Simon Prentis is the author of “SPEECH! How Language Made Us Human”, an acclaimed exploration of human history through the lens of language. He is an experienced translator and interpreter who has worked with different cultures and languages in over fifty countries.
EPISODE LINKS
SPEECH! How Language Made Us Human (Affiliate Link)
https://sciencentric.com/link/speech-how-language-made-us-human/
Follow Simon on Twitter: https://twitter.com/memesovergenes
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(Note: The following transcript is auto-generated and may contain errors.)
00;00;00;02 – 00;00;18;21
Simon Prentis
If you’re able to say something and he’s able to show that he’s understood it, you have communicated in a way that is using the abstract tool of language to enter that that world of intelligence to join minds. Essentially, that’s really what it’s about.00;00;22;13 – 00;00;50;26
Eric R Olson
Hey, guys. I’m Erica Olson, and welcome to another episode of the Synapse series on science centric Synapses, our signature discussion series, where we have thought provoking discussions with scientists, journalists, authors and other thought leaders. But before we dove in a couple of quick reminders. One, you can help keep this series going by reading this episode or writing a review on whichever platform you’re listening on or on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, and pretty much all the major platforms.00;00;51;03 – 00;01;13;19
Eric R Olson
And number two, you can help support us directly through Patreon. We have a couple of nice benefits over there, including early access to new episodes, ad free episodes, and a monthly patrons only. Q&A with me where you can suggest new show topics or guests. Check out the shownotes or visit science centric dot com slash support for more info.00;01;14;01 – 00;01;24;28
Eric R Olson
Simon Prentice, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for coming on and for for getting in touch. It’s awesome to have you here. And I think we’re very lucky to have you here.00;01;26;15 – 00;01;27;21
Simon Prentis
Well, thank you for inviting me.00;01;28;17 – 00;02;00;11
Eric R Olson
Awesome. So I, I typically have, you know, I typically write this intro for guests, but I had a great idea from from a viewer that, like, you know, you should just let the guests introduce themselves. So I think I think I’ll do that here. So maybe you could just tell the listeners and viewers a little bit about yourself, your background, and how you how you became a book author.00;02;01;14 – 00;02;31;21
Simon Prentis
All right. Well, that’s that could be potentially a long story. It may. The way into that would be to say that I’ve always been since my late teens have always been interested in other cultures and just sort of different ways of thinking about the world, and mainly due to a dissatisfaction with my own, I think. And so I sort of travel quite a bit in my youth, mainly in the Middle East and Europe.00;02;31;21 – 00;02;46;26
Simon Prentis
But then when I went to university, I wasn’t really doing anything to do with languages, particularly I studied literature and language, and then I became involved in a martial art called Aikido, which you may or may not know.00;02;46;29 – 00;02;47;23
Eric R Olson
Yes. Oh yeah.00;02;47;23 – 00;03;07;06
Simon Prentis
Japanese. Okay. More of an art than a martial arts, as I like to say. If you. Anyway, I decided I had to go to Japan, so I managed to wangle a way to get to Japan. And I spent. I originally thought I was going to be there for about a year and then I realized that wouldn’t even scratch the surface of it.00;03;07;06 – 00;03;33;01
Simon Prentis
And I began to learn the language, to my surprise, because I hadn’t been a linguist at school or university. And one thing led to another, and I ended up staying there eight years and qualifying as a translator and interpreter. And then I came back to Europe and based in London, started working as an interpreter and translator through many European countries.00;03;33;01 – 00;04;06;06
Simon Prentis
And the Middle East and also in America, other places. I’ve traveled quite widely and seen a lot of cultures firsthand. And the overriding thing that really bothered me, I guess, was how self-centered everybody is in their own culture. They all come convinced that this is the best score and that everybody else is somehow substandard. And particularly in the English speaking world, we’re so kind of it’s not even dismissive, it’s just plain ignorant of other cultures.00;04;06;13 – 00;04;27;06
Simon Prentis
We sort of kind of treat somebody who doesn’t speak English properly, is somehow mentally defective, and, you know, this is this is different to other cultures where if you because of the dominance of English, if you make the effort to speak their language, they’re generally very happy that that was it’s a very sort of one sided position that being speaking base.00;04;27;26 – 00;04;57;22
Simon Prentis
But nonetheless, and notwithstanding, each culture does have this secret belief that it is somehow really special and has these really special things that no other culture is. So I kind of started the idea was to write a book that would look at those cultural issues. Yeah. And why it is we end up in those sort of kind of rather blinkered positions and then because I’m obviously a linguist, I became more interested in, in nature of language and words.00;04;57;22 – 00;05;20;15
Simon Prentis
And I discovered that really nobody knows. You know, the language is a bit of a mystery. We all know that language is the one thing that distinguish it, but we don’t really know why. And so I started researching that. And then I ran into a piece of research that kind of opened a door for me when I realized that that’s the number of sounds that we use when we speak.00;05;20;24 – 00;05;46;08
Simon Prentis
You know, what normally people think of is vowels and consonants, sort of the pros call phonemes. You know, that these these are different numbers for different languages. And not only that, they can get quite small. The further way you get from Africa down into the jungles of South America, people are only using 1130. So right now in English it’s something like 44 and in other languages it’s even higher than that.00;05;46;15 – 00;05;59;17
Eric R Olson
And if so, I mean, a phoneme is basically like the most basic sound that we make, right? It’s like, yes, it would be yes, you know, par sound or it does sound or, you know, anything. That’s right. Yeah.00;05;59;29 – 00;06;21;03
Simon Prentis
I mean, it’s kind of what we think of as vowels and consonants. It’s like a general generic word for all of the sounds that we use. And yeah, people who don’t really think about language very much don’t really know that. But actually we are using a very limited number of sounds. It’s just everything we’re saying can be diced down into those small numbers of nonsense like numbers, really.00;06;21;03 – 00;06;29;09
Simon Prentis
You know the numbers, we have just ten digits and we can use those ten digits to make any number we like. And words are the same way.00;06;29;17 – 00;06;48;01
Eric R Olson
So. So let me jump in and and kind of kind of highlight this point that you’re making, which is that and by the way, I should mention the book is called Speech How Language Made US Human If That Hasn’t Been Covered, which is your book that came out, I think about a year ago, is that right?00;06;48;19 – 00;06;52;03
Simon Prentis
That’s right, yeah. And I just did an updated version. Yeah.00;06;52;06 – 00;07;01;05
Eric R Olson
So, so, so that, you know, the thing about language and maybe the podcast actually is the best sort of vehicle for talking about language, but.00;07;02;10 – 00;07;03;03
Simon Prentis
Hmm.00;07;03;03 – 00;07;21;04
Eric R Olson
I had that thought as we were, as I was kind of getting ready to speak with you. But, but we’re just, we’re born into it. We, we learn language from such a young age, and it’s so much a part of what we do that we just. It’s almost like a fish. I was thinking like a fish swimming in water.00;07;21;04 – 00;07;41;13
Eric R Olson
It’s like you don’t. Yeah, we didn’t. We never take that time to really think about, well, what are, what are we actually doing? Because we were so focused on the meaning of what we say. But, you know, and it’s that it’s instantly translated, but we don’t think about like those little individual noises that we’re making that somehow translate to let you.00;07;41;27 – 00;07;44;25
Eric R Olson
So I think that’s really what you’re getting at there. Yeah.00;07;45;27 – 00;08;07;02
Simon Prentis
Well, listen, the really interesting thing about that to me is that even the professionals don’t really think about that because, you know, humans have been thinking about well, some humans have been thinking about language as far back as we have records, you know, in ancient Greece, obviously. But, you know, in India, it goes back grammar. People who studied grammar go back thousands of years.00;08;07;16 – 00;08;26;25
Simon Prentis
And it’s all been about, well, how does this thing work? What are the rules that make language work? And so moving into the modern age, you have Chomsky who really took that the end degree and started applying computational techniques so that you’ve got these really complicated trees of, you know, the curse of sub clauses and all that stuff.00;08;26;25 – 00;08;48;20
Simon Prentis
And it’s yes, very complex. But that’s that’s not the actual basic line. That’s the kind of the superstructure, you know, when you drill down in it, what what is the really key thing that makes us different from other animals is the fact that we have lots of words, you know, I mean, words come before grammar. That seems to be the thing that people somehow miss.00;08;48;23 – 00;09;24;25
Simon Prentis
Hmm. You know, words are taken for granted. And, you know, if you think you speak another language, I don’t know. But if you’ve ever tried to learn one, obviously you start with individual words and only later on do you start to put the grammar together because you don’t have enough words and to do it again. Right. And the difference between what we do and what other animals do is that we have because we put sounds together, we can make lots of words very easily, whereas most animals just make one noise like, well, they do, you know, they haven’t got much choice.00;09;25;01 – 00;09;45;20
Simon Prentis
So it’s not surprising they don’t use grammar. And when people talk about what’s the difference between animals communication and human language, they usually talking about grammar. They say, well, they don’t do grammar, but mostly don’t good grammar. They haven’t got words. It’s it’s a much more basic thing. So that was really the starting point of my book was to point that out.00;09;45;22 – 00;09;52;14
Simon Prentis
It’s just all we’re doing is just like grunting at each other in a structured fashion.00;09;52;14 – 00;09;57;02
Eric R Olson
So now I won’t be able to continue talking. I mean, that’s that’s a little bit.00;09;57;02 – 00;09;59;21
Simon Prentis
How you you do. Yeah.00;09;59;21 – 00;10;28;13
Eric R Olson
You start focusing on that. I mean, it’s a little bit like, you know, you’re on some kind of hallucinogen and you start focusing on the sounds of that like I can’t talk because I’m listening to the sound of my own voice kind of thing, like a self-consciousness, which we can’t do, which actually might that might actually be a good, you know, that might be a Segway into talking about language and self and consciousness or art being, you know, I don’t know.00;10;28;23 – 00;10;30;18
Simon Prentis
Conscience, conscience.00;10;30;27 – 00;10;33;16
Eric R Olson
Conscious and self-conscious. It was related.00;10;34;11 – 00;10;39;14
Simon Prentis
To think self-consciousness. Yeah, I don’t know.00;10;40;03 – 00;11;00;02
Eric R Olson
So anyway, sorry, I lost my train of thought, but so. Well, so, so. So you know, a major premise of your book is that that language is actually a construction of our kind of constructs, our consciousness.00;11;00;28 – 00;11;02;04
Simon Prentis
And one one question.00;11;02;04 – 00;11;32;21
Eric R Olson
I had for you about that is just, you know, did your involvement in Japanese culture bring out that idea for you? Because I mean, to me, that sounds a lot like and we actually have a bit of a connection here because I’ve studied Chinese martial arts for a long time and then I was doing Taichi, which is which is very kind of has a lot of the same precepts that Aikido does.00;11;33;01 – 00;11;37;23
Eric R Olson
But, but it’s also heavily influenced by Daoism and Zen. And there’s this idea that.00;11;37;24 – 00;11;40;08
Simon Prentis
Yeah.00;11;40;08 – 00;11;58;25
Eric R Olson
Well, let me, let me let me let you answer the question. But do you think your involvement in Japanese culture, you know, contributed to this to this idea that you’re putting forward in the book, that that language actually is our conscious consciousness?00;11;59;09 – 00;12;40;02
Simon Prentis
Consciousness. Okay. Well, there’s there’s two parts to that, maybe, first of all. Yes, I think so. I think certainly my practice of Zen, not that it was hugely deep, but as a sort of, you know, ancillary to doing Aikido, you kind of get into that and, you know, meditation, Zen meditation is as much as anything sort of trying to shut off the stream of words that’s going through your head, stop the thoughts that are coming through and just sort of be be there and so once you do that, then you sort of realize that that you have a huge amount of sensory information that’s there that is often just obscured and blocked out.00;12;40;02 – 00;13;00;18
Simon Prentis
But it’s because what we’re doing now, I mean, we’re talking to each other. I’m actually with you wherever you are. Somehow in my mind, I’m not in my own space here. If I if I do that, then I’m suddenly. I’m not with you anymore. I’m. Yeah, that’s actually what I’m talking to you because of the illusion, the abstract world that words create.00;13;01;05 – 00;13;28;03
Simon Prentis
I’m no longer here. So doing meditation, I think, really made me see that contrast between what I what I in the book call awareness and consciousness. And I make a distinction between those two. And I think that’s not widely sort of made. And what I mean by that is you can be aware of things, but you can’t necessarily have a word for them.00;13;28;11 – 00;13;55;19
Simon Prentis
You don’t necessarily have words. It’s when you have a word that you can stop thinking about things. And it’s difficult to really is that famous quote that I close in my book from Thomas Hobbes saying was a wise man’s counters. They do but reckon with them that they are the currency of fools, meaning you don’t need wood, you need words to be able to think about things in a complex way.00;13;55;28 – 00;14;19;05
Simon Prentis
Yeah, but if you get trapped in words, it’s the currency of fools. Because actually what you have, all you have is your legs. And that’s what all animals share. All animals have an awareness and probably even it’s one to go to the extreme, maybe even rest as awareness. You know, you’ve got iron and water come together and they want to be together in the form of rust.00;14;19;23 – 00;14;41;02
Simon Prentis
Maybe they’re aware of that at some level. Maybe there’s a feeling also like that, but that’s the real basic awareness, right? But they don’t have any means bringing that to consciousness, whereas we do. What language has done is allows us to be aware that we are aware because we can put a noise that we agree means something and share that.00;14;41;25 – 00;14;48;15
Simon Prentis
And then once you’ve got that word, then you can use it. The thing so I’m probably not explaining this but no.00;14;48;22 – 00;15;16;13
Eric R Olson
I think I mean, I think yeah, I think it comes back. It’s, it’s, it makes sense if you, especially if you’ve read any Buddhism or, you know, Zen Buddhism or Daoism or anything like that. Yeah. It’s this idea of the they think they call it the monkey mind. It’s the phrase in Zen. It’s this, you know, kind of chattering this voice that we’re, oh, that’s always going in our head and talking and labeling things.00;15;16;13 – 00;15;24;28
Eric R Olson
And, you know, maybe Freud called it the ego. It’s the you know, and it is more of our just raw awareness.00;15;24;28 – 00;15;25;21
Simon Prentis
Or.00;15;25;23 – 00;15;42;18
Eric R Olson
You know yeah drives that we can’t really name but you know in Buddhism or Daoism, you meditate to quiet that chattering monkey mind and just go into pure awareness.00;15;45;14 – 00;16;13;23
Simon Prentis
So you can distinction between the identity and identity, which I have to write. This friend of mine told me that and I pretty I shamelessly stole it because I think it’s a great idea. The idea that your identity is this artificial construction that you have in your head, which is all to do with the culture you were brought up in and the language that you learn and the religion that surrounded that and all those things that give you your cultural identity.00;16;14;09 – 00;16;24;17
Simon Prentis
But nested inside that is this the ID, the identity that wants to break out and doesn’t like really being trapped in this sort of cultural armor?00;16;24;27 – 00;16;25;08
Eric R Olson
Yeah.00;16;25;08 – 00;16;32;23
Simon Prentis
And it’s that’s kind of a different way of saying what you’re saying. Yeah. You know, so it’s a meditation and.00;16;33;20 – 00;17;02;00
Eric R Olson
Yeah, I just wanted to take a moment to thank the sponsor of this episode, Flow Spark Media. So Full Spark Media is the video based media company that I founded in 2018. In addition to producing freely available series like the one you’re listening to, we also help science and technology focused organizations to develop, create and manage their video projects.00;17;02;17 – 00;17;41;04
Eric R Olson
Our clients range from major scientific publishers to SpaceX Telecom companies to stem focused educational programs. Head over to Flow, Spark Tor.com slash creative to find out how we can help you with your next project. Now back to the show. So so this idea that you’re that you’re putting forward is that if I understand it, that that language is a great is this great tool that humans developed that can do all these great things.00;17;41;04 – 00;17;53;10
Eric R Olson
But then we’re also sort of trapped by it. So how, how how are we traps by which what what are the traps that we fall.00;17;53;10 – 00;18;12;05
Simon Prentis
Into the traps to the answers to the questions that we have. The AI The way the book is structured is that I look at first of all, explain how we come to have be able to do this. The trick of language is we were just talking about putting sounds together. So then that allows you to have a conversation.00;18;13;00 – 00;18;31;12
Simon Prentis
So obviously that kind of the first set of conversations you start to have is how are we going to do things here? What are what are the ways we’re going to if you and I are going to sort of set up some kind of lives together, we’re going to have to make some practical decisions about how you do things.00;18;32;01 – 00;19;10;05
Simon Prentis
So that means discussing it, coming advances and come to those answers. And most of the time those answers will just be things you happen to discover along the way. And maybe a way to make fire or, you know, best way to arrange things in your life. And I talk about just things like dividing time. How are we going to talk about time, things like that, you know, I mean, it’s very there’s a lot of very practical things that soon come up once once you have language, as opposed to having know like animals can talk about time because they don’t have words to you know, they can’t say, you know, I’ll I’ll zoom with you next00;19;10;05 – 00;19;30;27
Simon Prentis
Wednesday, 6:00. That’s not going to happen. There’s too many questions involved that they haven’t answered. So so you get a whole set of decisions that you and I have made our little culture and other people will come to other decisions about how they’re going to do it. And they I mean, let’s just take the example of time, which I use in the book.00;19;31;07 – 00;19;57;08
Simon Prentis
Every culture comes up with different decisions about when does a day start? How long is a week? Oh yeah, how many hours in a day? All that kind of stuff. So it’s we get, you know, we think our way is the right way. So we get stuck with that. That’s what tradition is all about. It’s about believing that you’re the way your culture, the answers your culture came up with must be the right ones because here we are line.00;19;57;17 – 00;20;23;10
Simon Prentis
So that’s the first trap is and in a sense it’s the answer to the question. Now once you can start asking the question how you got to answer it, and the answer can become a trap, and likewise the next question. So the big question that comes along is why write why, why, what’s what’s going on? What you know, and in a sense, religion is, is the first answer to the question why?00;20;23;15 – 00;20;29;08
Simon Prentis
Because this is a whole set of stories they get told. Yeah. And you know. Right.00;20;29;21 – 00;20;56;15
Eric R Olson
One well let’s, let’s dwell in how a little bit here. Okay so one, one thing that I, I think that a lot of actually Americans take great pleasure in is is noticing all the little differences between British English and American English. They’re both English. And yet to be fair, the English invented English. Okay, so you may have.00;20;56;15 – 00;21;00;27
Simon Prentis
A bad word. We stole it from other people as well.00;21;01;12 – 00;21;25;23
Eric R Olson
But that’s that’s that’s true. That’s all other kind words. But but it’s it’s it’s almost like being a bit it’s almost like you feel like it’s a bit of a parallel universe when you’re, when you’re comparing all these things, like how could you? I remember going to the, to the grocery store and I worked with I worked for Nature Publishing, which is based in the U.K. So a lot of my colleagues were were British.00;21;25;23 – 00;21;45;09
Eric R Olson
And, you know, I was over there and we went to the grocery store and we’re talking about the the woman I was with, she was talking about the trolley. Oh, and you get the trolley for the to pick up groceries, you know, and here we call it grocery cart, we call it a trolley. I thought, you know, it’s just so it’s so funny.00;21;45;10 – 00;21;53;15
Eric R Olson
But like, as you’re saying, there’s there’s no real is there any benefit to calling one versus the other? You know, I mean.00;21;54;13 – 00;22;26;01
Simon Prentis
You should try taking a deep dove into another language because that that confusion that you’re talking about is multiplied in so many different dimensions. That’s like, oh, my God. You know, it’s yeah, it’s a wonderful experience just on a trolley. I can’t help mentioning this, but that is the current term of abuse for a Prime Minister trolley he’s referred to as a trolley because, you know, you go into a shopping mall and you take a cart and the Americans sense and, you know, one of the wheels is weird and it just won’t go in the direction that it wants you want it to go in.00;22;27;10 – 00;22;38;00
Simon Prentis
That is the current term of abuse for a wonderful prime minister and it’s very true trolley but clearly hasn’t got overdone because no, we do understand it in.00;22;38;00 – 00;22;49;05
Eric R Olson
America and we do have that word. We do have trolley but we when we it refers to a like a streetcar that you would ride on like a cable. That’s right.00;22;49;05 – 00;22;51;04
Simon Prentis
In which preference is equal to tram.00;22;51;11 – 00;22;51;19
Eric R Olson
Yes.00;22;51;22 – 00;22;52;28
Simon Prentis
Yes. We call that a train.00;22;52;28 – 00;22;58;08
Eric R Olson
Yeah. So it’s like it’s I don’t know, I just find that really fun and entertaining to.00;22;58;23 – 00;23;19;22
Simon Prentis
To, you know, compare this, then this, this whole, this whole thing ratchets up then because, you know, the next stage is, is why, as I was saying, so you get your religion, that little religion, you know, and I just read this wonderful thing that I was just remember what it was. Oh, yeah. The book by Matt Ridley was a very interesting character.00;23;19;22 – 00;23;58;21
Simon Prentis
Anyway, he said that this this is fantastic. But you sure you know it? On the Sistine Chapel in Rome, this portrait by Michelangelo showing God crazy, man. It’s like God and Adam touching his fingers. It’s a very sort of dramatic image and it’s always taken to mean, yeah, that this is the moment that God created man. And he suggests in the book that actually, no, it’s the other way around because anybody who has any sense of the history of religion must know that there are so many different options here that none of them can be right.00;23;58;21 – 00;24;20;26
Simon Prentis
And actually, the truth is that Adam is crazy, man. And if you look at that picture again and think of it that way around, that actually Adam touching God’s finger is creating God, right? It opens up a whole different universe. Right. But my point is there, you know, the really the next set of things that we get trapped by.00;24;21;08 – 00;24;41;21
Simon Prentis
Going back to your question about how this language traps. Yeah. Is that questions, you know what what’s the answer why we’re here because everybody has a different solution to that. And well, it might just be that your version is right, but the other logical solution is that they’re all wrong.00;24;42;23 – 00;24;53;09
Eric R Olson
Yeah. I mean, yeah, that’s. Yeah, I could see how that’s that’s certainly a trap.00;24;53;09 – 00;25;14;13
Simon Prentis
So moving on from that, then the question becomes how do you how do you where does lying what do you do about this? What do you do about the fact that you’re saying, you know, cart and I’m saying trolley or, you know, yeah, measuring things in miles and I’m using kilometers or all these things. And you say, well, your God made the universe.00;25;14;13 – 00;25;25;26
Simon Prentis
And I’m saying, No, my God did. How do you how do you deal with that? And and the answer, which is really to the point of science centric is, is science your scientific approach.00;25;25;26 – 00;25;26;09
Eric R Olson
Right.00;25;26;27 – 00;25;57;02
Simon Prentis
Is the one where you leap over all those things and you come together at a higher level where you’re actually able to apply a scientific method, which is really just logic and really just so that kind of putting all the arguments together and seeing how they stack up. And that’s, you know, that is the great joy of languages is sort of being able to use it as a tool to bring you closer to a, an understanding of what’s going on.00;25;57;02 – 00;25;59;15
Simon Prentis
Basic, I suppose.00;25;59;15 – 00;26;27;10
Eric R Olson
Yeah, I have one thing I just wanted to bring up was that reading your book and I read a review of it, and one of the things the review said was it’s kind of in the tradition of the book, which I absolutely adore, which is Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond and also Sapiens, which I actually didn’t I haven’t finished that, but I started reading it.00;26;27;10 – 00;26;57;12
Eric R Olson
But it’s it’s like language is so fundamental to everything that we do that it really, like, constructs our entire culture, right? I mean, this is this is how we get this complexity of culture because religion is actually can be very complex theology can be very complex. Yeah, very. Science, of course, is very complex. It’s involves logic and everything.00;26;57;12 – 00;27;04;07
Eric R Olson
So I’m not sure where I’m going with this, but I. Yeah.00;27;04;15 – 00;27;05;16
Simon Prentis
Well, I.00;27;05;16 – 00;27;08;14
Eric R Olson
Think it’s I think your book.00;27;08;14 – 00;27;08;29
Simon Prentis
Is a.00;27;09;07 – 00;27;28;11
Eric R Olson
Very, very large scope. So in some ways it’s, you know, it’s a it’s kind of a history of of the end of humanity and our relationship with language. And then it’s, you know, all of the things that we do really have this relationship with language. I mean, that’s that’s really right. I mean, that’s that’s.00;27;28;11 – 00;27;55;04
Simon Prentis
Why that yeah. The subtitle, I mean, it’s called Speech and Speech with an exclamation mark. So it’s not really about just about speech. It’s about how, how, how we get to be how we are. I mean, the subtitle is the thing How Language Made US Human. Yeah, because any species what I’m trying to say is that any species that was able to talk or share information.00;27;55;13 – 00;28;16;29
Simon Prentis
Yeah. Detailed information in the way that language allows us to do is going to run up against these questions. And it’s the fact that we were able to do that that turns into what we are. I mean, every culture has a culture, you know, has a religion, some form of more than one religion has an identity. And all these things are a necessary consequence of language.00;28;17;11 – 00;28;28;11
Simon Prentis
And then over and above that, we’re lucky we get some science that allows us to kind of sort out the the truth from the they’re not truth.00;28;28;11 – 00;28;30;05
Eric R Olson
Yeah, right, right, right.00;28;30;20 – 00;28;48;00
Simon Prentis
That’s that’s the hope behind it. And then that has consequences in turn because the technology then grows and that allows us to connect up in ways that we never could. I mean, you know, just what we’re doing now is is a is a miracle of technology. You know, when I was a kid. Oh, right.00;28;48;01 – 00;28;48;13
Eric R Olson
Oh, yeah.00;28;48;13 – 00;28;50;22
Simon Prentis
We could be doing it just insane.00;28;50;25 – 00;28;52;27
Eric R Olson
Oh, yeah. So even from when I.00;28;53;12 – 00;28;53;17
Simon Prentis
Was.00;28;53;17 – 00;28;59;14
Eric R Olson
A kid and I’m, I think a bit younger. But yeah, I mean, it’s unfathomable really.00;29;00;27 – 00;29;29;09
Simon Prentis
Yeah. So even though language is, has kind of splintered into all these different varieties and we have these astonishing, you know, different ways of looking at the world and thinking about, oh, the technology is bringing us all back together again. And, and we’re all really sort of now able to be back on the same page in ways that the history and that that, in a sense, gives us hope that we’re going to get past the kind of thing that’s going on in Ukraine, for example.00;29;29;18 – 00;29;32;13
Simon Prentis
It’s just essentially insane.00;29;32;14 – 00;30;04;07
Eric R Olson
That’s is there just to back up a little bit into, you know, is there any evidence that other animal species have anything similar to us in terms of language? I know that, for example, like chimpanzees and some birds do have some level of culture things that, you know, ideas or concepts that they can pass on about finding food and and, you know, more basic activities like that.00;30;04;07 – 00;30;14;04
Eric R Olson
But is there any evidence that that other species do language? Maybe not on the same level that we do, but yeah.00;30;14;15 – 00;30;43;26
Simon Prentis
Not not a great deal. But that’s partly and probably mostly because we haven’t really been looking for it or maybe even more so we haven’t had the tools to analyze it. And I think it’s now there’s just recently been some very interesting research published about chimpanzees and showing that even though we previously thought they could only make a very limited number of noises, they’ve shown that this up to about 400 words, according words.00;30;43;26 – 00;31;10;08
Simon Prentis
I mean, they by which they mean putting noises together to allow them to increase their vocabulary. Mm hmm. Just like the way that I argue in my in my book. So that that’s a very interesting thing, because it shows that what humans have done and what I say, digitizing noise and making language is actually something the other animals have started doing in different ways.00;31;10;21 – 00;31;34;01
Simon Prentis
So up until now, everybody’s thought that language is one of the mysteries of language, is why only humans, you know, how come humans have this power to think in recursive nested dependencies and all this stuff, you know, Chomsky and stuff. And no other animal can do it. It’s crazy why? But actually now, if you reduce it back down to the basics, you can see that other animals are doing it.00;31;34;19 – 00;32;06;18
Simon Prentis
And, you know, it’s still very primitive. But then these things, you know, evolution happens over millions if it doesn’t happen over your lifetime, my life. So we’ve taken language and language once it catches fire, once you’ve got the idea of putting words together, then over a quite short space of time, even then, probably a million years, you know, you’re going to start getting a hockey stick of, you know, very rapid development, you know.00;32;06;19 – 00;32;17;20
Simon Prentis
And I think that’s why humans are so far ahead of the game, is that once once it takes off, it really takes off. Whereas other animals have maybe got to that stage that.00;32;17;20 – 00;32;43;16
Eric R Olson
Hey, I just wanted to take a quick pause to think another one of our sponsors, HostGator. HostGator is one of the world’s top ten largest web hosting companies with over 8 million host of domains. They have around the clock support and all shared web hosting plans include a 45 day money back guarantee. I’ve personally used HostGator since 2008 for all of my hosting needs and couldn’t be happier.00;32;44;02 – 00;33;24;19
Eric R Olson
Sign up today using the promo code science centric and you’ll receive 25% off any new hosting plan. You mentioned in the book. This chimp I think a bone about chimp named Kanzi. Yeah. Could you could you talk a little bit about that and. Okay, this is what you’re referring to when you talk about chimps able to to make to learn something like 400 words and you said something interesting about this this chimp, that it sort of ceased to be a bone, a bow once it started to use language.00;33;24;19 – 00;33;26;04
Eric R Olson
So what do you mean by that?00;33;26;04 – 00;33;56;26
Simon Prentis
Exactly what I meant by that was that. Well, the interesting thing about they’ve tried for many years going back to the thirties to teach language to the great apes used mainly chimps, but also gorillas and other animals. And they’ve never really had much success with it, but they’ve they’ve managed to teach them some sign language and that they never really kind of got a point where they felt that they been able to grasp it.00;33;56;26 – 00;34;19;26
Simon Prentis
Now they can see his mother was one of the subjects of these experiments, and they were trying to teach her words and she was having a lot of trouble. And then I think I think when she was selected, that’s what it was when she was selected for the research, they didn’t know she was pregnant, but just sort of started into it and they realized that she was pregnant, so they had to carry on with it.00;34;19;26 – 00;34;51;23
Simon Prentis
And so she had the baby while she was doing, you know, part of the testing to teach her language. And after about three years, they just gave up with her because she just wasn’t making any progress. And they sort of stopped. But then Kanzi, who’d been watching the whole thing and they hadn’t been teaching him, he’d just been hanging around with his mother, he suddenly using the the interface board they had and showed that he could actually grasp things that his mother couldn’t grasp.00;34;52;17 – 00;35;19;19
Simon Prentis
And so then they worked with him and he was eventually able to understand quite complicated sentences, like, would you pick that television up and take it outside the room or something like that? And this one that sticks in my head. If you go on to YouTube, you can see it. You know that he’s being told things that are I mean, okay, it’s not quantum physics, but it is, you know, dedicated interactions with reality and just spoken to.00;35;19;27 – 00;35;20;28
Simon Prentis
And he understands.00;35;21;01 – 00;35;41;20
Eric R Olson
And and it’s not just it’s not just some repetitive task that they that he’s done and recognize. It’s the sound of the words like the researchers are actually putting together that he does not know. So he has to comprehend the new construction of the sentence. Yeah. Yeah.00;35;42;00 – 00;36;06;21
Simon Prentis
That’s absolutely right. And there’s a sort of there are also videos of him. He was he was taught how to make a fire and he could make a bonfire and cook marshmallows on a stick and eat them, you know, sort of I mean, again, basic stuff. But if you’re able to say something and he’s able to do, you know, to show that he’s understood it, then that’s kind of one of us, you know?00;36;06;24 – 00;36;37;02
Simon Prentis
Yeah, that’s what I mean by that. You know, this you have communicated in a way that is using the abstract tool of language to enter that that world of intelligence. Well, to join minds, essentially. That’s really what it’s about. Yeah. I mean, again, you go back to humans in the context of going into a foreign culture, that language you don’t speak, you’re cut off, you just, you know, people just come up to you and say things and you can’t understand what I mean.00;36;37;03 – 00;37;01;22
Simon Prentis
Yeah, there’s no way in. Yeah, but when you learn the language then then you’re in and then then you’ve joined, you know, the human aspect of that culture. So by Kanzi mastering some of those aspects of language, he became one of us. I mean, in the same way that somebody who can speak a little bit of your language is one of you in the way that somebody you can’t speak it.00;37;02;10 – 00;37;03;02
Eric R Olson
So so.00;37;03;02 – 00;37;04;00
Simon Prentis
It’s it is.00;37;04;18 – 00;37;26;16
Eric R Olson
So it’s really that your and you and you and you said this a few times, but that it’s like language sort of you sort of enter into this abstract space together. We’re having this conversation. We’re having this conversation across the Atlantic Ocean. We’re inhabiting this space, which, of course, is supported by, you know, technology and video and all of that.00;37;26;16 – 00;37;50;05
Eric R Olson
So we do have some non-verbal communication going on. But but we’re inhabiting if we were on the phone especially and we couldn’t see each other, we’d be inhabiting this verbal sort of mental world that’s that’s sort of separated from our actual awareness. Right. I mean, that’s that’s not that’s such a cool way to think about it, actually. I think that’s fascinating.00;37;50;09 – 00;38;13;03
Simon Prentis
And in the book I talk about language being or books, for example, being our first form of television, you know, because if you have a good book and you’re reading it, you go totally into it and in your head you’re seeing it or sort of it’s just like television. And you know, when it’s a book, you go, Oh yeah, well, it’s a book, but actually we’re doing it just all the time, right?00;38;13;06 – 00;38;38;02
Simon Prentis
Yeah, I’m. I’m giving you ideas and you’re bouncing back ideas to me. And we’re in that sort of conceptual world of sharing. Yeah. And abstract space and being able to then sort of move within it by manipulating sound. It’s the most incredible thing. Yeah. And as you said, beginning. We’re completely unaware of it. Yeah. It’s just you’re not realized.00;38;38;02 – 00;39;03;08
Eric R Olson
Well, I’m sorry. Star Trek. Star Trek fan. So I’m going to start going. It’s calling it subspace because that sounds like a it reminds me of that. It’s like we’re having this there’s this channel of communication that so so this so this chimp, I mean, this is just fascinating. So this chimp learns our language. And now that chimp is sort of inhabiting that with his caretakers or.00;39;03;08 – 00;39;08;17
Eric R Olson
Yes, you know, these researchers. So I my question about that, he.00;39;08;18 – 00;39;32;04
Simon Prentis
Also, by the way, just by the way, very quickly, he also taught his sister because he learned some sign language. And they they. Yeah, right. And again, this is very primitive. But the point the bigger point is, which I also make in the book, that it’s not that other animals aren’t they are intelligent, but they don’t have a way to share the notes.00;39;32;10 – 00;40;01;24
Simon Prentis
So they kind of cut off in in their own worlds. Now, one of the issues about the evolution of the human is that we have these big brains that seem to be too big for us. I mean, in terms of other animals, you know, our brains are three times bigger than the chimpanzee terms of brain body ratios. So conventionally the thinking in linguistic is that and even in sapiens, you may remember at the beginning of sapiens, he repeats that.00;40;02;17 – 00;40;24;20
Simon Prentis
So, you know, our brains just got bigger. And then one day they were ready for language and we were so we were able to do this. You know, there was a conceptual revolution, whatever that means, and we were one day able to speak. So, okay, why did our brains get bigger? Oh, I don’t know. Maybe. Well, they just did, you know, whereas my.00;40;25;06 – 00;40;49;27
Simon Prentis
I would like to turn that on its head and say we actually because we learned even at a very primitive level of the level of Kanzi over how to start exchanging ideas, then that puts the premium on intelligence because the smartest members of the community can share their ideas. And the smarter you are that doesn’t just benefit you as an individual, benefits the whole community, right?00;40;49;27 – 00;41;34;04
Simon Prentis
So suddenly that’s an evolutionary pressure to get smarter. So, you know, over again, hundreds of thousands, millions of years, it makes sense for a language enabled community to develop bigger brains and then that really puts you ahead of the game, folks. Yeah, the smart and we’ve actually reached the limit for ourselves if you think about it. I mean, other animals can give birth quite easily, but it’s quite tricky for humans to give birth, especially unaided, because the times that we actually have to give birth prematurely in terms of animal terms, in order that our brains can grow outside them because they’re just so enormously huge.00;41;34;04 – 00;41;47;04
Simon Prentis
I mean, it must have been a really, really, really powerful reason for wanting to do that. But that being evolutionary, acceptable, and the easiest answer to that is this language. Otherwise, how do you explain it?00;41;47;16 – 00;41;52;02
Eric R Olson
I’m laughing because I just have the thought that we’re we’re like.00;41;52;18 – 00;41;53;22
Simon Prentis
We’re we’re.00;41;54;07 – 00;42;04;27
Eric R Olson
Sort of marsupials almost just for our brains. Right? Like, you know, forests of young mammals are born very immature, but for us, it’s not the rest of our body, it’s just for our heads.00;42;04;27 – 00;42;22;01
Simon Prentis
Yeah, just for our heads. Yeah. Because you know, again, it’s a point I make in the book is that, you know, we went from being really powerful. I mean, a chimpanzee, a male chimpanzee is a pretty mean bastard.00;42;22;02 – 00;42;22;17
Eric R Olson
Oh, yeah.00;42;22;23 – 00;42;32;05
Simon Prentis
If you were with a hungry chimp having a fight together some highly, you know, there’s no way that an unarmed human could fight with a chimpanzee.00;42;32;05 – 00;42;33;05
Eric R Olson
An incredibly strong.00;42;33;06 – 00;43;04;09
Simon Prentis
Outcome. But we know also that we evolved from that. So why did we become physically weaker? Why is that environmental? That’s all right. Yes, it’s an evolutionary it’s sort of a smart strategy, unless we have to compensate for it. Yeah. Well, if we had language and we were able to work together in groups and plan strategies and hunt and do things using that incredible ability to communicate in the abstract world, then you wouldn’t need to be individually strong.00;43;04;18 – 00;43;11;26
Simon Prentis
Whereas, you know, it would be better to put the effort into having a smarter brain. That’s kind of what seems to have happened.00;43;12;05 – 00;43;39;25
Eric R Olson
So so let me just play devil’s advocate for for a second on that, because as I was thinking about that, but I mean, what couldn’t you say that wolves and other say orca whales that hunt in packs similarly have that ability in terms of. Yeah, I mean, I guess you could argue actually that that orcas do have language so that maybe maybe actually reinforces your point.00;43;39;25 – 00;43;41;19
Eric R Olson
But I’m not sure about wolves.00;43;43;00 – 00;44;10;18
Simon Prentis
Yeah, well, I mean, to a certain extent. I mean, you see group activity among other animals as well. And I’m not saying that you can’t have group activity without language. I’m just saying that if you have language, your ability to leverage that group activity is just sort of exponentially different. Yeah, I mean, you can hunt in a group because you sort of get the idea of like circling around a, you know, fish so that you corral them into a corner.00;44;10;18 – 00;44;30;18
Simon Prentis
That’s that’s kind of a you can sort of teach that on an almost a visual way. You know, it’s just watch me and do the same kind of thing. But you can’t say, well, let’s as I said earlier, you know, let’s meet next Wednesday, round the back of that class and we’ll hang out and you just wait there and I’ll try the shop and then you grab, you know, that kind of stuff that’s not happening.00;44;30;24 – 00;44;54;14
Simon Prentis
Yeah. And that’s why, you know, you could say maybe they do to some extent have language, but you can tell from their behavior that they don’t have a sophisticated capacity for communication because if they did, they would behave differently. Yeah. You know, they there is, as you said, some kind of behavior going, but it’s very, very limited.00;44;54;28 – 00;45;21;19
Eric R Olson
Yeah. Well, and you know, I suppose if you looked at I think whales are particularly interesting because they do have. Yeah you know pretty as far as animals go pretty sophisticated communication. They are the top predators of the ocean. I mean, they do have that advantage. So, you know, maybe even a couple more million years, they would develop something that would be on par with human communication.00;45;21;19 – 00;45;46;28
Simon Prentis
And I’m not exactly sure if they came back on land again because they came from the land. That’s that really kind of weird thing about whale, about whales. Oh, yeah. What was what was so bad about being on land that they had to go see them develop? You know, that must have been really hot and dry and miserable on the land at that time.00;45;46;28 – 00;45;49;26
Eric R Olson
So okay.00;45;49;26 – 00;45;51;15
Simon Prentis
So yeah.00;45;52;04 – 00;46;04;05
Eric R Olson
So, so to put it in sort of, I don’t know how you would say duck, duck. Kinsey in terms. Richard You know. Richard Dawkins famous geneticist.00;46;04;05 – 00;46;04;29
Simon Prentis
Yeah. Okay.00;46;05;03 – 00;46;36;01
Eric R Olson
He, he, he talked in his book, The Selfish Gene About Means. So it sounds like your kind of hypothesis, if you will, is that, you know, means sort of drove genes so that, you know, having these language skills, no matter how rudimentary, sort of drove genetic evolution to to to towards bigger brains so that we could get better at making means.00;46;36;01 – 00;46;42;24
Eric R Olson
And, you know, kind of I guess you could look at it as like a virtuous circle sort of scenario. Yes.00;46;43;05 – 00;46;47;11
Simon Prentis
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Whereas whereas weather.00;46;47;16 – 00;47;27;01
Eric R Olson
Sorry, let me just finish the thought. So whereas, you know, other research or other ideas about it had, have been sort of that, that there’s gene that the genes sort of disappear, you know, some there was some kind of mutation that can confer this ability to speak. Yeah. And, and the most classic one being the one that I’ve heard the most about is this FOXP2 gene, I think it’s called in and that we have or variant of that chimpanzees don’t have and we’re like really closely related to chimps and we’re basically hairless big brained chimps.00;47;27;01 – 00;47;31;11
Eric R Olson
But yeah, so am I characterizing that correctly?00;47;31;11 – 00;47;55;05
Simon Prentis
And yes, I mean, in terms specifically the selfish gene, the final chapter of the original book talks about mean. That’s where he coined the word. Yeah, which obviously has become a bit hijacked in the last 30 or 40 years. But nonetheless, the idea was that was a unit of cultural transmission. That was how he defined it, basically an idea.00;47;55;11 – 00;48;16;13
Simon Prentis
You want to simplify it, you know, so and I think the last sentence of the book says something like that means what liberators from the tyranny of our genes? Because the whole notion of the selfish gene is that basically, you know, we’re just vehicles for genes and genes. Genes that just sort of doing their thing. And it’s all about survival.00;48;16;13 – 00;48;44;16
Simon Prentis
And we have to be the vehicle that which is plausible explanation for most of nature. However, humans are different. Why are they different? Well, as he says, writing in the book, it’s about means. So in a sense, my book is just an expanded version of that last chapter. Yeah, that’s right. I sent him it sent him a copy of my book with that explanation, and he was kind enough to read it and and and said nice things about it.00;48;44;16 – 00;48;50;29
Simon Prentis
So I guess, you know, in terms of Bill Dawkins in point of view, I got the right place.00;48;51;00 – 00;48;52;16
Eric R Olson
Now that’s.00;48;52;16 – 00;49;16;03
Simon Prentis
Good. That is because it is. It’s like, okay, so if means were liberated just from the tyranny of our genes, then what does that mean? What is that trajectory? I mean, going back to, you know, guns, germs and steel, you know, it’s just a fantastic book that looks at I mean, what is he his initial question is, why do the white men have all the cargo?00;49;16;03 – 00;49;37;15
Simon Prentis
And that’s black. Brown folks have had none. That’s it’s kind of framing question. Right. So my framing question is why do humans dominate the world and have all this stuff? And they’re able to do what we’re doing now and no other species can? Why is that? Yeah, you know, the answer is language. And how does that play out?00;49;37;19 – 00;49;39;28
Simon Prentis
Yeah. Trajectory. Yes. Really?00;49;40;12 – 00;50;10;25
Eric R Olson
Yeah. Yeah. Well, it’s and it’s fascinating. You know, like I said, it’s it’s I would say it’s in the camp of those books because it’s it’s because of its breadth, because you’re going into, you know, science and and religion and technology. I mean, all of those things are connected to language. So I think to really get, you know, for people listening or watching, to really get the breadth of it, like you should read it because it’s, you know, we can’t do it justice.00;50;10;25 – 00;50;17;02
Eric R Olson
And in an hour and one thing I should just go ahead and.00;50;17;22 – 00;50;37;22
Simon Prentis
Do what I was just going to say about about sapiens that because, you know, that’s another big broad brush book that looks at sort of, you know, the historical evolution from a sort of history was made. But he hardly mentions language at all. He does talk about, you know, the big concepts that unite us, but he hardly mentions it.00;50;38;02 – 00;50;58;16
Simon Prentis
And as I said earlier, he talks about, you know, the conceptual revolution that happened. Somehow something happened and we could do. BANNER Right. Okay. I mean, that’s like page one, no further discussion. And the thing that really sort of struck me is that when he comes to talking because he talks about the agricultural revolution as the second one, fair enough.00;50;58;19 – 00;51;23;10
Simon Prentis
Nobody disagrees with that. And then the scientific revolution and his explanation for the scientific revolution is that essentially one day we we woke up and realized that we were ignorant. Yeah. And to say, well, yes, I’m sure that could be so. But that actually happened to coincide with printing, you know, the scientific revolution and printing it in the West, in Europe happened at the same time.00;51;23;10 – 00;51;51;16
Simon Prentis
So basically you’re going from a situation where there were 30,000 books in the whole of Europe, and that doesn’t mean 30,000 different books. I mean 30,000 just physical books, right? In 1450 and by 1500, you’ve got 10 million books. So suddenly the dissemination of information, you know, even the very simple but the important early Greek understanding of the universe suddenly spread out of this number of people.00;51;52;11 – 00;51;58;22
Simon Prentis
And by coincidence, you get a scientific revolution. I think it was probably a lot to do with printing. Yeah.00;52;00;09 – 00;52;01;00
Eric R Olson
Yeah, that’s that’s.00;52;01;10 – 00;52;02;15
Simon Prentis
An excellent language.00;52;02;28 – 00;52;29;01
Eric R Olson
I think that’s one thing that is a bit of a tangent, but I do think that we tend to for some reason discount technology in the in the growth or change in culture. So the one that I always come back that I always think about and and people it seems like people just discount it or forget it. Is is the birth control pill was huge was huge.00;52;29;08 – 00;52;29;21
Simon Prentis
In terms.00;52;29;21 – 00;52;46;12
Eric R Olson
Of changing, you know, interactions between men and women and possibilities for women and concerns and everything and changed our culture so dramatically. And that happened, you know, maybe, what, 50 years ago? 56 years ago, 66.00;52;46;27 – 00;52;47;06
Simon Prentis
Yeah.00;52;47;07 – 00;53;06;11
Eric R Olson
Yeah. And it’s like that was a fundamental change. And in our culture and we’ve forgotten that that happened and that it was, you know, absolutely. And for some reason, we discount those things and we think that the culture just would have evolved anyways. But that’s just not how it works. They, they co-evolved.00;53;06;25 – 00;53;29;16
Simon Prentis
Together. Yeah. And the mother load of that technology is language. Right. Right. Because it is a technology. But as you said right in the beginning, it’s like a fish in water. We just don’t even see it, you know, just sucked into it. And it’s, it’s not it’s invisible unless you happen to run into another language. And then suddenly it’s like, oh, what’s going on?00;53;29;16 – 00;53;36;06
Simon Prentis
Oh, there’s something wrong with. And that’s kind of the way it goes. But that’s not a trolley. That’s a.00;53;36;06 – 00;53;37;24
Eric R Olson
Grocery cart. What’s wrong with you?00;53;38;04 – 00;53;43;21
Simon Prentis
Yeah, certainly. Exactly. Exactly.00;53;43;21 – 00;54;10;04
Eric R Olson
Sorry for the interruption. I swear. I swear. This is the last one. I just wanted to tell you about the reading room that we have set up over at Science Intercom. It’s a page dedicated to cool science and nature books, many of them written by authors who have appeared on this show. Any book you purchase through the links on the page directly supports the podcast and the other amazing projects we have in the works.00;54;10;17 – 00;54;43;05
Eric R Olson
The nice thing is there’s no additional cost to you, so if you’d like to see a nice collection of science books that you can purchase, head over to science centric tor.com and check out our reading room. So yeah, you have a whole section of the book talking about sex, drugs and rock and roll as as a bit of an antidote to one of the traps of language that we discussed a little bit, but maybe you could talk about that.00;54;43;05 – 00;55;01;25
Eric R Olson
And I think you could probably throw, you know, Zen meditation in there as well. But but why? Why are sex, drugs and rock n roll in your book aside from you know, it sounds good some interests of yours now I’m just kidding but.00;55;02;02 – 00;55;34;10
Simon Prentis
I don’t know. Please but well, I just thought to myself, I mean, my wife is Japanese and, you know, nowadays it’s maybe not so uncommon for people to marry outside of their house. They put this racial tape or whatever. You know, it’s especially in America, obviously, there’s much more of a mixed community in New York, you know, especially so.00;55;34;10 – 00;56;11;18
Simon Prentis
But when I was, you know, in my twenties and especially in the context of Japan, it was a huge, huge thing for my family due to deal with the idea of I was going to get married to a Japanese woman. It’s like, what’s wrong with you? So and you know, as a as I say in the book, if you if you fall in love across cultural, religious or identity boundaries, be you yourself, you, the feeling is, you know, you know, you’re dealing with some of the human.00;56;11;18 – 00;56;30;26
Simon Prentis
Yeah. And there’s this the rest of it is just artificial. Mhm. Yeah. I was very clear and so if I’m identifying which I do in the first part of the book traps that we fall into, you know, the cultural, the religious, the identity traps, then how is it that we’re able to break out of them? Because we do.00;56;31;16 – 00;56;57;09
Simon Prentis
And the most, the easiest one I could think of was well, I call it sex, but it’s, you know, it’s it’s it’s a it’s the relationship that you have a sexual relationship and then, you know, choosing a partner who is from a different culture and a different language and a different religion. And that makes complete sense when you’re in that scene from the outside, people are going to go were doing it.00;56;58;01 – 00;57;46;07
Simon Prentis
But it’s from an internal point of view that that’s the escape route from the trap. And so drugs similarly anybody watching this has had an experience with them will know that they are a way of breaking down barriers. I mean, alcohol is just stick with alcohol. Yeah, it’s sort of it’s a way of liberating yourself, maybe not always to good effect, but the rules, you know, culture, religion, identity, all these things, they kind of rules that, you know, as you grow up, you may not realize that there are rules, but the things that you signed off on and then whatever it is going on in the brain, recreational drugs of all varieties have the capacity00;57;46;21 – 00;58;12;05
Simon Prentis
to make you question or maybe ignore them. Yeah. So this is sort of potential. They’re also realizing the artificiality of the, the traps that you’re you’re stuck in. Yeah. So I thought that was another interesting way, especially, you know, now and now, you know, now we’re beginning once again to start looking at the therapeutic effects of psychedelic drugs.00;58;12;05 – 00;58;44;27
Simon Prentis
I really very much hope that this will continue because, you know, it’s some of you know, some of these things are intractable unless you have a way of pulling yourself out of yourself. Yeah. Now, of course, meditate. We’re talking about earlier. It’s one of the classic ways of doing right. I mean, every every religious tradition has a tradition of, you know, what reflection, whether they call it meditation, whatever they do, you know, I mean, like in Christian traditions, you go on retreats and you don’t talk.00;58;44;28 – 00;59;13;10
Simon Prentis
Yeah. Just kind of words and drugs. I think Aldous Huxley once described LSD as being a hammer blow to enlightenment. So, you know, it’s like, are you you know, it’s it’s not perhaps the the the the safest way of getting there, but it is a way of just busting open all the preconception it’s that you have that sort of trap you right in those walls we’re talking about.00;59;13;29 – 00;59;38;00
Simon Prentis
So that’s drugs. Yeah. Rock and roll. I’m using that term very loosely to mean anything you get excited by, you know? So sport very much falls into that category. I mean, look at what sport does in terms of uniting the world around something that personally I’m not that interested in. But I, you know, it’s sort of the idea of kicking an inflated pig’s blood around a pitcher.00;59;38;00 – 01;00;00;24
Simon Prentis
90 minutes seems to excite everybody and everybody can understand that. And they it brings you pass those kind of cultural barriers that otherwise separates. So that’s why I put those three things together in the center of the book for chapter five. This is, as you said, antidotes. It’s like, how do we escape from stuff?01;00;01;06 – 01;00;32;11
Eric R Olson
And yeah, I mean, sports is kind of interesting because I was also going to mention that a lot of religious traditions have not only kind of quiet reflection or meditation, but they also have like ecstatic sort of participation that involves music or depravation of the senses and kind of tries to induce almost a hallucinogenic state in people that in sports, I think could maybe be.01;00;32;11 – 01;00;33;25
Simon Prentis
That kind of on par.01;00;34;05 – 01;00;37;28
Eric R Olson
With that for some people know where you’re just so focused and.01;00;38;05 – 01;00;43;28
Simon Prentis
Put about the bucket with beer. I think.01;00;43;28 – 01;00;48;08
Eric R Olson
Yes, it’s also also consumed in tandem. But yeah.01;00;48;22 – 01;01;15;24
Simon Prentis
Yeah, yeah. But anyways, so let’s just stick with religions though. I mean, it’s sort of why do they all have and why have they independently all evolved, evolved these these practices is because people have realized that they’re the trapped and they, you know, they want to to reach some kind of greater understanding of what they are. I mean, call it God, whatever you want to say.01;01;15;24 – 01;01;44;28
Simon Prentis
They want to be connected more deeply to the experience of reality. And the only way they can do that is to just shut down all the noise, you know, the monkey brain or the chatter, which is both visible in terms of language and invisible in terms of cultural assumptions and norms and and everything and mysticism. Yeah. In every religion takes you outside the, you know, the headline stories about in the Bible or the Koran or anything else.01;01;44;28 – 01;01;49;08
Simon Prentis
And it sort of tries to the reach God directly.01;01;49;12 – 01;02;21;17
Eric R Olson
Yeah I mean, it’s interesting that it’s interesting how religions have that sort of dualism because, you know, as you as you talk about at length in your book is, you know, religion can become very dogmatic and it’s based in doctrine and words and, you know, descriptions of things. But then it also also has this kind of chaotic, ecstatic, you know, mystical component to it.01;02;22;06 – 01;02;47;21
Eric R Olson
And those seem to be so like at odds with each other in a way, you know? And when you bring up that, like, you know, sex, drugs and rock and roll are, you know, and those those of the authorities are always trying to kind of clamp down on those because it does take people out of that everyday experience and that cultural conformity.01;02;47;21 – 01;02;54;14
Simon Prentis
It makes you ask questions to ask questions basic. Well, yeah.01;02;54;14 – 01;02;59;17
Eric R Olson
But it seems like there’s this duality in that, and.01;02;59;27 – 01;03;26;17
Simon Prentis
Maybe it’s because the religion is such a, you know, that one is contain the seeds of its it contains the seeds of its own destruction. I mean, it’s because it’s such a an all encompassing doctrine about how to live, although, you know, read the Bible, learn it by heart, do what it says, you know, Leviticus, you know, what is it?01;03;26;17 – 01;03;47;04
Simon Prentis
Ten pages of who you should or shouldn’t be naked with and why, you know, and you just got to learn that and do it. And then some people realize that that’s kind of there’s something else that they want to get attached to. Yeah, because there is an artificial constraint. I mean it’s, there’s nothing about religion that that comes with.01;03;47;17 – 01;04;16;11
Simon Prentis
You’re not born religious. You have to learn to write. You know. And so it’s a sort of a natural escape valve I think of. Yeah, that’s isn’t so you know or it’s, you know, if it’s if religion is a metaphor, you know, it’s sort of telling a set of stories and saying it’s trying to say something, but that’s what mysticism essentially is saying, that this is just the story and the reality is actually behind that.01;04;16;17 – 01;04;23;24
Simon Prentis
So it’s a much larger thing. But most people don’t have the time or the interest to do that. So to that.01;04;24;16 – 01;05;02;27
Eric R Olson
Or maybe also they can you know, it’s that if those experiences that are, you know, just kind of purely awareness experiences without thought are sort of contained within a religion, then that somehow makes them a bit safer. And like, well, that’s part of this religious practice and therefore, you know, you’re still following the doctrine and, you know, but we’re framing it within that instead of saying, Yeah, well, you should just question everything that you know about everything, because you had this crazy LSD trip or something.01;05;02;27 – 01;05;04;06
Eric R Olson
And we, you know.01;05;04;25 – 01;05;39;06
Simon Prentis
Yeah, that’s that that makes sense. I mean, I think it it is a scary thing to to question everything. And, you know, that’s what happens when people have a psychotic break down. So, you know, these are these are not things that are easily messed with. But nonetheless, you know, the for me, I think going back originally to why did I write book it was it was sort of looking at how come we are just really clashing over stuff that is common to us or we’ve just kind of decided our own little world is right.01;05;40;03 – 01;05;57;03
Simon Prentis
Just can we back off a little bit and see that none of us are actually right? Yes. We’re all entitled to do what we like and enjoy ourselves. That’s absolutely fine. But yeah, don’t make it particularly don’t make it a religious thing that says, my God is right, yours is wrong and I’m going to fix you. I mean, that’s just crazy.01;05;57;03 – 01;05;58;05
Simon Prentis
That’s absolutely mad.01;05;58;25 – 01;06;22;03
Eric R Olson
I don’t know if you’re familiar with the philosopher. He’s kind of a new agey philosopher named Ken Wilber. But he had this great expression, which is that kind of underpinned his philosophy. He was doing another one of these kind of things where he was trying to trying to reconcile religion and science. But he said, not everybody can’t be wrong all of the time.01;06;22;25 – 01;06;41;12
Eric R Olson
And it’s like that idea that that, you know what most people are probably wrong about, like most of what they think is they know, but they can’t be wrong all of the time. So he his idea was, well, we can take a little bit from every culture that they seem to be doing right and kind of reconcile it.01;06;41;20 – 01;06;43;09
Eric R Olson
And I think that’s a really cool idea.01;06;45;00 – 01;07;06;04
Simon Prentis
Yeah. And I kind of touched on that at the end of my chapter on religion. So say, you know, it’s very easy to laugh at religions if you’re a sophisticated bit, you know, urban kind of a person. You go, how could anybody be so stupid? But, you know, 80% of the world subscribes to some form of religion and there must be something within that that is delivering the goods for them.01;07;06;09 – 01;07;37;23
Simon Prentis
Yeah, it’s sort of, you know, and, you know, maybe we haven’t found the right way of of characterizing it yet, but that, you know, the sense of belonging to a greater thing than just yourself, I think is something that that is innate to us. And maybe it’s a property of consciousness that, you know, in his throughout the universe, if one wants to be grand about it, that, you know, these a one, you shouldn’t be everybody should be allowed to find their own way.01;07;37;23 – 01;07;45;26
Simon Prentis
I think that’s probably the thing. But on the other hand, you know, there are some things that are just plain stupid, maybe real. Discuss those as well.01;07;46;24 – 01;08;07;03
Eric R Olson
Yeah, I think I think that’s my take on a lot of traditional practices is that we shouldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. There’s something there’s probably something good there. If people were doing this for a long time, if we can sort of separate the wheat from the chaff then there’s something there. But it’s probably not going to be the same thing.01;08;07;03 – 01;08;22;04
Eric R Olson
That is the exact doctrine that, you know, is written down. So Yeah. Anyways, that’s probably probably a good place to stop. I think when you talk about this, I think we can talk about this.01;08;22;07 – 01;08;22;25
Simon Prentis
A couple more.01;08;22;25 – 01;08;45;26
Eric R Olson
Hours. It’s fascinating and and it’s encompasses so many different things. But anyways, it’s really been a pleasure to talk to you. And, and I really enjoyed reading your book. Where can people find find you online, interact with you, ask you questions and you know, where are you sure in the Internet space?01;08;47;11 – 01;09;14;20
Simon Prentis
Okay. Well, I have I have a Twitter account which is called Meme Server Jeans. I can readily that was the first that’s the Dawkins thing that if you just put Simon Francis and little pop up memes at memes over jeans is my Twitter handle. I have a website. Simon Princess Dot Net and Princess, by the way, is spelled B, R, E and t, i s just one is no e’s.01;09;16;06 – 01;09;28;08
Simon Prentis
You’ll find it anywhere. And if you’re interested in my book, which I have a handy copy of here. All right, that’s good. You can get that on Amazon. The usual not banned in bookshops. Which one.01;09;28;20 – 01;09;35;10
Eric R Olson
Wrote? Thanks a lot, Simon. It’s been great speaking with you and I look forward to see what see what you’re up to next.01;09;36;26 – 01;09;43;18
Simon Prentis
Thank you very much. This enjoyable talking to.01;09;43;18 – 01;10;10;19
Eric R Olson
Well, that’s it for this show. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this episode. Email us at feedback at Science. Centrica. Also, don’t forget to rate this show and leave a review wherever you happen to download your podcast, you can directly support future episodes by joining our Patreon page as little as a dollar per month. We have a couple of nice benefits available, including early access to new episodes and a monthly live Q&A with.01;10;10;19 – 01;10;33;03
Eric R Olson
Yours truly head over to science centric dot com slash support for more info. Science centric is a full spark media production. Our audio engineer for this episode was John Chadwick. Guest booking was handled by Melissa David. Thanks for listening. And until next time. I’m Eric Olson.