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<v Intro>This session of the 2013 Adelaide Festival of Ideas was recorded by</v>

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Radio Adelaide through the support of the Vast mid library,

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University of Adelaide,

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The University of South Australia library and Flinders University library.

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Welcome everyone. My name.

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<v Robert Phideon>Name is Robert Phideon.</v>

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I'm the chair of the Festival of Ideas and I'm and I'm an associate professor in

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English at Flinders University which is in fact,

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one of the sponsors along with Adelaide University of the Festival of Ideas.

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I like to keep reminding people a welcome to the Festival Art in today's

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session,

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looking to the stars in search of our place in the universe with a truly,

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truly sorry, stellar panel.

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I acknowledged that today we are gathered on the traditional country of the

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garner people of the Adelaide Plains.

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We recognise and respect their cultural heritage,

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beliefs and relationships with the land. We acknowledge that they are,

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that their continuing importance to the garner people living today,

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and we respect their elders and their past

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a bit of housekeeping. Before we get going,

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please switch off your mobile phones or at least turn them on to silent.

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Because the next thing I tell you,

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I can tell you is that the tweet handle is at at ADL FOI,

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hashtag.

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And so how you do that if you've just turned your phone off is a little beyond.

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Even me,

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unauthorized recordings of any kind are not permitted during the session.

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Today's session is being introduced, being interpreted by Icelands silence,

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always fill me with admiration

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then being audio recorded by radio Adelaide for broadcast and future

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podcasts.

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And now I'd declared session,

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open booking to the stars.

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A humanist walked into a room and didn't find an Englishman, an Irishman,

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and a Scotsman. He found that populated by people,

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fascinated with the furthest reaches of the universe, the future,

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the faith of the planet, that humanist is me.

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I am way out of my depth. That's what I like about the festival of ideas.

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And that's definitely what I like about the stars.

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All my humans concerns seem nothing to them.

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I spend my life with human concerns and that is strangely refreshing.

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I will find that they make no claim on me. It's a sort of cleansing thing.

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This is what I feel most intensely with nature.

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And particularly the stars are six speakers tonight. In fact,

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will take us to the stars in different and far better informed ways than I could

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from the literal to the figurative. So it's not all astronomy.

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There's plenty of information, the program and you are in,

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you're not here to hear me speak any longer.

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So I will not detain him with long introductions.

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We'll start a brief presentation from each speaker.

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And then we'll move on to question and answer.

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We might have some questions from the panel of each other,

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or we might go straight to the audience depending on how we go for time.

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And there is a, there is an almost certain risk that we'll we'll.

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We will take a couple of minutes extra to get through.

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So such a wealth of material.

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So I'll just introduce each of them now and then get out of your way.

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Ben Pederick will be going first he's co-founder of good morning,

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beautiful films.

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He has been making nature documentaries around the world for organisations such

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as national geographic USA, radio free Asia,

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and the nature Conservancy on environmental themes since 1996

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in we'll start in a moment with brief film and then he will,

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and then he will throw to a few words from auntie Beryl,

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who is here this evening who is the real owner of the stories.

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Second will be full bland professor of planetary science in the,

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in the department of applied geology.

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If you haven't got the photos in front of you, I'm working across the room

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it's a concept in science at at sorry

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applied geology at Curtin university in Perth.

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He knows more about the significance of primitive meteorites than nearly anyone.

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Certainly more than me then called Davies polymath

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of the Arizona state universities beyond center for fundamental concepts in

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science.

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He's a world renowned astrophysicist and a great public intellectual to whom

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then 2013 Festival of Ideas is dedicated.

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Then Christina Grecia is a leading consumer trends expert.

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Who's likely to be more figurative in our understanding of the stars than

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perhaps Paul might be who's particularly engaged in the,

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in the need to fit consumption to the natural rhythms of the world.

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She acts on the belief that to avoid trashing the star we're on consumers need

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to use our imaginations to understand their place better or naturally more

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rhythmically. And finally, Sean Williams

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is who is certainly Australia's ranking science fiction writer over 40

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novels. I mean, how many of us managed to read 40 novels in a year,

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little and write them published internationally for him the stars,

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I've always been a creative space,

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a space where science and imagination can collide.

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So we'll start with a brief, we'll start with Ben.

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Pederick will introduce a brief film and the mission move on. Thank you.

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<v Ben Pederick>[Inaudible] Good evening, everyone. I just wanted to,</v>

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to introduce a short film that conveys a story that Annie Beryl Carmichael,

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who's sitting behind you tonight and the AMPA elder from the Menindee lakes

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area. She's us to talk about the film once you played it. So it'll,

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I'm sure open your eyes and your minds. I hope you enjoy it.

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<v 4>We're on the side of light Minnelli</v>

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and light Mindy was very important

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to my people as much as it was to me.

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When we lived on a mission, they would come out here and go hunting.

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There were lots of a shelter out here. You can camp anywhere.

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Oh, people always said that we got two laws,

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one on the land and one up in the night,

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wow. Lying on the ground and on your swag and gazing up into the sky.

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Does the sky, the Milky way,

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a very prominent you can't mistake it.

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Then all there.

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They explained to us that that was carpet snake.

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We call him thorough.

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It was his duty to travel all over the country and plant,

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put the seeds there for the Plains.

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They decided that singing spirit up into the night sky for a certain

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monitors that are only for him and through his actions

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that we had an abundance of food.

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Another story with EMU EMU is up in the night sky

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with his foot in the coal sack. And when you see him sitting down,

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you know,

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that you can gather the eggs from middle

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of autumn rod through to Bab end the voguers.

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But after that, when you look up in the sky again, and you'll say like,

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just like Amy was starting to rise up, that's when, you know,

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you must unpack the egg they added.

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If we go at the wrong time. Well, that's not, we're breaking the law

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because these stories, when I'm talking better

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Nanda dam for thousands and tens of generations.

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So, you know,

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the simple messages that's imparted to us through the stars

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through the night sky, it's very meaningful,

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you know, often think with the,

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with all the stories up in the night sky,

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what do people still go wrong?

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<v Ben Pederick>I think I'd work that out.</v>

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That story is a part of a series of films that many films,

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over a hundred stories that we've been working with Aboriginal elders across the

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Murray-Darling river to create. They'd been sharing their stories with us,

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and they understand that it's only through those kinds of participations that

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Australia can really learn about the wealth of culture that it has here.

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And over that four year journey of doing this work I've had

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the privilege to spend time with many different Aboriginal knowledge holders

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and, and teachers. I should also recognize that Annie Cheryl Buchanan,

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Guam elder is here with us tonight. She's also part of this project.

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And there's been times when my sense of human time has

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been vastly expanded times when I've been talking to somebody who's

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talked as casually about yesterday as about time before the last ice age,

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when they used to walk to Cambridge Ireland.

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And there's been nights where I've laid under the stars and people have shown

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me forms in the stars that I've seen on rock walls.

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And I've seen painted on bodies and I've seen sun and that are their own

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identities that are their own spirits.

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These are living around us in Australia and they immediately replaced Ryan and

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the panhandle and these very sort of hard to

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relate to Western European stories that still exist in my mind.

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And it started to make me realise that my relationship,

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not only to nature that I, you know, the, the terrestrial world,

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but actually to the universe, the cosmos,

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as I perceive it every night has been vastly limited at exactly the same time

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that we've learned so much about it through science and the work of people at

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professor Davis. We've seen to have blinded ourselves to the experience,

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the direct experience of including the stars in our

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understanding of ourselves. And I just wanted to you know,

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I'm very grateful that the festival of ideas has allowed us to share this story

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with you and allowed me to come here.

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But most importantly antiviral Carmichael is here tonight.

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And I think it's important that she's able to speak about those stories.

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So she's up at the bank and.

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<v 4>Thank you very much, Ben. Yeah, sorry. I'm happy if folks,</v>

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it was not, not my doing,

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but unfortunately it was too hard for me to come back up with my

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just complaints and so on. So I took advantage of the fair safeties and Sydney,

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but I'd like to pay my respects to the elders of the traditional

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elders past and present of this land as well. The guy, people,

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we work very closely together.

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I work with a lot of the Aboriginal people from south Australia.

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I've had them come out to them in India, as artists,

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as well to work in my camps.

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And we built up a great relationship to the extent as a fan.

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They have some of their people from like Menindee moved over here to

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south Australia when Mitchell went up to Darwin.

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So that's how long ago the people disappeared from rim in indie.

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Like I went to South Australia and I was really lucky and fortunate to

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mix up with them in the last 10 to 20 years. So yeah,

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the stories are very important.

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And when we used to go at droving and lying on our swagger in the camp for her

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facing all that,

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and mama matelasse was look up in the sky and find the,

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find the pictures that we needed for whatever we wanted to do,

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you know? And,

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but the one I liked the most was I guess the six sisters,

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seven sisters up in NASCAR, the pledges,

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I'm not very good at the scientific names of the style,

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but like I know the pattern. So that helped me a lot.

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And so when we look at the night sky,

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when the seven sisters are up in,

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especially in light January after the new moon, we called the new moon,

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but the first quarter has gone down.

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It is time for the 6,000 sisters to go out and hunt the pokey pine,

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the kidney. And when they go hunting the pokey pond,

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we're angry for the poor me barn meat.

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So it's a two way thing and the link between the night sky

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and every no people. And that's been going on, like I said,

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for generations in general,

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but it's still very important to us today makes us

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think about that respect that we have for that animal. Never kill him.

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Beef ran Christmas time or before, because that's when he's nasty.

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He settling down the nest.

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So there's the range of stories up in the night sky.

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And eventually we'll probably get them all out in book form

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that I got one out now and it's called the story of the Southern cross and the

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Southern cross got in the sky. And once again,

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that's linking us to the night sky because of broader

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star in the Southern cross is even better and ever there is a possum

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and we tell the little children, when you go wander away from camp,

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you look and see where ever there is those broad star. And when you,

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if you lose track of time and you know,

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you get carried away doing things and you get lost,

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but you look back and find evidence and he'll guide you back home again.

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So there's all these things up there with meanings, for everything we do,

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whatever we do on land is done up there in the stars.

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And I get a bit shaky, I suppose, because I have,

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I keep thinking,

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I'll let you people then standing happy beyond that.

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I can't talk for too long,

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but I just like to say to Ben and his team as well,

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they did an excellent job. And we spent a lot of time.

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We may have turned around a few times,

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but we got going again and done everything right.

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And I'm here. If anyone asks me questions after or whatever that,

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just remember that the nod sky is our all new

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calendar. I guess I can say for us on top of the four seasons,

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once we got the four season on land and we got the others up the night sky

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for us.

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So there's all range of pitches and things to come out that

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we must get out for the sake of our children.

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And for the sake of our people who haven't heard the stories

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or down the stories of the night sky as well,

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the big fellow opened his eye in the morning and Molly on Molly on his Eagle

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Hawk, he wakes us up the Dawn.

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So there's things like that that we can pass on to the children.

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There's a whole range of stuff there, but I can't talk for too long.

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I'm sorry about that. When anyway,

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thanks very much for giving me this opportunity to be, to not.

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<v Ben Pederick>It's,</v>

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it's ironic really only that you couldn't make it down here because it makes you

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a little bit like you're up in the sky or anyway, we all have to look up.

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And it's not,

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it's not for me to speak about indigenous and traditional knowledge.

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So I just wanted to say that from my experience of this

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the vastness of the knowledge that exists in this country,

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and when I say vastness, I don't just mean geographical. I mean you know,

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chronological or, or historical. I mean, the,

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these are shared records of time that stretch back at

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least 50,000 years.

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And that reflect a sense of yourself in

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which the changing of the night sky as things actually change as stars have

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moved. I mean, that, that's, that's part of that, that,

255
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that clock that that people have existed with intimately

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until just, you know, 200 years ago, or it's still do exist with sorry,

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but was the prominent clock in this country. And it's, it's a,

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it's a clock that we can we can all actually learn to read

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it's there.

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And it's strange one because the S the act of telling stories which

261
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has such a link to the way in which our minds retain information

262
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is also somehow perfect for ordering things as vast as the

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cosmos, as it spins over our heads.

264
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So there's got to be many things that are much more profound than ones that I

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could say now that could come out of our engaging with that,

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that level of of living knowledge. Thank you very much.

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Thank you. An antiviral Feel blend.

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<v Robert Phideon>You can sit down, I think, yeah, I think it's the end of the day. All.</v>

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<v Phil Bland>Right. My name is Phil Bland.</v>

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I'm a planetary scientist as a planetary scientist.

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We're interested in both the formation of the solar system and its evolution

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how planets have changed over time. So,

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so geologists basically study the earth and the earth system,

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planetary scientists are interested in all rocks,

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I guess in space, the whole,

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the whole caboodle actually just the link to Ben's

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piece. One of the things that I love doing,

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one project that I'm doing right now is we're trying to put a network of cameras

279
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all the way across Australia,

280
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so that we'll be able to image the whole night sky all the

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time, every,

282
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so some of those images are really beautiful because I,

283
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a lot of what I do you know, we'll analyze a rock in the lab,

284
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we'll get back a string of numbers, and then we'll try and,

285
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and say something about what that means.

286
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But it's a joy to be doing the project. So the project that I do, where, where,

287
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you know, the data is in these incredible images that we get,

288
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and I do love that.

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So one of the things that we're going to try and do with that is basically make

290
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it available to everyone so that you'll be able to see what the cameras are

291
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seeing at any given time. Okay.

292
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So that's that one project now as a planetary size,

293
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one of the things we're trying to get at is, is how the solar system formed.

294
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So the way that we,

295
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the way that I'm interested in getting at that is using me, tries me,

296
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tries to the oldest rocks and existence we tries are if you ever hold

297
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one in your hands that's the oldest thing you'll ever hold in your hands,

298
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four and a half billion years old.

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And there's actually grains in the tiny little micron size grains

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in them that are even older than that, that formed in the atmospheres of other,

301
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the stars,

302
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supernovae or the stars that contributed to the giant

303
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ball of Dustin gas that was there before our solar system formed.

304
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And one of the exciting things for me is you started out as a geologist,

305
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is that we still don't know how we went from a cloud of

306
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dust and gas to make terrestrial planets,

307
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which is what a geologist calls, planet, slave, Rocky planets,

308
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like mercury Mars the earth Phoenix. We,

309
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we still don't know how to do that. We know how the earth works in great detail.

310
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We don't know how we made the earth,

311
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which is like kind of a big hole. And no.

312
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So so one of the things that I'm trying to get out with obviously many,

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many of the thousands of people is answering that question is like,

314
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is how did we get a composition of the earth where we've got that beautiful

315
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balance between, between, you know, rock. And that must fear and water.

316
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There's not 30 kilometers of ocean of Rover heads which you might've expected

317
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if a whole bunch of other processes hadn't happened.

318
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So that's part of the story and that obviously feeds into

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into life and, and,

320
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and life in the universe.

321
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And we know we've got you know,

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we've got this one example of,

323
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of life on our own planet that seemed to pop up within a hundred

324
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or 200 million years of of when there was so many impacts going

325
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on on the surface of the earth,

326
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that it was probably not an equitable environment before that time.

327
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So it was kind of life popped up pretty much as soon as he could is what is the

328
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ballpark information that we have,

329
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which gives optimist like me a feel that maybe, you know,

330
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maybe we'll get life on other planets as well. And it's basically

331
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optimists that drive the all the missions to Mars and

332
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places like, well, Mars basically,

333
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because the reason why we keep throwing space probes at Mars and not

334
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Venus for instance, is because people think that there might be life on Mars.

335
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We want to test that. So NASA won't sign up to,

336
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we're looking for life on Mars with our beautiful new curiosity Rover,

337
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but that's basically the reason, but they're,

338
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they're in all these incredible missions to Mars to try and find things like

339
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that. So it's, it's,

340
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it's missions to Mars to try and find evidence of life now or missions

341
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other solar system objects like Europa, where we think maybe this life,

342
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or it certainly could be an equitable region where terrestrial

343
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life could exist.

344
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If you put some terrestrial bacteria under the ice on Europa,

345
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which is one of Jupiter's moons it would, it would probably be okay,

346
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so maybe it would also be an environment where life could have arisen.

347
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And we might have answers to those questions within within a few decades.

348
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So, so speaking to someone who's kind of, you know,

349
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started out in this field 15,

350
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20 years ago is exciting to be, to have the feel that, you know,

351
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we might actually be getting answers to some of these questions over

352
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my own career. They might be negative answers.

353
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They might be pessimistic answers very bad, but it'd still be very useful.

354
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And the other one that I've,

355
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that I'm very excited about is is a bit outside my

356
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own specialty. It's kind of where planetary science meets astronomy. So,

357
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so astronomers recently,

358
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I've been doing some beautiful observations of of relatively nearby stars.

359
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So stars in our region of the galaxy to try and spot whether there

360
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are other planets around those stars. When I started out as an undergrad

361
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okay.

362
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20 years ago we actually I was a geologist.

363
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We didn't even know if there were any other planets in the universe,

364
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apart from what existed in our own solar system. So as a geologist,

365
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that makes you incredibly important because you might be looking at the only

366
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example of a planet like the earth and you were in the universe.

367
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Now the, the astronomers have been looking at these are the nearby stars,

368
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and we've got evidence of,

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of almost a thousand other planets in in

370
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nearby stars in the galaxy. And this is, this is a field that's, you know,

371
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it's only 15 years old, really. So what's going to be found,

372
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what's going to be discovered over the next 10, 20, 30 years.

373
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It's just anyone's guess the goal is that in the end,

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what they found mostly now are, are big planets,

375
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like Uranus, Neptune, Jupiter sat, they have found smaller ones.

376
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The it's basically just the instruments that they've been using.

377
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If when they use better telescopes, there'll be able to see smaller objects.

378
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The goal is that when we've seen a whole bunch of,

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of terrestrial size planets, we'll be able to image them.

380
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And even if it's just a pixel on a, on an image,

381
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we'll be able to get an idea of what the atmosphere is like at that point or for

382
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that planet.

383
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Now there's a wacky thing about the earth that we have an oxygenated atmosphere

384
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and there's me Fein in it.

385
00:26:00.111 --> 00:26:04.820
And there's things like that that is completely out of

386
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equilibrium with, with if we were a dead planet it'd be,

387
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it'd be all carbon dioxide. It'd be like Venus.

388
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So our atmosphere is basically shouts

389
00:26:17.361 --> 00:26:20.750
out that there's a biosphere on the earth.

390
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And if anyone was looking from 50 light years away they'd be able to

391
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tell that there's a biosphere here.

392
00:26:27.530 --> 00:26:30.800
They wouldn't be able to tell what it was in detail,

393
00:26:31.070 --> 00:26:34.670
but they'd know that there was life. And the exciting thing is, again,

394
00:26:34.850 --> 00:26:39.740
is that in the next generation we sift through those other planetary systems.

395
00:26:39.741 --> 00:26:44.070
We might actually get an answer to that and he could happen tomorrow,

396
00:26:44.490 --> 00:26:47.010
which is kind of bonkers.

397
00:26:47.130 --> 00:26:51.690
So so that's my take, sir.

398
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<v 6>Yep. Cool. Yep. Hello everybody. So does he work good?</v>

399
00:27:04.640 --> 00:27:08.180
I'm director of the beyond center for fundamental concepts and science.

400
00:27:08.330 --> 00:27:13.010
I was in a state university and our motto is confronting the big questions.

401
00:27:13.370 --> 00:27:16.010
And one of the biggest questions everybody asks is,

402
00:27:16.100 --> 00:27:18.320
are we alone in the universe?

403
00:27:19.520 --> 00:27:24.350
And so I'm going to pick up where Phil left off the question about whether

404
00:27:24.351 --> 00:27:28.580
there is life elsewhere in the universe and in particular intelligent life is

405
00:27:28.581 --> 00:27:30.260
one that everybody thinks about.

406
00:27:31.490 --> 00:27:34.460
And I speak to you with no authority, whatever,

407
00:27:34.880 --> 00:27:39.650
except chairing a curious body called the settee post

408
00:27:39.651 --> 00:27:41.030
detection task group.

409
00:27:41.570 --> 00:27:45.950
SETI stands for search for extraterrestrial intelligence.

410
00:27:47.000 --> 00:27:51.500
And this is a program that started about 52 years ago.

411
00:27:52.910 --> 00:27:54.470
It's a heroic program,

412
00:27:54.680 --> 00:27:59.300
sweeping the skies with radio telescopes in the hope of stumbling across a

413
00:27:59.301 --> 00:28:04.040
radio message from ITI and the post detection task

414
00:28:04.041 --> 00:28:08.960
group is supposed to deliberate on what do we do if something

415
00:28:08.961 --> 00:28:13.250
is picked up. And so I like to say that if he T calls on my watch,

416
00:28:13.520 --> 00:28:18.380
I should be the Fest. And and then the question is what next

417
00:28:19.910 --> 00:28:24.350
the task group is a mostly collection of scientists,

418
00:28:24.380 --> 00:28:28.610
journalists. We've got a couple of lawyers, a priest,

419
00:28:29.000 --> 00:28:33.230
and a science fiction writer, and we meet from time to time. There's no budget,

420
00:28:33.231 --> 00:28:36.980
so we don't meet very often, but we circulate information quite a bit.

421
00:28:37.340 --> 00:28:41.690
And just in the last six months or so we've been

422
00:28:42.230 --> 00:28:46.850
considering a paper which has been published by a couple of Russian.

423
00:28:49.580 --> 00:28:51.050
<v Ben Pederick>Molecular biologists.</v>

424
00:28:51.200 --> 00:28:56.030
<v 6>Basically claiming that if you look very carefully at the genetic code,</v>

425
00:28:56.450 --> 00:29:01.190
the universal code that translates the language of

426
00:29:01.191 --> 00:29:05.720
DNA and to the language of proteins that are buried in the mathematics of this

427
00:29:05.721 --> 00:29:10.280
code is a pattern a message if you like from ETS.

428
00:29:10.310 --> 00:29:12.950
So this is sometimes called genomic SETI.

429
00:29:13.190 --> 00:29:17.840
This means that ITI has sent us a message, not via radio waves,

430
00:29:17.841 --> 00:29:22.550
but embedded in the molecular architecture of very own

431
00:29:22.670 --> 00:29:26.540
cells. So that's a bit of a wild one. So we've been evaluating that.

432
00:29:26.720 --> 00:29:30.380
So as you can imagine, all sorts of curious people get in touch with us,

433
00:29:30.590 --> 00:29:35.570
but it is our job to sort of figure out how will we recognize a

434
00:29:35.571 --> 00:29:38.000
message from an extraterrestrial civilization?

435
00:29:38.001 --> 00:29:40.430
If we saw one what do we do about it?

436
00:29:41.350 --> 00:29:44.980
If we do see one I could talk all night about this. I don't,

437
00:29:44.981 --> 00:29:47.110
I know we're limited to like five or six minutes.

438
00:29:47.440 --> 00:29:51.430
I just wanted to say that there is no lack of, as Phyllis explained,

439
00:29:51.431 --> 00:29:56.200
there's no lack of real estate out there on which life could form.

440
00:29:56.440 --> 00:30:00.700
Our galaxy alone probably has about 1 billion Earth-like planets,

441
00:30:00.970 --> 00:30:04.690
but just because somewhere is suitable for life,

442
00:30:04.750 --> 00:30:09.430
just because it's habit to bull doesn't mean it's inhabited seeing as we have no

443
00:30:09.431 --> 00:30:11.080
idea how life gets going.

444
00:30:11.651 --> 00:30:15.610
It's impossible to say whether it's going to pop up obligingly on all of these

445
00:30:16.270 --> 00:30:17.980
potentially habitable planets,

446
00:30:18.310 --> 00:30:23.020
or whether it's life on earth is still a stupendously bizarre

447
00:30:23.021 --> 00:30:26.290
fluke that may have happened at once in the observable universe.

448
00:30:26.291 --> 00:30:30.580
We have no idea on that spectrum and no way even to figure out how we can figure

449
00:30:30.581 --> 00:30:34.660
out the likelihood that there may be life elsewhere.

450
00:30:34.661 --> 00:30:37.390
So whilst we're scratching our heads,

451
00:30:38.050 --> 00:30:41.740
the people with the radio telescopes are continuing to listen so far,

452
00:30:41.920 --> 00:30:44.290
nothing only an eerie silence.

453
00:30:44.950 --> 00:30:49.030
But of course the absence of evidence doesn't mean it's evidence for absence.

454
00:30:49.541 --> 00:30:51.490
So we watch and we wait and we think,

455
00:30:51.850 --> 00:30:55.510
and I just hope that in my lifetime,

456
00:30:55.720 --> 00:30:59.650
we get a bit of a clue as to where on that spectrum for,

457
00:31:00.150 --> 00:31:04.480
we are alone in the universe to it's teaming the life just somewhere on that

458
00:31:04.481 --> 00:31:07.810
spectrum. A bit of a clue would be nice to,

459
00:31:07.850 --> 00:31:12.700
to know in the next, however long I've got. So I'll stop there.

460
00:31:12.760 --> 00:31:13.593
Thank you.

461
00:31:20.310 --> 00:31:23.720
<v 7>I'm not quite sure if I could make such a clever segue as the other presenters.</v>

462
00:31:23.721 --> 00:31:27.870
So I'm just going to just be a bit go at my go rogue if I can.

463
00:31:28.830 --> 00:31:30.090
So my name's Christina,

464
00:31:30.120 --> 00:31:33.510
I'm a trend forecaster when people say what's that they think I do something

465
00:31:33.511 --> 00:31:37.380
with trains, and then I say, no, no consumer trends. And then I say, oh,

466
00:31:37.381 --> 00:31:39.870
it's about the future. And they say, oh, where's your crystal ball.

467
00:31:40.140 --> 00:31:42.810
So those are the questions I always have to deal with at dinner parties.

468
00:31:42.811 --> 00:31:45.870
I'm sure these illustrious spoke of also stories such as that.

469
00:31:46.800 --> 00:31:50.250
I started to realize my, my job is really tracking patterns,

470
00:31:50.560 --> 00:31:54.780
those patterns of consumer behavior and patterns of economic cycles. And,

471
00:31:54.810 --> 00:31:58.620
you know, every living thing has a life cycle. We've almost forgotten that,

472
00:31:59.010 --> 00:31:59.191
you know,

473
00:31:59.191 --> 00:32:03.000
we always keep thinking that the economic the economy would be on a constant

474
00:32:03.001 --> 00:32:05.580
upward trajectory, but that's just an impossibility.

475
00:32:06.030 --> 00:32:10.110
And so I just really realized that we weren't designing and living within the,

476
00:32:10.470 --> 00:32:14.970
or operating design of life, which was nature's rhythms. And very much that,

477
00:32:15.300 --> 00:32:15.571
you know,

478
00:32:15.571 --> 00:32:19.140
we study patterns because they're both the changing and the change lists.

479
00:32:19.500 --> 00:32:23.370
And to me, rhythm became to be seen as very fundamental to wellbeing.

480
00:32:24.030 --> 00:32:27.060
It was not just the keynote of life that actually is life.

481
00:32:28.050 --> 00:32:31.560
And people always speak about, oh, we're so disconnected from nature.

482
00:32:31.561 --> 00:32:32.430
But for me,

483
00:32:32.431 --> 00:32:35.940
it really actually isn't that it's more that we see nature as the it,

484
00:32:36.090 --> 00:32:37.350
rather than the us.

485
00:32:37.860 --> 00:32:42.020
And so we see people always in there taking pictures of glorious sunsets and

486
00:32:42.520 --> 00:32:45.880
almost saying, oh, need a bit more apricot here and a bit more violet here,

487
00:32:45.970 --> 00:32:49.430
or they want to take a picture of the ocean and there's some people,

488
00:32:49.630 --> 00:32:52.570
and they're like, get out of the way you're blocking the photo.

489
00:32:52.900 --> 00:32:56.500
Not realizing that nature is in our guts, just as much as it is in the wind.

490
00:32:57.400 --> 00:33:00.280
So my work has really led me to focus on four rhythms,

491
00:33:00.550 --> 00:33:04.150
which are seasonal circadian title and Luna.

492
00:33:04.751 --> 00:33:08.020
And that very much fits in with everything that [inaudible] was saying earlier.

493
00:33:08.440 --> 00:33:11.620
Now, with this panel, they could actually speak about the natural phenomenon,

494
00:33:11.920 --> 00:33:13.180
but that is not my background.

495
00:33:13.450 --> 00:33:17.530
I actually read these rhythms and these patterns of energies as metaphor,

496
00:33:17.890 --> 00:33:19.900
archetypes, emotional abstract.

497
00:33:20.140 --> 00:33:25.000
So the seasons for me are all about acceptance and read that any which way

498
00:33:25.001 --> 00:33:26.620
that you will. But for me,

499
00:33:26.621 --> 00:33:30.910
I feel that within these patterns of energies are encoded wisdom so that

500
00:33:30.911 --> 00:33:33.790
nature's wisdom can actually become our very own wisdom.

501
00:33:34.270 --> 00:33:37.210
And so how that kind of relates to the panel tonight is obviously the lunar

502
00:33:37.211 --> 00:33:38.710
rhythm. And for me,

503
00:33:38.711 --> 00:33:43.360
I believe that the moon's energies can teach us three main things and they are

504
00:33:43.361 --> 00:33:48.130
reflection how to pace the importance of pacing and phasing.

505
00:33:48.460 --> 00:33:52.000
So in a sense that very few of us actually act as the witness of our lives.

506
00:33:52.001 --> 00:33:53.920
We're very rarely in the observer mode.

507
00:33:54.461 --> 00:33:56.860
If I asked you where the moon was in its cycle at the moment,

508
00:33:57.070 --> 00:34:00.490
probably very few people could say, but I'm sure this is a learned crowd,

509
00:34:00.491 --> 00:34:05.410
and I can see hands going up so I can hear 99% full tomorrow being

510
00:34:05.411 --> 00:34:08.680
full moon. Fantastic. And so most of us, you know,

511
00:34:08.681 --> 00:34:09.730
sometimes we sit there and think,

512
00:34:09.940 --> 00:34:13.210
how can all the mental frustration going on inside of us compare with the

513
00:34:13.211 --> 00:34:17.350
luminosity of the sky, but we very rarely placed our consciousness there.

514
00:34:17.830 --> 00:34:20.680
And I think also Australia being a very adolescent country,

515
00:34:20.950 --> 00:34:23.800
we're always about the new almost in a way always want to,

516
00:34:23.920 --> 00:34:27.640
we're great at like doing say 2014 new year's resolutions,

517
00:34:27.641 --> 00:34:31.960
but haven't yet put to bed the past of the failed of 20 13, 20 12,

518
00:34:31.961 --> 00:34:34.450
and 11 all the way back or Mr. Worth being alive.

519
00:34:34.840 --> 00:34:38.470
And because we don't build in periods of contemplation and reflection in our

520
00:34:38.471 --> 00:34:39.430
lives, we,

521
00:34:39.431 --> 00:34:44.050
it's almost like we're always impulsively reacting rather than contemplating and

522
00:34:44.080 --> 00:34:46.030
responding in a considered kind of way.

523
00:34:46.390 --> 00:34:49.960
And so I think it's so key in regards to, especially my work,

524
00:34:49.961 --> 00:34:51.640
which is so much about, you know,

525
00:34:51.641 --> 00:34:55.360
music actually comes from the space in between the beats and it, to me,

526
00:34:55.361 --> 00:34:59.290
innovation and creativity and intuition lies in that still gap between the

527
00:34:59.291 --> 00:35:00.124
thoughts.

528
00:35:00.130 --> 00:35:03.490
But most of us really place ourselves in the stillness to be able to accept that

529
00:35:04.120 --> 00:35:08.260
when I look at pace I'm from Adelaide originally, I've been away for 13 years.

530
00:35:09.400 --> 00:35:12.850
I came back last year, almost thinking that I wanted the pace of life,

531
00:35:12.851 --> 00:35:14.920
the quality of life that Adelaide always speaks about,

532
00:35:14.921 --> 00:35:17.870
but I came back and to me it was almost a bit alien, like in the wet,

533
00:35:17.920 --> 00:35:20.650
the fact that everybody was running around with coffee cups to their lips.

534
00:35:20.650 --> 00:35:24.430
And I'm like, what is this, you know, phenomena? And I'm one of those people,

535
00:35:24.431 --> 00:35:26.380
if you don't have time to drink your coffee,

536
00:35:26.590 --> 00:35:27.940
you just don't have time for coffee.

537
00:35:28.630 --> 00:35:31.060
And it seems that like who was being paced here,

538
00:35:31.061 --> 00:35:34.450
it was like out of pace and out of sync with the environment.

539
00:35:34.480 --> 00:35:39.270
And it is one of those things where you meaning actually comes by infusing

540
00:35:39.271 --> 00:35:41.310
whatever we're doing with its appropriate pace.

541
00:35:41.311 --> 00:35:44.220
And there's a wonderful Italian musical form called dumb.

542
00:35:44.250 --> 00:35:46.800
And I apologize to any Italian Italians in the crowd call.

543
00:35:47.040 --> 00:35:49.800
It will temple just though which I think I have totally just butchered,

544
00:35:50.100 --> 00:35:52.530
but it actually just means the right tempo.

545
00:35:53.070 --> 00:35:56.610
And we can look at it both in the subjective and objective interpretation

546
00:35:56.910 --> 00:35:59.700
objectively it's 66 to 76 on the metronome,

547
00:35:59.701 --> 00:36:01.830
and it's the scale and the beat of the human heart.

548
00:36:02.190 --> 00:36:05.550
But when we actually look at it as subjectively,

549
00:36:05.790 --> 00:36:08.150
it actually is intuition. The,

550
00:36:08.151 --> 00:36:11.760
the piece of music is played at the rate garnered by the own,

551
00:36:11.790 --> 00:36:15.480
the musician's own intuition. And most of us almost have,

552
00:36:15.520 --> 00:36:20.280
have lost the right tempo of living where corporate life is dictating our

553
00:36:20.281 --> 00:36:21.690
rhythm more than natures.

554
00:36:22.050 --> 00:36:25.800
And I think we've also lost the ability to connect to time through sensation.

555
00:36:26.040 --> 00:36:30.780
It's all about time through a digital artifice and we've lost actually the

556
00:36:30.781 --> 00:36:33.150
movement of time through the sun and the moon

557
00:36:34.920 --> 00:36:39.480
and almost just to be almost dictated to by the iPhone. And so finally,

558
00:36:39.481 --> 00:36:40.920
when I look at also phasing,

559
00:36:40.921 --> 00:36:44.850
very few people know how to run their long-term objectives,

560
00:36:44.851 --> 00:36:49.800
their future in parallel with short term objectives. And that really,

561
00:36:50.460 --> 00:36:52.350
if you think about a car and it gear change,

562
00:36:52.351 --> 00:36:56.520
you can't go to first to fifth overnight, just as the moon doesn't go from,

563
00:36:56.540 --> 00:37:00.420
from new to fall. There's actually a process we have to go to go through.

564
00:37:00.420 --> 00:37:02.550
You've got to be 39 before you're 40.

565
00:37:02.790 --> 00:37:05.640
You almost have to fail before you've actually succeeded.

566
00:37:05.940 --> 00:37:08.970
And I think when I look at the moon and when I gaze up to the stars,

567
00:37:08.971 --> 00:37:10.080
what it actually teaches me,

568
00:37:10.230 --> 00:37:14.580
it's almost like it's an inherited blueprint of energy management in a way.

569
00:37:14.850 --> 00:37:18.840
So it's not the time management that's being promoted to us to prioritize and do

570
00:37:18.841 --> 00:37:21.390
all of those things because that's really just a routine.

571
00:37:21.570 --> 00:37:23.670
It's actually a rhythm that we're actually after.

572
00:37:24.030 --> 00:37:26.160
And so it's one of those things where,

573
00:37:26.400 --> 00:37:29.910
when I kind of gaze gaze to the moon and what it kind of teaches me is that

574
00:37:30.620 --> 00:37:33.330
there is a rhythm to all things. There's, there's an air and there's a flow.

575
00:37:33.331 --> 00:37:35.520
That's really all the moon actually is it's, you know,

576
00:37:35.521 --> 00:37:39.000
the distinct waxing and waning within an unchanging cycle.

577
00:37:39.240 --> 00:37:42.360
It's the expansion and the contraction it's building up to us.

578
00:37:42.510 --> 00:37:45.060
There's more light in the moon, more energy for ourselves,

579
00:37:45.300 --> 00:37:47.880
as well as there's an adequate contraction. And a bit,

580
00:37:47.940 --> 00:37:50.670
when we look at the seasonal rhythm, sometimes I feel in that light,

581
00:37:50.671 --> 00:37:53.160
we want to live the summer of our lives consistently.

582
00:37:53.400 --> 00:37:56.550
We don't always know how to retreat and hibernate and learn from the harvest.

583
00:37:56.551 --> 00:38:00.840
So I think really what the moon is really teaching us is how to reflect how to

584
00:38:00.841 --> 00:38:04.320
pace and how to phase. And really just to close this by saying, you know,

585
00:38:04.590 --> 00:38:09.240
that we cannot break the rhythm of nature, only ourselves against them.

586
00:38:09.600 --> 00:38:13.260
And so it's so important to live in the rhythm of the lives, the seasons,

587
00:38:13.261 --> 00:38:16.410
the tides, you know, the moon and our 24 hour body clock,

588
00:38:16.650 --> 00:38:20.100
because within that is the answer to all things because we do exist within the

589
00:38:20.101 --> 00:38:22.550
patterns of nature. Thank you. Thank you.

590
00:38:28.930 --> 00:38:29.763
Thank you.

591
00:38:30.590 --> 00:38:33.110
<v 8>Now I'm going to stand up for two reasons. That's okay.</v>

592
00:38:33.470 --> 00:38:35.090
Cause I wrote a speech because I don't trust myself,

593
00:38:35.620 --> 00:38:37.990
speak off the top of my head as well as my colleagues here.

594
00:38:38.260 --> 00:38:41.980
And also because I have a writing related injury I might ask is killing me.

595
00:38:43.770 --> 00:38:44.603
Apologies.

596
00:38:45.630 --> 00:38:50.070
there's often a talk of two cultures divide between science and the humanities.

597
00:38:50.130 --> 00:38:52.560
And this is something that comes up occasionally for science fiction writers

598
00:38:52.561 --> 00:38:57.030
like myself to someone once asked me how I do what I do because

599
00:38:57.390 --> 00:38:58.470
maths and sciences,

600
00:38:58.471 --> 00:39:01.230
right brain and writing is left brain or whichever way round it is.

601
00:39:01.231 --> 00:39:04.140
And I don't pay attention to that kind of graph. To me,

602
00:39:04.141 --> 00:39:06.030
it's all part of the human experience.

603
00:39:06.060 --> 00:39:10.710
Just different facets of a wonderful spinning Juul. I love science.

604
00:39:10.830 --> 00:39:12.960
I also love writing. And to me,

605
00:39:12.961 --> 00:39:16.200
there's no contradiction on my 11th birthday.

606
00:39:16.230 --> 00:39:20.190
I stepped out into my grandmother's front garden in rural south Australia cow.

607
00:39:20.220 --> 00:39:20.791
Specifically,

608
00:39:20.791 --> 00:39:24.810
if anybody knows cow with the stars on a clear night are just amazing and looked

609
00:39:24.811 --> 00:39:28.680
up at the sky. It was dusk at the time. So I wasn't expecting to see very much,

610
00:39:29.220 --> 00:39:30.330
but at exactly that moment,

611
00:39:30.331 --> 00:39:34.710
a shooting star raised across the sky and suddenly split into three fragments

612
00:39:34.950 --> 00:39:39.270
before vanishing into the deepening. And what I learned at that moment was this,

613
00:39:39.780 --> 00:39:44.190
the sky always surprise you. And it always pays to look up just in case.

614
00:39:45.250 --> 00:39:48.750
Let me just describe myself in those days. I was an avid reader,

615
00:39:49.320 --> 00:39:52.800
not just of science fiction, mainly in the form of doctor who novels back then,

616
00:39:53.190 --> 00:39:56.010
but also Agatha Christie. And I didn't know it then,

617
00:39:56.011 --> 00:39:59.670
but I'd been hooked on the drug that lies at the heart of both genres,

618
00:39:59.700 --> 00:40:03.180
which is mystery in both science fiction and crime novels.

619
00:40:03.180 --> 00:40:05.400
There's often something to be solved in crime.

620
00:40:05.401 --> 00:40:08.310
It's stereotypically a who done it. Whereas in science fiction, it's a,

621
00:40:08.311 --> 00:40:12.660
how or why done it, why something works. But the question is the same.

622
00:40:12.930 --> 00:40:16.410
Something has happened in the world around us. And we as detective scientist,

623
00:40:16.440 --> 00:40:21.150
people want to understand it in the 30 years following my limit

624
00:40:21.180 --> 00:40:24.990
birthday, I saw sundogs over the Hudson river on my first trip to New York.

625
00:40:25.230 --> 00:40:28.920
I watched a comment rise over west beach in Adelaide, here with my new family.

626
00:40:29.220 --> 00:40:33.630
I teared up while staring at the steering to the old telescope in Sydney

627
00:40:33.631 --> 00:40:35.340
observatory at the Galilean moons.

628
00:40:35.430 --> 00:40:38.580
I enjoyed the rings of Saturn with a friend from his balcony and Surry Hills in

629
00:40:38.581 --> 00:40:39.330
Sydney.

630
00:40:39.330 --> 00:40:42.600
I stood in the woman of a restricted zone and gaped an amazement at a total

631
00:40:42.601 --> 00:40:44.310
eclipse, actually on that occasion,

632
00:40:44.311 --> 00:40:47.160
two minutes after the eclipse I proposed to the woman I was seeing at the time

633
00:40:47.161 --> 00:40:51.360
he responded, I don't answer trick questions, which was a bad sign.

634
00:40:52.980 --> 00:40:56.400
It didn't work out. I say all this,

635
00:40:56.401 --> 00:40:58.170
not to boast about the things I've seen.

636
00:40:58.260 --> 00:41:01.800
I'm no more remarkable than anybody else. And that's my point. Really?

637
00:41:01.830 --> 00:41:05.310
We all look to the skies of inspiration, wonder and beauty.

638
00:41:05.340 --> 00:41:08.910
We are touched and we share these moments with other people.

639
00:41:09.330 --> 00:41:11.430
Astronomy is a community accompany,

640
00:41:12.240 --> 00:41:14.820
a communal experience pursued by everyone,

641
00:41:14.821 --> 00:41:19.200
enjoyed by everyone for everyone we admire. We ask questions.

642
00:41:19.201 --> 00:41:22.260
We confront mysteries. Sometimes we find answers.

643
00:41:22.590 --> 00:41:24.750
You can say the same thing about literature and storytelling,

644
00:41:24.751 --> 00:41:26.010
the other great human pursuit.

645
00:41:26.340 --> 00:41:28.260
And this I think is where science fiction comes in.

646
00:41:29.280 --> 00:41:31.590
There are many mysteries in the universe that we haven't solved yet.

647
00:41:32.250 --> 00:41:35.240
That doesn't stop us about what it might be like to solve them.

648
00:41:35.360 --> 00:41:37.490
How the world might look when we have sold them,

649
00:41:37.760 --> 00:41:40.340
what it would feel like to be the one who solved them,

650
00:41:40.610 --> 00:41:43.700
what further lists mysteries might lie beyond those solutions.

651
00:41:44.210 --> 00:41:48.260
Science creates hypotheses and test them science fiction and creates hotter pie

652
00:41:48.261 --> 00:41:51.170
hypotheses based on those hypothesis, creating narratives,

653
00:41:51.650 --> 00:41:53.420
not intended to represent the real world,

654
00:41:53.421 --> 00:41:57.440
but to place the world against a mirror of our current understanding and see

655
00:41:57.441 --> 00:41:58.640
what image it reflects.

656
00:41:59.840 --> 00:42:03.170
Science fiction is focus on science as an important human endeavor ignores

657
00:42:03.171 --> 00:42:05.540
neither. The good nor bad consequences of that endeavor.

658
00:42:05.900 --> 00:42:08.330
It is neither consistently triumphal nor damning,

659
00:42:08.810 --> 00:42:12.260
so different from historical fiction or fiction set in an alternate version of

660
00:42:12.261 --> 00:42:14.030
the present day in different countries,

661
00:42:14.031 --> 00:42:18.560
through different social mores or sensory different eyes. Because at its heart,

662
00:42:19.040 --> 00:42:22.310
it's aims at the same as science and literature to put humanity in the

663
00:42:22.311 --> 00:42:25.340
environment we inhabit to put, I'll start that again,

664
00:42:25.341 --> 00:42:29.830
to put humanity and the environment we have me inhibit in context each other.

665
00:42:30.730 --> 00:42:31.990
This is why I write it down because

666
00:42:34.030 --> 00:42:36.820
this may be hard to accept if you've used science fiction solely through the

667
00:42:36.821 --> 00:42:40.510
lens of Dr who and star wars ignoring a century or more of evolving literary

668
00:42:40.511 --> 00:42:43.930
traditions, but even the basis Saifai populus. And I've written.

669
00:42:43.931 --> 00:42:48.820
Some of those asks the valuable question. What if you may not like the answers,

670
00:42:48.850 --> 00:42:50.740
but by paying attention to the question,

671
00:42:50.980 --> 00:42:54.310
we can see we are all staring up and outward and exactly the same way,

672
00:42:54.311 --> 00:42:58.210
whether we're 11 or 46 or 68 or 92,

673
00:42:58.390 --> 00:43:01.840
you don't even need eyes to do it. You just need to use your mind.

674
00:43:03.010 --> 00:43:06.880
There are plenty of imaginative and unlikely antecedents for theories currently

675
00:43:06.881 --> 00:43:11.080
experienced bored by science creation and the big bang ancient astronauts.

676
00:43:11.081 --> 00:43:11.920
And panspermia,

677
00:43:12.910 --> 00:43:15.070
although that might still be considered science fiction these days,

678
00:43:15.520 --> 00:43:18.460
I would argue that science fiction is busily creating Edisons for new

679
00:43:18.461 --> 00:43:21.700
scientists, new science, waiting to be on waiting to unfold.

680
00:43:21.701 --> 00:43:26.080
Once the current theories are established or discarded, just like science,

681
00:43:26.081 --> 00:43:29.680
some of the science fiction written today will also be discovered discarded.

682
00:43:30.280 --> 00:43:32.650
And that's not the fault of either science fiction or science,

683
00:43:32.680 --> 00:43:34.270
because we can only see so far.

684
00:43:34.600 --> 00:43:37.990
We barely glimpse the shapes behind the wondrous veils before our eyes.

685
00:43:38.680 --> 00:43:39.790
And if we don't accept our mistakes,

686
00:43:39.791 --> 00:43:41.980
we might as well close our eyes and stop looking altogether,

687
00:43:42.370 --> 00:43:46.210
which is where I would argue being a irritating hard-nose atheist,

688
00:43:46.211 --> 00:43:49.060
that religions are losing the race for the future of the human race.

689
00:43:49.360 --> 00:43:52.600
We wonder we pick it mysteries until they unravel. We move forward.

690
00:43:52.900 --> 00:43:55.510
There's some benefit in sitting still and meditating,

691
00:43:55.511 --> 00:43:58.780
but when everything else is moving and changing around us in chaotic and

692
00:43:58.781 --> 00:44:02.590
unpredictable and beautiful ways, that's a dangerous evolutionary strategy.

693
00:44:03.580 --> 00:44:07.240
My 39th novel comes out next week. My 83rd short story with it,

694
00:44:07.390 --> 00:44:09.940
it said in a world where Mehta transmitters have rented planes, trains,

695
00:44:09.941 --> 00:44:10.990
and automobiles that relevant.

696
00:44:10.991 --> 00:44:13.810
And at the same time opened up the stars to all humanity,

697
00:44:13.811 --> 00:44:16.990
because why send a rocket when you can beam yourself right up to orbit,

698
00:44:17.110 --> 00:44:18.280
which is where I want to be,

699
00:44:18.281 --> 00:44:21.970
which is why I'm in favor of a space administration center right here in

700
00:44:21.971 --> 00:44:24.580
Adelaide fingers crossed that will happen one day.

701
00:44:25.570 --> 00:44:29.110
I've imagined all manner of outcomes from humanity ranging from, for the hotel,

702
00:44:29.170 --> 00:44:30.670
from the hopeful to the catastrophic.

703
00:44:31.020 --> 00:44:33.240
None of which I anticipate actually occurring.

704
00:44:33.630 --> 00:44:38.220
I put humanity in cosmic context that I fully expect to be a more or less,

705
00:44:38.221 --> 00:44:40.950
no relation to actual scientific discoveries. Well,

706
00:44:41.040 --> 00:44:42.210
there were a couple of times I've been right,

707
00:44:42.211 --> 00:44:44.400
such as certain types of extreme exoplanets,

708
00:44:44.760 --> 00:44:48.180
which I was writing about a long time ago in which I bombarded poor Phil here

709
00:44:48.181 --> 00:44:49.770
with Elliot, trying to take credit for them.

710
00:44:50.460 --> 00:44:52.470
Sometimes I've labored for months over research.

711
00:44:52.500 --> 00:44:55.470
Sometimes I've hand waved with vigor to distract from the fact that I don't know

712
00:44:55.471 --> 00:44:56.304
what I'm talking about.

713
00:44:56.520 --> 00:45:00.120
Sometimes no one knows because the journey that both literature and science are

714
00:45:00.121 --> 00:45:04.290
taking jointly or separately, can't be answered with 100% certainty.

715
00:45:04.740 --> 00:45:06.390
What is our place in the universe?

716
00:45:06.720 --> 00:45:10.590
It's the biggest question of all part of me is still 11 years old,

717
00:45:10.591 --> 00:45:12.510
staring up at the sky in amazement.

718
00:45:12.810 --> 00:45:15.780
Wondering if we'll ever answer that question, determinately,

719
00:45:15.781 --> 00:45:20.160
ignoring the adult I am now who knows that if we ever do, I'll be out of a job.

720
00:45:20.490 --> 00:45:21.323
Thank you.

721
00:45:29.840 --> 00:45:30.770
<v Robert Phideon>When I look up,</v>

722
00:45:31.130 --> 00:45:35.120
there's going to be a Mo RO roving microphone for questions from the audience

723
00:45:36.110 --> 00:45:36.943
Q two.

724
00:45:38.870 --> 00:45:43.490
But in the meantime I need perhaps to get in with a quick

725
00:45:43.820 --> 00:45:44.900
preemptive apology.

726
00:45:45.890 --> 00:45:49.760
Paul Paul Davies does have won't won't eat if he doesn't leave by about 10 past.

727
00:45:49.820 --> 00:45:52.460
So he may have to leave. People were absolutely finished.

728
00:45:53.150 --> 00:45:57.290
And so I'm going to start by asking the question. In 1999,

729
00:45:57.291 --> 00:46:00.110
I found myself in a chemist shop in south London.

730
00:46:01.591 --> 00:46:05.810
I was working on a PhD in English at the time I had a bleeding thumb and I

731
00:46:05.811 --> 00:46:10.190
wanted a band-aid. They didn't know what I was talking about.

732
00:46:12.200 --> 00:46:15.920
I didn't know the word that they needed, which was sticking plaster. Right?

733
00:46:16.370 --> 00:46:18.770
My question is let's look for follows from the city.

734
00:46:18.850 --> 00:46:22.400
The city city stuff is how would we start that? We,

735
00:46:22.401 --> 00:46:26.540
any ideas at all about how we would start to communicate if someone answered.

736
00:46:27.020 --> 00:46:31.100
<v 6>Back? Oh, it's now first thing, the last word betrays</v>

737
00:46:32.840 --> 00:46:35.570
SETI is a listing program, not a transmitting.

738
00:46:36.050 --> 00:46:39.950
So it means that we are scanning the skies with radio telescopes.

739
00:46:40.820 --> 00:46:44.150
Is there any radio traffic out there that could not have a natural origin?

740
00:46:44.900 --> 00:46:47.780
Just occasionally as a CUNY, people will transmit,

741
00:46:48.350 --> 00:46:50.660
but it's not been done on any systematic basis.

742
00:46:50.780 --> 00:46:54.260
It is more symbolic or to get young people interested.

743
00:46:54.290 --> 00:46:55.880
So it's a listening program.

744
00:46:56.300 --> 00:47:00.890
And so the question is supposedly we were pick up a signal and then we're faced

745
00:47:00.891 --> 00:47:04.430
with the issue. Do we reply if so,

746
00:47:04.431 --> 00:47:06.440
what did we say and who speaks for us?

747
00:47:06.620 --> 00:47:09.800
Those are the sorts of things that this task group deliberates on.

748
00:47:11.480 --> 00:47:14.930
A lot of people if you say

749
00:47:16.400 --> 00:47:20.960
we run, we ran a competition on this in Arizona. Give us a message. You know,

750
00:47:21.210 --> 00:47:24.080
what, what should we say to ITI? What's the most important thing? Well,

751
00:47:24.081 --> 00:47:27.830
of course you immediately recognize that ITI is not going to speak English not

752
00:47:27.980 --> 00:47:28.813
going to understand.

753
00:47:29.590 --> 00:47:32.620
And I think it's all about sport or politics or any of that stuff.

754
00:47:33.040 --> 00:47:34.690
What would we share?

755
00:47:34.720 --> 00:47:39.010
What is there in the universe that we would have in common where they truly

756
00:47:39.130 --> 00:47:41.830
alien mind or an alien civilization?

757
00:47:42.370 --> 00:47:45.730
And the two things just about everybody's agreed on is we wouldn't be

758
00:47:45.731 --> 00:47:50.080
communicating with them if they didn't have radio technology or,

759
00:47:50.150 --> 00:47:52.240
or laser technology. In other words,

760
00:47:52.241 --> 00:47:56.050
they would have an understanding of the laws of physics and the laws of physics

761
00:47:56.051 --> 00:47:58.720
are of course, mathematical relationships.

762
00:47:58.900 --> 00:48:03.040
So they would have an understanding of mathematics and fundamental physics,

763
00:48:03.430 --> 00:48:07.510
and that provides a common basis in which we could begin a conversation.

764
00:48:08.501 --> 00:48:12.280
And so my feeling is if we could only just say one thing,

765
00:48:12.580 --> 00:48:17.500
but have to be something that would be meaningful would betray

766
00:48:17.501 --> 00:48:21.640
our level of understanding of fundamental physics.

767
00:48:21.850 --> 00:48:26.500
And so what I would send is in this program mean anything to maybe one or two

768
00:48:26.501 --> 00:48:31.420
people here the reciprocal of the fine structure, constant in binary.

769
00:48:31.660 --> 00:48:34.090
So this is one of the fundamental constants of nature.

770
00:48:34.330 --> 00:48:36.880
You'd have to put it in binary because otherwise it wouldn't know what basic

771
00:48:36.910 --> 00:48:41.140
arithmetic it's a number that you measure experimentally. It's a pure number.

772
00:48:41.141 --> 00:48:42.880
It doesn't depend on our system of units.

773
00:48:43.210 --> 00:48:46.300
And it shows that if we understand that that number is significant,

774
00:48:46.570 --> 00:48:51.550
we understand quantum mechanics and electrodynamics at least so just in

775
00:48:51.551 --> 00:48:52.390
that one number,

776
00:48:52.480 --> 00:48:56.050
we immediately give something about our level of scientific development.

777
00:48:56.400 --> 00:49:00.580
And we've got a common basis to build on no point in sending the football scores

778
00:49:00.581 --> 00:49:03.930
or other things. So all that's out of the way or music.

779
00:49:04.680 --> 00:49:05.220
<v Robert Phideon>Yeah. So,</v>

780
00:49:05.220 --> 00:49:09.090
so the fact that stint Tindall Cruz fielding a date fine league will not be a

781
00:49:09.740 --> 00:49:12.810
particularly useful people. No,

782
00:49:13.050 --> 00:49:14.760
I don't think he ever has either actually.

783
00:49:15.060 --> 00:49:18.180
So do we have some questions from the floor and and,

784
00:49:18.181 --> 00:49:22.020
and you will need to speak into the microphone. So have, has, can someone,

785
00:49:23.280 --> 00:49:27.930
no. Oh, sorry. We found, we found one conveniently close.

786
00:49:27.931 --> 00:49:28.764
Thank you.

787
00:49:29.090 --> 00:49:33.510
<v 4>Oh Cheryl Buchanan, I'm from the Goleman nation in Southwest Queensland.</v>

788
00:49:34.890 --> 00:49:38.190
It's just not a question,

789
00:49:38.191 --> 00:49:42.990
but an observance and anyone can comment on my

790
00:49:42.991 --> 00:49:47.340
observations. I've been on this planet for quite a few years.

791
00:49:48.000 --> 00:49:50.280
I'm now an elder in my community.

792
00:49:51.570 --> 00:49:56.460
What really astounds me is the the intellect that

793
00:49:57.360 --> 00:49:59.010
that we have in this country.

794
00:50:00.150 --> 00:50:03.540
And with that intellect is this incredible arrogance that people have.

795
00:50:04.680 --> 00:50:06.510
And it's the arrogance that

796
00:50:08.310 --> 00:50:12.240
there does not ever seem here. I am listening to this coming,

797
00:50:12.241 --> 00:50:16.080
being quite excited by this this discussion.

798
00:50:16.590 --> 00:50:21.180
There's never any acknowledgement of the fact that this planet,

799
00:50:21.300 --> 00:50:23.370
this place here in particular,

800
00:50:24.390 --> 00:50:28.730
Camara Australia had visitors from another world

801
00:50:28.731 --> 00:50:30.200
outside our planet.

802
00:50:30.980 --> 00:50:34.460
Those are recorded in cave paintings,

803
00:50:34.490 --> 00:50:39.200
throughout many nations in this country that

804
00:50:40.310 --> 00:50:45.200
the traditional knowledge holders of those stories are

805
00:50:45.201 --> 00:50:48.320
never acknowledged and respected at all.

806
00:50:49.220 --> 00:50:51.620
And whether it's in the field that you're in,

807
00:50:53.060 --> 00:50:56.270
whether it's in the field of science,

808
00:50:57.230 --> 00:51:00.710
where we're talking about water matters and the connectivity between land and

809
00:51:00.711 --> 00:51:03.920
water, you know, now, and then they say, oh,

810
00:51:03.921 --> 00:51:08.330
the traditional knowledge holders. And they have all this amazing information,

811
00:51:08.780 --> 00:51:10.280
but it's always an afterthought.

812
00:51:11.360 --> 00:51:15.530
It's never put in the front upfront as bank people.

813
00:51:15.680 --> 00:51:19.520
Who've lived here in thousands of years. And that young woman,

814
00:51:19.521 --> 00:51:20.540
she probably does not.

815
00:51:20.541 --> 00:51:24.650
She was a black fellow in another lifetime because all of her

816
00:51:25.370 --> 00:51:29.600
talk is absolutely intrinsically

817
00:51:30.020 --> 00:51:32.600
inherent with the way that our people think.

818
00:51:34.670 --> 00:51:38.150
And it's that sense that you have to have, you know,

819
00:51:38.210 --> 00:51:41.960
a balance of life and that you have to

820
00:51:42.530 --> 00:51:45.470
accept the world that you live in.

821
00:51:46.580 --> 00:51:49.100
And I tell you within our communities, you know,

822
00:51:49.101 --> 00:51:54.050
the one thing that always just astounds us is that when people will

823
00:51:54.051 --> 00:51:58.610
ever get to understand or get to the point where they can actually accept the

824
00:51:58.611 --> 00:52:00.890
world that they live in the world that they're born in,

825
00:52:03.380 --> 00:52:05.240
you are in this beautiful country here,

826
00:52:05.900 --> 00:52:09.650
and yet you still not cannot accept the reason that this country has.

827
00:52:10.790 --> 00:52:14.780
You still don't know it at all. You don't know the land,

828
00:52:14.781 --> 00:52:18.110
you don't know the waters, you don't know the sky.

829
00:52:19.250 --> 00:52:21.650
You don't know the sea in it,

830
00:52:21.651 --> 00:52:26.300
all of those people for the last 200 years, who could have helped you

831
00:52:28.910 --> 00:52:33.290
who asked them the questions he gives them, who gives them the authority.

832
00:52:34.070 --> 00:52:35.240
He gives them respect.

833
00:52:41.290 --> 00:52:45.160
<v Robert Phideon>Okay. Thank you. Anyone want to respond to that? It's the question about,</v>

834
00:52:45.370 --> 00:52:49.600
I guess, intellectual humility, which you learn more of as you grow older?

835
00:52:49.601 --> 00:52:52.210
I think I hope, I think,

836
00:52:52.390 --> 00:52:56.380
I think I just I'd like to support what Cheryl was saying in terms of that

837
00:52:57.520 --> 00:53:01.570
as a Western sciences, a lot that I'm very proud,

838
00:53:02.410 --> 00:53:03.400
partly achieved,

839
00:53:03.910 --> 00:53:08.560
and yet it it tends towards a sense

840
00:53:09.191 --> 00:53:10.990
of only one looking out perhaps,

841
00:53:11.620 --> 00:53:15.520
and always considering itself as some kind of solution and you know,

842
00:53:15.970 --> 00:53:19.750
provision provide solution. But in the time that I was being,

843
00:53:19.870 --> 00:53:23.080
I've been working with indigenous people in Australia and the time I've worked

844
00:53:23.081 --> 00:53:27.390
with indigenous people around the world it's very clear that the Western

845
00:53:27.391 --> 00:53:32.280
tradition of knowledge is actually far from a solution on,

846
00:53:32.340 --> 00:53:36.270
in most of the corners in the world where it has sort of waded in with not

847
00:53:36.271 --> 00:53:37.380
knowing, oh, I don't,

848
00:53:37.381 --> 00:53:40.830
I would like to find out how does this work and in the process breaking whatever

849
00:53:40.831 --> 00:53:43.860
it is that it's seeking to discover.

850
00:53:43.861 --> 00:53:48.360
So I understand and respect what Cheryl was saying. And I think, you know, in,

851
00:53:48.361 --> 00:53:52.050
in going to the stars and understanding the stars,

852
00:53:52.410 --> 00:53:57.330
it would be good if we didn't continue to repeat that exact pattern

853
00:53:57.600 --> 00:53:58.530
of arrogantly.

854
00:53:59.610 --> 00:54:04.410
Assuming that our intellect is a passport that forgives us all

855
00:54:04.710 --> 00:54:09.710
our mistakes, sins and misdemeanors cool

856
00:54:13.500 --> 00:54:15.050
science itself is not.

857
00:54:16.700 --> 00:54:20.750
<v Phil Bland>It's done in a reductionist way. We, we focus on,</v>

858
00:54:21.080 --> 00:54:25.340
on small problems because that's the only way we can get to the big problems.

859
00:54:25.760 --> 00:54:29.450
But, but as an endeavor, as an individual,

860
00:54:29.780 --> 00:54:32.600
the things that I live about are not the little,

861
00:54:33.020 --> 00:54:37.130
it's not the little tiny bit that I'm interested in.

862
00:54:37.131 --> 00:54:42.080
It's not the little bit that I managed to do in my whole career or

863
00:54:42.081 --> 00:54:46.940
my whole life. It's being part of a global endeavor.

864
00:54:46.941 --> 00:54:51.290
And that endeavor is not is not alien or

865
00:54:51.590 --> 00:54:54.980
different or, or distanced from

866
00:54:56.570 --> 00:54:59.900
from the universe, from our world.

867
00:55:00.350 --> 00:55:05.060
It's the most intimate bond possible with it because we're trying to

868
00:55:05.180 --> 00:55:09.980
explore it with our minds in the best way

869
00:55:10.190 --> 00:55:14.840
we can and the most in the most detailed way that we can.

870
00:55:15.260 --> 00:55:16.093
And if you,

871
00:55:16.160 --> 00:55:20.780
if you sit down with a with a scientist and actually

872
00:55:20.781 --> 00:55:24.770
find out what makes them tick, as opposed to, you know,

873
00:55:24.771 --> 00:55:29.300
read in the media about some of the latest

874
00:55:29.720 --> 00:55:34.640
gossip or the latest problems with with this or that theory

875
00:55:34.641 --> 00:55:39.170
or emails released or whatever if you actually sit down with someone and find

876
00:55:39.171 --> 00:55:43.520
out about what makes them tick, it won't be not some bolts.

877
00:55:43.610 --> 00:55:47.060
It won't be reductionist. It won't be distanced. It'll be,

878
00:55:47.150 --> 00:55:51.950
it'll be big picture and it'll be, it'll move you.

879
00:55:52.550 --> 00:55:54.350
And and I think it's worth

880
00:55:57.080 --> 00:56:00.470
finding out what it really is that new scientists,

881
00:56:00.480 --> 00:56:03.950
rather than rather than reading in a newspaper.

882
00:56:05.700 --> 00:56:06.930
<v 7>I just would like to just say, like,</v>

883
00:56:07.430 --> 00:56:10.880
you can't actually understand rhythm from the mind only through the heart.

884
00:56:13.890 --> 00:56:17.450
<v Robert Phideon>You can say another sentence. It's got to come all the way down here. No</v>

885
00:56:22.960 --> 00:56:26.950
is when we were, when do we make the effort effort to stop looking when we,

886
00:56:27.460 --> 00:56:29.560
when we haven't found the bar biospheres et cetera.

887
00:56:30.550 --> 00:56:31.620
<v Phil Bland>Yeah. To a,</v>

888
00:56:31.630 --> 00:56:36.330
to a favorite science fiction movie of mine, which is there,

889
00:56:36.770 --> 00:56:41.640
which is this incredibly overblown thing that H G Wells was did call things to

890
00:56:41.641 --> 00:56:45.210
come. And and there's a great bit, right at the end of that,

891
00:56:45.211 --> 00:56:49.200
where the two main parts is there's this incredibly kind of bold visionary guy.

892
00:56:49.380 --> 00:56:52.140
Who's looking to the future and his poor friend who's,

893
00:56:52.290 --> 00:56:57.090
he's been dragging around for donkey's years. And and basically the guy says,

894
00:56:57.091 --> 00:57:00.450
you know, that it'll always be the next horizon.

895
00:57:00.451 --> 00:57:04.320
They'll always be another adventure. And it might be that, you know,

896
00:57:04.321 --> 00:57:09.270
that in the end we do understand that universe

897
00:57:09.720 --> 00:57:14.610
is in, is in as close and detailed and beautiful way

898
00:57:15.600 --> 00:57:19.200
as we can, or it might be that there's always a, another horizon.

899
00:57:21.780 --> 00:57:26.370
<v 6>I think the gentleman was referring specifically to how long should we continue</v>

900
00:57:26.371 --> 00:57:30.750
to put resources into a radio search kids 52 years?

901
00:57:31.241 --> 00:57:33.900
It's only an eerie silence, and this is often asked.

902
00:57:33.990 --> 00:57:38.160
And the first point to make is that there's virtually no taxpayer money goes

903
00:57:38.161 --> 00:57:41.100
into it. It's almost entirely privately funded. Secondly,

904
00:57:41.190 --> 00:57:44.340
it's a tiny handful of people doing it. Those,

905
00:57:44.370 --> 00:57:48.450
they support a big industry of researchers doing peripheral aspects of

906
00:57:48.780 --> 00:57:49.890
astrobiology.

907
00:57:50.730 --> 00:57:55.350
And the third point is that I would never have expected them to

908
00:57:55.351 --> 00:57:59.550
succeed so far. If you talk to a SETI optimist, like Frank Drake,

909
00:57:59.551 --> 00:58:04.140
who began this program in 1960 and based on no

910
00:58:04.141 --> 00:58:05.370
science, cause I've explained,

911
00:58:05.371 --> 00:58:09.750
we have no idea what the numbers but what would he think will be the number of

912
00:58:09.751 --> 00:58:13.560
communicating civilizations of the galaxy of this time? And he says, well,

913
00:58:13.561 --> 00:58:14.640
maybe 10,000.

914
00:58:15.480 --> 00:58:19.530
And if you take that number and I think it may well be zero.

915
00:58:20.190 --> 00:58:22.590
But if you take 10,000 hours, where,

916
00:58:22.860 --> 00:58:27.750
how far away is the nearest communicating civilization likely to be several

917
00:58:27.751 --> 00:58:32.160
hundred light years. And so let's take a round for girls thousand light years,

918
00:58:32.161 --> 00:58:32.994
if your

919
00:58:34.890 --> 00:58:37.620
civilization over there thousand light years away,

920
00:58:37.770 --> 00:58:41.100
you don't see earth as it is now, but as it was a thousand years ago,

921
00:58:41.720 --> 00:58:45.510
there weren't a radio telescopes. Then they may have super-duper instruments.

922
00:58:45.511 --> 00:58:48.810
Like Phil was saying, you might they might deduce that there's life on earth.

923
00:58:49.260 --> 00:58:54.120
And I often imagine that there may be some SETI enthusiasts on

924
00:58:54.121 --> 00:58:58.590
this planet and they go to their government saying we'd like some money to

925
00:58:59.190 --> 00:59:01.620
transmit that planet over there. Cause we know there's earth on it.

926
00:59:02.010 --> 00:59:03.360
And we think there's life on it.

927
00:59:03.600 --> 00:59:08.310
And we think maybe any millennium soon they will have radio technology.

928
00:59:08.570 --> 00:59:11.250
And I know what the answer would be, you know, come back when you know,

929
00:59:11.251 --> 00:59:12.840
they're on the air and we'll give you the money

930
00:59:14.400 --> 00:59:19.260
and they won't know we're on the air for another 900 years or

931
00:59:19.261 --> 00:59:21.790
so. And then their signal to come through us.

932
00:59:21.791 --> 00:59:26.510
So really is a very long-term venture. But the truth is even now,

933
00:59:26.660 --> 00:59:30.950
it's very hard to get young people to take up this particular enterprise.

934
00:59:30.951 --> 00:59:35.930
It's just done by old folks. Basically they're all retiring. So it depends.

935
00:59:35.960 --> 00:59:39.070
I mean, I hate to do this cause I get ticked off, but I read a whole book about,

936
00:59:39.080 --> 00:59:41.360
you know, what do we do next? It's called the eras islands.

937
00:59:42.020 --> 00:59:45.230
And it's very much depends on the nature of the message.

938
00:59:45.260 --> 00:59:49.640
So if it is simply that we get indirect evidence

939
00:59:50.210 --> 00:59:52.490
for alien technologies, there's not a message,

940
00:59:52.520 --> 00:59:57.050
but we just did use on the basis either had an of radio waves or some other

941
00:59:57.260 --> 01:00:02.060
physical clue signature that there is no natural

942
01:00:02.061 --> 01:00:06.710
explanation. Then it is one of these profound discoveries.

943
01:00:06.890 --> 01:00:09.890
We're not alone in the universe, but we can't say very much more about that.

944
01:00:10.250 --> 01:00:13.760
And I often say it would be the, for a week,

945
01:00:13.850 --> 01:00:17.030
the media will be full of this momentous discovery and then people we'll get

946
01:00:17.031 --> 01:00:21.530
back to the cricket and baseball and so on. But over a period of centuries,

947
01:00:21.531 --> 01:00:25.190
it would seep in just like a Copana because his announcement,

948
01:00:25.191 --> 01:00:28.130
the earth is going around the sound didn't change the price of beer,

949
01:00:28.190 --> 01:00:32.180
nothing really changed. But at the same with Darwin's theory of evolution,

950
01:00:32.750 --> 01:00:33.950
really nothing changed.

951
01:00:34.190 --> 01:00:39.170
But our sense of where we fit in to nature and our place in the

952
01:00:39.171 --> 01:00:42.230
universe is profoundly changed. And that will be the case.

953
01:00:42.740 --> 01:00:47.570
If it was a message full of technological and scientific

954
01:00:47.571 --> 01:00:48.260
information,

955
01:00:48.260 --> 01:00:53.240
all bets are off because even something as simple as showing us

956
01:00:53.241 --> 01:00:57.680
how to gain control over nuclear fusion as a power source, you might think,

957
01:00:57.681 --> 01:00:59.480
well, that's great gift from ITI.

958
01:00:59.810 --> 01:01:03.020
This is how to solve your energy problems immediately with these stabilize,

959
01:01:03.021 --> 01:01:07.850
the world stock markets transform the economists of many countries.

960
01:01:07.851 --> 01:01:10.820
Whoever had this knowledge would suddenly have a huge amount of power.

961
01:01:11.210 --> 01:01:15.770
I can imagine warfare just had just one piece of altruistic information like

962
01:01:15.771 --> 01:01:18.260
that could be very destabilizing. So I think

963
01:01:20.420 --> 01:01:24.950
between those, those two extremes, again, there's a spectrum of possibilities.

964
01:01:25.070 --> 01:01:27.110
<v Phil Bland>The one thing can, we can be really sure of, I think.</v>

965
01:01:27.200 --> 01:01:30.620
<v 8>Is it will change science fiction in the same way that the collapse of the</v>

966
01:01:30.621 --> 01:01:32.480
Soviet union changed thrillers forever.

967
01:01:35.890 --> 01:01:40.750
<v Robert Phideon>Well, on that wonderfully confident prediction. I'd like to thank,</v>

968
01:01:40.930 --> 01:01:42.100
thank all our guests.

969
01:01:43.390 --> 01:01:45.970
It's been a fascinating session.

970
01:01:46.510 --> 01:01:51.070
I think about imagination, about evidence,

971
01:01:51.130 --> 01:01:54.400
about discipline, about intellectual humility.

972
01:01:55.681 --> 01:02:00.250
And I guess my answer to the last question is I, I'm not a physicist,

973
01:02:00.280 --> 01:02:03.730
but I think we should be looking for these things because they are interesting

974
01:02:03.790 --> 01:02:07.000
because I, because they are interesting to be honest.

975
01:02:08.650 --> 01:02:13.450
That's what exploration is. That's what looking to the stars is about.

976
01:02:13.451 --> 01:02:16.480
So can you join me in thanking our fascinating guests?

977
01:02:25.310 --> 01:02:30.020
<v Intro>This session of the 2013 Adelaide festival of ideas was recorded by</v>

978
01:02:30.021 --> 01:02:33.320
radio Adelaide through the support of the vast mid library,

979
01:02:33.440 --> 01:02:34.640
university of Adelaide,

980
01:02:34.760 --> 01:02:38.630
the university of south Australia library and Flinders university library.