ADAM LEONARD: Welcome, everyone.
Thank you for coming today.
Hello to everyone live
in the room with me.
And we have people
participating in the livestream
from all over the world.
And also hello to those of
you who will be seeing us
on YouTube after the fact.
So my name is Adam Leonard
from the People Development
Department.
And I'm really
excited about today.
It's been in conversation
for many months
for several different reasons.
So one is that our speaker
today is a scientist,
and I have great
respect for him.
He has a Ph.D. in
mathematics-- let's see,
I want to get this right--
studying the singularities
in gravitational systems.
And so I know there's a lot
of scientists here at Google,
but oftentimes what
can happen-- I'm not
a scientist by training,
but whatever work we do,
we can be so heads
down, so busy that we
lose sight of what was that
initial inspiration that
attracted us to whatever
we ended up studying
in the first place, whether
it was computer science
or what have you.
And so what I love
so much about Brian
and his work is that, in my own
experience, he's brought back,
you can call it the
wonder, the awe,
the heart in science, and in
cosmology, and the universe,
and this sense that
we had of the mystery
that we find ourselves
in since childhood.
That can sometimes
get lost over time.
And so by bringing in a
kind of poetry to science,
it's quite a gift,
and it's quite unique.
And so I think you'll be able
to experience at least a taste
of that today along with me.
So thank you for coming, and
I'm going to hand it over
to Brian Swimme.
[APPLAUSE]
BRIAN SWIMME: It's great
to be with you today.
I like the way Adam
described my work.
It's a way of remembering
the wonder of the universe.
Another way to talk
about it is to say
that it could be that the human
species is going through one
of its fundamental
changes, and we're
right in the middle of it.
I mean, this has
happened before.
We talk about the Paleolithic
era, the Neolithic era,
the classical civilizations,
and the modern period.
And so it could
be that we're just
on the cusp of entering
another era of humanity.
And I don't claim to
know this with certainty
at all, because we're
right in the middle of it.
But nevertheless, I think
it's a hopeful vision
that we're moving out of
one era and into another.
And so I'm really here to talk
about that as a possibility,
something to reflect on.
Is it the case that
we're wobbling forward
into a new era of
the human adventure?
One way to say it
is that the cultures
have a fundamental story, a
fundamental way of orienting
themselves to the universe.
I mean, every culture
that we've looked at
has this kind of overview.
It's a way in which
we can gather together
human energies to focus on
what we think is important.
And the basic idea
to repeat is that I
think the orientation
during the modern period
is not as convincing
as it once was.
Something else
might be emerging.
And if I can tell you just in
a phrase what I think that is.
I think it is the case
that for the first time
in human history, we
are seeing the emergence
of a fundamental story
of the universe that
draws upon the
experience of humans
from every continent,
every culture.
It's not the only
thing that's emerging.
I'm not saying that, but I'm
saying that it's remarkable
that during the last 400 years
of modern science, scientists
working in different fields
entirely-- engineers,
technologists, scientists--
different fields have
eventuated with a story
that is comprehensive
concerning the birth of
universe and its development.
I mean, I myself first noticed
this in graduate school.
So there we were at
night, and talking
about the evolution
of the stars,
or the birth of the Earth.
And we all were speaking
about the same story.
One of my friends
was from China,
another was from Afghanistan,
another was from Bolivia.
All of our different
backgrounds, and yet we
agreed on these
fundamental perspectives.
So that is this
notion that perhaps,
even in the middle of a
very difficult situation
on the planet, with
war taking place
and all kinds of violence,
even in the midst of this,
there appears the possibility
of an understanding that
has at least the promise of
deepening the unity that humans
feel with one another.
One way to enter
into this discussion
was to think about the last time
something like this happened.
And that was with Copernicus.
So Copernicus with his
great discovery of the Earth
actually moving around
the sun, I mean,
that was a huge insight
into the universe.
And it took centuries
for to really take hold.
And I think something
similar is taking place here.
And if you can imagine
it's the year 1542, which
is just the year
before Copernicus died,
he was very reluctant to
talk about his findings.
But just imagine
that he took a trip
to London, the
center of the world,
and he wanted to talk about
this new fundamental story that
was emerging.
And what kind of a
reception would he get?
He wouldn't get
much of anything.
One of the difficulties
is, the ongoing challenge
of just survival in
London, in England,
actually, in 1542, the
population of England
had been going downhill
for three centuries.
The plague had taken out
a good number of people,
but also there was
scurvy, there was measles,
there was tuberculosis.
So England was on the way
out, and the last thing
in the world they
want to listen to
is a guy talking about
the sun and the Earth.
They had more pressing things.
And I think that's similar
to our situation now.
We have so many pressing issues.
But there's another reason.
Another reason that a new
story is difficult to take in
is because it's fundamentally
counterintuitive to the default
assumptions of the culture,
fundamentally counterintuitive.
You can imagine.
Here's Copernicus.
He's talking to Londoners,
and he's telling them,
it turns out that the sun
isn't going around the Earth.
The Earth is actually spinning.
Well, this goes against
what everyone had assumed
was the case, almost everyone
had assumed was the case.
And right away, there are
intellectual objections.
So for instance, if the
Earth is actually spinning,
they would say to him, then
why isn't the Atlantic Ocean
washing over the island?
So the science of the
time would be at odds
with what Copernicus was saying.
And the same is
true of this story
that science and technology
are bringing to us.
There are three fundamentally
counterintuitive aspects
to the new story that
make it difficult
for it to be drawn into
the society as a whole.
The first is the notion that
the universe is expanding.
Now, among people that
are educated in science,
this is now taken
as commonplace,
but it has to be recognized that
this was the main challenge.
When Albert Einstein first
articulated his field equations
in 1915, as many
of you might know,
he actually altered
the equations
so that it would take away
the idea that the universe was
expanding.
It was Alexander Friedman,
a mathematician in Russia,
that actually discovered
this possibility,
and pointed it out to Einstein.
Einstein had no interest in it.
So here's Einstein.
He makes a discovery, and it's
too much for him to take in,
because there's no
evidence whatsoever
of an expansion with Einstein.
So this notion of the
universe expanding
and even, if you
push it further,
the very notion that the
trillion galaxies we now
know about, the
trillion galaxies,
came from something the
size of an apple seed?
I mean counterintuitive,
difficult to hold onto to,
but this would be great,
great insight coming out
of Einstein's work, and
Friedman, and Hubble, Lemaitre,
all of them together
arrived at the second,
the second profoundly
counterintuitive notion.
It has to do with the
nature of matter itself.
And this was the whole
quantum insight, but matter,
from the times of the Greeks
Democritus, Leucippus,
Epicurus, all of them had
an atomic theory of matter.
And so this was
what Newton loved
coming from the Greeks, the
idea that the universe consists
of these hard, massy
objects called atoms.
And then it wasn't until Dalton
in the 19th century actually
investigated it that we started
to realize that, actually,
empirically, we now
know that the universe
consists of atoms, these
hard, hard, point-like like
particles.
And then this quantum
revolution takes place.
And the person I'm going
to focus on is Paul Dirac.
Paul Dirac, like Einstein,
through the mathematics,
arrives at a puzzling insight
into the nature of universe,
namely that-- well, actually,
just like Einstein didn't
know how to interpret
his own equations that
said it was expanding, he
altered them, with Dirac,
what he was discovering
in the equations was
the appearance of
negative energies
and how to interpret that.
I mean, he didn't know
how to interpret it.
But he finally arrived
at the idea of it,
that this pointed to the
notion of antimatter.
And he published that in 1931.
He just went ahead and
threw it out there.
And he talked about
this ocean, an unseen
ocean of potentiality, where
these anti-particles existed.
1932, Carl Anderson here in
the United States actually
discovered, discovered
empirically,
the first anti-particle,
the anti-electron,
soon to be called the positron.
But the amazing thing
that Dirac arrived at
was that the point-like
particles of matter
would disappear when they
met their anti-particle.
You have a proton that
meets an anti-proton,
and it disappears
in a flash of light.
So matter, then, instead
of being something
hard and gritty
indestructible points,
matter turns out to be
something more like a flame,
or exactly what
it's hard to say.
So both of these,
I'm suggesting,
are some of the reasons,
two of the reasons,
that the emergence of this
story isn't recognized.
It doesn't quite fit with
our underlying assumptions
of the nature of the universe.
There's a third
counterintuitive,
but I'm going to
introduce that later.
What I wanted to do now was
to talk about the idea of how
this story will spread.
If this story is part of a
change in the human species,
then it will find a way into
the minds and hearts of people
other than the mathematics.
Because very, very few
people can handle that.
And so the way I wanted to think
about this with you was this--
what would be the essence
of this new story coming off
science and technology?
What would be the
essence that could
be conveyed to our children?
I mean, some of
you have children.
Some of you will have children.
The fastest way to find out
what one's underlying story
of reality is, is to
ask ourselves, well,
how do we explain the
world to our children?
How do we make it
understandable, reasonable,
whatever?
I mean, at least when
our children were young,
we started off, my
wife, it was like you
want to protect children from
the really harsh realities that
are out there, but
at a certain point,
they have to be
introduced to them.
And so you're forced to give
some kind of explanation
to what's going on.
I think that some of
the difficulties we're
having as a human
species is that we
have these different ways
of explaining the universe.
I don't want to
eliminate the diversity.
I simply wanted to
indicate, here's another way
of providing an orientation
to young people,
using the images that we
have that have come out
of our science and technology.
So here I'm going to
move to some images,
and give you a sense
of how I would suggest
this story is being conveyed.
Or will be conveyed
to our children.
OK, so I hit that.
There.
OK, fantastic.
So here would be the first
image I would begin with.
And I would tell them,
this is the Wilkinson map.
This is an image of
the oldest things
we have found in the universe.
This light comes from the
furthest distance away.
So what we do know is that 14
billion years ago, the universe
was very simple.
It consisted of hydrogen and
helium atoms, and that was it.
And then as you-- yes, OK.
And then, as we move forward in
time, within a billion years,
the hydrogen and
helium atoms actually
organized themselves in
the form of the galaxies.
Now, this movement from
hydrogen and helium
to galaxies, the question
is, how does this take place?
And the phrase that
is emerging is simply
in terms of the self-organizing
dynamics of the universe,
the self-organizing
dynamics of universe.
Up until the 20th
century-- So humans
have been around
for 200,000 years.
Up until the 20th
century, we wondered
about the band of light
that we call the Milky Way.
And every culture, not every,
but many, many cultures,
had a story about what
that band of light is.
And it was in the 20th century
we began to resolve and see
that there are stars.
And we realized we actually are
inside of a galaxy, the Milky
Way Galaxy, we call it.
But not scientists
didn't know if the Milky
Way was the entire universe,
or if it was one of many.
So Harlow Shapley
at Harvard, he was
convinced-- he was the
reigning astronomer
in the early 20th century.
He was convinced the Milky
Way Galaxy was the universe.
And so we don't have a lot
of experience with galaxies.
Then it was Hubble in the 1920s.
He realized that
these smudges of light
actually were far outside
of the Milky Way Galaxy.
That was the moment when the
understanding of the universe
multiplied by a billion fold.
There has never been a moment
in the history of humanity
that we know about when
the universe that was
reflect upon in consciousness
magnified to such an extent.
Like I was saying, we're right
in the middle of that change
over.
When the scientists first
began to look at the galaxies,
they were stunned by the
appearance of these arms.
And universally, they were
thought to be made of matter.
It was simply the way in which
the stars were distributed.
But it was in the 1960s that,
actually, the astronomers
began to realize, no, no, no.
Those are not matter arms
that are moving through space.
They're actually
density waves created
by the galaxy as a whole.
And the density waves that
are passing through the galaxy
and igniting the stars.
They're igniting stars that burn
brightly for a million years,
and then die out.
And then the wave goes
on and ignites new stars.
I love this phrase, that when
the first scientists were
thinking about this, looking
at the Whirlpool Galaxy,
but a galaxy like
this, and they're
realizing that it was the
galaxy as a whole that
was creating these stars.
I forget the name
of the one, but he
said, I realized we were looking
at something like a cell,
something like a biologically
organism, a cell.
And that switch,
I would say, would
be very close to the
fundamental change that
is being called for by
this emerging story,
namely the switch from, we have
assumed the universe consists
of objects distributed
throughout space,
and now we began to
realize that there
are entities that are involved
with self-organization.
That would be the fundamental
shift-- from objects
to self-organizing events.
And then just a close up
on some of the clouds.
So here we have a cloud
of hydrogen, and helium,
and the wave passing through.
It squeezes together
the cloud, and ignite
its old self-organizing
dynamics.
And we have the birth of a star.
The star no longer needs
that wave, that density wave.
It has its own dynamics.
Throughout the modern
period, scientists
wondered about where the
heat came from the sun.
I mean, how is it possible?
What was the source of it?
Isaac Newton even
wondered if maybe there
was a giant pile of
wood that was burning.
And he calculated
that it would have
to be at least 50,000
years before it burn out.
So it's been burning
50,000 years.
Now that catapulted him out of
the cultural story of his time.
Because the chronology was
way, way different than he
was Discovering.
But it wasn't until
the 1950s that we
realize that the energy is
coming from the nuclear fusion
in the center.
I'm just trying to emphasize the
fact that these were questions
that no doubt entered
into the minds of humans
over the last 200,000 years.
We have evidence of
cultural artifacts
in South Africa that
are 77,000 years old.
So I mean, were they
thinking about the stars?
It's easy to imagine that that
would come into their mind
every now and then.
But it wasn't until
the 1950s, and I'm
trying to emphasize the fact
that so many of these things
are just emerging, just coming
together in our lifetime.
So then, again, to convey the
story to young people, here
we have this star
that's organized itself,
and now we know where its
energy is coming from.
It's transforming itself
from the very center.
It's transforming
hydrogen into helium.
And in the process, it's
converting four million tons
into light every second.
So another four million tons,
another four million tons.
That light emanates
in all directions.
Earth captures one billionth of
the light that's left the sun.
And every human act
from the beginning
has been powered by that
small little spike of energy,
one billionth from the sun.
So it's the greatest poetry
is powered by the sun.
The greatest insights in
philosophy and mathematics,
all of them, in a certain sense,
can be considered solar events.
The human isn't disconnected.
The human is actually
in that flow of energy,
and we're bringing it
into a new form, for sure,
but its origin is
the sun itself.
This is an exploding
star, Eta Carinae.
It's something like
7,500 light years away.
It's 200 or 300 times
bigger than our sun.
And this, I think,
if there's one thing
I wish all children of
the world could learn
about the new story, it's this.
I mean, it's just such
a spectacular insight,
that the stars give birth.
They create the elements.
They create hydrogen,
and they create helium.
They create carbon,
phosphorous, and nitrogen--
all of the elements.
And then through the
explosion and the dispersal,
our bodies are
constructed out of them.
My wife teaches second
grade, and so she
has me come in and give talks
to the kids every now and then.
And so there they are.
They're seven years old.
And so I'm telling, I'm
saying, the stars blew up,
and they created the
carbon and phosphorus--
I use those words-- the elements
of our bodies, the elements.
they come from an
exploding star.
And Ahmed, his eyes were
just-- he's just staring at me,
and I saw his hand just
go up and touch his skin.
It was just such a great moment.
He was realizing.
He was discovering something
about the nature of what
it means to be a human being.
I mean, it was like this
skin came from a star!
It was like a larger identity.
He was moving out of
understanding himself
as an American, or
a French person,
or whatever-- a larger
and larger identity,
every human being.
The way he touched
his skin, he was
entering into another
moment in his life.
And then another time, that was
second grade. then my wife also
taught kindergartner.
So then I went in there and
gave a little different kind
of explanation.
And so one time I was telling
them about the stars exploding.
I said, the stars, the
stars, they gave birth
to the elements of your skin.
And this little kid looked up
at me and said, I know that.
And I don't know.
Did he know it?
Was he just trying to please me?
I don't know.
I mean, he'd only been
here a few years, right?
But it was just this sense.
Now, this notion that the stars
give birth to the elements
is from 1954, Fred Hoyle.
So just imagine.
So for 200,000, all the way
through that time, when anybody
wondered where does
this stuff come from,
no one knew, at least
in recorded history.
No one knew with anything
like our certainly
that carbon comes from a star.
Another way to say it, maybe
I'm belaboring the point,
but for the existence of
a single atom of carbon,
we need a galaxy.
We have no way of imagining,
at least scientifically,
the construction
of carbon atoms,
unless we have a galaxy that's
creating stars that explode.
So what does it
mean to be human?
What does it mean?
These are the kinds of questions
that every cultural story will
ask.
And the perspective that we
have now, that to be human
is to be a cosmic
event, in certain ways.
We come out of a cosmic process.
So certainly we've been
aware of the planets
all around the world.
But then we wonder, are
there other planets?
1992 is the first
discovery of an exo-planet,
and now there are hundreds
that we've identified.
But just extrapolating,
we imagine
there are many
billions of planets,
many billions of planets
in the Milky Way alone.
And so we have two basic kinds.
We have gaseous planets.
Jupiter is like a small
star that didn't ignite.
And we have these rocky
planets, like Mars.
I mean, astronomers
know this, of course.
They've known this
for a long time,
but, again, the
general public doesn't
realize that Mars
is fundamentally
different from Earth in terms
of its overall dynamics.
And in a simple, phrase,
Mars is like a solid rock
all the way through.
It's solid and fixed.
But this is the
opposite of Jupiter,
which is chaotic gases.
But right in between, in
between the solid planets,
totally solid, and
the gaseous ones,
there's this range
of where you have
a balance between the
gravitational interaction
and the electromagnetic,
and that the planet can
remain fluid, in a sense.
So Earth occupies
that slender range
where it's able to
create structures,
and yet, it doesn't fixate.
So the lava, the
lava comes forth.
But what distinguishes Earth
from these other billions
of plants, from Jupiter and
Mars-- it's not the material.
The same minerals,
the same atoms
are present in all
of these planets.
It is the fundamental dynamics
coming from the size of Earth.
So the Earth, because
it's in between the chaos
and the rigidity,
it remains fluid,
and we have lava coming forth.
And this would be the
second most important thing
I would like to convey to
every child on the planet.
The Earth, because it's
in this creative zone,
is able to evoke the
creative dynamics that
give birth to this.
This amazing being
comes forth from this.
So molten earth precisely
because it can bring forth
the self-organizing
dynamics of the universe,
is able to bring forth the eyes.
Look at these eyes.
These eyes were brought
here from some other place.
They are the ongoing
development of molten lava.
So what in a sense, have
we learned about this?
What does this mean?
I think it gives a sense of
what it means to be creative.
The Earth is the most
creative planet we know about.
It remains in this zone.
one phrase is
balanced turbulence.
Remain in the zone of balanced
turbulence and creativity
happens.
It would be the same-- Mars
was molten for a while,
but it didn't it.
It froze up.
So we didn't really get
a theory of the this,
of what Earth does, until the
1960s, with plate tectonics.
So again, so recent.
You see?
We're just getting to understand
the overall dynamics of Earth
as a whole.
But this anthropologist at UC
Berkeley had a great phrase.
Trying to think about
what it means to be human,
he said this.
The ideal condition for a human
being is not bovine placidity.
It is, rather, the
highest degree of tension
that can be creatively borne.
And I think of that as a way of
also describing the Earth-- not
bovine placidity.
It's not some rigidity fixed.
It's the highest
degree of tension.
This is also the third
counterintuitive part
of the new story.
Remember, I said
there were three?
This is the third one.
The third one is the
relationship of consciousness
to the universe as a whole.
We don't have a theory
of consciousness
that would match Dirac's
theory of Quantum Field Theory,
or Einstein's General
Theory of Relativity.
I think we're waiting for,
it, and some scientists
are convinced that when
this theory emerges,
it will be at a par with
Einstein's, a par with Darwin.
It's like a piece that's
just coming forth.
But already, there's a way in
which what we're discovering
is counterintuitive.
Our default assumption
around human consciousness,
our default assumption is that
it exists only within humans.
And this goes right
back to Rene Descartes,
the principal philosopher
of the modern era.
Humans were conscious.
All else were mechanisms.
All other machines
were mechanical.
And his point was
that if you hear
or if you see a dog suffering,
you think the dog is suffering.
It's really just
malfunctioning machinery.
We project our feelings onto it.
So that was the dominant view
throughout the modern period,
but it's been breaking down.
And there a great celebrated
moment around this
was the Cambridge Declaration.
Perhaps you've heard of it.
This was in 2012.
Major brain scientists meeting
at Cambridge University
just made this statement that
non-human animals, all mammals,
all birds, even octopuses, have
the neurological substrates
of consciousness.
they came out boldly and said,
in all of these creatures,
there is some form
of consciousness.
And I've just read The
New York Times today,
and scientists now,
some scientists
at Macquarie University
in Australia,
said that insects also have
a form of consciousness.
And then there's the
whole question of robots.
Do robots have consciousness?
I'm simply saying
that this is yet
another revolution in our
understanding of the universe
and how prevalent
consciousness is.
Let me tell you a
little story, though.
So I don't have any
giant opinion about that,
but I do want to
tell you this story.
So a friend of mine,
Dr. Barbara Smuts
at the University of
Michigan, studies baboons.
And so she will live with
them for years at a time.
And so she'll travel
with them, and she'll
eat the same things
they do, and she just
really lives their life.
There's this one great story.
She fell asleep one time.
And something woke her up.
And she looked, and it
was a young male baboon.
And it was, just to give you
a close-up on the fingernail,
the young male baboon had placed
its finger right next to hers
while she was sleeping.
And while she woke
up, he was looking
at her finger and
her finger together,
and then looking
up at her, kind of
astonished, and then
back at the fingernail,
and then back up her.
The primate intelligence
was making a connection
in the universe
that was surprising.
This, in a real sense, I see as
the very essence of a science
itself.
Humans have forever been
looking for these patterns.
And so this is Stonehenge.
Why?
Why would they
build this monument?
Because they wanted
to align themselves
with the powers in the
universe, the patterns,
the processes in the universe.
And I think that we are
still doing the same thing.
It's an ongoing process.
I talk about the discovery of
relativity and quantum field
theory, it's ongoing.
Consciousness.
So here's Einstein.
I started off
talking about how he
didn't believe the
prediction of own equations.
Edward Hubble called him up.
He said, honestly, Al,
you oughta come down here,
take a look.
He did, and looked
out, and what he saw
was, well, as a poorer
version of this.
This is from the
Hubble telescope.
But Einstein was
looking out, and he
saw, in fact, the universe
is expanding, the redshift.
And so every one of these dots,
except for the three stars
over there, every one of
these dots is a galaxy.
And this is obviously
a still photo.
But in real time,
they're moving apart.
And then, in 1973,
Stephen Hawking
just did analysis of
the movement itself.
He learned something
alarming for all of us,
that if you altered the
expansion by one part and 10
to 16th, the universe,
in either direction,
if you alter it in one
part and 10 to 16th,
the universe would collapse,
or it would explode.
So if you slowed it down
by one part and 10 to 16th,
it would collapse immediately
into a black hole.
If the expansion had been
greater than one part and 10
to 16th at the beginning,
it would expand into dust--
no galaxies.
So the question of the
expansion rate of the universe
is a major conundrum
in theoretical physics.
No clear answer.
Why only want to emphasize
one thing that Hawkings said
that I think is just wonderful.
So here's Hawking.
He's attempting to
make sense of this.
Why is the universe
expanding this way?
Why?
And his answer, here's his
answer-- "Because we are here."
"Because we are here."
And what did he mean by that?
He meant that, first
of all, if we're here,
if we're here, if
there's anybody here,
the universe didn't collapse
back down into a black hole.
And if there's somebody
here who's thinking,
it didn't separate into dust.
So if we're here, the expansion
had to be exactly that rate.
Also, if there's a
complex human being here,
who's able to reflect
on all of this,
we've gotta build
up organic life.
That takes billions of years.
That takes billions of years.
So for an intelligent
observer to be
noting the size
and age of universe
shows you what the
universe has to be.
I had this picture on our
wall back in New York.
And one of my wife's friends
was there, who's a lawyer.
And when she asked
what it was, I
gave a quick little
explanation, it's
the nearest million galaxies.
And she actually ran out of
the room and across the street,
because it was so overwhelming
to her, so overwhelming.
To think of ourselves
lost in the vastness,
an insignificant little
cipher in the vastness,
is to be yet in
the modern story.
What is the new story?
What is the new story?
The new story is
like I've just said.
The universe is
exactly what it would
be for us to be here,
meaning-- another physicist put
it this way.
This is the smallest universe we
could fit into-- the smallest.
We couldn't fit
anything smaller.
The universe, to build up this
kind of complexity that we are,
had to be this big.
Another phrase
which I like so much
is, we, humans, or any
advanced form of life,
fit into the universe
like a hand into a glove.
So it gives a
different orientation,
a different kind of feeling.
So we're coming to this
understanding of the universe
right as we are carrying
out, unwittingly,
a mass extinction of species.
So there's never been
an any destruction
like what's taking place now
over the last 65 million years.
So right as we're discovering
the majesty of our universe,
we're ending an
entire era of life.
I like to think this
moment like the moment
in the "Matrix" film.
So there's Neo, and he's
being offered two pills.
And one pill is, just keep going
with things the way they are.
And the other pill
is about recognizing
that we don't live in a
collection of objects,
but rather we're a part of
an amazing community of life.
And it's almost we have
this fundamental choice
of consciousness to make.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for coming.
I really appreciate it.
I'd love to hear
any reflections.
I don't necessarily want to have
only questions, just anything
that you're thinking about.
Like I try to indicate,
this emerging story
is unfinished for sure.
And so we all have
different kinds
of perspectives
and orientations,
and I'd love to
hear any of those.
AUDIENCE: I'd love to know
how your thoughts on how
this new emerging
story, which I guess I
would term as cosmology or
something associated with it,
how that fits in, or how
we can reconcile that
with the old stories that
are currently existing,
if that's even possible, or
if we need to proactively help
the demise of the old stories.
Is that too dramatic?
BRIAN SWIMME: No. no.
AUDIENCE: I'm talking
about science skeptics
and other orientations
of truths.
BRIAN SWIMME: Say the last part.
I missed it.
AUDIENCE: Other orientations of
truth that may contradict it.
BRIAN SWIMME: Want to pick one?
[CHUCKLING]
No, no.
You don't have to.
AUDIENCE: I'm just trying
to be politically correct.
BRIAN SWIMME: Yeah. yeah, I see.
Well, no.
OK, your question,
I mean, it couldn't
be more important and relevant.
I mean, how much of the violence
taking place around the planet
is related to just
that question, right?
So the fundamentalists, whether
fundamentalist scientists,
fundamentalist
religionists, I mean,
talking about fundamentalists
from the point
of your religion,
many of them will
regard science and materialism
as the source of all
the destruction taking place.
Insist that we would
be named Satan.
And so what I'm
trying to suggest
is that if we can
allow ourselves just
to feel the majesty
of what is before us,
if we can just have to touch
of awe concerning the universe,
I think some of
those disagreements
and arguments will
become less important.
I mean, even though I'm just
amazed at what we've learned,
all of us here know, if you
go into it deeply enough,
you realize we know
next to nothing.
There's so much more to learn.
So I think that the
proper orientation
is one of humility, one
of deep, deep humility,
and that if we
begin with a sense
that we recognize we're on
this journey of discovery, then
we can see one another as
part of the same journey.
And rather than identifying
people as dead wrong,
I think that's a mistake.
Because I think
that limits us down.
So my own sense is
that science itself
provides an amazing
context for discussion.
So whether a person's coming
from an ancient religious point
of view, or a more contemporary
philosophical point of view,
the discussion is going to
take place within the universe.
So I don't think
science is going
to make these kind of certain
and finished judgments
about the wisdom that
exist in other traditions.
What's your view?
AUDIENCE: I tend
to agree with you.
I do think that these
co-exist in different ways,
and they aren't mutually
against each other,
despite what the
politics of it tends to.
BRIAN SWIMME: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: I mean, I think
the best orientation
is one of curiosity and
wanting to learn more.
And that's something
that I think
is shared across all
human beings in general.
So I think that's something
that I'd like to make centric
as part of this new story.
BRIAN SWIMME: Yeah,
curiosity I mean,
the things that we really do
well as humans, what are they?
We're curious.
We discover things.
So that's fundamental, for sure.
Yeah.
AUDIENCE: Yeah.
So I guess I agree,
but I think, while you
say curiosity is
something that's inherent,
I think that perhaps
humility is not something
that is inherent to all people.
And so I think it's an
interesting perspective,
because like you say, it's
all happening so very quickly.
And there's things that
have been engrained
in human culture
for a very long time
that, sure, we can say
they're being answered,
but if there's a whole lot
of people that don't believe
that it's actually an answer,
then it's creating this divide.
So I'm not sure.
That's not really a question.
It's just a comment.
BRIAN SWIMME: No, I very
much appreciate your comment.
What I tell myself
is that I think
the change in understanding
that's taking place
is way bigger than the
Copernican revolution.
It's way, way huger.
And that required-- if
you go from Copernicus
up to Isaac Newton,
that was 144 years.
And so I think that
the changeover point
for us in terms of the story
was 1964, when we discovered
the background radiation.
And so had realized, wow, we
really do have a new view.
So 1964, we have
144 years from 1964.
So we're in the middle of it.
That's why I do it.
I tell myself that we're
in the middle of it,
and so we have to be patient
with ourselves and one another.
Again, thanks so
much for coming.
[APPLAUSE]
