but it's going back to her begin if a compositions were set in a sort of great of building blocks that you can make 575 00:54:07,14 --> 00:54:12,11 anything out of it but if the building blocks have the characteristic that you make something 576 00:54:12,12 --> 00:54:14,92 and it turns out to be exactly what you wanted to be 577 00:54:14,93 --> 00:54:20,42 but exactly the wrong thing for what turns out to be the problem which you didn't understand at the beginning yes yes 578 00:54:20,91 --> 00:54:27,98 you're going to say I'm just doing that that's right I judge if you. Go to no. 579 00:54:27,98 --> 00:54:35,12 Part of the series will sort of the kind of describing the various kind of I would say kind of personalities we find in 580 00:54:35,13 --> 00:54:45,68 science because now we might study the same phenomena but there's a great diversity also in the personal approach and. 581 00:54:45,68 --> 00:54:50,34 I'm looking here at this animal that's on the on the technological tell me what to do is 582 00:54:50,55 --> 00:54:56,59 and why is there this is a work hog and my wife bought this model back from someplace from Zambia 583 00:54:56,6 --> 00:54:59,95 or wherever she was and I'm very fond of it 584 00:55:00,73 --> 00:55:08,69 and one reason for being fond of it is that I do believe that in the idea of totems totem is an animal that you think 585 00:55:08,7 --> 00:55:17,81 might embody some of your best characteristics and so I have two and one of these totems is a. 586 00:55:17,81 --> 00:55:23,12 Rhinoceros and the reason I like rhinoceroses is it's not a particularly bright animal 587 00:55:23,16 --> 00:55:28,71 and it solves problems by going through the problems country while you go through the country well you don't go around 588 00:55:28,72 --> 00:55:32,16 the country well and I feel emotional can ship with that 589 00:55:32,87 --> 00:55:40,86 and then these are so beautiful these animals there you know not maybe to you and to me but to their mothers 590 00:55:40,9 --> 00:55:42,12 and it's so beautiful 591 00:55:42,47 --> 00:55:50,43 and so I feel I fit in that category too so I'm I'm I'm for both of these animals if you look around to look at your 592 00:55:50,44 --> 00:55:55,05 colleagues new you see other animals in the natural I do I do I do I do 593 00:55:55,06 --> 00:55:59,98 and they run all the way from the most glorious of creatures to others I have. 594 00:56:00,91 --> 00:56:11,75 One it would be impolite to make that that two column yes to call an. Excel spreadsheet but it's there. 595 00:56:11,75 --> 00:56:19,41 An issue which is an interesting one about which we haven't talked is the division between science and engineering 596 00:56:19,45 --> 00:56:23,98 or more properly I think the fact that that's not all there is. 597 00:56:23,98 --> 00:56:28,25 So your argument is there's an argument now in the United States that science 598 00:56:28,26 --> 00:56:32,16 and engineering are just slightly different colored versions of the same thing 599 00:56:32,21 --> 00:56:39,33 and I think that's not correct because science really like to understand things even if it's not necessarily useful yes 600 00:56:39,37 --> 00:56:46,11 and engineers have this wonderful enthusiasm for taking something that basically exists in some ways 601 00:56:46,45 --> 00:56:51,26 and making it better yes I mean it is a different point of view but there's a third part of it 602 00:56:51,34 --> 00:56:59,35 and maybe even a fourth part the third part is invention and people who are inventors are the ones who go from not 603 00:57:00,18 --> 00:57:06,64 and to one hundred or one to ten but from zero to one give an example of a canonical example of an invention 604 00:57:07,19 --> 00:57:12,85 and a canonical example of an invention is probably a transistor because there was no such thing before 605 00:57:13,12 --> 00:57:16,89 and it came into being for a different reason but a stool 606 00:57:17,1 --> 00:57:24,27 or a fire I mean these words of wheel we will begin by someone you know your invention is not necessarily a flash of 607 00:57:24,31 --> 00:57:27,92 lightning it may be a process that gets you somewhere 608 00:57:28,19 --> 00:57:35,39 but it nonetheless creates an idea concept of how the market will be and it's it wasn't there before yes 609 00:57:35,43 --> 00:57:41,52 and so we need to be a little bit careful not to say that you can be a scientist or you can be an engineer 610 00:57:42,02 --> 00:57:45,39 but that's all there is perhaps a difference between inventing something 611 00:57:45,4 --> 00:57:52,44 and discovering something because of the two are related Well in one case you look at the world 612 00:57:52,53 --> 00:57:56,41 and you see what's there that you don't understand and you have struck an idea from it 613 00:57:56,42 --> 00:57:59,29 and that's the charm of much of the. 614 00:58:00,01 --> 00:58:02,31 Interface between the physical sciences 615 00:58:02,32 --> 00:58:07,75 and the biological sciences life offers so many interesting opportunities to do that 616 00:58:08,71 --> 00:58:15,36 but the you know the other is sometimes you just are curious using Could this be done counterfactual thinking is 617 00:58:15,37 --> 00:58:21,89 actually I think very useful in science as if you get up in the morning and you say the sun rises in the east 618 00:58:22,64 --> 00:58:27,66 and you realise that what you're really saying is that every day I've looked at it the sun rose in the east 619 00:58:27,7 --> 00:58:34,31 but what would happen if the sun rose in the West and you are sometimes led into pathways that are quite interesting 620 00:58:34,32 --> 00:58:41,61 and sometimes you're led to go nuts right you know yeah both work yes what about the other disciplines No In particular 621 00:58:41,62 --> 00:58:43,24 if you think about invention 622 00:58:43,25 --> 00:58:51,47 or something creativity I also naturally think about the arts you think about the arts Yes And they of course operate 623 00:58:51,66 --> 00:58:53,08 in a somewhat different way 624 00:58:53,09 --> 00:59:00,97 but with the same kind of process if you look at the Arts which is so far as I can see a human construct it's a 625 00:59:00,98 --> 00:59:05,56 construct of sought and you ask how that happens and what do they come up with 626 00:59:05,57 --> 00:59:08,85 and how does that work it's astonishing 627 00:59:09,18 --> 00:59:16,95 and it you know part of that which is actually fairly interesting is that if you read as a child as I did science 628 00:59:16,96 --> 00:59:19,45 fiction. 629 00:59:19,45 --> 00:59:26,86 It's easy to look back and say well all they did was take about spaceships and the Internet 630 00:59:27,02 --> 00:59:28,96 and life on other planets 631 00:59:29,49 --> 00:59:34,09 but what you have to realise is they thought about all this before none of these ideas because they were I mean they 632 00:59:34,1 --> 00:59:40,29 created if you know where I just come into being yes and it was an astonishing act of creation 633 00:59:40,57 --> 00:59:44,81 and in the same way people create of course societies and they create personalities 634 00:59:45,33 --> 00:59:53,39 and the people who do this know things that we haven't gotten a grip on in some way that is there's also published our 635 00:59:53,43 --> 00:59:59,78 the power of our imagination Oh I don't know just that imagination and in driving this mean and how do you. 636 01:00:00,01 --> 01:00:05,06 Kind of explained is that we can see things imagine things that aren't there yet I don't think we know 637 01:00:05,95 --> 01:00:12,94 and one of the interesting notion was about for example machine intelligence is that. 638 01:00:12,94 --> 01:00:24,39 It is showing us things that we have not previously appreciated the interesting baby example was Alpha go the program 639 01:00:25,2 --> 01:00:31,92 that had the characteristic that it actually defeated the world's champion go to that's not so interesting 640 01:00:31,96 --> 01:00:34,92 but what was interesting to me was that there were apparently one 641 01:00:34,93 --> 01:00:44,12 or two games in which the program made moves which the human player apparently would not have made now that's creation 642 01:00:44,22 --> 01:00:49,94 and not his creation in a very defined universe with a tight set of rules but that's OK 643 01:00:49,95 --> 01:00:58,04 and that we know that that will change I found it interesting that actually does the feat of human beings by machine 644 01:00:58,47 --> 01:01:05,37 actually lead to a lot more interesting go because particularly with this element that this might be an incredible. 645 01:01:05,37 --> 01:01:07,12 And reaching process and yet 646 01:01:07,13 --> 01:01:16,99 when the standing to game one of the things that crops up in in science fiction is the notion of systems that can make 647 01:01:17,00 --> 01:01:18,17 very rapid decisions 648 01:01:19,17 --> 01:01:27,51 and if you look at an area which is tended to be one which stimulated great creativity in the sense which is where fair 649 01:01:27,63 --> 01:01:34,18 and you find exactly that's going on because those systems make decisions in ways and it distances 650 01:01:34,19 --> 01:01:40,08 and in wavelengths we can't begin to really get a good grip on yes so it's happening 651 01:01:40,09 --> 01:01:47,72 and everybody around you look you do in your group has a drone drones didn't exist ten years ago yes 652 01:01:47,73 --> 01:01:51,7 and now drones are everywhere now our little eyes you know flying around 653 01:01:51,71 --> 01:01:58,38 and looking for us in interesting directions so the opportunities for change are absolutely everywhere if you're 654 01:01:58,39 --> 01:02:03,78 curious about. You know can I make a bookcase fly yes I can make a book. 655 01:02:03,78 --> 01:02:11,07 We talk about artificial intelligence if you also talk about artificial imagination. 656 01:02:11,07 --> 01:02:15,51 That's a question to which the answer has to be yes but whether you 657 01:02:15,52 --> 01:02:23,88 and I can talk about it I don't know magination is the ability to imagine worlds the don't exist that's not enough 658 01:02:23,92 --> 01:02:26,7 because it has to be an interesting world that doesn't exist 659 01:02:26,71 --> 01:02:32,65 or a world that doesn't exist according to rules that people have not taken for granted yes 660 01:02:32,77 --> 01:02:40,08 and it is counterfactual I think it's basically a notion of imagining what cannot be assuming it to be asking how you 661 01:02:40,09 --> 01:02:44,76 get there and then asking what happens once you've gone there so there is perhaps a process 662 01:02:45,01 --> 01:02:52,54 but it's not something which everyone necessarily does in a way that has an influence on those around them to as we 663 01:02:52,55 --> 01:02:54,61 talked about the evolution of life 664 01:02:54,65 --> 01:03:01,31 and that they can you know from its very mysterious beginning through great complexity to the emergence of intelligent 665 01:03:01,32 --> 01:03:02,98 life. 666 01:03:02,98 --> 01:03:10,68 And now we're in this phase where certainly you know human beings but also you know very smart programs and Sheens 667 01:03:10,69 --> 01:03:15,89 and computers are kind of linked together. 668 01:03:15,89 --> 01:03:22,8 How do you see this mean if you just take a almost like a planetary perspective. 669 01:03:22,8 --> 01:03:25,00 That looks almost like the planet is coming alive 670 01:03:25,04 --> 01:03:33,1 and becoming an intelligent by itself yes I mean if you threw out the issue of replication why not why not have a 671 01:03:33,11 --> 01:03:40,49 planetary intelligence that consist of everything one of the more interesting technological things that's come along in 672 01:03:40,5 --> 01:03:46,67 the last period of time has been the ability to read signals from the brain 673 01:03:46,68 --> 01:03:52,28 and use those to cause intentional Motions Universe run a robotic arm 674 01:03:52,29 --> 01:03:54,85 or something like that it's pretty primitive at this point 675 01:03:55,38 --> 01:03:59,95 but what it connecting our minds to set sort of say the mind of the robot the mind. 676 01:04:00,01 --> 01:04:07,03 The mind of robot has and it's at the action as a level not of sought but at the level of. 677 01:04:07,03 --> 01:04:10,1 Action and mechanics but it's a step 678 01:04:10,37 --> 01:04:15,43 and it's really interesting step to a world in which you don't have to have physical connections 679 01:04:15,44 --> 01:04:23,47 and have things happen now you say that well there's no way of going from that to. 680 01:04:23,47 --> 01:04:32,05 Something which is more to do with thinking on the other hand having tried Oculus Rift I can't tell the difference 681 01:04:32,06 --> 01:04:36,34 between that world and the real world it's a virtual reality it's a virtual reality yet solved 682 01:04:36,8 --> 01:04:43,25 and so you put all of this together and all of a sudden you begin to imagine moving things at a distance 683 01:04:43,31 --> 01:04:51,51 and looking through the eyes of those who are not you at these things in wavelengths that you can't imagine you will 684 01:04:51,52 --> 01:04:52,62 build memories from that 685 01:04:52,71 --> 01:04:59,2 and you will construct your own reality from that so I don't know that I necessarily have to think what you're thinking 686 01:04:59,31 --> 01:05:04,72 but if I experience what you're experiencing it may have the same effect and I'm shake shaping your brain 687 01:05:04,73 --> 01:05:09,58 and you're shaping my Yeah you're welcome to go at mine. 688 01:05:09,58 --> 01:05:14,99 If you take even more a kind of a wider perspective think of it you know of the cosmos 689 01:05:15,00 --> 01:05:20,93 and in the title of the series is the mind of the universe. 690 01:05:20,93 --> 01:05:27,5 Is that grandiose overstatements what we are doing here on planet Earth. 691 01:05:27,5 --> 01:05:35,29 Where we've got a problem when one goes long distances we think because of the issues of speed of light 692 01:05:35,76 --> 01:05:42,04 but on Earth that's not such much of a problem really we we are a little limited 693 01:05:42,05 --> 01:05:47,86 but not that much limited so is there any reason to think we couldn't have global connectivity we have global 694 01:05:47,87 --> 01:05:52,74 connectivity you know it's just a question of having it adapt and evolve 695 01:05:53,49 --> 01:06:02,01 and what it evolves into what are the what will be the evolutionary pressures on a system in which. There are no. 696 01:06:02,01 --> 01:06:08,51 Competitors and because very again it's only one in August or Well that's right 697 01:06:08,62 --> 01:06:15,26 but of course there was only one cell at the beginning in it evolved its own predator yes that makes funny like you see 698 01:06:15,74 --> 01:06:22,64 this is outside of my lifetime but it's not necessarily outside of lifetimes twenty generations from now yes 699 01:06:23,07 --> 01:06:31,46 and in fact you can argue I suppose that hiking is a little first you know it's one Finch throwing a stone at another 700 01:06:31,47 --> 01:06:34,09 thing it was something of that kind. 701 01:06:34,09 --> 01:06:43,23 I going back again to a beginning of your life and I were you told to get your child interested in math and science. 702 01:06:43,23 --> 01:06:47,47 Coffee looking back everything you've seen. 703 01:06:47,47 --> 01:06:52,45 Are you amazed by just what what happened what you've seen in terms of science and research 704 01:06:52,46 --> 01:06:55,95 and technology you have to be amazed of course one is amazed 705 01:06:55,99 --> 01:07:02,26 and one is amazed every day the there's a little bit of a problem in that kind of question because I would have been 706 01:07:02,27 --> 01:07:09,13 amazed by almost anything as children don't know anything so everything is amazing I mean if you ask what's the best 707 01:07:09,3 --> 01:07:10,00 scientist 708 01:07:10,01 --> 01:07:14,77 and everyone who thinks about it would agree the best scientist in the world is two year old yes who invents all these 709 01:07:14,78 --> 01:07:17,41 Newtonian physics false falling down 710 01:07:17,42 --> 01:07:23,36 and all the rest of it while inventing language while doing all the rest is just truly phenomenal that's what they do 711 01:07:23,37 --> 01:07:28,42 because they're really interested yes because if they don't get it right they thought that it isn't the book was 712 01:07:28,43 --> 01:07:31,33 downhill from there they spend their days are in a sense 713 01:07:31,96 --> 01:07:36,01 but you know I think it would be equally amazed by just going out 714 01:07:36,02 --> 01:07:42,24 and looking at the world yes that what you get in science is the ability to intervene 715 01:07:42,78 --> 01:07:50,93 and that makes to me a world of difference I just think it's so much fun to figure out I think that my work that way 716 01:07:50,94 --> 01:07:55,65 well if it works that way maybe if I poke here something will come out over there and I poke here 717 01:07:55,66 --> 01:07:56,82 and it doesn't it comes out of you 718 01:07:57,01 --> 01:08:02,93 and that you know that really gets you up in the morning thank you for sharing some of that fun with us it's been a 719 01:08:02,94 --> 01:08:04,04 real pleasure thank you Rick.