Latest / Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe / What is creativity? (featuring Dr. Moiya McTier)

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What is creativity? (featuring Dr. Moiya McTier) · Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: On today's show, we're interviewing Dr. Moya McTeer about her
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: latest book, Mothers of Invention. We're going to talk about
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: how one defines creativity, how science studies creativity, and more.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: And frankly, I'm finding the pressure of creating a creative
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: introduction to an episode about creativity overwhelming, so let's just
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: move on to the main episode. Welcome to Daniel and
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Kelly's Creative Universe.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist who thinks about aliens,
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: and I have no idea where my ideas come from.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Kelly Wienersmith. I study parasites and space. And
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: when I am struggling to be creative, I read more.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: And that is my secret to getting the creativity juice back.
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: Hmm.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: For me, it's pacing. I get off my computer, I
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: stop reading, and I just walk either the hallways here
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: or do a loop around campus. Inevitably, my brain bumps
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: into something and I'm like, ooh, I got to write
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: that down. That's a good idea.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: And then you see Daniel sprinting across campus to get
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: back to his computer.
• 1:23
  Speaker 4: I go on goat walks too sometimes, and that helps also.
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: You think that goats are an important part of your creativity?
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: You know, I was listening to this great podcast by
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Russ Roberts called Econ Talk, and he had an expert
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: on who studies creativity.
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: And for the life of me, I can't remember their name.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: But he was saying that the trick is to do
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: something that does not involve the thing you're doing at all.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:44
  Speaker 4: Like completely distract yourself.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: But the back like part of your mind is still
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: working the problem while you're distracting yourself with something else.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: And so I do feel like when I come back
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: after a walk with the goats, I'm paying attention to
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: how silly they are and how cute my goats are.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: And please stop eating that. My hair is not a snack.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Get off my back. And like all that stuff distracts me.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: And when I come back, I feel like I'm like
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: ready to tackle the problem again.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's mysterious. It's amazing. And as far as I've experienced,
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: it's still not automatable. Every few months I do the
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: experiment where I give the latest chatbot like, here's my
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: last five papers. think about my approach to physics. Come
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: up with an idea for another project. And not once
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: have they generated anything useful or interesting or at all creative.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: It's all derivative nonsense. So far. We'll see if that changes.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: Almost once a month, Zach and I will ask the
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: various AI programs like, OK, create a Saturday morning breakfast
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: cereal comic and.
• 2:46
  Speaker 4: Show us what you come up with.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: And for a while they were just like it was
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: just absolute gibberish and no pay. The panels didn't connect
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: to each other in any clear way. It was just like,
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: what is going on? But it's been getting better over time.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: And now every once in a while, it will get
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: something where you're like, I get, I understand the joke
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: you were trying to make. And you had the right
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: characters saying the right things. You didn't like jumble the characters.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: But I would still say that, you know, Zach.
• 3:11
  Speaker 4: Is much funnier than Claude. So I'm still team Zach.
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: But that might change.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: Well, this sounds like a good topic for an SMBC comic.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: The meta comic about the comic.
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: I do feel like science is creative in a way
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: that AI hasn't quite captured yet. And I think one
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: of the things I miss about when I used to
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: do science much more regularly was designing experiments. Like, I
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: think my favorite experiment to design with Scott Egan, who
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: we had on the show to talk about what is
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: a species, was when we were essentially trying to figure out, like,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: what would it be like to be a wasp living
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: inside of a stem? And how do we test... how
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: the manipulation that we were studying, like how it would
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: benefit it. And so like that exercise of what is
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: the wasp experiencing and what might the wasp's life be
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: like and how can we manipulate what the wasp experiences
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: to try to actually get a handle on the answers
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: to our questions. Like, I don't know, that was fun.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: And I thought we came up with creative ways to
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: test that. different hypotheses that we had to see which
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: one was correct. And I don't know, that was like,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: I'm not a good painter. When I try knitting, I
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: look angry. But like this kind of creativity, I really enjoy.
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: I thought a little bit about what creativity means in science.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: And for me, part of it is coming up with
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: a new idea that's exciting. Like I know I've succeeded
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: when I have a new project That when you mention
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: it to people, they're like, oh, wow, that's cool. I
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: want to know the answer to that. You know, something
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: that excites the curiosity in the audience, in the customers. And,
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: you know, sometimes I think of science as a creative art.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Sometimes I think of it like entrepreneurial. You know, you're
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: like running a little business. You know, you have a
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: limited set of resources and you need to produce, in
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: this case, a product, which is science that people are
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: excited about and want to consume. And you can't just
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: be totally blue sky about it. You've got to be practical.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: What tools do we actually have? What problems can we
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: solve in a reasonable amount of time? It's such a
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: funny blend of creativity and entrepreneurialness and then just hard work.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I mean, that's one of the nice things
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: about science, I think, is that there's so many different, like,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: it's so multifaceted. And you got to kind of juggle
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: all of those things at once. And it's hard, but
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: then it's almost, it's like a puzzle. If you can
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: figure out the way to, like, answer an interesting question
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: on the budget you have while training five new graduate
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: students so that they're learning something, too.
• 5:42
  Speaker 4: It's like, woo! Like, at the end, it feels like
• 5:44
  Speaker 4: there should be, you know, confetti coming from the ceiling. Like,
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: you did the thing! But, of course, that's not how
• 5:49
  Speaker 4: it works.
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: And the amazing part is that we don't get trained
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: in most of those skills at all, right? No! managing budgets, mentorship, teaching,
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: all of this stuff. Anyway, so you got to be
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: creative on the fly. But neither you nor I are
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: an expert in the topic of creativity. So Kelly, you
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: invited somebody on the show who is.
• 6:09
  Speaker 4: Oh my gosh, she's amazing.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: So today we have Moya McTeer, and she wrote a
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: whole book about creativity, how it's changed over time. This
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: concept of like the lone geniuses is something she dug
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: into also. We didn't get to talk about that during
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: the episode, but that's another cool thing that she deals
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: with in the book. Uh, and you know, she talks
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: about the current moment and how things like the internet
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: and social media and AI are impacting creativity.
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: Uh, and what, if anything we need to do about that.
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: And so let's stop hearing me talk about Moya's book
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: and let's go ahead and bring her on the show. Yeah. Dr.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: Moya McTeer grew up in a cabin in the woods
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: with no running water, no TV, and no heating. She
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: went on to become the first Harvard graduate to double
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: major in astrophysics and mythology, and the first Black woman
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: to graduate from Columbia University's astronomy PhD program. She's a
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: podcast host, does creative consulting, writes sci-fi, and has published
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: two pop sci books, the most recent of which, Mothers
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: of Invention, we will be talking about today.
• 7:04
  Speaker 4: Welcome to the show, Moya. We're so excited to have you.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: Thanks, Kelly. Thanks, Daniel. It's so nice to be here.
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: How you doing? Awesome.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: I'm really intrigued by your background. I had a good
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: friend in college who studied physics and classics, and it was,
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: I think, because he was torn between the two topics.
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Is that what happened for you, or did you feel
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: like they come from the same core curiosity?
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: No, that's exactly what happened to me. I'm very stubborn
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: and very bad at making decisions. So when I fell
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: in love with both of these departments, I refused to
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: let either of them go. And then they let me
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: study both of them. It actually wasn't on the pre-approved
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: list of double majors. But I told them I could
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: write a science fiction novel that was set on a
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: real exoplanet that I studied. And they were like, oh, yeah,
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: that sounds interesting. Go do that.
• 7:51
  Speaker 4: I love that they embraced that, though. And they weren't like, no, no,
• 7:54
  Speaker 4: that breaks the rules.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: Because I feel like sometimes there are very silly rules
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: that will not get broken, you know, for any reason.
• 7:59
  Speaker 4: And so, yay.
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, especially at these old places. But I think it
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: worked to my advantage that the astro and mythology departments
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: were two of the smallest departments at the school, so
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: they just couldn't afford to lose bodies.
• 8:12
  Speaker 4: I guess that's good.
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: And I bet both of those trainings are useful when
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: it comes to the most important thing in science, which
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: is naming stuff, right?
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: Understanding mythology and context, right? And then, like, understanding the
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: science that's going on out there. Like, If you had
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: been in charge, would we have a better categorization of
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: stuff in the solar system? Not all this crazy like
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: planets and dwarf planets and centaurs and insanity?
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: No, we'd still have all of that stuff. We might
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: even have weirder stuff if I was in charge.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: Wait, what about.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: Isn't it Neptune or Jupiter? The rings are called like A, B, C,
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: D and E or something like that. Like very uncreative.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: Am I misremembering? Saturn's rings are lettered and they are
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: not in alphabetical order from the center. If I recall correctly,
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: it's really frustrating.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: It's like the buildings at MIT. Let's give them numbers,
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: but then not have that be useful.
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 9:08
  Speaker 4: Well, let's focus.
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: So we've gotten to some examples where there wasn't a
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: lot of creativity, the naming of the rings, for example.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: But so you wrote this amazing book about creativity. So
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: how do you personally define creativity?
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: Oh, I am personally kind of agnostic. I like people
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: to use their own idea of what creativity can be.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: But broadly speaking, And scientifically speaking, when you're testing this,
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: according to psychologists, creativity is the ability to divergently think
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: and to come up with novel and useful ideas. And
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: that's a modern definition. That is not what people throughout
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: history have considered creativity, or that's not the bounds of
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: art that people have always agreed on. But I think
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: that's useful. Divergent thinking is vague enough that we can
• 9:58
  Speaker 3: all understand it without being too boxed in.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: Wow, it's intriguing that you added useful ideas. So for example,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: somebody who just like, comes up with clever jokes that
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: end up in web comics online. Would that be, you know,
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: not creative?
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: Is that a burn there? No, I think that useful can,
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: you know, be a lot of different things. So there
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: are definitely people who can read your web comics and
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: get joy from those. And that is useful. I'm not
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: talking about like completely practical, hard usefulness, hard utility. Yeah.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: So I was trying to figure out, like, what is
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: an example of something that isn't creative? And I think
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: that I, you know, first of all, I would feel
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: bad telling someone that they are not.
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: Creative in their work.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: And so I think that I tend to have a
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: particularly expansive definition of creativity because I don't want to, like,
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: exclude anyone. And so I was thinking, you know, like
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: my first job was. when I was 16 was I
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: was a bagger at Kroger's in Perrysburg, Ohio. And I
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: feel like I was thinking of creative ways to like
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: efficiently do my job in different ways.
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: Than other people.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: And so I guess I feel like I can almost
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: imagine any job being creative if you are like coming
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: at it creatively.
• 11:14
  Speaker 4: But what do you think? Are there jobs that are
• 11:16
  Speaker 4: not creative?
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Hmm.
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: I don't No, if I could think of any task
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: that I would say is inherently not creative. But you
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: can do any task in a not creative way. You
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: can be derivative. You can just be rote and you
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: can be formulaic. So I think that I've read books
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: before where I was like, this plot doesn't feel like
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: it's doing anything new. It doesn't feel like the author
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: was trying to experiment or have fun with this. They
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: were just following a formula. And to me, that's not creative.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: I think, Kelly, your example is a good one because
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: there's an opportunity there for you to make decisions, right?
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: And you could, for example, like, I don't like this guy.
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: I'm going to put his ice cream next to his
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: rotisserie chicken or whatever. But my first job was at McDonald's.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: And one of the things that I found so mind-numbing
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: about it was that there was absolutely no room for
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: decision-making at all. Like, you press the fryer button, and
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: then it dings at you, and you take the fries out.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: And I felt like completely trapped by the fact that
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: I was essentially just like a robot following instructions. And
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: I know it's designed that way. So you get your
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: fries exactly the same way, no matter who's pressing the button.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: But it was frustrating to me precisely because there's absolutely
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: no room there for personality.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good point. Part of divergent thinking is
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: the choices you have to make. So the more choices
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: that are removed from a situation, the less opportunity for
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: creativity there will be.
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: So you mentioned that the definition of creativity has changed
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: over time. Can you give us some examples of how
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: people used to sort of perceive what counted as creativity
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: or not?
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: Would love to. The ancient Greeks only considered poetry a
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: creative art form.
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: What?
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: What about all of their amazing statues and stuff?
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: I know. I know. To them, those were considered crafts.
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: They were techni, and crafts like sculpting, painting, cooking, architecture—
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: they were done according to rules that existed before. So
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: you weren't creating anything from scratch. You were just discovering
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: something that already existed. And poetry was special. It had
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: its own word, poiesis, meant to make. And the idea
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: was that poets are actually kind of synthesizing something new
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: that hasn't existed before. Although that changed, the ancient Romans
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: then added that visual arts can be creative. And then
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: in the medieval Christian period, we kind of regressed to
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: saying actually nothing a human makes can be creative because
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: the only being who can create is God.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Oh, wow.
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Yes. And then in the Enlightenment period, people start to
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: insert themselves into creativity again.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: So the ancient Greeks might have said web comics are
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: the only people being creative today.
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: If your comics are poetic, yes. But the drawings wouldn't
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: have been considered creative.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: All right. Let's not make this too specific.
• 14:10
  Speaker 4: We should stop picking on Zach. Because Zach isn't here.
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: I never mentioned him. I don't know what you're talking about.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: But on your comment, does that mean that they didn't
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: think philosophy was creative, like exploring the universe and having ideas?
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: That was like a craft?
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: That was a craft. You were discovering truths about the
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: universe or truths were being whispered into your ear. And
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: this is really the whole inspiration, the core of my
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: latest book, Mothers of Invention. Thousands of years ago, the
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: idea of a genius was external to the person. It
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: was a guide, a tutelary spirit, if you will. And
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: they whispered inspiration into your ear. They breathed it in.
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: That's why inspiration has the root inspire, to breathe in. What?
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: Oh, my gosh.
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: Yes. And then much later.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: That's so obvious now that I think about it.
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: We started saying instead of that person has a genius...
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: We said, that person is a genius. So we absorbed
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: the genius or the muse into ourself.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: Why do you think that historically we saw it so differently?
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: Do you think people imagined that all of their good
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: creative ideas came externally because they couldn't account for where
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: they came from?
• 15:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think they were still trying to figure it out.
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: It was a more mystical time back then. A lot
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: of explanations for the natural world were magical. We... explained
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: eclipses and weather patterns and the seasons with God. So
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: why not also explain what's going on in our brains
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: with mystical beings as well?
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: Well, then zooming forward to modern times, do we have
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: any idea where ideas come from? I think a lot
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: of people struggle with this. Sometimes you sit down and
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: you're like, okay, time for me to be creative. And
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: either it happens or it doesn't. So I'd love to
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: blame somebody else for my dull periods. Do we have
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: any understanding with modern science about how creativity happens?
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: A little bit. We have a better understanding than Plato did,
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: for sure.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: We have done some experiments. My favorite was actually done twice,
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: once in 2008 and then again in the 2020s, I
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: think 2025. Both of these tests were done with jazz musicians,
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: putting them inside fMRI machines and having them play music
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: from memory. music from paper and music improvised.
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh.
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: And seeing what parts of their brain lit up during
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: each of those activities. And in 2008, they found that
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: there were some parts, like the prefrontal cortex, that are
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: lighting up when you're being creative, when you're improvising, which
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: is like the most creative you can be as a
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: jazz musician for sure. But in the 2020s, when they
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: did this same study again, they were emphasizing networks of
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: the brain more than individual parts of the brain. I
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: guess the field had advanced in those intervening years. And
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: what we've found in the more recent study was that
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: three networks in the brain are very active when the
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: jazz musicians were improvising. One was the default mode network,
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: which made sense to a lot of people. The default
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: mode network is what some people describe as like your
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: back burner thinking. It's parts of the brain that are
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: working when you're not paying attention to that particular thing.
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: And then the salience network was also lighting up when
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: the musicians were improvising, which is the exact opposite of
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: the default mode network. It's the parts of your brain
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: that are paying attention to what's in front of you
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: right now, what is salient to your focus. And then
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: the third network was the executive network, decision-making about what
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: you should do based on the stimuli you're receiving. And people,
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: I think, were shocked a little bit that those three
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: modes of the brain were working at once because it
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: doesn't seem like they should be able to. But really,
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: that is a long-winded way of saying we know a
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: little bit more, but just enough to have more questions.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Science.
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: Science.
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: There are things that we've found that can help you
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: be more creative, that can kickstart some creative thinking and
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: divergent processes. My favorite is almost falling asleep.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: What?
• 18:26
  Speaker 4: Go on.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: Apparently, right before you enter a deeper sleep, you're in
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: a state called a hypnagogic state where I don't know
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: how it works, but Studies have shown that when you
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: wake people up right before they completely fall asleep and
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: give them a creative task after that, they will do
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: better on that creative task. And Salvador Dali, who was
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: a complicated person but a very creative artist, he used
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: to start taking a nap with a nail or something
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: metallic in his hand so that when he drifted off,
• 18:59
  Speaker 3: it would fall and make a noise and he would
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: be awoken from that hypnagogic state and then he could
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: come up with his ideas.
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: That explains all of his paintings well.
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 19:08
  Speaker 4: I think all of my creative work would be angry.
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: Because I don't like being woken up. If I was like, oh,
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: I just fell asleep. And then I woke myself up again.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: I'd be like, here's another angry poem about how the
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: world is unfair. But is there a link between creativity
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: and intelligence?
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: Or are these totally different things?
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: There's.
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: Kind of a link, but they are distinct. We have
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: found that people with high creativity scores can have low
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: IQ scores and vice versa. We've also seen on mass
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: that our IQ scores as a society are increasing. this
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: is called the Flynn effect where every generation seems to
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: be doing better on IQ tests than the generation before
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: at the same time our scores on creativity tests are
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: decreasing steadily yeah.
• 20:03
  Speaker 4: How do you measure that yes.
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: The creativity part yeah I'm so glad you asked. I
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: love thinking about creativity tests. Some of these tests are written.
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: Some of these tests are verbal. You might have to
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: finish a story like what happened when the cow jumped
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: over the moon? Or you might have to answer a
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: weird hypothetical like if humans had a third arm, where
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: would it be? How would we use it? Or you
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: might have to do some drawings. So one of the
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: common tests is that you get a bunch of boxes
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: that all have the same incomplete shape in it. And
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: you have to complete that shape in as many ways
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: as possible in some kind of time limit. And all
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: of these tests are meant to see how quickly can
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: you come up with an idea that is statistically different
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: from an idea that an average person would come up
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: with in that scenario.
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: I get that all these tests are a way to
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: quantify something, which is very, very fuzzy.
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: And I could be convinced that they're somehow correlated with
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: something like creativity, but I always find it frustrating that
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: we use that to measure and define creativity the same way.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: Like the IQ test is testing something, but it's not
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: really intelligence, right? There's cultural factors, et cetera. So what
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: are we really measuring with these tests?
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: That's a great question. Yeah.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: In the Torrance test, I like that it's so many
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: different types of tests that you can get a more
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: holistic view. But really, what if a person isn't comfortable
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: in that testing environment? What if a person doesn't have
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: that cultural knowledge of something in that test? One of
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: the other tests that they give is something called an
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: alternative uses test, where you would ask, how many ways
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: could a person use a brick? That was the original question.
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: format of the test. But eventually, Torrance realized that he
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: was giving this test to children and they didn't have
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: that much experience with bricks. So he changed it to
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: a tin can. So there really is a lot of
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: like you have to be aware of the cultural knowledge
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: that people will have. There are other tests that are
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: more language based, but none of these tests are perfect.
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: Like if you're testing Kelly, you'd have to know that
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: you have to get her angry.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: To be creative. My concern with that creativity test is
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: that like I don't do anything well on the fly.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: And so like I like to imagine that I write creatively,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: but it takes me a long time to get that
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: chapter done. And like if I'm on the spot, I
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: don't know that you'd be measuring my creativity anymore.
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: In the most, I don't know, effective or efficient way.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like if somebody said, okay, let's measure your funniness,
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: be funny.
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: So true. I agree with you. I don't do well
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: with time tests either. I think they try to get
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: around that by having the test take a long time.
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: So one of the big landmark creativity studies happened in
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: the late 50s, and it was something like over 100
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: architects gathered on the– UC Berkeley campus to get this
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: barrage of psych tests done. And the fact that they
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: were there for the whole weekend meant that they might
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: not have felt that same time pressure. Also meant that
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: you could do multiple tests to get a kind of
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: average score for a person. Okay. Cool. Yeah.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: So creativity is fuzzy, but it's also deeply human. What
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: was it about this topic that made you decide, I
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: want to dig into this? I....
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: Have spent almost my entire life around creative people. My
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: mom's a writer and some of my favorite friends are comedians, musicians.
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: And I have seen them struggle lately. I have struggled
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: as a creative writer and as a person trying to
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: sell comedy shows. And I wanted to dig to the
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: bottom of that. I had seen that we are in
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: the era of reboots. I think I started noticing that
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: in like 2018, 2019. And it really annoyed me But
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: once I realized that it's hard to find good art
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: and hard to make good art, I had to write
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: something about it.
• 24:30
  Speaker 4: I would love to dig into that more. So let's
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: take a break.
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: And when we get back, we will talk more about
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: how the Internet is impacting creativity.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: And we're back.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: And so, Moya, you were saying that you've noticed that
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: we're in the era of reboots and that, like, you know,
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: being a person who's online, creativity is maybe changing over time.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: Could you dig in a little bit more and talk
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: about what you think is causing that change?
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: There's so much. A whole book's worth. Yes.
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: So....
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: I argue in the book that we have entered this
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: new phase of human imagination that I call the age
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: of celebrity. And this is different from every phase of
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: human imagination we've experienced before, according to this Irish philosopher
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: of imagination named Richard Kearney. In this age of celebrity,
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: the point of art is no longer primarily to express
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: something or but to redirect attention back to the creator
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: so that the creator can make more stuff and make
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: their fame even brighter. That leads to the era of reboots.
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: The majority of movies and TV shows made today are
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: original IP, but the majority of the popular movies and
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: TV shows made today, like an overwhelming 75%, those are
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: based on pre-existing intellectual property. That's a problem. We see
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: the same faces in media over and over again. I
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: just saw The Odyssey last week and I enjoyed it,
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: but it did take me out of the experience to
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: see Matt Damon or Anne Hathaway because I know that
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: they are Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway. But the studios
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: want those big names because that's who's going to bring
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: the audience. It's not about the art anymore. It's about
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: whose name is on the billing.
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: And spell it out for us. Why is it a
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: problem that we are recycling ideas and names and faces?
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: It's less exciting. It's not making us work our creative
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: muscles anymore. And it's leaving an entire swath of independent
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: artists undiscovered. There used to be much more of a
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: practice of apprenticeship and of bringing people up the ladder
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: behind you when you made it in media. There were
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: pipelines for getting undiscovered comedians their own TV shows. They
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: would work the comedy club circuit and then they would
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: get like a five minute slot on someone's late night
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: show and that would work up to being a correspondent
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: and then they would eventually get their own show. That
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: type of pipeline doesn't exist anymore because the studios are
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: incentivized to keep pouring money into the famous people and
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: not incentivized to use their resources to bring others up.
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: Do you have any thoughts on how we got here?
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: Because, like, I can imagine, like, having new people on
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: your show is a chance to be able to say, like, oh,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: I'm the one who discovered, you know, this new amazing
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: comedian or something. Like, why are we not doing that anymore?
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: How did we get here?
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: I will trace it back to Nielsen ratings. It goes
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: further than that. It's a bigger problem. But right now
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: I'll trace it back to Nielsen ratings. In 1950, the
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: Nielsen company switched from monitoring radio activity. Primarily, they continued
• 28:02
  Speaker 3: to do that, but they started monitoring TV activity. So
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: they sent these devices around that could monitor what channels
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: different TVs are tuned into so they can get statistics
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: for what shows are popular. And eventually those statistics got
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: so good and so granular that you could see when
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: are people turning off a particular show. So you can
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: see like which actors are really popular, which types of
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: tropes are really popular. And eventually there became an overabundance
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: of data in a creative space so that business people
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: are making decisions based on what the algorithm says people
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: will like, which is kind of the antithesis to creativity,
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: which is where you're experimenting and you're just trying to
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: see what people will like instead of defining it ahead
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: of time.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: It's the problem with turning something fuzzy into something numerical, right?
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: The metric then becomes the target.
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: But let me take the other side of that argument
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: just for the other side of the argument. Like, if
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: that's what people want, if that's what people like, and
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: the data says people like Matt Damon, then if I'm
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: a business person, why shouldn't I give people what they
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: want instead of, you know, risking money on five brand
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: new folks who might be terrible?
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: To that I would say, what, like 100, 150 years ago,
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: people wanted faster horses. They didn't want cars. People don't
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: necessarily know what they want if they aren't exposed to it.
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: But if you just keep putting the same thing in
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: front of their faces, then all of a sudden they
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: feel like they need that thing. We need to be
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: exposed to new ideas. new faces, new people, new perspectives.
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: That's part of growing and that's part of fostering creativity.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: Wow, that's a great analogy. I love that.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: So to express the Wienersmith's sort of grumpy opinion about
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: how things are changing. So, you know, we've alluded to
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: the fact that my husband is a web cartoonist. And
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: when he started doing web cartooning, you know, I remember
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: he would be up to like 2 a.m. putting out
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: a new comic every day. And he like it was
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: it was brutal. It was really hard. And every day
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: he like tries to read a new book or at
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: least every couple of days to get new ideas. He
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: works really hard at what he does. And when he started,
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: it was pretty easy to connect with an audience. But
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: now over time on the different social media platforms that
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: he has to be on now because people expect to
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: go to like Reddit to see all of their comics
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: in one place instead of going to Zach's website. All
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: of these different places now have algorithms that you need
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: to maximize. And then places like Facebook will change their algorithm.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: And now Zach's like, I can't reach my audience at
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: all anymore. And so, so many of the different people
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: in this community are spending a lot of time optimizing
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: algorithms to make sure that people see their art. And
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: that takes time away from doing the art itself. And
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: I feel like that's also selecting for a different community
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: because Zach is talking about like, I don't really enjoy
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: doing comics anymore because I don't want to figure out
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: what the algorithm wants. I want to like make a
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: joke about population ethics because that's what I'm reading right now.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: But maybe that's not what the algorithm is going to want.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: And yeah, how do you think the algorithms are sort
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: of playing into all of this?
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: Oh, majorly in a similar way to the Nielsen ratings.
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: It's data being used to make something fuzzy into something clear.
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: I like how you put that, Daniela. But the algorithms,
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: they play into the age of celebrity heavily because they
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: will direct attention to what's already getting attention. It's like
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: gravity out in the universe. Once you have some attention,
• 31:36
  Speaker 3: it's easier for you to get more. And that leads
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: to influencers, that leads to content creators who are not,
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: they're not artists. I think that that's derivative. When we
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: get people following trends, when we get people doing like
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: the same dance's Over and over again when they're not
• 31:54
  Speaker 3: really adding anything new to it.
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: Can we talk about that phrase content creator? That takes
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: like all of the joy and the art out of,
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: you know, this process for me. Like, I mean, you're
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: like extruding content or something like, oh, it's such a
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: terrible phrase.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: It is. It's like sweat and you're just sweating it out.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like some device in a factory and
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: there's just like a tube of content, you know, being
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: extruded from me. It's like, ugh, anyway.
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: But I feel like it's an apt comparison though, or
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: like it's an apt phrase. Because I mean, I remember
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: when my kids were young and we started like watching
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: stuff on YouTube, it would be like, an unboxing video.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: It's like, you're not doing anything creative. You're just opening
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: a toy. But then on the other hand, like, you know,
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: trying to see.
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: Things both ways.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: And one of the things I really liked about your
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: book is that it made me sit back later and
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: think like, well, what is creativity? And what is the
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: problem with giving like my daughter what she, she wanted
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: to see these unboxing videos, even though it made me like, angry.
• 32:53
  Speaker 4: It's like, you should not be enjoying this. Yeah.
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: What is the problem with their, yeah, I can't remember
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: where I was going to go with this. I've just
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: gotten angry and forgotten.
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: Oh, no. Did you wake up from a nap? Look,
• 33:07
  Speaker 3: I am not going to sit here and say that
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: all of those types of videos, the dance trends, the unboxings,
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: the get ready with me's, I don't think it's bad
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: that they exist, we can have things in our society
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: that are entertainment but aren't creative and aren't artistic. That's fine.
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: The issue is when people get a lot of attention
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: and praise and adoration for doing those things that are
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: not creative. When we start idolizing an individual for who
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: they are and not what they do, then we leave
• 33:45
  Speaker 3: ourselves vulnerable to a lot of the terrible things that
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: are happening in society right now, where we're letting people
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: do bad things just because we like who they are
• 33:54
  Speaker 3: or what they've maybe done in the past.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: And I think you're making another argument also, which is
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: that even if what you want to do is appeal
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: to the audience, to give Kelly's daughter the most satisfying
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: YouTube experience or whatever, the best way to do that
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: is not to double down on what you think is
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: the risk-minimizing IP, but to fund exploration of that artistic space.
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: Because in the end, that will yield transformational new creativity
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: that invents whole new forms of art and whole new
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: stories that in the end will make Kelly's daughter happier. Yes.
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And it's not that that stuff doesn't exist. It's
• 34:32
  Speaker 3: out there. Absolutely. It's just way harder to find and
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: the algorithms make it even harder.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: And I think we're facing exactly the same problem in science.
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: You know, it's harder and harder to get like crazy
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: ideas funded because budgets are shrinking and funding agencies very
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: understandably are like, well, do I give my million dollars
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: to this big group at MIT that's pumping out science reliably?
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Or do I spread it out to a bunch of
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: crazy groups with insane ideas, one of which might revolutionize science, but,
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: you know, they could also just turn into nothing. And so,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: you know, they get more and more conservative and we
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: starve out the fringe ideas and the new directions.
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, one of the chapters in the book
• 35:11
  Speaker 3: is about the invention of the internet, which started as ARPANET,
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: which was a collection, a network of research computers at
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: civilian research institutions so they could share resources. And the
• 35:24
  Speaker 3: idea there for a while, at least, was that they
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: should be able to just research what was interesting to them.
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: And then we will find an application for it later.
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: And that was beautiful.
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: Give the nerds money. Exactly.
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: Please.
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: I say with no skin in the game at all.
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: I feel like there was so much optimism when the
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: internet started that has kind.
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: Of gone away lately. Yeah.
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: Seems like the internet is no longer a great place
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: for creativity, but How do you think AI is going
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: to further impact things?
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: Hmm. Deep sigh.
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: Oh, heavy sigh.
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: Look, I have spent the last, I think, two or
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: three years working with a group that's trying to get
• 36:06
  Speaker 3: regulations passed for generative AI specifically. Great. So that we
• 36:10
  Speaker 3: can protect artists' rights and rights. Everything that I have
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: done with this campaign has been about maximizing people's choice.
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: I want people to be able to choose how much
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: they engage with AI as creators of art and as
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: enjoyers of art. The issue now is that It's being
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: pushed on people. It's not labeled. So people have to
• 36:32
  Speaker 3: use their own discernment to figure out if something they're
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: seeing is AI. But we're not trained to do that.
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: There has never been any reason throughout human history that
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: we've had to look that closely at the uncanny valley
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: to see if it's in our part of the hills
• 36:49
  Speaker 3: or something.
• 36:50
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: And really, the only time we've had to do that
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: is in monster stories about shapeshifters and people who steal
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: your face and voice. And yet we're freely giving over
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: our faces and our voices and our critical thinking, our
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: writing skills to this thing that our ancestors would have
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: seen as a monster. It makes me really sad. I
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: don't want to use it at all. And I don't
• 37:15
  Speaker 3: want it to touch my work. But I know it has.
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: How has it touched your work?
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: Oh, I know that my books have been scraped for
• 37:23
  Speaker 3: data training. Yeah. If I were a teacher, I would
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: see it in the classrooms. If I were a music producer,
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: I would see it in some of the beats that
• 37:32
  Speaker 3: I've been getting because I talk to artists and I
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: see that there is a huge range of opinions. Some
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: are willing to run with it. I've heard some people
• 37:41
  Speaker 3: describe generative AI right now without regulations as the wild,
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: wild west. And you should just run and use AI
• 37:47
  Speaker 3: to make as many beats as possible to make as
• 37:49
  Speaker 3: much money as possible. That broke my heart when I
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: heard like an old school hip hop producer say that.
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: But I also have talked to many artists who don't
• 38:01
  Speaker 3: want to use it or are thinking very critically about
• 38:05
  Speaker 3: how they use it and making sure that they're using
• 38:07
  Speaker 3: it as a tool and not as a crutch or
• 38:10
  Speaker 3: a replacement. Because there are creative ways to use it.
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: Not for me, not in my work that I've done
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: right now, but other people. And that's the beauty of art, right?
• 38:19
  Speaker 3: That we continue to expand what has been done before.
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: I was going to push back on that a little
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: bit just for the sake of argument.
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: I understand if you say, hey, ChatGPT, write me a
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: new hit song. You know, there's no creativity there. But
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: if you use it as a tool to allow you
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: to do things you haven't done before, allow you to
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: imagine new directions you could go in, you might see
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: it as an extension of a series of tools that
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: have been given to artists. You know, other tools that
• 38:50
  Speaker 2: have changed the way music happens, you know, resampling and
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: many tracks and technology definitely opened up new areas of creativity,
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: but crucially because they haven't given up that core guidance, right?
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: That they're still the person being creative. And I mean,
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: I'm basically just speaking from my experience in science that
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: I see people using AI as a tool, but then
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: I also see other people just like, you know, giving
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: over their entire program to AI.
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's happening everywhere.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: Do you have any advice for like, what the heck
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: do we do? Like, how do we, how do we
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: get out of this situation? Cause it feels like, you know,
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: there's fewer ways to be creative or there's fewer ways
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: to make a living being creative, you know, with the
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: internet and with AI.
• 39:34
  Speaker 4: Solve the problem, Moya.
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: Okay, okay. Here's the secret sauce. No, I think that
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: it's one of those problems that we have to chip
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: at incrementally, starting on an individual scale and then growing
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: up from there. a lot of individual people have just
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: accepted that they're not creative, have just accepted that it's
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: not a part of their lives. We need to nip
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: that in the bud right now. Everyone can be creative
• 40:00
  Speaker 3: and this is a skill that you can practice. So
• 40:02
  Speaker 3: I'd say everyone should practice small creativity every day. It
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: doesn't have to be like go out and paint a
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: whole mural. You don't have to be Daniel's daughter painting
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: walls out here, but you can cook a new recipe.
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: You can do your hair in a new way or
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: try something new with your makeup. try a new outfit.
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: There are so many ways to express. And I wish
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: we just actively did that more. And once we're doing
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: that on an individual level, we'll start to appreciate it
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: in others more. So then we'll see that societal change.
• 40:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I like that. Let's take a break.
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: And when we get back, we will talk about the
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: amazing creative act that was you writing Mothers of Invention,
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: because I thought you had a really creative way of
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: bringing all of this information to the reader.
• 41:08
  Speaker 4: And we're back.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: And the questions today were motivated by Moya's new amazing book,
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: Mothers of Invention. And I tried writing fiction once. And
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: it nearly killed me. I was like, I am not
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: good at this. Even even if I wake myself up
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: from sleep, I'm not good at it. But you managed
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: to combine a really like informative pop side book in
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: like the this jacket of a fictional environment. So like
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: tell me about the process, how you decided to go
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: about writing the book in this like super creative, amazing way.
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: Thank you. Yeah, this is kind of my thing now.
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: My first book was written from the point of view
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: of the Milky Way galaxy. And from there, how can
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: you get bigger than that? Obviously, by going to the gods.
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: And so I told you before that I was seeing
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: we're in the era of reboots. I was seeing this
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: creativity crisis, as some are calling it. And I was
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: remembering a TED Talk that I absolutely loved as a
• 42:08
  Speaker 3: high schooler by Elizabeth Gilbert called Your Elusive Creative Genius.
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: And all of that made me really want to write
• 42:14
  Speaker 3: something from the perspective of the muses. Because who better
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: to talk about creativity and inspiration than the goddesses of that?
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: And it was the biggest creative challenge I've ever given myself.
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: Oh, wow.
• 42:27
  Speaker 3: Because I wanted all of the muses to feel like
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: distinct characters. I know that character work is a weakness
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: of mine in fiction. So I use this book to
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: practice that and give them each distinct voices and personalities
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: and writing styles. all while making sure that it was
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: in service to teaching people information, teaching people about the
• 42:48
  Speaker 3: history of these inventions. I cover eight different inventions. And
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: combining that, kind of braiding it together with commentary on creativity.
• 42:57
  Speaker 3: So it was, I saw it as kind of like
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: a three-dimensional puzzle coming together in my brain. I don't
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: know if that's a helpful image.
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: It is, yes.
• 43:09
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 43:09
  Speaker 3: Okay, good.
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: And how did you pick those eight topics? Because there's
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: so many topics you could have picked. Yeah, how did
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: you pick the eight?
• 43:17
  Speaker 3: Oh, there are notebooks full of my thoughts on this,
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: for sure. I wanted to make sure that each of
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: the inventions made sense for the muse that inspired it,
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: but wasn't too obvious. So I have Arania, the muse
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: of astronomy, helping us with the invention of the telescope.
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: That was obvious. Yes. But I also have Polymnia, the
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: muse of sacred poetry, helping with the invention of electricity
• 43:43
  Speaker 3: or the harnessing of electricity. That one was unexpected because
• 43:48
  Speaker 3: the muse of sacred poetry, you know, maybe she would
• 43:50
  Speaker 3: do something with the church. Maybe she would do something
• 43:52
  Speaker 3: with organized religion. But I wanted to flip that on
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: its head and turn her into like a power hungry
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: spy master. And she's trying to get control of electricity
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: so she can overthrow Zeus on his throne on Olympus.
• 44:06
  Speaker 3: And so. It really was just like looking at these
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: muses as characters and figuring out what would they have
• 44:13
  Speaker 3: the most fun inspiring among humanity that I can then
• 44:18
  Speaker 3: flip into this useful narrative. And it almost like arranging
• 44:25
  Speaker 3: an astronomical observation, like all of the constraints kind of
• 44:27
  Speaker 3: fell into place and led me to this list of eight.
• 44:30
  Speaker 4: Awesome.
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: And I liked the way at the beginning of the book,
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: you dealt with the fact that this is a pop-sci
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: book with fiction, and you sort of explain how you
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: dealt with that. But can you tell us about that now?
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: How did you deal with the fact that you were
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: layering on an imaginary world, well-telling pop-sci? Did that make
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: it more challenging? Or yeah, how did you deal with that?
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: I think that's just how my brain works. I have
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: spent so long... thinking about the myths that humans have
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: told about the night sky and how that is actually
• 45:04
  Speaker 3: a cover for true science so my brain kind of
• 45:10
  Speaker 3: understands that translation very well wait.
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: Back up hold on how is astrology and the mythology
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: of the night sky a cover.
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: For true science Because it's based on real observations. You know,
• 45:22
  Speaker 3: people were telling myths about the star Sirius coming above
• 45:29
  Speaker 3: the horizon at a particular time, like in the summer,
• 45:32
  Speaker 3: and using that to predict when the Nile River would
• 45:35
  Speaker 3: flood in ancient Egypt. And that's real science. But they
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: explained that with a story of their goddess Isis going
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: on a trip around the world to try and recover
• 45:45
  Speaker 3: the body parts of her husband, Osiris. And the reason
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: the Nile is flooding is because she is that star
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: and she's coming above the horizon weeping because she misses
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: her husband and that causes the floods. And so it's,
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: I've gotten very good at kind of seeing the truth
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: behind all of the fiction to the point where that
• 46:04
  Speaker 3: might just be how my brain sees information now. And
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: so it was really easy to put this fictional filter
• 46:12
  Speaker 3: over it and my favorite chapter to write was the
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: final chapter on the invention of the internet because I
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: present it as an epic fantasy story of this queen
• 46:24
  Speaker 3: engaging in this epic war against Obscuro. Obscuro is this
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: evil figure who's trying to steal people's legacy. And the queen, Calliope,
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: is trying to give people a way to make their
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: legacies permanent. through writing, through publishing, and through the internet.
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: So the battle is the battle of internet null, and
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: there are war unicorns, and Ares intervenes, and it sounds
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: ridiculous when I say it out loud, but this is
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: how real stories in ancient times, real deeds, were mythologized
• 46:56
  Speaker 3: and exaggerated to the point where they became myths. Like Hercules'
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: 12 labors, were probably firstly done by multiple different people,
• 47:04
  Speaker 3: but they were much more mundane. The labor of him
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: killing a river monster probably actually started as a human
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: figure diverting a stream so that it didn't flood a city.
• 47:19
  Speaker 3: And then that turned into a hero killing a water monster.
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: So I just like thinking about those translations. Totally.
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: And I love how you did this in this untraditional way,
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: which in the end makes an argument about how creativity
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: links what we typically think of as creative things like
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: creative writing, as well as science, right? Effectively, you're making
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: an argument that there is creativity in science. And I mean,
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: that's the way I think about it. I think of
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: like theoretical physicists and science fiction authors as like, you know,
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: different parts of the same spectrum, not like different in kind.
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: Is that something that was intentional in your work?
• 47:54
  Speaker 3: 100%.
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: I wanted people to expand their ideas of what creativity
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: could be because a lot of people don't consider science creative,
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: but that's just because they don't know how science is done.
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: So I wanted to show them some of the process
• 48:09
  Speaker 3: behind a lot of these inventions and how it was
• 48:12
  Speaker 3: actually made so they could see the creativity in it. Awesome.
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: So one of the things that I love about writing
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: a book, especially when it's on a bunch of different topics,
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: is that often there's a topic where you expected the
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: story to go one way. And then when you dive
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: into the research, you're like, what? This isn't what I
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: had expected at all. This isn't like my understanding of
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: this was clearly superficial. Was there like a chapter where
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: you were doing the research and you were like, this
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: is not going where I thought it was going to go?
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: I feel like almost every chapter was like that. There
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: is a chapter in the book about the invention of
• 48:47
  Speaker 3: jazz music, which if you had asked me like three
• 48:50
  Speaker 3: years ago, hey, Moya, what kind of music do you like?
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: My standard answer was, oh, I'll listen to pretty much everything,
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: but I don't like Christmas music or jazz. And then
• 49:01
  Speaker 3: I decided to write a whole chapter on it. And
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: now I have a much deeper appreciation for it. And
• 49:06
  Speaker 3: I did not expect that going in. Also on the
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: electricity chapter, I started that thinking, oh, this is going
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: to be a story about Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison,
• 49:17
  Speaker 3: because those are the two names that I've heard throughout
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: my entire life in this story. I had no idea
• 49:22
  Speaker 3: who George Westinghouse was before I started researching this. So
• 49:26
  Speaker 3: that was a fun extra character that I got to
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: spend time with.
• 49:29
  Speaker 4: Excellent. So are you starting on a new book?
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 49:33
  Speaker 4: Can you tell us about it?
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: I'm starting on a new book and I'm going to
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: try to adapt Mothers of Invention into a TV show.
• 49:40
  Speaker 3: So I'm working on a screenplay for that right now.
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: But the next book, I've known about this for years,
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: I think since 2022. I'm going to call it Cosmophobia.
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: It's going to be about people who are afraid of space.
• 49:54
  Speaker 3: And I'll interview psychologists and daredevils, people who have been
• 49:57
  Speaker 3: to space, hopefully. And the whole structure of the book
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: will be a kind of classic dialogue a la Plato
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: or Aristotle. And it'll be between the universe and a
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: person who is afraid of it, a conversation about really
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: what fear is and what we can do with it.
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: I don't think that I've encountered this category of people
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: who are afraid of space or what are they afraid of?
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: Is it just the overwhelming, what are they afraid of?
• 50:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they find me.
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: I'm afraid of going to space.
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: Same. You and me same, yes. I feel like almost
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: every talk I give has one person coming up to
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: me at the end saying, I'm afraid of space. Like,
• 50:39
  Speaker 3: it's really big, or it's been around for so long, or...
• 50:44
  Speaker 3: It's so mysterious. So how do we know an asteroid
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: isn't going to come and kill us like it did
• 50:48
  Speaker 3: the dinosaurs?
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: Fair.
• 50:50
  Speaker 3: Or I'm scared that we are actually moving and that
• 50:55
  Speaker 3: there is a lot of stuff happening in the universe
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: that I'm not aware of right now. There are a
• 50:59
  Speaker 3: lot of reasons.
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. These things are all terrifying. I guess it's just
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: a point of view, right? It's like either terrifying or
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: exciting or both.
• 51:07
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. And a lot of people have heard about big,
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: scary space stuff like black holes or solar flares, but
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: they don't have a good understanding of the scale of
• 51:17
  Speaker 3: space or of what is actually possible. So they think
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: that we are in danger of a black hole coming
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: and sucking us up or something.
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: I feel like I encounter.
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: So for my PhD, I studied parasites, and parasites are, like,
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: my big thing, which you might not expect, given that
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: I don't write about parasites at all in my books.
• 51:35
  Speaker 4: It's always space and technology.
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: But anyway, and I find that a lot of people,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: when you first start talking about parasites, they're very scared,
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: because they start seeing, like, imagining parasites are everywhere. They
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: think they're probably getting infected by parasites.
• 51:46
  Speaker 4: But the more they.
• 51:47
  Speaker 3: Especially now.
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: Yeah, right.
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: Yes, right.
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: It's in your lettuce, and there's invasive ticks all over
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: the place. And anyway, but when I... explain parasites in
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: more detail. And I'm like, OK, you know, ticks tend
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: to be in these locations and here's what you can
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: do to protect yourself. And like the more you know,
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: the less scary it is. Do you for a lot
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: of these people, is it just like if you tell
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: them more about space, they'll stop being scared of space?
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: Or is it not like parasites in that way?
• 52:16
  Speaker 3: For a lot of them, it is kind of like parasites. Yeah,
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: the kind of the whole point of a podcast that
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: I've been hosting for a few years now I say
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: that it's the astronomy podcast for people who are overwhelmed
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: by the universe but still want to be its friend.
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: I truly believe that the more you learn about space,
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: the more familiar it becomes, the more you feel like
• 52:34
  Speaker 3: you are a part of it. So there's no reason
• 52:37
  Speaker 3: to be afraid anymore. But some, some cannot be helped
• 52:41
  Speaker 3: by learning more. I've made that mistake a couple of
• 52:44
  Speaker 3: times where I'm like, oh, no, it's OK. Here's how
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: far away the nearest black hole is. And then they
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: hear a really big number and they get scared again.
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: So there are different techniques to deal with it. And
• 52:55
  Speaker 3: that's why I'm really excited to dig into the research
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: for that one. Awesome.
• 52:59
  Speaker 4: I can't wait to read that book. Tell us where
• 53:01
  Speaker 4: else folks can find you.
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: You can find me online at moiamictier.com. I'm on all
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: the socials at GoAstroMo. And there you can find information
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: about my book and my podcast, Pale Blue Pod.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: All right. Well, thank you so much for being on
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: the show. I had a ton of fun and hopefully
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: we'll have you back sometime.
• 53:19
  Speaker 3: I'd love that. Thank you so much.
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: Thanks, everybody, for listening. Please go and do us a
• 53:29
  Speaker 2: favor and rate the show on whatever podcast app you're using.
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: It really helps people find us.
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: Daniel and Kelly's Extraordinary Universe is edited by the amazing
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: Matt Kesselman.
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: He really is a wizard. You can also find us
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: online on Blue Sky, Instagram, and XDNK Universe. Come engage
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: with us.
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: You can email us at questions at danielandkelly.org. We really
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: do want to hear from you.
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: And you can find our website, www.danielandkelly.org. where you'll also
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: find an invitation to join our Discord, where everybody comes
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: and talks about the amazing universe.
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: And we also have the most amazing moderators. This is
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: an iHeart podcast. Thanks for joining us.