Latest / Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe / The SF Universe of Becky Chamber's "The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet"

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The SF Universe of Becky Chamber's "The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet" · Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe

0:08
Speaker 1: Hey, Daniel, I have a question for you about aliens. Oh,
0:12
Speaker 1: I'm always ready to gobble that up. When you meet
0:14
Speaker 1: another human culture, it means a lot to share a
0:18
Speaker 1: meal together, you know, like if you visit somebody or
0:20
Speaker 1: in a different country, it's important, you know, to sit
0:23
Speaker 1: down and eat together. But if aliens visit, would you
0:26
Speaker 1: be willing to try their food even if it looks
0:30
Speaker 1: super gross? You know, the fate of the earth might
0:33
Speaker 1: be on the line. You don't want to offend them.
0:37
Speaker 1: I'm not sure I could take a bite and smile.
0:38
Speaker 1: I think maybe we should send our Ambassador of Weird
0:42
Speaker 1: snack Foods. Oh wow, that sounds like a prestigious title.
0:45
Speaker 1: Who did you have in mind? I just admitted the
0:47
Speaker 1: form to nominate you. Sounds delicious. Hi am Jorge. I'm
1:07
Speaker 1: a cartoonist and the creator of PhD comments. Hi I'm Daniel.
1:10
Speaker 1: I'm a particle physicist. But I honestly do like weird
1:13
Speaker 1: snack foods. What's the weirdest snack would you ever eat? In? Then?
1:18
Speaker 1: I don't even know what it was. Because we have
1:21
Speaker 1: some Japanese markets here where there's nothing in English, and
1:24
Speaker 1: sometimes we just go in and get a few bags
1:26
Speaker 1: of weird really Japanese roulette with the snack Japanese snack roulette,
1:31
Speaker 1: And I'm like, is this a salty snack? Is it
1:34
Speaker 1: baby food? Is it dessert? I don't even know. Does
1:37
Speaker 1: it have fish in it? Does it have fish and
1:39
Speaker 1: cheese on it? Everything has fish in it. Everything is fishing.
1:42
Speaker 1: It's the Japanese market. It's all extracted from shrimp somehow. Yeah, yeah,
1:47
Speaker 1: but I love it. Yeah. Well, Welcome to our podcast.
1:49
Speaker 1: Daniel and Jorge talk about snack foods, eat, weird stuff,
1:53
Speaker 1: and the universe. No. Welcome to our podcast. Daniel and
1:56
Speaker 1: Jorge explain the Universe, a production of I Heart Radio,
2:00
Speaker 1: which we talk about all the amazing and tasty and
2:03
Speaker 1: weird things about our universe that we find ourselves in.
2:06
Speaker 1: You have woken up as a conscious being in this universe,
2:09
Speaker 1: imbued with curiosity, and look out into the cosmos and
2:12
Speaker 1: wonder why is it like that? Well, we are here
2:15
Speaker 1: to tell you why, right? And what does it taste like?
2:18
Speaker 1: That's important? Does that ever cross your mind? Daniel? I
2:20
Speaker 1: wonder what aliens taste like? You know, maybe they won't
2:23
Speaker 1: eat us? Maybe no, No, I'm trending more and more vegetarian.
2:29
Speaker 1: But I have wondered. You know, sometimes they talk about
2:31
Speaker 1: like a teaspoon of neutron star ways as much as whatever,
2:34
Speaker 1: and I wonder, what does that taste like? You know,
2:36
Speaker 1: what is a teaspoon of neutron stars? Probably probably kind
2:40
Speaker 1: of heavy. Maybe you should spread it on toast or something,
2:42
Speaker 1: you know, mix it with a little cream. I don't know,
2:44
Speaker 1: sparkling a toast to toast. But yeah, welcome to our
2:49
Speaker 1: podcast in which we talk about all of the amazing
2:52
Speaker 1: things in the universe, all the delicious things, and all
2:55
Speaker 1: of the things that may not yet exist or happen
2:57
Speaker 1: in this universe. And we like to talk about the
3:00
Speaker 1: real universe, the one that's actually out there that scientists
3:03
Speaker 1: are trying to figure out, because it's filled with crazy
3:06
Speaker 1: puzzles and amazing mysteries and mind blowing discoveries. But sometimes
3:10
Speaker 1: the best way to explore our universe is to think
3:12
Speaker 1: about other hypothetical universes that might be and also might
3:17
Speaker 1: be our universe. Yeah, because businesses, I think you we
3:20
Speaker 1: think of them as explorers, you know, the universe, trying
3:23
Speaker 1: to discover new things, but even more out there, I
3:26
Speaker 1: would say maybe the advanced scouts of the human consciousness
3:31
Speaker 1: and search for knowledge are sort of the the inventors,
3:33
Speaker 1: you know, the artists, the writers who think of what
3:37
Speaker 1: could possibly be possible and what would happen if we
3:40
Speaker 1: found them. That's true. Artists certainly are at the forefront
3:43
Speaker 1: of what is possible and what might be impossible. I'm
3:46
Speaker 1: glad that you think about physicists as explorers, though sometimes
3:49
Speaker 1: you describe me as an explorer from the couch, like
3:51
Speaker 1: a couch explorer. You probably know that couch really well,
3:56
Speaker 1: you know every it's well suited to the shape of
3:59
Speaker 1: my bottom. That's true. So if it's physicists explore the
4:02
Speaker 1: universe from the couch, then artists explore the universe from
4:05
Speaker 1: from from their brains, from inside. Nobody uses typewriters, um,
4:12
Speaker 1: but you know, from their computers, from their fingers and
4:14
Speaker 1: the keyboards. No. It really is a mental exercise, though,
4:17
Speaker 1: to think about how the universe is and how the
4:19
Speaker 1: universe might be. And that's why I'm such a huge
4:21
Speaker 1: fan of science fiction, because to me, the fun puzzle
4:25
Speaker 1: of science fiction is figuring out how does this universe
4:27
Speaker 1: work that some artists or some writer has created. And
4:30
Speaker 1: that's the same puzzle we're facing in our actual universe,
4:33
Speaker 1: and so the mental exercise is very similar. It's a
4:36
Speaker 1: big physics, scientific detective mystery. And so today on the program,
4:41
Speaker 1: we're having the third of our series of interviews and
4:45
Speaker 1: reviews of famous, well known science fiction novels, otherwise known
4:49
Speaker 1: as Daniel's Excuse to talk to all the authors. He's
4:52
Speaker 1: a big fan of uh welcome to Daniel becomes a
4:57
Speaker 1: fanboy live in front of the people and loves every
5:02
Speaker 1: minute of it. Now, this has been super fun. We
5:05
Speaker 1: talked already to Ann Lecky, who in The Hugo and
5:07
Speaker 1: the Nebula, for her great book Ancillary Justice, and we
5:09
Speaker 1: recently talked to Blake Crouch about his really fun book Recursion.
5:13
Speaker 1: And so today we're excited to talk to you about
5:15
Speaker 1: another book. Yeah, it's a pretty and it's a kind
5:18
Speaker 1: of a different science fiction type of book. I haven't
5:20
Speaker 1: read it, and so I'm looking forward to hearing about
5:22
Speaker 1: it from you, but you're you're telling me that it's
5:25
Speaker 1: it's it's sort of hard science fiction, but it's also
5:27
Speaker 1: kind of a humorous book, Like it has a sense
5:30
Speaker 1: of humor which you don't usually associate maybe unless you
5:34
Speaker 1: think about Douglas Adams, right, and and The Hitchhiker's Guide
5:38
Speaker 1: to the Galaxy. Yeah. Well, you have some science fiction
5:41
Speaker 1: books that take themselves very seriously, and you know, I'm
5:43
Speaker 1: a big fan of those. And then you've got the
5:45
Speaker 1: ones that don't take themselves that seriously. You know, Star Trek,
5:48
Speaker 1: where they're sort of like winking at you when they're saying, well,
5:52
Speaker 1: you know they have seriously, Well, then do you know
5:56
Speaker 1: how to reverse the polarity on the taw generator? Yeah?
5:59
Speaker 1: Just uh, Daniel, I'm not I'm not a scientist. I'm
6:04
Speaker 1: just an engineer. Um. And then you have your sort
6:08
Speaker 1: of like wacky science fiction hit Tiger's Guide to the Galaxy,
6:11
Speaker 1: for example, filled with crazy characters and silly hijinks and
6:14
Speaker 1: and all sorts of stuff, and this one, I think
6:16
Speaker 1: sort of stretches all those genres. It's like very hardcore
6:20
Speaker 1: about the physics and how that universe works. She really
6:23
Speaker 1: tried hard to make it realistic and interesting. But then
6:25
Speaker 1: it's also mostly about the emotional story of these characters
6:29
Speaker 1: and the bonds they make together and their antics and
6:32
Speaker 1: the silly food they eat together, and so it's a
6:35
Speaker 1: really human story. Sounds like it's a sitcom space opera,
6:38
Speaker 1: a little bit sitcom space opera. Yeah, and you provide
6:42
Speaker 1: the laugh track. I laughed a lot while reading this book.
6:45
Speaker 1: Oh really, you actually laugh out loud? Yeah? I left
6:48
Speaker 1: a lot. I woke up my wife several times while
6:49
Speaker 1: reading this book. Really. Wow. Well, maybe maybe I'll check
6:53
Speaker 1: it out. But it's kind of an interesting story for
6:55
Speaker 1: a book because the author self published it first online
7:01
Speaker 1: or is your kickstarter, and then it got picked up
7:03
Speaker 1: by a publisher and then it sort of took off
7:05
Speaker 1: and won a Hugo Award for the whole series last year. Yeah,
7:09
Speaker 1: it's a real inspiration for everybody out there who wants
7:13
Speaker 1: to be a mainline science fiction author and thinks they
7:16
Speaker 1: have what it takes but isn't sure and doesn't know
7:18
Speaker 1: how to break in. Here's the story of somebody who
7:20
Speaker 1: has just started writing and then it took off on
7:23
Speaker 1: its own. It's sort of like an Andy Weird story, right.
7:26
Speaker 1: She owned herself, she published to be a kickstarter, and
7:29
Speaker 1: then later somebody sort of influential found it and funded
7:32
Speaker 1: the rest of the series, and now she's a winning
7:35
Speaker 1: massive prizes and getting paid to do this full time.
7:38
Speaker 1: So it's a it's a really exca prestigious podcast. I mean,
7:42
Speaker 1: that's living the dream, is she can I get invited
7:44
Speaker 1: to a prestigious podcast that sounds like fun talking about
7:48
Speaker 1: ut Daniel whoop. Sorry, yeah, damnit, Daniel fake until you
7:53
Speaker 1: are not a podcast host. No, it's um. She has
7:56
Speaker 1: a fun story and she has a lot of personalities
7:58
Speaker 1: I think you'll hear in the interview. And she's really
8:01
Speaker 1: done a great job of carrying that personality into her
8:04
Speaker 1: characters and creating realistic characters in a fascinating science fiction universe. Awesome.
8:09
Speaker 1: And so today on the program, we'll be talking about
8:17
Speaker 1: the fun science fiction universe of Becky Chambers. The Long
8:21
Speaker 1: Way to a Small Angry Planet, And even just that title,
8:25
Speaker 1: it really drew me in from the very beginning, Like
8:27
Speaker 1: that sounds like a good story, doesn't it. The Long
8:30
Speaker 1: Way to a small Angry Planet. I guess it's the
8:32
Speaker 1: play between like long small angry. Yeah, it's kind of funny.
8:38
Speaker 1: I used to think of a like a bitter, bitter,
8:40
Speaker 1: little shriveled up planet. Well, it tells you that there's
8:43
Speaker 1: going to be a journey involved, and you already like that.
8:45
Speaker 1: It's like tolkn esque, right, it's a long way. The
8:47
Speaker 1: story is going to be about traveling, and when you
8:49
Speaker 1: get there, there's gonna be something exciting because this planet
8:52
Speaker 1: is piste off really interesting. Well I'm hooked already. Um,
8:58
Speaker 1: So let's talk about what the basic idea of the
9:02
Speaker 1: novel is and then let's talk about the signs of it,
9:05
Speaker 1: and then we'll play the interview for you guys. Um,
9:08
Speaker 1: but what is this a small angry planet? It is?
9:10
Speaker 1: It's not us? Is it? Is it Earth? We are
9:12
Speaker 1: not the angry planet. No, So to set the scene
9:15
Speaker 1: in her universe, we all live in the galaxy. But
9:18
Speaker 1: the galaxy is filled with aliens, all sorts of crazy aliens.
9:22
Speaker 1: Aliens that have more legs or fins, are all sorts
9:24
Speaker 1: of weird stuff. But they're sort of human like, you know,
9:28
Speaker 1: they're very understandable. They have a similar sense of humor,
9:32
Speaker 1: they eat in a kitchen, they sleep, Um, they can
9:34
Speaker 1: be like interspecies romance. So you know they're alien, but
9:38
Speaker 1: they're also not that alien. Is it? Is it more
9:42
Speaker 1: like Star Wars or Star Trek in terms of its
9:44
Speaker 1: budget for um, you know, special makeup, in effects. I'd
9:49
Speaker 1: say it's a little bit more Star Trek that way,
9:51
Speaker 1: you know, like the Klingons are like humans, but with
9:53
Speaker 1: little ridges on their heads and they tend to be grumpy,
9:55
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. All the aliens are like humans,
9:58
Speaker 1: perturbed in some interesting went. I see. It's not like
10:01
Speaker 1: your your fallen in love with the blob of of
10:04
Speaker 1: scenting gas. I got nothing against that. You know, between
10:07
Speaker 1: consenting blobs of scenting gas can do whatever they like.
10:11
Speaker 1: But in this book, there are no sentient blobs of
10:14
Speaker 1: aliening gas, only sentient blobs of water and minerals in carbon. Yeah,
10:20
Speaker 1: and it's fascinating, and you know, I think that that's
10:22
Speaker 1: sort of unrealistic. We'll get into that later, but yeah,
10:25
Speaker 1: for sure, I feel like you lost me already. But
10:29
Speaker 1: I think that she did this on purpose to sort
10:31
Speaker 1: of make the aliens approachable, because the book is mostly
10:34
Speaker 1: about this gang that lives on a ship and they're
10:37
Speaker 1: like a work gag. They have a job. They're building wormholes,
10:40
Speaker 1: and you know, they've got a contract. They've gotta work
10:42
Speaker 1: together and sort of sort of like what it's like
10:44
Speaker 1: to be on this ship together with this crew that's
10:47
Speaker 1: multi species. It totally is a sitcom. Here's what wormholes. Yeah,
10:55
Speaker 1: and um. In order for that to work, you know
10:58
Speaker 1: that the aliens have to be able to talk to
10:59
Speaker 1: each other and share experiences and relate to each other.
11:03
Speaker 1: I see what you mean. They'd sort of not just
11:05
Speaker 1: look alike a little bit. They're humanoid, but they're also
11:09
Speaker 1: you know, sort of um share kind of a human sensibility.
11:14
Speaker 1: You know, it really hard to talk to a centient
11:17
Speaker 1: blob that you know prioritizes different things than us. Yeah,
11:21
Speaker 1: and will also be hard to have an alien be
11:23
Speaker 1: your cook on your ship if they had no idea
11:26
Speaker 1: how to make human food, or if they had no
11:28
Speaker 1: interest in human food. Um. And so she enforces this
11:32
Speaker 1: sort of to make this this overlap, okay, and you
11:35
Speaker 1: know she acknowledges that she winks to it in the book,
11:38
Speaker 1: Like everybody's wondering why all the aliens so human? Is
11:41
Speaker 1: there some sort of like common ancestor, you know, she's
11:43
Speaker 1: aware ofeness. So I thought that was done pretty well.
11:46
Speaker 1: But that's sort of The galaxy right choked filled with aliens,
11:50
Speaker 1: is all sorts of kinds, more than I can keep
11:52
Speaker 1: track of. But the core structure of the book is
11:55
Speaker 1: about how you get around the galaxy, and like, how
11:58
Speaker 1: do you get from solar system to solar system. Oh,
12:01
Speaker 1: I see, because that you were saying they work at
12:03
Speaker 1: a wormhole factory or a wormhole station or where do
12:07
Speaker 1: they work. They work on a ship that builds wormholes.
12:10
Speaker 1: And so, of course to get from one solar system
12:13
Speaker 1: to another takes a long time. If you're traveling at
12:15
Speaker 1: less than the speed of light, take millions of years
12:18
Speaker 1: to get across the galaxy, you know, it's some small
12:21
Speaker 1: fraction in the speed of light. Or even if you're
12:22
Speaker 1: moving at the speed of light, it would take you, you
12:24
Speaker 1: you know, a hundred thousand years to get across the
12:26
Speaker 1: milky Way. That's not really good for building a galaxy
12:29
Speaker 1: sized society. So you have to have some way to
12:32
Speaker 1: connect these solar systems, and in her book they do
12:35
Speaker 1: a via wormholes, and you know, wormholes we've talked about
12:38
Speaker 1: on the show, and we'll talk in a minute about
12:39
Speaker 1: whether they're realistic. The thing that's really cool about this
12:43
Speaker 1: book that's different from a lot of other books that
12:46
Speaker 1: have wormholes in them is that she doesn't just sort
12:48
Speaker 1: of hand wave her way to wormholes, like, oh, and
12:50
Speaker 1: there are wormholes. She she talks about like, how do
12:54
Speaker 1: you actually build a wormhole. She has instructions in the
12:57
Speaker 1: book about how to do it. Yeah, and the characters
13:00
Speaker 1: in this book live on a ship and work together
13:03
Speaker 1: building wormholes. So they're like flying this wormhole construction ship
13:07
Speaker 1: around the galaxy and each one is kind of a
13:09
Speaker 1: pain in the butt. I mean, later when people use it,
13:12
Speaker 1: it's pretty easy. But actually constructing the wormhole, she's stopped
13:15
Speaker 1: through like how you would do that and the difficulties,
13:18
Speaker 1: and you know, built up this whole bureaucracy and infrastructure
13:21
Speaker 1: around how that would work in the economics of it,
13:25
Speaker 1: And so you are on a journey of building a
13:27
Speaker 1: wormhole in this book. Yeah, you call it a wormhole engineering,
13:31
Speaker 1: which sounds like an awesome title for a degree. I'm
13:34
Speaker 1: a wormhole engineer. Oh man, are we creating more kinds
13:38
Speaker 1: of engineers already? You can't have enough? And I thought
13:43
Speaker 1: you would like that because it's not just like, well,
13:45
Speaker 1: the physicists say it's possible, so therefore we have them
13:48
Speaker 1: in our world. It's like, well, how would you actually
13:50
Speaker 1: make one? You know, physicists say a lot of things possible.
13:53
Speaker 1: Space elevators are possible, other orbits are possible. How do
13:57
Speaker 1: you actually make it? Happen, So she not just thought
14:01
Speaker 1: that through but makes it sort of the central driving
14:04
Speaker 1: plot of the book is this crew building this this
14:07
Speaker 1: difficult wormhole to an angry planet. Okay, so I'm getting
14:11
Speaker 1: the sense that it's sort of a mix of Star
14:13
Speaker 1: Trek cheers and Discovery Channel documentary about how to build
14:17
Speaker 1: bridges in the best possible way with with food apparently
14:24
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah, yeah, I think the author drinks a
14:27
Speaker 1: lot of tea, So there's a lot of discussion of
14:29
Speaker 1: different kinds of tea and weird alien tea and all
14:31
Speaker 1: sorts of stuff. All right, So so that the novel
14:34
Speaker 1: is spends a lot of time and in the mechanics
14:36
Speaker 1: of building a wormhole, which sounds pretty interesting. And then
14:39
Speaker 1: you also noted here that um, they do have faster
14:42
Speaker 1: than light travel, but they don't use it. Yeah, it's
14:44
Speaker 1: sort of a toss away in the book she mentions
14:47
Speaker 1: briefly like, and of course, some scientists figured out how
14:51
Speaker 1: to do faster than light travel. They built a faster
14:53
Speaker 1: than light drive, but it led to all sorts of
14:56
Speaker 1: like bureaucratic complications. Because it's violet, it's causality, has time
15:00
Speaker 1: travel and basically just gives everybody a headache, so they
15:03
Speaker 1: outlawed it, which always works obviously oddline things totally makes
15:09
Speaker 1: them all go away and nobody ever tries it. Or
15:11
Speaker 1: that's right FTL prohibition. And I asked her about that
15:15
Speaker 1: in the interview. You'll hear her response, Um, I thought
15:18
Speaker 1: it was pretty fun, though, I'll be honest, if fast
15:21
Speaker 1: and light travel was possible, I would definitely be ignoring
15:24
Speaker 1: the laws against it, like I would like to go
15:26
Speaker 1: to another for sure, once you take a bootleg ride
15:29
Speaker 1: to another planet fast like Well, I don't know, what
15:31
Speaker 1: are these alien prisons look like if you get caught.
15:35
Speaker 1: I don't know. We sound good. Alien prisons are never good.
15:38
Speaker 1: But if you have a faster than light drive, how
15:40
Speaker 1: are they going to catch you? Right? You can always
15:42
Speaker 1: get away from them, true, true, And you can buy
15:45
Speaker 1: late postalities, so your kid, I don't know, raised them
15:48
Speaker 1: before they catch you. I don't know, yeah, exactly. All right, Well,
15:51
Speaker 1: let's get into the signs of it and whether or
15:54
Speaker 1: not it's plausible from your point of view, and then
15:56
Speaker 1: we'll get to the interview with biking. But first let's
15:58
Speaker 1: take a quick break. All right, we're talking about Biggie
16:14
Speaker 1: Chambers debut novel, Long Way to a Small Angry Planet,
16:17
Speaker 1: which won the Hugo for Best Series. The series is
16:20
Speaker 1: called Wayfarers, right, Yeah, and there's three books in the
16:23
Speaker 1: series and they all have fun titles, and they track
16:25
Speaker 1: the exploits of this crew and the rest of the
16:28
Speaker 1: galaxy and all the stuff that happens in to these people.
16:31
Speaker 1: Is a sequel called The Longer Way to a Smaller,
16:34
Speaker 1: angerer Planet or a Short Way to a Large Happy Planet. Um, no,
16:39
Speaker 1: this she has more clever titles. The next ones are
16:42
Speaker 1: called A Closed and Common Orbit, and then the Record
16:46
Speaker 1: of a Spaceborn Few And I gotta say she has
16:49
Speaker 1: a bit of a knack combing up for cool titles.
16:51
Speaker 1: These are those are good titles. Yeah, they tell a
16:53
Speaker 1: story onto themselves. Yeah, they summarize the whole book in
16:57
Speaker 1: just a few words. It's cool. Alright. So then, um,
17:00
Speaker 1: you're telling me that a lot of the book is
17:02
Speaker 1: about building wormholes and the engineering of it, and so
17:06
Speaker 1: let's let's dig into that. Is it sort of plausible
17:08
Speaker 1: what she talks about in the book, Um, not just
17:12
Speaker 1: wormholes as an idea, but just the way she's talking
17:14
Speaker 1: about describing how you would build one. Well, I would
17:18
Speaker 1: say on the large scale, yes, and then wormholes are
17:21
Speaker 1: totally theoretically possible in our universe and nobody knows how
17:26
Speaker 1: to build one at all. So she's operating and sort
17:29
Speaker 1: of a void there for like how you would actually
17:31
Speaker 1: build them. If I had to guess how wormholes worked
17:35
Speaker 1: and how you would construct them, I don't think I
17:36
Speaker 1: would have come up with the solution she found. But
17:39
Speaker 1: you know I can't criticize it. Well, maybe let's reach
17:42
Speaker 1: out for the audience. A wormhole is, right now, a
17:45
Speaker 1: theoretical kind of shortcut in space, right, like the ideas
17:49
Speaker 1: that you somehow connect space here to a bit of
17:53
Speaker 1: space somewhere far away, and the laws of physics actually
17:57
Speaker 1: allow you to do that, that's right. And the motivation
18:01
Speaker 1: is to get somewhere far away without going through all
18:04
Speaker 1: the space between here and there. And the idea is
18:07
Speaker 1: to somehow shorten the space between here and there, not
18:10
Speaker 1: like a warp drive, which like squeezes it, but to
18:13
Speaker 1: actually make a connection between here and there, and like
18:17
Speaker 1: a bad door, like a back door. And there's sort
18:19
Speaker 1: of two different mathematical ways to think about them we
18:22
Speaker 1: can talk about. But general relativity says that they're possible,
18:26
Speaker 1: Like if you write down the laws of general relativity
18:28
Speaker 1: to tell us how space bends and how space is connected,
18:32
Speaker 1: you can find a solution to those equations that connects
18:35
Speaker 1: too far away points in space via this wormhole, and
18:39
Speaker 1: you have a black hole on one side and a
18:40
Speaker 1: white hole on the other side. Well, and and so
18:43
Speaker 1: one thing I've always wondered about about wormholes is does
18:46
Speaker 1: a math math suggest that they're you know, you're connecting points,
18:51
Speaker 1: and so you're connecting points. How can you fit anything
18:54
Speaker 1: through it? Or can you make warmholes that are bigger
18:56
Speaker 1: than a point? Yeah, that's one of the problems. If
18:59
Speaker 1: you just make a wormhole that's a point, it will
19:02
Speaker 1: collapse that it's unstable. They will not stay open, and anyway,
19:06
Speaker 1: you can't get anything through it if it's just a point.
19:08
Speaker 1: So what you need is to keep it open and
19:10
Speaker 1: to expand that hole. And the way you need to
19:14
Speaker 1: do that is somehow have some sort of negative pressure.
19:16
Speaker 1: You need negative gravitational pressure, which is not something we
19:20
Speaker 1: know how to do, but theoretically people think, well, maybe
19:24
Speaker 1: if there were particles that had negative mass. We call
19:27
Speaker 1: this exotic matter, and we talked about it recently on
19:30
Speaker 1: the program. Then if those existed, maybe they could hold
19:33
Speaker 1: it open and keep it stable and have the opening
19:36
Speaker 1: be big enough that you could pass an object through,
19:38
Speaker 1: maybe even a spaceship. But there's a lot of steps there, right,
19:42
Speaker 1: And she sort of has that into her book. You
19:43
Speaker 1: were telling me, like you in her book, you open
19:45
Speaker 1: a wormhole and then you have to throw buoy's in
19:48
Speaker 1: there to keep it open. Yeah, so maybe let's talk
19:51
Speaker 1: about the idea she has for a wormhole, and then
19:53
Speaker 1: let's talk about whether that lines up with wormholes in reality.
19:57
Speaker 1: So in her imagining wormholes, the way they work is
19:59
Speaker 1: that our space, our three dimensional space, is sort of
20:02
Speaker 1: embedded in a higher dimensional space, the way like a
20:05
Speaker 1: sheet of paper is two dimensions and it's embedded in
20:08
Speaker 1: our three dimensional space. And in three dimensions, you can
20:11
Speaker 1: twist a sheet of paper and you know, you could
20:14
Speaker 1: leave the surface and come back somewhere else. And imagine,
20:17
Speaker 1: for example, if that surface was rolled up, if that
20:20
Speaker 1: two dimensionals sheet was like a roll of toilet paper,
20:23
Speaker 1: then you might actually be really close to other places
20:25
Speaker 1: on that two D surface without realizing it, because you're
20:28
Speaker 1: close sort of in three dimensions, right, because you're you're
20:31
Speaker 1: folded in that higher dimensional space. And actually you're sitting
20:35
Speaker 1: right next to each other, but to us it seems
20:37
Speaker 1: far away because you have to go all around the
20:39
Speaker 1: toilet paper first. Yeah, and so she calls this the
20:42
Speaker 1: space between space, the sub layer, and in her universe,
20:46
Speaker 1: you can punch a hole and sort of move off
20:49
Speaker 1: the surface of our three dimensional space into this higher
20:52
Speaker 1: dimensional space, transit through this weird subspace, and then punch
20:57
Speaker 1: another hole and get back. And the the job of
21:00
Speaker 1: these ships is to punch that whole and then to
21:03
Speaker 1: navigate through that space, which is pretty tricky, dropping buoys
21:07
Speaker 1: along the way so that ships that come later can
21:09
Speaker 1: just follow the buoy's. So you're saying, we're sitting in
21:12
Speaker 1: a bigger space, but I guess is that possible or
21:16
Speaker 1: is it possible we're sitting in a bigger space. So
21:18
Speaker 1: it is possible that we're sitting in a bigger space,
21:20
Speaker 1: And by bigger we don't mean like larger, like more
21:23
Speaker 1: three D space, but that there are other dimensions, There
21:25
Speaker 1: are different ways to move the way that a two
21:28
Speaker 1: D sheet of paper is sitting in a three D space.
21:31
Speaker 1: Try to imagine our three D space in some four
21:34
Speaker 1: D or five D or ten dimensional space, and as
21:37
Speaker 1: we talked about once in the program, we don't know
21:39
Speaker 1: how many dimensions of space there are. There could be three,
21:43
Speaker 1: there could be eleven, there could be twenty six, there
21:45
Speaker 1: could be more. We just don't And it is like
21:48
Speaker 1: like it is that you know, like you and I
21:50
Speaker 1: are far apart from each other right now, but maybe
21:52
Speaker 1: there's a dimension that if I just take a step
21:55
Speaker 1: in that direction in this higher dimensional space, suddenly I'm
21:59
Speaker 1: next to you. Yeah, if if this three D space
22:02
Speaker 1: happens to be folded in that higher dimensional space so
22:06
Speaker 1: that we're close in this higher dimensional space, you have
22:09
Speaker 1: to find those folds, And is that part of the plot,
22:11
Speaker 1: like finding those folds? Yeah, And apparently it's very difficult
22:15
Speaker 1: to navigate, and only certain kinds of beings know how
22:18
Speaker 1: to do it, and that part is kind of hand wavy.
22:20
Speaker 1: In the book, she doesn't get into the details. It's
22:22
Speaker 1: just sort of like everybody who gets into the subspace
22:25
Speaker 1: sort of like loses their sense of time. But there's
22:27
Speaker 1: this special category of sentient beings that know how to
22:30
Speaker 1: navigate it and find their way and build these wormholes.
22:33
Speaker 1: If you eat the spice, then let's see it's actually
22:37
Speaker 1: if you get this weird brain virus that they pass
22:40
Speaker 1: on to their children. It's quite fascinating virus. Yeah, yeah,
22:44
Speaker 1: And so that's that's one way of thinking about wormholes
22:46
Speaker 1: is like moving in some higher dimension and imagining that
22:50
Speaker 1: the constraints of our universe are only because we're not
22:52
Speaker 1: seeing the full picture, and if we could only move
22:55
Speaker 1: in this other way, then maybe we could find shortcuts.
22:57
Speaker 1: See so that's her flavor of warmholes. And you're saying
23:00
Speaker 1: there's another flavor that physicists have also considered or think
23:04
Speaker 1: is maybe more realistic. I think it's more realistic. I've
23:08
Speaker 1: considered it. So you know that's one physicist at least
23:13
Speaker 1: um And that's sort of an intrinsic one. I mean,
23:16
Speaker 1: when we talk about bending of space, we don't think
23:19
Speaker 1: about the bending of space in the context of some
23:22
Speaker 1: higher dimension. Like when when the Sun bends the space
23:26
Speaker 1: near the Earth so that the Earth is moving in
23:28
Speaker 1: an orbit, it's not bending, it's in some higher dimension,
23:31
Speaker 1: the way like a bowling ball and a rubber sheet
23:34
Speaker 1: bends a two D space in three D. Instead, the
23:38
Speaker 1: bending is intrinsic. It's not relative to some external ruler.
23:42
Speaker 1: It just changes the relationship between bits of space. It
23:45
Speaker 1: changes how far things are from each other. And so
23:48
Speaker 1: that's an intrinsic kind of bending instead of an extrinsic bending,
23:51
Speaker 1: and physicist in general sort of think this one is
23:53
Speaker 1: more realistic. Well, intrinsic bending is definitely what happens in
23:57
Speaker 1: our three dimensional space due to math in general relativity,
24:01
Speaker 1: So that's definitely the kind of bending we have seen.
24:03
Speaker 1: We don't know if we're in a higher dimensional space.
24:05
Speaker 1: We've never seen extrinsic bending relative to that, but we
24:09
Speaker 1: have seen intrinsic bending, and the equations of general relativity
24:13
Speaker 1: are consistent with this sort of intrinsic connection between two
24:16
Speaker 1: points in space, a black hole in one, a white
24:20
Speaker 1: hole in the other, and then at their core those
24:22
Speaker 1: two points are the same point. Right. But but this
24:25
Speaker 1: is also thing that we might be living in a
24:27
Speaker 1: higher dimensional space, right, Yes, that's their dimensions, that's right.
24:31
Speaker 1: There may be other dimensions. We've never seen them. We
24:34
Speaker 1: can't rule them out, however, and some theories of physics
24:37
Speaker 1: predict them, like like bosonic string theory and superstring theory
24:41
Speaker 1: predict eleven or twenty six dimensions. Those are theoretical ideas
24:44
Speaker 1: we've never seen those dimensions. We've never seen bending in
24:47
Speaker 1: those dimensions. We have, however, seen bending in these three
24:51
Speaker 1: this intrinsic bending. We just change the relative relationship between
24:55
Speaker 1: bits of space. That's happening all the time. You're doing
24:58
Speaker 1: that right now with the mass of your bending space.
25:01
Speaker 1: Right now, you blow mines and bend space. All right, Well,
25:06
Speaker 1: it sounds like, um, it sounds like you maybe want
25:09
Speaker 1: to write the opposing novel The Long Way to a
25:12
Speaker 1: small angry physicist, and in that in that version, if
25:15
Speaker 1: you build a wormhole, there would be no traveling in between, right.
25:19
Speaker 1: The one side of the wormhole is the other side
25:21
Speaker 1: of the wormhole. There's no like working through higher dimensional
25:25
Speaker 1: space or subspace. It's just instantly connected. Yeah, it's not
25:29
Speaker 1: about navigating the folds. It's just like you, it's just
25:33
Speaker 1: joined together. But you know, a fair criticism is nobody
25:37
Speaker 1: knows how to build that. Like it's consistent with the
25:40
Speaker 1: laws of physics. That doesn't mean we know how to
25:42
Speaker 1: make it happen, right, It's a big difference. It sounds
25:45
Speaker 1: like what she what she did was sort of plausible,
25:48
Speaker 1: totally totally plausible. Maybe not the favorite theory of physicists
25:51
Speaker 1: but it sounds like, um, it's plausible, and how she
25:55
Speaker 1: describes building one, is that sort of realistic or is that,
25:57
Speaker 1: you know, just her using her imagination At that point
26:00
Speaker 1: it's her using her imagination because nobody knows anything about
26:03
Speaker 1: what would happen in these higher dimensions with the laws
26:05
Speaker 1: of physics would be like there. Um, But you know,
26:07
Speaker 1: she built a credible idea and she followed it through
26:10
Speaker 1: and she stuck to the rules of her story. So
26:13
Speaker 1: you know I give her five stars for that. Well, well,
26:16
Speaker 1: I am certainly interested in reading this book now and
26:20
Speaker 1: so again the book is called The Long Way to
26:22
Speaker 1: a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers. And so, now, Daniel,
26:25
Speaker 1: you spoke to Becky recently and asked her a bunch
26:28
Speaker 1: of questions I did. She was kind enough to give
26:31
Speaker 1: me some of her time and to share with me
26:33
Speaker 1: how she built her science fiction universe, why she made
26:35
Speaker 1: the choices she did, how she designed her characters, and
26:38
Speaker 1: also to tell me, in her own words, a bit
26:40
Speaker 1: about her personal journey from totally unknown, struggling writer to
26:45
Speaker 1: Hugo winning science fiction author. Wow, I guess he's not
26:49
Speaker 1: as angry anymore. She seems like a pretty happy person.
26:54
Speaker 1: It's been a long way to a large, happy career,
26:57
Speaker 1: to a large, happy shelf full of awards. Yes, so
27:02
Speaker 1: thanks Becky for spending your time and congrats on all
27:05
Speaker 1: your success. Awesome. Well, here is Daniel interviewing science fiction
27:09
Speaker 1: author Banky Chambers. Okay, thank you very much for coming
27:13
Speaker 1: on our podcast. Would you mind first introducing yourself for
27:17
Speaker 1: our listeners. Absolutely. My name's Becky Chambers, and I'm the
27:22
Speaker 1: author of varied sci fi books. I'm best known for
27:27
Speaker 1: my Wayfair series, which currently includes The Long Way to
27:31
Speaker 1: a Small Angry Planet, A Closed and Common Orbit, and
27:34
Speaker 1: Record of a space Born Few. I'm also the author
27:37
Speaker 1: of a standalone novella called to Be Taught If Fortunate. Well,
27:42
Speaker 1: congratulations on all of your success. It's been kind of
27:45
Speaker 1: a journey for you. Can you tell us a little
27:47
Speaker 1: bit about how you got to be where you are? Yeah,
27:50
Speaker 1: I still don't know exactly how I got to work.
27:53
Speaker 1: It all started in two thousand and twelve. I was
27:57
Speaker 1: working on the Long Way to a Small Angry Planet,
28:00
Speaker 1: and I was doing freelance writing at the time, which
28:04
Speaker 1: you know is not the most stable of professions. And
28:09
Speaker 1: I reached one of those points I think it's familiar
28:11
Speaker 1: to most freelancers. Where I ran out of paying gigs
28:15
Speaker 1: for a few months. I was really close to finishing
28:17
Speaker 1: the book and I didn't want to stop, is what
28:21
Speaker 1: it came down to, And and pitching and and finding
28:24
Speaker 1: gigs is something that takes up a ton of time
28:27
Speaker 1: an effort, and it I knew that I kind of
28:29
Speaker 1: had a choice there as to which I was going
28:31
Speaker 1: to focus on. So I turned to Kickstarter and I said, Hey,
28:35
Speaker 1: I've got this idea for a book. I need two
28:38
Speaker 1: months to finish it. Would you help me out? And
28:40
Speaker 1: to my eternal surprise, um, the Internet obliged and I
28:45
Speaker 1: was able to to finish it and myself published and
28:48
Speaker 1: put it out there, and I kind of thought that
28:50
Speaker 1: was it. You know, I I had given my backers
28:53
Speaker 1: what I said I would make it. You know, I
28:54
Speaker 1: sold a little bit, but not much. And then I
28:57
Speaker 1: had the extraordinary lightning strike good fortune of meeting just
29:03
Speaker 1: the right person at a convention a couple of years later,
29:07
Speaker 1: and we had beers and chatted, and that was that.
29:09
Speaker 1: I didn't talk about the book at all. Uh. And
29:11
Speaker 1: then a few months later she got in touch because
29:13
Speaker 1: she had read it and offered me my first book
29:15
Speaker 1: deal and it's been a crazy ride ever since. So, um,
29:19
Speaker 1: this is now what I do full time, which is
29:22
Speaker 1: the best job ever. Well depending on which day you
29:26
Speaker 1: catch me. But yeah, when people ask me, you know,
29:29
Speaker 1: how do you get published? How do you go about
29:31
Speaker 1: writing a book? I have no idea what to say, because, um,
29:34
Speaker 1: it really has been um kind of a crazy ride. Well,
29:38
Speaker 1: congratulations on all of your success, and I hope that
29:40
Speaker 1: your story serves, like, you know, an inspiration to other
29:44
Speaker 1: folks out there who are hoping to break in and
29:46
Speaker 1: seeing that it's possible from you know, from the outside
29:49
Speaker 1: to just write something wonderful that resonates with people and
29:52
Speaker 1: have a take off. Thank you very much. So in
29:55
Speaker 1: these interviews, we'd like to get to know an author
29:57
Speaker 1: a little bit by asking them some class sak science
30:00
Speaker 1: fiction questions. So here's a philosophical question about transporters like
30:05
Speaker 1: Star Trek style. Do you think that it actually moves
30:09
Speaker 1: you from one place to another or that it sort
30:12
Speaker 1: of kills you, disassembles you and clones you somewhere else.
30:17
Speaker 1: I'm in the disassembling camp, which is really graham. I
30:21
Speaker 1: hate it, but I feel like that's what happens, and
30:24
Speaker 1: if so, would you use a transporter? Absolutely not, I'd
30:28
Speaker 1: be like I'd be like bones in this situation where
30:31
Speaker 1: I'm like, I don't want to get in that. Ever,
30:33
Speaker 1: the thing is people use them, you know, every day,
30:35
Speaker 1: and they don't think too much about it. But I'm
30:38
Speaker 1: the sort of person who would overthink it, because when
30:40
Speaker 1: a transporter goes wrong, it goes really really wrong. So
30:43
Speaker 1: I think i'd I think i'd stick to shuttles unless
30:45
Speaker 1: I absolutely had to. Well, then, thinking more broadly in
30:49
Speaker 1: science fiction that you read, what sort of technology that
30:53
Speaker 1: you see in science fiction would you like to see
30:56
Speaker 1: actually come into reality? Oh? Are we talking about technology
31:01
Speaker 1: that's likely or anything anything? Think broadly, I would like
31:07
Speaker 1: sticking with Star Trek. I'd love a replicator because I
31:10
Speaker 1: hate cooking and just bring me constant joy, just to
31:14
Speaker 1: not have to put any thought into dinner, just to
31:16
Speaker 1: be like I'm having filet mignon tonight or whatever. I
31:19
Speaker 1: also think artificial gravity would be a good one, because
31:23
Speaker 1: I really want to go to space and that I'd
31:26
Speaker 1: love to see Earth from orbit. I'd like to go
31:28
Speaker 1: out there, but I also get really emotion sick, so
31:31
Speaker 1: I have a feeling that me and micro gravity might
31:34
Speaker 1: not be the best of friends. So if you can,
31:36
Speaker 1: if you can give me somewhere where I can actually
31:37
Speaker 1: sit on a couch in a couple of and look out,
31:40
Speaker 1: that would be That would be fantastic. Well, very good.
31:42
Speaker 1: That sounds like a very nice wish list. It's all
31:45
Speaker 1: creature comforts now that I'm thinking about. It's nothing revolutionary.
31:48
Speaker 1: I should have said some sort of medical technology, but no,
31:51
Speaker 1: I just want to be comfy and eat my steak
31:53
Speaker 1: right and have a wonderful view of Earth exactly. Well.
31:56
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed reading your book. It was a lot
31:59
Speaker 1: of fun. I read a lot of science fiction, and
32:02
Speaker 1: I don't finish everything that I read, but yours I
32:04
Speaker 1: found a lot of fun. I was really impressed with
32:06
Speaker 1: the characters you created, and I loved how you could
32:09
Speaker 1: really get to know these characters. I mean, they are
32:11
Speaker 1: all facing really different challenges than anything I've ever faced,
32:15
Speaker 1: but I still sort of felt like, Hey, these are
32:18
Speaker 1: real people and they're going through struggles that I can
32:20
Speaker 1: identify with a little bit, or at least enough to
32:23
Speaker 1: get to know them. And it seems to me like
32:26
Speaker 1: quite a challenge to create characters in this alternate universe
32:29
Speaker 1: that are different enough from us that they're like honestly
32:33
Speaker 1: in that universe, not in hours, but still similar enough
32:37
Speaker 1: that we can identify with them. I'm happy to hear
32:39
Speaker 1: you say that, but yeah, it it is tricky. I
32:41
Speaker 1: always have to figure out what that, what the anchor
32:43
Speaker 1: points are right, because, um, yeah, I like to take
32:47
Speaker 1: you on kind of a journey in that respect. You know,
32:50
Speaker 1: I want you to think outside of your box. I
32:52
Speaker 1: want you to consider other cultures and ways of thinking
32:55
Speaker 1: and other structures of families and all of that. But
32:57
Speaker 1: there has to be uh degree of relatability, and there's
33:01
Speaker 1: something where you can get in and really, you know,
33:04
Speaker 1: even if you know you're very physically different, or if
33:06
Speaker 1: you're very culturally different, that you can still relate to
33:09
Speaker 1: them on some level. Um. And so I mess with
33:12
Speaker 1: that in a lot of different ways. Sometimes it's physicality. Um.
33:16
Speaker 1: If it's a character that I want you to be
33:18
Speaker 1: able to trust right off the bat, I'm more likely
33:20
Speaker 1: to make them buy people because because if somebody walks
33:23
Speaker 1: up to you looking like a giant lobster, you're gonna
33:25
Speaker 1: have that moment of book. Um, even if they're the
33:27
Speaker 1: nicest person in the world. You know, it's things like that,
33:30
Speaker 1: or just things like maybe sharing food or or um,
33:34
Speaker 1: you know, just having an honest conversation about well, here's
33:37
Speaker 1: how my family works, here's how you know, here's how
33:39
Speaker 1: my language works. Because you can learn a lot about
33:41
Speaker 1: how a person thinks by the way they speak, etcetera. UM,
33:44
Speaker 1: So those are the things I've I've really I really
33:47
Speaker 1: enjoy teasing out, um figuring out finding that good balance
33:51
Speaker 1: between I want to make this weird. I want to
33:53
Speaker 1: make you stretch your brain a bit, but I also
33:55
Speaker 1: want you to feel like this is a person you
33:58
Speaker 1: could be friends with. It's seems like you spent a
34:00
Speaker 1: lot of time thinking about how the various aliens would
34:03
Speaker 1: interact with each other, which food from this species would
34:06
Speaker 1: work for the other one, and how social ideas from
34:09
Speaker 1: one culture could be different from another. I imagine in
34:13
Speaker 1: our universe it would be much more difficult than what
34:15
Speaker 1: you describe. I mean, I think real aliens would be
34:18
Speaker 1: so vastly different that you couldn't have tea with them
34:21
Speaker 1: or share a kitchen. But if you want to have
34:24
Speaker 1: a culture and have them interact in some way, then
34:27
Speaker 1: you have to Is that what motivated you to make
34:29
Speaker 1: them all sort of human like, to make them frankly
34:32
Speaker 1: a bit unrealistically human. Absolutely, it's it's very intentional on
34:36
Speaker 1: my part, and it's not with the Wayfarers universe, it's
34:40
Speaker 1: not reflective of what I think life in the universe
34:44
Speaker 1: would actually be like. Much as I'd love to go
34:46
Speaker 1: have tea with an alien, I don't think that would
34:49
Speaker 1: would be possible. I imagine something much more like UM,
34:54
Speaker 1: say Arrival, for example, where they're they're so odd and
34:57
Speaker 1: they're so alien that that it's it's upsetting and disconcerting,
35:01
Speaker 1: and even though you're trying to figure each other out,
35:03
Speaker 1: it's it's difficult and painful and um and you never
35:06
Speaker 1: even when you get there, you can't really explain it
35:09
Speaker 1: to anybody else. I think if if we were lucky
35:11
Speaker 1: enough to exist at the same time as another civilization
35:13
Speaker 1: level species, that's more what it would be like. UM.
35:17
Speaker 1: But with the Wayfarer's books, the the intent is to
35:21
Speaker 1: to follow in the footsteps of things like Star Trek
35:24
Speaker 1: and for Escape and Star Wars, all these wonderful multi
35:28
Speaker 1: species universes that I grew up with, and to make
35:32
Speaker 1: you feel like you could be part of it. That
35:34
Speaker 1: you could easily inhabit it um. So it is a
35:37
Speaker 1: very conscious choice on my part to um to make
35:42
Speaker 1: them more a little more human than I than I
35:45
Speaker 1: think they would be. Well, I think you succeeded because
35:48
Speaker 1: I would love to hang out with your aliens and
35:51
Speaker 1: have a meal with them. I mean, in general, I
35:53
Speaker 1: would love to hang out with aliens. I have so
35:56
Speaker 1: many physics questions for aliens. I would like to ask
35:59
Speaker 1: the alien ins about wormholes and interstellar travel and all
36:02
Speaker 1: that stuff. So it frustrates me to imagine that they
36:06
Speaker 1: might show up on Earth and then we'd have like
36:08
Speaker 1: no way to talk to them. But let me turn
36:10
Speaker 1: them into the physics of your universe, because I'm a
36:13
Speaker 1: physicist and our show is mostly about physics, and I
36:16
Speaker 1: was really intrigued by the physics of the universe that
36:19
Speaker 1: you built in your novel. My take on it is
36:21
Speaker 1: that in your novel, to get around the galaxy, you
36:24
Speaker 1: use wormholes. But these wormholes require like actual work to construct.
36:29
Speaker 1: This is unusual to see in the science fiction book
36:31
Speaker 1: to really think about how the wormholes would get built.
36:35
Speaker 1: I mean, in your universe, you have to like punch
36:37
Speaker 1: a hole into this sub layer of space this space
36:40
Speaker 1: between space and then make these connections sort of manually
36:45
Speaker 1: before people can actually use them for transport. Is that
36:48
Speaker 1: how you describe sort of the major physics of your universe?
36:51
Speaker 1: I would, I would, Okay, awesome. I wanted to make
36:55
Speaker 1: sure I got that right. So what gave you the
36:57
Speaker 1: idea to build your universe your story around that? I mean,
37:01
Speaker 1: did you start from this sort of science and engineering
37:03
Speaker 1: concept of having wormholes that are difficult to actually build?
37:07
Speaker 1: Or did you have a story you wanted to tell
37:09
Speaker 1: and you needed something with that sort of story structure
37:12
Speaker 1: in it. So it's it's started with the characters um
37:16
Speaker 1: In Uh, you know, I I wrote this crew first
37:20
Speaker 1: and like them. Alatton was like, okay, well where do
37:22
Speaker 1: they live and what do they do? Um and propulsion
37:26
Speaker 1: became the first obvious question, you know, because that that
37:29
Speaker 1: shapes so much of what kind of science fiction story
37:32
Speaker 1: you're telling. Are you living in a Star Wars future
37:36
Speaker 1: in which or past? I guess because it's a galaxy
37:38
Speaker 1: a long time ago, but um, you know, are you
37:41
Speaker 1: living in a in a Star Wars style universe where
37:42
Speaker 1: you can get anywhere instantly? Or are you talking sort
37:45
Speaker 1: of a generationship style thing where it's going to take
37:47
Speaker 1: you decades or centuries to get between systems. These are
37:51
Speaker 1: very different kinds of stories, and so I wanted to
37:55
Speaker 1: be somewhere in the middle bit closer to to faster
37:59
Speaker 1: travel well, and that I didn't want it to take
38:01
Speaker 1: years to leave a system, you know. I wanted you
38:04
Speaker 1: to be these people, to be able to hop between
38:06
Speaker 1: planets from chapter to chapter. And wormholes just seemed like
38:12
Speaker 1: the obvious fit. Wormholes have been something or something that
38:14
Speaker 1: have captured my imagination for a really long time. Um
38:19
Speaker 1: some of my my biggest or like entry points into
38:23
Speaker 1: into science fiction. Um, you know, we're um Carl Sagan's contact. Um.
38:27
Speaker 1: The movie came out when I was twelve years old,
38:29
Speaker 1: and I was wrapped, um and and uh you know,
38:34
Speaker 1: then read the books and whatnot, and then you know,
38:36
Speaker 1: round about the same time, um, Deep Space nine was
38:39
Speaker 1: on TV and I watched that every week. So Wormholes
38:41
Speaker 1: were just sort of this this I don't know, they
38:44
Speaker 1: had a moment there in my tweens and and and
38:48
Speaker 1: stuck with me. So um yeah, it just it felt
38:51
Speaker 1: like the obvious choice for me personally, and also something
38:55
Speaker 1: um that I thought would be fun to play with.
38:58
Speaker 1: Let's take a quick break, we'll be back. So tell
39:13
Speaker 1: me what's fascinating to you about wormholes. What is it
39:16
Speaker 1: about wormholes that really sticks in your brain? The whole
39:20
Speaker 1: concept of it's this sphere, right, it's we think it's
39:24
Speaker 1: al easy as for us to think of it like
39:25
Speaker 1: a door that you just kind of open and you
39:27
Speaker 1: walk through space on the other side. But no, it's
39:29
Speaker 1: an it's an object, and no matter where you enter from,
39:32
Speaker 1: you're coming out somewhere else. And that is the most
39:36
Speaker 1: mind bending, uncomfortable idea to me because it doesn't make it,
39:41
Speaker 1: you know, to to us uh, three dimensional beings, it
39:45
Speaker 1: makes no sense whatsoever. And there is a degree of
39:48
Speaker 1: magic in it. To me, Um, I think it's you know,
39:52
Speaker 1: I try not to make things too fantastical, but the
39:55
Speaker 1: fact that you know wormholes are, um you know, something
39:59
Speaker 1: that sthmatically have been talked about as to whether or
40:02
Speaker 1: not they could exist, um, gives the universe this, uh,
40:07
Speaker 1: this wonderful esoteric quality. To me that that just shows
40:09
Speaker 1: how much we don't know and how much we don't understand,
40:11
Speaker 1: and how we are very locked tom our dimensional understanding
40:16
Speaker 1: of things. Yeah, my favorite thing about a lot of
40:19
Speaker 1: these topics in physics is that they're very counterintuitive. Right,
40:23
Speaker 1: we don't experience any of these things in our everyday life.
40:27
Speaker 1: But then learning that our experience is not representative of
40:31
Speaker 1: what's going on out there in the universe that could
40:33
Speaker 1: be totally weird and different. That's super fun, especially when
40:37
Speaker 1: you discover that these things could be real, like wormholes
40:40
Speaker 1: could actually be happening out there. So I want to
40:44
Speaker 1: ask you a little bit more about the mechanics of it.
40:46
Speaker 1: If you don't mind what is going on in this
40:48
Speaker 1: sort of sub layer, this space between space, How do
40:51
Speaker 1: you build a wormhole in your universe? All right? So
40:55
Speaker 1: I'm going to preface this by saying I don't actually
40:57
Speaker 1: know how to build a wormhole, but however, BS my
41:04
Speaker 1: way around it. Sure. So the the idea is that you, um,
41:08
Speaker 1: you first punch a hole, right, and that there's this
41:11
Speaker 1: space between space and you you build a tunnel through
41:14
Speaker 1: it by using these and and you're building through space
41:18
Speaker 1: and time. This is important. This is why you have
41:20
Speaker 1: to be licensed to build a wormhole, because you want
41:22
Speaker 1: to make sure you're coming out at the right time. Um,
41:24
Speaker 1: otherwise it causes a lot of problems. So you you
41:26
Speaker 1: are creating a tunnel through this space between space, and
41:31
Speaker 1: you drop these booies that basically hold it open right
41:35
Speaker 1: so that it doesn't because it naturally would just collapse
41:37
Speaker 1: back and on itself. So, um, you're you're creating this
41:41
Speaker 1: corridor from point A to point B and then around
41:46
Speaker 1: the entry and exit points, you have this cage that
41:49
Speaker 1: keeps space. It keeps the hole open, but it also
41:53
Speaker 1: keeps it from ripping further, so that, um, you know,
41:58
Speaker 1: you're not you're not causing damn, you're not getting you know,
42:00
Speaker 1: having planets get sucked in or what have you. It's
42:03
Speaker 1: it's a stable Um, it's a it's a stable highway essentially. Now,
42:08
Speaker 1: as to the mechanics of how any of that works,
42:10
Speaker 1: I have no idea. But in your mind, is our
42:13
Speaker 1: three dimensional space sort of embedded in a higher dimension
42:17
Speaker 1: and you're making a tunnel through that higher dimensional space?
42:21
Speaker 1: Or are you like connecting three D space in a
42:24
Speaker 1: new way that's just sort of changing the way the
42:27
Speaker 1: space is organized? Right? So I I imagine that there
42:30
Speaker 1: is that there we're talking about a higher dimension as
42:34
Speaker 1: you said, like that that there's some there's a connective
42:36
Speaker 1: tissue there that we're not aware of and that UM
42:39
Speaker 1: instead of like folding space necessarily you you you are
42:44
Speaker 1: able to um traverse through that you know, the sub layer,
42:49
Speaker 1: as it's called um, in order to take shortcuts. It
42:53
Speaker 1: doesn't behave UM. You know, distances don't mean the same
42:57
Speaker 1: thing there that they do here. UM. So that's that's
43:01
Speaker 1: that's how I picture it. At least, well, I really
43:05
Speaker 1: enjoyed it. UM. It was really unusual. Your universe sort
43:08
Speaker 1: of sits between the various kinds of science fiction universes
43:11
Speaker 1: I've seen before. One where you can just like sort
43:14
Speaker 1: of get anywhere instantly, and then another one where you
43:17
Speaker 1: can sort of and then other ones where like literally
43:20
Speaker 1: takes forever to get and then other ones where it
43:23
Speaker 1: takes almost forever to get anywhere. Here, it's like it's
43:27
Speaker 1: a struggle to get somewhere the first time because you
43:29
Speaker 1: actually have to build this wormhole. And I sort of
43:32
Speaker 1: like that that nod did engineering, you know, like, hey,
43:35
Speaker 1: maybe physicists can come up with the idea for the wormhole,
43:38
Speaker 1: but actually building one is real work, Like it's the
43:42
Speaker 1: project of this whole novel, and it's not just like boom,
43:45
Speaker 1: You've got a wormhole. It's like, let's build one. I
43:48
Speaker 1: think Jorge would like that thanks to his engineering background.
43:51
Speaker 1: So then my next question for you is, do you
43:54
Speaker 1: imagine that this might actually be possible in our universe?
43:58
Speaker 1: Do you think that it requires different physics or do
44:01
Speaker 1: you think that these wormholes might actually work in our universe?
44:05
Speaker 1: I think it would require different physics probably, or at
44:08
Speaker 1: least it would require UM technology and an understanding of
44:13
Speaker 1: physics that we do not currently have. That's the caveat
44:18
Speaker 1: I I The internal caveat I always have with with
44:21
Speaker 1: all of UM these books is that I just assume that,
44:26
Speaker 1: you know, centuries and centuries in the future, people have
44:29
Speaker 1: a much better understanding of how to work with the stuff,
44:31
Speaker 1: and they're able to do things that now seem impossible
44:34
Speaker 1: given my understanding of the universe. UM. You know, here
44:38
Speaker 1: in I don't think what I've written is possible. But
44:42
Speaker 1: if somebody six hundred years from now wants to prove
44:44
Speaker 1: me wrong, that would be fantastic. But UM, but I
44:47
Speaker 1: am definitely UM taking a few flights of fancy with it.
44:51
Speaker 1: I think, well, I think that's a really important point
44:55
Speaker 1: about what's possible, Like if physics hasn't said it's impo possible,
45:00
Speaker 1: but we haven't figured out how to do it yet.
45:03
Speaker 1: You can just speculate about how it might just take
45:06
Speaker 1: a few hundred years to figure it out. But it
45:08
Speaker 1: sounds to me like you're specifically not doing anything that
45:12
Speaker 1: physics would say no to today. So in that sense,
45:16
Speaker 1: you're sort of placing it in our universe far in
45:19
Speaker 1: the future and handwaving you know some of the technological solutions.
45:23
Speaker 1: Is that fair? Yeah, that's that's it exactly, And and
45:25
Speaker 1: that too, is done very intentionally and that I want
45:29
Speaker 1: to make the reader feel like this is a place
45:31
Speaker 1: they can inhabit really easily, and so that does require
45:34
Speaker 1: things like, um, you know that the ships all have
45:36
Speaker 1: artificial gravity so that you can actually like eat off
45:39
Speaker 1: of a plate on a table, and you know, have
45:41
Speaker 1: scenes where you're having tea with someone or comfort creature
45:44
Speaker 1: comforts or you know, um a, a trip between planets
45:49
Speaker 1: sakes several weeks or months, but it's not going to
45:51
Speaker 1: take your whole life, you know. Um, these are these
45:53
Speaker 1: are little um shortcuts that I take to make sure
45:56
Speaker 1: that the readers having fun and can easily imagine themselves there.
45:59
Speaker 1: But I'm also trying to not um break the laws
46:03
Speaker 1: of physics too much, or if I do, I I
46:06
Speaker 1: often will not add it intentionally with somebody be like,
46:08
Speaker 1: I don't know how that would work, and then be like,
46:10
Speaker 1: you know, whatever it works, um, Because ultimately, what I
46:15
Speaker 1: want is for the reader to feel a connection to
46:18
Speaker 1: our our universe as it exists, you know. And that's
46:21
Speaker 1: why I shy away from too much. You know, it's
46:23
Speaker 1: straying too much into the space, magic realm of things,
46:26
Speaker 1: because I want people to get interested in the real
46:28
Speaker 1: thing and I want people to to uh feel that
46:31
Speaker 1: connection to the larger universe. And so if I if
46:35
Speaker 1: I mess with the rules too much, I'm worried that
46:37
Speaker 1: I might shoot myself in the foot in that regard. Okay,
46:41
Speaker 1: very nice. So then let's talk about the rules in
46:44
Speaker 1: your universe, because wormholes are such a big part of
46:47
Speaker 1: the universe. But then you also include faster than light travel,
46:51
Speaker 1: but then it's sort of outlawed because it creates too
46:54
Speaker 1: much trouble. Tell me more about why you wanted to
46:56
Speaker 1: do it that way. Have both faster than light travel
46:59
Speaker 1: and worm holes in your universe. I think that faster
47:02
Speaker 1: and night travel would be an absolute logistical and bureaucratic nightmare.
47:08
Speaker 1: You know, how do you because because since I'm not
47:10
Speaker 1: breaking the laws of relativity, um, how do you deal
47:15
Speaker 1: with that? How do you deal with with people aging
47:18
Speaker 1: at different rates or you know, showing up seventy years
47:21
Speaker 1: in the future and they've only aged two years or
47:23
Speaker 1: what you know? That to me is that's a very
47:28
Speaker 1: different kind of science fiction story, and it would break
47:32
Speaker 1: the universe as I've written it, in which you can
47:34
Speaker 1: have people who aren't um, you know, in an in
47:37
Speaker 1: an interstellar sort of way, you know, like leaving their
47:40
Speaker 1: families behind and and seeing that their kids have already
47:43
Speaker 1: aged and died in etcetera. Like that's that's not what
47:47
Speaker 1: I was intending to write. So, um, I just I
47:51
Speaker 1: wanted to give that little nod of like, yeah, it's
47:53
Speaker 1: the thing we can do, but we we decided we
47:55
Speaker 1: decided not to. It's too much a mess. Oh but
47:59
Speaker 1: that was agony for me though. I was like, oh
48:02
Speaker 1: my gosh, what really tell me more about it? And
48:05
Speaker 1: then you just sort of like put it aside and
48:07
Speaker 1: it seemed like a tease. I also thought it was
48:10
Speaker 1: it was pretty fascinating as a solution to this storytelling
48:13
Speaker 1: issue like fast and life travel would break your universe,
48:16
Speaker 1: and so you decided to fix it with like a
48:18
Speaker 1: bureaucratic obstacle. I mean, if I were writing it, I
48:22
Speaker 1: would be like, you know, handway woo woo, some science obstacle.
48:25
Speaker 1: I think it's kind of hilarious and creative that you say,
48:28
Speaker 1: oh no, no, that's possible, we just don't do it
48:32
Speaker 1: because it's you know, against our cultural rules. That's kind
48:35
Speaker 1: of fascinating. I think ultimately, you know, I am so
48:38
Speaker 1: interested in in astronomy and in the sciences and all
48:43
Speaker 1: of it, but the science is to me also, you know,
48:44
Speaker 1: definitely includes the social side, and and that's something um
48:49
Speaker 1: I obviously really like exploring in these stories and the universes.
48:53
Speaker 1: I imagine it is kind of a bureaucracy. It's this,
48:56
Speaker 1: it's this um every you know, they have to get
49:00
Speaker 1: permits to build wormholes, and it's all reliant on these
49:03
Speaker 1: treaties and I'm having the right sort of licenses, and
49:06
Speaker 1: you have to go to piloting school and tunneling school
49:08
Speaker 1: and all of that. So it's it's the books are
49:11
Speaker 1: just as much about how to live in this society
49:15
Speaker 1: that as they are here's all the cool technology we have,
49:18
Speaker 1: and here's how we jump between planets. And you think
49:21
Speaker 1: in that universe everyone would sort of follow the rules,
49:24
Speaker 1: like you wouldn't get FTL pirates or you know, FTL
49:28
Speaker 1: smugglers or something. People wouldn't be like trying to skirt
49:31
Speaker 1: the rules and get around them. I think you definitely do. UM.
49:34
Speaker 1: It's something I've never written, just because the types of
49:38
Speaker 1: stories I'm writing aren't aren't UM quite the right venue
49:43
Speaker 1: for that. But I think people do try to get
49:45
Speaker 1: around I mean there are obviously UM and so some
49:47
Speaker 1: of the later books UM, there we encounter cultures and
49:51
Speaker 1: worlds that are estranged from the galactic commons, which is
49:55
Speaker 1: the main setting that I'm describing, UM, in which people
50:00
Speaker 1: are doing things that are very illegal UM or that
50:02
Speaker 1: would be culturally taboo. UM. So I with specifically with FDL, though,
50:08
Speaker 1: I think that the resources you need to do it
50:11
Speaker 1: would require, um the right connections or you know, enough
50:15
Speaker 1: enough money to do it. I think it would be
50:17
Speaker 1: difficult for your average UM, you know, just sort of
50:21
Speaker 1: scummy pirate to get their hands on an FTL drive. UM.
50:25
Speaker 1: You know, it just sort of like be somebody, you know,
50:26
Speaker 1: like someone getting I don't know, a nuclear weapon something
50:30
Speaker 1: unless that is going to be so tightly locked down
50:31
Speaker 1: and it requires, um, such high tech development that, um,
50:36
Speaker 1: it's going to be hard for the average person to
50:38
Speaker 1: get cool. Well that makes sense. Well, again, congrats on
50:42
Speaker 1: thinking through this amazing universe, building it out and taking
50:46
Speaker 1: us on a fun tour in your book. That's really wonderful.
50:49
Speaker 1: So congrats on all of your success. It's very well deserved,
50:52
Speaker 1: and thanks for taking some time to talk to us
50:54
Speaker 1: before we go. Do you have any upcoming projects you'd
50:57
Speaker 1: like to tell our listeners about. Sure, So, I'm currently
50:59
Speaker 1: working on the next Wayfarer's book. It is currently untitled,
51:03
Speaker 1: but it will be out early next year. Um. I
51:06
Speaker 1: also have a pair of novella's coming out from tour
51:10
Speaker 1: dot Com also next year. Those will be solar punk,
51:13
Speaker 1: not space opera. So that's a a fun departure for me.
51:16
Speaker 1: So it's a busy year and I'll be stuck in
51:19
Speaker 1: my writing cave, but I'll have a lot of stuff
51:22
Speaker 1: coming out wonderful. Well, thanks again for coming on our show.
51:26
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for having me. All Right, that was
51:28
Speaker 1: Science Fetching author Becky Chambers, and she sounds really fun
51:32
Speaker 1: and pretty amazing. Sounds like you guys that have a
51:34
Speaker 1: really great conversation. Yeah, we had a lot of fun.
51:37
Speaker 1: She was very kind to spend her time talking to me,
51:39
Speaker 1: and she clearly thought this stuff through and did her best,
51:43
Speaker 1: like make a universe that made sense. And he heard
51:45
Speaker 1: her say she really wanted to set it in our universe.
51:48
Speaker 1: She was not trying to invent new laws of physics.
51:51
Speaker 1: You're just sort of trying to fast forward hundreds or
51:53
Speaker 1: thousands of years to what people might do with our
51:56
Speaker 1: laws of physics. And I told the respect that it
51:58
Speaker 1: sounds like she did her research. You know, it sounds
52:01
Speaker 1: like she's pretty knowledgeable about these high dimensional ideas and
52:05
Speaker 1: and did she just do a lot of research, thats
52:08
Speaker 1: that she always been sort of a physics fan. I
52:11
Speaker 1: think she was. Yes, she's been watching Star Trek and
52:13
Speaker 1: reading science fiction for a long time and that's led
52:16
Speaker 1: her to be curious about physics. And so kudos to
52:19
Speaker 1: her for doing her research. And also you can hear
52:21
Speaker 1: on the interview she acknowledges when she's at the edge
52:23
Speaker 1: of her knowledge and the things that she needed a
52:26
Speaker 1: handwave or like at some point nobody wants to see,
52:28
Speaker 1: like equations in a science fiction book, right, I mean
52:34
Speaker 1: where the appendix is. I want the hardest science fiction possible.
52:38
Speaker 1: That's right. This should be a paper and it should
52:40
Speaker 1: be published. It should just be equations, the whole novel
52:43
Speaker 1: to just be long, long equation. Hey, you know, I
52:45
Speaker 1: always say math is the language of physics. So maybe
52:48
Speaker 1: some days somebody will write prose and even poetry and
52:51
Speaker 1: songs in mathematics. No, well, there you go. We can
52:54
Speaker 1: always dream. No. So she did a great job, and
52:57
Speaker 1: she totally acknowledged where she ran up to her the
52:59
Speaker 1: limits for her knowledge, and where she was inventing stuff.
53:02
Speaker 1: And I think she total a really fun story. I
53:05
Speaker 1: got sucked into and I wanted to be in her universe.
53:09
Speaker 1: So I think she did a great job, and I
53:10
Speaker 1: recommended to all the fans of science fiction out there. Awesome.
53:13
Speaker 1: And what do you think she's trying to say, Like,
53:15
Speaker 1: what's the takeaway message from you know, interacting with all
53:18
Speaker 1: these different types of species and kind of closing closing
53:23
Speaker 1: the distances in our universe? What does that do to
53:25
Speaker 1: humans and the human consciousness? I think she was just
53:28
Speaker 1: trying to imagine, you know, how humans would experience this
53:32
Speaker 1: other kind of universe, interacting with aliens and trying new things,
53:36
Speaker 1: and it's sort of like a travel novel large, you know,
53:40
Speaker 1: like going to Japan and trying weird stuff, and it
53:44
Speaker 1: sort of has that flavor of it. And I think
53:46
Speaker 1: she just tried to like paint that on the whole
53:48
Speaker 1: galaxy instead. And you know, she could have made it
53:51
Speaker 1: like super aliens. She could have made it like, oh
53:53
Speaker 1: my god, we go to this planet and they're all
53:55
Speaker 1: just blobs of gas. We can and talk to them.
53:57
Speaker 1: We don't know if they're angry or if they're just
53:59
Speaker 1: happy to see us, so they're just farting all the time.
54:02
Speaker 1: They couldn't Who knows, she could have made a super alien.
54:06
Speaker 1: All their jokes are far jokes, and aren't all our
54:10
Speaker 1: jokes are our jokes too. That's the common great commonality
54:14
Speaker 1: in Lead. But that's the thing is she wanted to
54:16
Speaker 1: find the commonality. She wanted there to be aliens we
54:18
Speaker 1: could relate to, and that was her constraint, because it's
54:21
Speaker 1: not that much fun to read a book where you
54:23
Speaker 1: find aliens and then you can't communicate with them at all. Right,
54:26
Speaker 1: there's no satisfaction there. Well, it sounds pretty cool, so again,
54:29
Speaker 1: if anyone wants to check it out. It's called The
54:31
Speaker 1: Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, part of the
54:34
Speaker 1: Wayfarer series Hugo Award winning Wayfers series by Backy Chambers.
54:39
Speaker 1: So thanks to everybody who's been sending in your science
54:41
Speaker 1: fiction recommendations. Please keep it up. I'm reading those books
54:45
Speaker 1: and if one of them strikes my fancy and we
54:47
Speaker 1: can get the author on the podcast, we will do
54:49
Speaker 1: more of these episodes. And thanks again to Baky Chambers
54:52
Speaker 1: for being on the podcast. We hope you enjoyed that.
54:55
Speaker 1: See you next night. Before you still have a question
55:05
Speaker 1: after listening to all these explanations, please drop us a line.
55:08
Speaker 1: We'd love to hear from you. You can find us
55:11
Speaker 1: on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at Daniel and Jorge That's
55:14
Speaker 1: one word, or email us at Feedback at Daniel and
55:18
Speaker 1: Jorge dot com. Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel
55:21
Speaker 1: and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of I
55:24
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Speaker 1: I Heart Radio, a Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
55:32
Speaker 1: to your favorite shows. Yea