Dr. Donald Hoffman (cognitive psychologist & author)

Dr. Donald Hoffman is cognitive psychologist and science author.  He studies consciousness, visual perception and evolutionary psychology using mathematical models and psychophysical experiments.  His book “The Case Against Reality” challenges whether what we perceive is really reality or an interface we are using.  We discuss all this in the episode as well as black holes & worm holes, the space time continuum, artificial intelligence, what happens when we die and more! 

00:00 - Intro
01:00 - Misperceptions of Reality & Jewel Beetles 
03:30 - Phantom Limb Phenomenon & User Interface
06:35 - Evolving with Interface Vs. Reality As It Is 
08:52 - Problems with Space Time Continuum & Quantum Theory 
15:20 - Black Holes & Worm Holes 
18:25 - Time Travel and Speed of Light & Space Time Shortcuts 
20:25 - True Reality Behind the Curtain, The Brain & Consciousness 
27:56 - Virtual Reality, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence & Consciousness 
38:02 - Peak Into Portals Through Dreams, Drugs & Meditation 
40:42 - Consciousness Is Fundamental & Hidden Connections 
41:55 - Government Studying This Versus Physicists & Power
44:36 - Simulation Vs. Reality  & Endless Variety of Consciousness 
47:25 - Death & Consciousness 
49:45 - What is The Purpose of Life & Global Consciousness  
54:20 - Donating to Research 
56:08 - Outro

Case Against Reality book:
https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-Reality-Evolution-Truth/dp/0393254690

Donating to Research:
https://brilliantfuture.uci.edu/give-to-uci/

Chuck Shute website:
 http://chuckshute.com

Transcript

Chuck Shute: 0:00

Welcome to the show today we have on Dr. Donald Hoffman. He's a cognitive psychologist and science author and Hoffman studies consciousness visual perception and evolutionary psychology, using mathematical models and psychos physical experience experiments. He has a book out now called the case against reality. And we're going to discuss this and his theories, but also some of the research that he's working on now. And this is very intellectual, deep stuff. And so if you find some of it's above your head, you're not alone. I often felt that during this conversation, but try to focus on the big picture and understanding the concepts. Dr. Hoffman is clearly a very brilliant guy and he's done some doing some really exciting work so stick around, check it out. Here we go. Boy, so reality perceptions of reality. So I think the first thing that we can talk about that's kind of basic for I think, for most people understand is the mistakes that we're seeing with our perceptions of reality. And like one example you give in the book is The these jewel beetles. So explain that to my audience like?

Dr. Donald Hoffman: 1:19

That's right. So we typically think that evolution would shape us to see the truth, or at least the truth that we need to see because that would make us more fit. That seems intuitive. But we have examples in nature where we see quite the opposite of that, like with the jewel beetle, the the beetles are dimpled, glossy and brown. The females are flightless, the male's fly and they search around for females. And when they find a eligible female, they'll alight and mate. But anyway, I think well, so evolution has shaped them to know what females are. The male beetles know what a female beetle is. But it turns out that these beetles are in Western Australia and near the Outback and in the outback. And so some guys, some Australian guys, we're throwing out these beer bottles, they call them studies into the Outback. And they're dimpled, glossy, and apparently just the right shade of brown to grab the fancy of these beetles. And so the male beetles were just flocking all over the bottles trying to mate. And the females, the real females weren't getting anything. So the species almost went extinct. And notice that the male beetles are crawling all over these bottles, they have full body contact, and yet, they still cannot break the illusion. And so the species almost went extinct. And they actually, you know, had to click the bottles and do things to help the Beatles along so. So here, we see the male jewel Beetle was shaped by evolution, not to really know what females are, but it was shaped with a sensory trick or hack. A female is anything dimpled, glossy and brown. And apparently the bigger the better so, so that instead of seeing the truth, evolution does things on the cheap. It and that was the first insight that made me start to study this was I thought, well, evolution might be doing things on the cheap. So maybe we won't see the truth. Maybe, maybe we'll just have all these tricks and hacks and not the truth at all. And it turns out, that's part of the story. But it's not the deepest part. It turns out, there are even much deeper reasons why we're shaped to see basically no aspect of objective reality.

Chuck Shute: 3:29

So yeah, and then there's some other things too, are the, like, the Phantom Limb phenomenon is kind of an interesting thing that I still don't understand this, but people will lose their limbs. And then they're feeling like there's a limb still there, but there's not a limb there. So that's some sort of air with this evolutionary thing as well.

Unknown: 3:49

Well, that's right. So we might say, Well, look, maybe we don't get the truth with vision. But surely when I touch things, I'm not making that up that I mean, touches direct contact with objective reality. So they're, we're perceiving the truth. But the Phantom Limb phenomenon when people have, for example, they lose lose an arm. In many cases, they'll they'll complain that they still feel a hand and that often they have pain in the hand in the arm, for example, that that isn't there. And if you ask them, where's the pain, they'll point to empty space, and they feel a pain in empty space. That's where they refer the pain to. And from a neurobiological perspective, one would argue that this is because there are areas of the somatosensory cortex that are that are getting bad input or no input. And so as a result, this is a cortical thing, I think for deeper reasons that the brain doesn't even exist when it's not perceived. So, so we'd have to go after a deeper explanation. But But, but if we just stick with a standard neurobiological explanation, the Phantom Limb sufferers are perceiving have a hand in an arm and feeling pain in it even when in fact, there is no hand and arm. So that's also an illusory perception. And so so the idea that our senses have been shaped, to show us truths about objective reality, which is something we all deeply believe, when we when we don't even believe we just know it's true, right? We just know that that mean, how else could it be? It turns out that we're just, we're deeply wrong and our best evolutionary theory, analysis tells us that that's just not the case, we we've been shaped with, essentially a user interface, like your desktop interface for a virtual reality headset that you use to play a game. So we're shaped with something to allow us to play the game of life, our senses allow us to play the game of life. But what's really going on is hidden from us because we don't need to know it, just like you're playing a virtual reality game, with with automobiles and cars that you're racing, and so forth, that you don't really need to know about the diodes and resistors and voltages that you're really manipulating inside some super computer. If you had to toggle those voltages to play the game, you couldn't do it. So the VR headsets there to really allow you to play the game without knowing what it is that you're really playing on that. Namely, you don't have to know about the supercomputer and all the software that's in there. And so that's what evolution really did for us. It allowed us to play the game of life. And we don't need to know the reality, we just need to know the right user interface. And so that's what our senses have been shaped to be.

Chuck Shute: 6:30

Right. And it's, I mean, it's different for different species, like the fish, you know, fish can live underwater, obviously, we can't. But now, do you think that we were designed that way originally? Because how did we evolve if like, because I think you said that in originally that we could see everything and we could see the full interface and it was didn't help us? It was actually what would destroy us. So then, how did we did we start there and then evolve over time? Are we just designed originally with that interface?

Unknown: 6:59

Well, in the simulations that some of my graduate students have done on this using genetic algorithms, and so forth, Justin, Mark, and Brian Marion and other graduate students, what we found is that, when you just start off with random genes in your simulated creatures, that there's very little chance that you'll ever get a creature, an organism evolving, that even has the right genes for seeing the truth. So my guess is on evolutionary grounds, just using evolutionary theory on its own terms, probably there's never been a point in history, except maybe some trivial thing now, and then by complete accident, where the sensory systems would ever see reality as it is, my guess is that has never happened. Again, this is just based on evolutionary theory, right? I don't know what the truth is. All I'm saying is that when you take evolution by natural selection, seriously, this is what the mathematics says, you know, we can argue about whether that's the right theory or not, but that's the best theory the scientists have. And so that's the reason I'm studying that theory, because we have no better theory than evolution by natural selection. And in particular, the mathematical version of it that John Maynard Smith came up with, which is evolutionary game theory, and evolutionary graph theory. So So all I'm saying, so I won't be doctrinaire all else. All I'll say is this, as a scientist is just my job to study the best scientific theories we have today. I'm not saying that they're the final word. I'm not saying that they're the truth. But they are the best theories we have today. And the best theory we have today about sensory evolution is very clear, the probability is zero that any organism has ever perceived the truth in any way. Now, we may not like that. And we may then want to find a deeper theory. But we don't have a deeper theory right now. So this is the best theory we've got. And that's what it means. All

Chuck Shute: 8:48

right. So there's the evolutionary that theory. And then you say there's also problems with the space time continuum theory like that's, I mean, that's basically what a lot of this stuff is talking about, like the things that we see are not real. So then that means like, a lot of the space time theories are not accurate as well.

Unknown: 9:05

Right? That's one of the radical implications of this theory, from evolution by natural selection, it clearly entails that no aspect of our sensory perceptions are telling us the truth. And that includes the big structure, like space and time. Those are also just merely convenient data structures that we evolved to survive there. They're not there to show us the truth. And you might say, okay, look, Hoffman is just a cognitive scientist studying this stuff. We're talking space and time. That's, that's the domain of physicists, right. So surely the physicist will put this whole thing to rest. Well, it turns out that, no, the physicists are quite onboard. Independently, they, based on their own theories, namely, when they put quantum field theory together with Einstein's theory of gravity, general relativity. They come to the same conclusion that space and time or Einstein's fusion of space and time into space time is not fundamental. So they will say, space time is doomed. So if you if you just Google, the phrase space time is doomed, you will be sent to the videos and so forth of physicists, who will tell you with great precision, why space and time cannot be fundamental. And that includes quantum theory. So quantum theory, and the Hilbert spaces of quantum theory are not fundamental, either. There's some deeper structure and they're finding, by the way, the younger physicists aren't upset about this, this is fun for the new generation of physicists mean space and time has been the framework for centuries. And now, they have, they're the first generation of physicists that gets to go beyond space time. And they are finding these beautiful new structures, things called the cosmological polytopes, and the amplitude hedron, and associate hedron. These are these beautiful, mathematically defined geometric shapes beyond space time, that have no notion of time or space built into them. Technically, they have no notion of unitarity or locality that which we haven't space time. So so they and they have no notion of Hilbert space in them. So there's no quantum theory there. So these are structures beyond space, time and beyond quantum theory. But these structures predict experimental data in space and time like at the Large Hadron Collider, when you're smashing particles together and seeing what sprays out, you're looking at those kinds of so called scattering events and the amplitudes of the probabilities for those events. These new deep structures give you wonderful simple computations for them much simpler than if you do them in space and time. So the math becomes easier. When you let go of space and time, the math becomes easier. And they've discovered new symmetries that are true of the scattering events when using like, have two, so called gluons smash into each other and four gluons go spreche. This spring up. There are symmetries in those interactions that you don't really see in spacetime. But you do see them once you let go of spacetime. So called dual conformal symmetry, that that's true of the scattering data, but you can't see it in space time. So the physicists are saying space time is doomed, is not fundamental in physics. And when you let go of it, all of a sudden, all sorts of new vistas open up that are really exciting. And the younger generation is jumping in and having a good time exploring this new realm. So it's overflow space time, and it's a big party out there.

Chuck Shute: 12:34

But isn't just space time. And they're just saying, you're saying that's part of the interface that's very surface and it goes much deeper? That's what you mean by it's not fundamental right? Like, that's not the basis of it. This is just part of the interface. And then it goes even below that,

Unknown: 12:48

that that's exactly right. So so evolutionary theory makes it very, very clear that that spacetime has to be just like our headset, it's like the the heads up that we're right, it's not fundamental, and then the physicist independently, not thinking about evolutionary theory at all, just based on gravity and quantum field theory and how they interact, have concluded the spacetime cannot be fundamental that there has been and so that so that's not fundamental in the sense that there is a much, much deeper structure. It's like, we used to think that earth, air, fire and water, were the basic elements, right? Well, we discovered they're not with me, they're interesting. earth, air, fire and water are interesting. But if you're going to build a theory of everything, you're not going to build it on earth, air, fire and water. Well, that's what's happened with space time, we thought that we could build a theory of everything based on space time, but just like earth, air, fire and water, it turns out not to be fundamental. And so there's these these new polytopes, these new structures beyond space time that have just been discovered in the last 12 to 15 years, this is brand new stuff is very, very new. But the interesting thing is they're not finding any dynamics. They've just got the static shapes right now. There's no notion of who ordered them, why are they there? Why are they capturing everything that we know about in space and time? There's no dynamic, there's nothing dynamical about them in any sense. So we don't know what it's about

Chuck Shute: 14:11

or something and they see the shapes and the micros are how do they how do they even see them? Or

Unknown: 14:15

no, wow. So they're in high dimensions. So they're beyond four dimensions in many cases. So so they're the way they're finding them use mathematics. They're discovering these structures mathematically. And they're proving that the structures actually compute the scattering amplitudes correctly and show you new symmetries that aren't there. So the flashlight into the Dark Beyond spacetime, is mathematics. And these these brilliant geniuses in so Nima or Connie Hamid, one mole to Siena and lots of people that are working with them, all of whom are saying those two guys are saying spacetime was doomed. And Nathan CyberGhost saying that David gross. There's a bunch of physicists who are very, very famous who are saying space time is doomed. And they're, they're using mathematics to discover structures beyond space time. And they know they're onto something when they can take those structures, and project them back into space time and get back what we know is is true within space time. Okay, true experiments we can do within spacetime.

Chuck Shute: 15:19

So some of the things that we do know a little bit about, like the black holes and the wormholes. What is going on there, then is that is that a mistake in the interface or?

Unknown: 15:30

Well, so black holes are really one of the big hints that space time is doomed. So so I'll just go into it just a little bit. Okay. So the, what the physicist will point out is that when you want to study at smaller and smaller scales, what you're seeing in space time, like you want to use a microscope to look down to see things you can't see at a smaller scale, what you have to do is use light that has smaller and smaller wavelengths, right to resolve the smaller and smaller stuff. Well, with quantum theory, that's no problem, you can just make smaller and smaller wavelengths as much as you want, the energy goes up, the smaller wavelengths of light have more and more energy. So you have put more energy but but in principle, if you had enough energy, you could go as small as you want it. But gravity is the party pooper here, because as soon as you start getting more and more energy into a smaller, smaller space, because you're getting these finer wavelengths of light, Einstein tells us that that energy is equal to mass equals MC squared. And so you're getting more and more mass concentrated into a smaller area. And once you get enough of it, you create a black hole. So all of a sudden, you can't, that you're trying to see something really small, and all of a sudden, you've destroyed it. And if you say, Well, I'm going to try to go smaller, smaller, I'll put more energy in smaller, smaller wavelengths, the black hole just gets bigger and bigger, bigger. So effectively, what happens is we know when spacetime ceases to make sense, is precisely around 10 to the minus 33 centimeters. And that's not very deep, I would be impressed if it was 10 to the minus 33 trillion, but it's only 10 to the minus 33 centimeters, this doesn't go very deep. So beyond that, the very notion of space time and space and time, so time, it's a 10 to the minus 43 seconds. So it's not that they're pixels of space. And time, it's not like there's some kind of digital surface that we're reaching is rather than the very idea of space, time, or space and time, simply don't make sense. There's no operational meaning to them. There's no way of putting any meaning to the concepts of space and time. So that means that number one, the ontology of space time, which has been the fundamental ontology of science is over. And we don't know what the deeper ontology is yet. So this is really cool. All right, this x has been about space and time and what happens in space time. And now we don't know what physics is about yet. We're finding these, well, they're finding I'm not the physicists are finding these these polytopes these geometric structures beyond spacetime. We don't know what they're about. We don't know if there's any dynamics that we're missing, that what that whole world is about, we don't know, we've only seen the structures in the last 12 to 15 years. So so we're just like, we've got our flashlights on them. But we know that they're there. And we know that they work. But what it's about, we don't know. So it's pretty, pretty exciting stuff,

Chuck Shute: 18:22

right? Because like, I know that I remember somebody telling me like, you know, time travel, the way that time travel would work is like the because of the speed of light. Like if you had a really long telescope, and you were in another universe, and you had it and it was 10 million light years away, I would or you would see like the dinosaurs and stuff, right? But that's still just on the surface of the interface. So even you could go even deeper below that you could find out a shortcut.

Unknown: 18:47

That's, that's really an interesting possibility. And we haven't worked that out yet. But But right now, you're absolutely right. To get to the nearest star, it's it's, you know, it takes several years at the speed of light. And to the to the nearest galaxy would take several million years to the Andromeda Galaxy is like 2.4 million light years away or something like that. It's so you, you're not going to make it your grandkids aren't going to make it your great great grandkids aren't going to make it out, you know, how do we get there? Well, if spacetime isn't fundamental, if it's basically just a data structure, a headset that we've evolved, then if we're sharp enough to figure out what's behind that data structure, maybe we won't have to go through spacetime, we can go around it. So maybe we'll find ways of just, I want to go to approximate star, Proxima Centauri, one of the nearest star, I don't have to spend years at the speed of light going through space, maybe I'll be able to figure out how to go around space. Just like when Maxwell came up with the equations of electromagnetism. All of a sudden, we found a way to just talk to people on the other side of the world without having to do what we thought we would have to do. So new technologies, open up all these new possibilities. So no, I'm not saying that the physicists have found how I'm not allowed to go around space time yet. But so I'm not saying that that's established. But I am saying that you know, it's a tantalizing possibility. And once we understand these structures beyond space time, that's we always know that there will be new technologies. Every time our science advances, technology comes along, that seems miraculous compared to what we had before. So I tried the same here. So

Chuck Shute: 20:24

that's what I think the question is of I'm sure you're trying to answer is what is what is behind the curtain? What is the real reality if though, if what we're living in is kind of maybe just an interface and a perception of we're not seeing the real reality? What is behind the curtain?

Unknown: 20:39

Right, so our theories are good enough to tell us where they stop. Right? So spacetime is doomed. We, our theories tell, but our theories don't tell us what's behind the curtain. Right? And so that's why it's sort of fun for the new physicists and also for, you know, cognitive scientists like me to ask, okay, well, so our theories aren't going to tell us what's beyond space and time. So we get to make creative leaps. Come up with our own ideas about what's beyond space and time. And you there, you can get any ideas that you want, you know, in any way you want to maybe it's driving, you know, drinking or smoking or something, something or whatever it might be. But eventually, you have to get a mathematically precise, be sober, and then go make predictions that you can test inside space and time. So the, the idea that I'm playing with is that consciousness is fundamental. So this turns everything around. Most of like my colleagues, for example, in cognitive neuroscience, think that space and time is fundamental, because that's the way it's been until very recently. And that therefore things like brains, are the source of consciousness, somehow brain activity causes our conscious experiences. Well, spacetime isn't fundamental. So objects in space time aren't fundamental. That means particles, like protons, electrons, gluons, and so forth. These aren't fundamental, these are just part of the interface, and so is the brain. So it's not going to be making consciousness because in some sense, the brain doesn't even exist when it's not perceived all of these things, all objects in space and time, just like the objects in your virtual reality headset. Like if I'm if I'm playing a game of Grand Theft Auto in a VR headset. I look over and I see a red Camaro. Well, the Camaro only exists when I look, as soon as I turn my headsets over there and see a white Porsche. I've deleted the red Camaro there, and there is no red Camaro in the computer. If you look, if you look on the supercomputer, there's no red Camaro in there. There's diodes and resistors and software and voltages, but there's no red Camaro anywhere. The only red Camaro is the one I made when I looked over there, and that Camaro disappeared when I looked over there and saw a white muscle, a white Ferrari, or whatever I saw over there. So we're making this stuff up on the fly, and then deleting it as soon as we look away. And that's true of the brain. We create brains and neurons when we look inside skulls. And as soon as we look away, we delete them. Now there is some reality we're interacting with, just like with when I see the red Camaro, there is a reality. I'm interacting within that metaphor. But it's nothing like a red Camaro was not red. It's not Camaro shape. There's nothing like it. It's like circuits and software and diodes and resistors, something utterly different. And so, so the same thing is going to be true about brains and neurons that that's what we see when we look in a certain way. But what we're really interacting with, has nothing in space and time. And so I'm proposing with my colleagues in shaytaan, Prakash and Manish Singh and Robert threatener. And Chris fields and other brilliant colleagues that have been working with, we're proposing a mathematical model of consciousness. So we're turning things around, we're saying instead of saying that the brain or you know, maybe the right kinds of artificial intelligences can create consciousness is the other way around, we have a mathematical model of consciousness, we have to show how that could lead to the creation of space and time as a data structure, and then to objects like brains inside that data structure. So the idea would be consciousness creates space and time and it creates brains, just just the reverse. Instead of having brains create consciousness, it's consciousness creates brains.

Chuck Shute: 24:17

So how do you do that? How do you how do you find out that formula?

Unknown: 24:22

Well, so we published one. So if people are interested and want to just see what this would look like, we have a paper called objects of consciousness. So if you just Google my name and objects of consciousness, it's online for free. So you can just pick it up real easy. And you can see what we did. But at top level, if you think about it, if you want a scientific theory of consciousness, there's lots of things that that are going to have to be talked about in consciousness. There's the notion of a self, perhaps free will, learning, memory, problem solving, intelligence planning, the raw experiences of you know, tasting cheese Chocolate, we're having a headache. All we think all these things are gonna be part of, of what we want to talk about in consciousness. So for a scientist, creating a theory of consciousness, we want to take the smallest number of parts of consciousness, the smallest aspect of consciousness that we can get away with, turn that into mathematics, because we want to then prove all the rest follows. You don't want to assume everything, because then it's all everything's a miracle. If you just assume everything, I'm going to assume freewill, I'm going to assume cells, I'm gonna assume learning. If I assume all that stuff, there's, there's no work for me to do. So what we've assumed in our theory is what we think is a very minimal set, we assume that there are conscious experiences. And that they can affect other conscious experiences. So we have this idea of, of conscious units or conscious agents, but the word agent may bring in the notion of a self. So I'll call it a conscious unit for the moment. And these conscious units have certain set of conscious experiences that they could have like a head ache, or the smell of garlic or something like that. And they can probabilistically affect the conscious experiences of other conscious units. That's it, that's all we assume. And from that, we can prove that in principle, we can boot up learning memory, problem solving, even a notion of self, but as a construct, not as a fundamental thing, but as a construct of consciousness. So and then the other thing we have to do is to then show how we would get space and time arising from a theory in which consciousness is fundamental. And to do that, we're going to first have to show how we can get the kinds of new structures that the physicists are finding, right, that's, they're finding these things called the amplitude hedron, the cosmological polytopes, these these geometries that I was talking about, be behind space and time. And so we, we have a way of doing that we are, in principle where we're looking at the long term, or what's called the asymptotic behavior of these interacting conscious agents. When you look at the asymptotics, you get a description in terms of permutations, that that's a way of describing the asymptotics. And it turns out the permutations are the heart of the new structures that the physicists are finding. So that's going to be the connection that we go after. So we'll have this. So what's interesting is we'll have this theory of consciousness where consciousness is fundamental, and dynamics. And when we project that dynamics on to just its long term behavior, which is a great simplification of the dynamics, then we find out that we're getting all these permutations coming out and combinations of permutations. Well, that turns out to be the backbone of the structures that the physicists are finding beyond space time. So we'll connect there, and then the physicists tell us how to get from there into space time. So we'll so the physicists have done half the work for us. All right. And so that's how I hope to see this thing work out.

Chuck Shute: 27:54

Because then the other the other two things that I think are going on right now is like we know, people are making these virtual reality. They're doing the metaverse, so they're making a virtual reality. So they're doing that way. And then also the robotics with the AI. That's another avenue. Is it does that do those two fields kind of connect to yours at all?

Unknown: 28:15

Well, yes, I think that the meta verse is going to be a big help here in psychologically, right now, when I talk about this stuff, people of my generation, just find it almost impossible. I mean, this like, Give me a break, you're saying that the brain doesn't create consciousness, consciousness creates the brain, that that's and that the brain doesn't exist when it's not perceived. Create the brain where I look, and I delete it. I create the moon when I look. And then when I look away, the moon doesn't exist. How can you even think about that, but for someone, some kid that spent most of his life, you know, playing with friends in the metaverse, he's gonna take off his headset and know that everything that he saw there was something that he created on the fly. If you saw a red Ferrari in virtual reality, or in the metaverse, that was because he made up the red Ferrari, there's no red Ferrari there. It's it's all virtual. So when he takes off his headset, the kind of stuff I'm talking about will be, you know, of course, this won't be a big deal. So So I think the metaverse the next generation that's raised on the metaverse will just sort of get this. It might my generation doesn't get it but but we didn't have this technology to help our imagination. But it won't take a big imagination for the next generation to get this. So I think it will really, really help AI will will mean AI helps in a very, very different way. So a lot of my colleagues right now are trying to figure out how AIS could become conscious right if we get them programmed in the right way. They could be come conscious, right? The the attitude is, look, we know that machines can be conscious. The brain is machine. It's a carbon based machine and it generates consciousness. So if carbon based machines can create consciousness, why not silicon or Other kinds of hardware machines, why can't they create conscience? If so, the idea of most of my colleagues is that if you have the right function to the right software running effectively, in on the hardware, then you can somehow create consciousness. So what I'm saying is that that approach won't work. Because FaceTime isn't fundamental. Consciousness isn't being booted up from physical stuff is the other way around, the physical stuff is being booted up from consciousness. So, but do I think that we could eventually build things that are AI? Is that effectively our consciousness? I think so. But was there a way

Chuck Shute: 30:41

to transfer if someone dying? Could they transfer their consciousness into a virtual reality or into an AI robot?

Unknown: 30:49

Well, so? That's a great question. And it really helps, I think, to clarify the different issues here. So the way that most of my colleagues think about this is they would say, Look, if we if we're thinking about the brain as creating consciousness, and as somehow the programs running in the brain that are really critical to that, once we can sort of decipher what those programs are, we could download those programs into a computer and run those programs on a computer and the computer would have your consciousness so we could download all of your your, your personality and your consciousness into that computer. But notice, that's assuming that the computer exists when it's not perceived. Right. And the AIS can exist from there. But even space time itself doesn't exist when it's not perceived. So no objects in space time is that so that whole framework of of downloading into another physical system to preserve your consciousness has to be rethought from the get go. But here's how here's how I think we can rethink it there. But this you have to really think out of the box here. Okay. So when I am talking with you, with with Chuck, I, I know that I'm interacting with your consciousness, I believe that your consciousness is being affected by things that I'm saying, but by ideas in my mind are affecting your ideas, and your ideas are affecting my ideas back and forth. How is that happening? Well, through our bodies, well, what are our bodies, we used to think that the bodies were these physical things that it just always existed, they were there, right? In space and time. Now we realize that the bodies are like the Ferrari in virtual reality. It's there when you create it, and it's not there and when you don't so so what's going on here? Well, your body, really the body of the ice of Chuck. And right now I'm only seeing it through zoom. So I'm really only seeing pixels on the screen. But nevertheless, I'm getting a portal into your conscious experiences. And my body as you perceive it, is your portal into my conscious experiences. So instead of thinking of our bodies as creating conscious experiences, think the other way around, I am creating a body image of Chuck, which is my portal into a consciousness behind that, which is Chuck's consciousness, which I'm not creating Chuck's consciousness checks consciousness is there, but I'm getting access to it through my portal. Now, when I look at my cat, my portal isn't as good. I have some idea about the consciousness of interacting with. And when I look at an ant, my portal is quite poor. Now I'm not even sure it is conscious, you know, who knows what I have a portal that I call, you know, like a rock. Now my portal is giving me no insight into consciousness. But that is no surprise spacetime is just an interface is going to dumb things down. So I'll have better insight into Chuck than I have into my cat better insight into my cat than into a rock. But that's not because I'm not dealing with consciousness is because my interface has to give up at some point. So so as a result, once we understand how these portals work, and we have one technology for building new portals, right, we have to reverse engineer so the one technology that we all know, we can use to build new portals into consciousness is very low tech. It's having kids when you have kids, you are building new portals into consciousness that were never there before. So we haven't

Chuck Shute: 34:21

reversible Yeah, you're creating life.

Unknown: 34:24

You're creating life and consciousness and you're accessing a consciousness that will surprise you you kids will surprise you know, I'm sure Einstein surprised his dad, with his theory of relativity with dark are so we were creating new portals that are not the same as us. They're they they're opening up new windows into consciousness where we can be surprised by what we learn. So once we understand this whole business of is not body's creating consciousness, bodies don't even exist. Spacetime doesn't even exist. Space Time is doomed. bodies in space time are data structures in our consciousness. and some of those data structures open good portals into consciousness. Others are, you know, like my rock structure is not a very good portal into consciousness. It's very good for other things, but not for me understanding consciousness.

Chuck Shute: 35:12

So there may be some other world or some because where's that consciousness coming from? I mean, it's it's coming from somewhere

Unknown: 35:19

outside of space and time. So that somewhere but but not in space and time, space and time itself is just a data structure. So this the theory of conscious agents that I'm working on, is, is a theory in which there are there are countless conscious agents. And in some sense, they're, they're just in this abstract space. They don't need space and time, except as a user interface to interact with each other. But they're not trapped in space, like something

Chuck Shute: 35:45

basically, we can't even wrap our head around. So is what you're saying?

Unknown: 35:48

Well, I think some of us, older folks will be able to wrap our heads around it. But I think the younger generation will, will just laugh at us. And they'll they'll, they'll go, you know, you just had a hard time because you weren't used to it when you grew up, just like people would think, you know, before Maxwell, the idea that you could talk with someone they lose sight of the world immediately is just insane. That's just that's just magic. But we just take it for granted. And we're not too worried about it. But but the one just say in terms of what you mentioned about artificial intelligence and consciousness. So now what would happen is if we understand how to build new portals, then it may turn out that when we build new portals, it may involve technology that looks like artificial intelligence, it might look like circuits and software. But But what will happen will be very, very different. It won't be that these pre existing circuits and software are somehow giving rise to consciousness. It's rather that consciousness has a user interface, and certain tools in that interface by which is opening a new portal into consciousness. And that tool that portal happens to look like an artificial intelligence. And so it's going to be so so the answer is yes, AI's could be conscious, but it's very, very different from the way standard, people are thinking about their their thinking, a real physical system that really exists, and might not be conscious program correctly, could become conscious, I'm saying that whole way of thinking is wrong, because space time is doomed. But if we think of these things as data structures that we're using, and the AI is just a data structure that we create as a portal, then yes, we may be able to create API's as data structures, that only exists when we use them. Right? That portal only exists when we even my kid, my data structure for my kid only exists when I use it. My kids consciousness is there all the time. But But I have no access to it unless I use my portal to get access to my kids consciousness. So there is something that exists is consciousness, and we get portals to it that are only existing when we use the portal?

Chuck Shute: 38:01

Hmm. Do you think that like with dreams, and meditation and do another degree drugs, psychedelic drugs? Or you think you're kind of getting a peek into those portals? Or is it is that something totally different?

Unknown: 38:15

It's quite possible. It's quite possible that dreams and drugs may may be giving us new portals in the following sense. It might be for example, that our portals are such that they can be tweaked. Right, so I'm getting an access to consciousness in a certain way, too, to other conscious consciousnesses in a certain way, through portals. But maybe my interface can be tweaked by drugs, and then I will see new aspects of consciousness that I didn't see before. That's quite possible. It's also possible by the way that some drugs, give portals and others just sort of screw things up. Right? That mean that that's quite possible as well. So we're going to have to, to really answer your question deeply, Chuck will have to really have a good understanding of the mathematics of this conscious realm that I've been talking about, and what my paper with my colleagues is the first step, but I'm sure that, you know, it's just 1.0 There'll be 10.0 and 20.0, and so forth, we'll be developing deeper and deeper mathematical models of mind is not the final word by anything. It's just like a baby step in direction we have to go. But once we've made further advances, will then be able to understand what more about what consciousness is up to what these portals are like. And then we'll be able to ask, okay, what is five Meo DMT? Doing? What is you know, pot doing? What, what, what are these various what is LSD doing? Because we'll be able to reverse engineer these things will say, well, so we're DMT that's just a user interface symbol. What does it mean in terms of this network of conscious agents? What what I see when I see something called DMT what Has that chemical structure really mean in terms of conscious agents? Okay, now that I know what that means with conscious agents, how is that affecting the dynamics of conscious agents? How is that affecting my portal to conscious agents? And is it really given me new insights? Or is it just screwing things up? So we'll be able to answer this. But you can see we have a little bit of homework to do. Before we before we can answer that question, I probably won't get to it before dinner. So

Chuck Shute: 40:21

no, no, but there's a lot of things that I feel like some of this stuff could be connected. That's why you're right, like, like connecting the dots. Like there's so many mysteries in the world that I just feel like this has to be there's something going on here that we don't understand, or the is there some sort of connection?

Unknown: 40:41

I think so it was interesting here is that this idea that consciousness is fundamental. And we can do a mathematical model of it means that there's connections outside of space and time that we didn't see before. space, we always thought that everything had to go through spacetime, we had hints of something beyond with entanglement. So in quantum physics, we have this notion of entanglement. And we have, we can have particles that are, you know, millions of light years apart, that are entangled in changing the state of one in some sense, we know that instantaneously, it changes the state of the other. But with entanglement, you can't actually send information through spacetime. You it's interesting, you know, the correlations are there, but you can't send information using them. But once we get a dynamics of consciousness beyond space time, we may find something even deeper than entanglement that would allow us to actually go around space time, as we talked about before. And so So I agree that there's going to be all sorts of connections that we're going to see that were hidden by our user interface of space and time. And technologies are going to come out of this, they're going to be mind blown.

Chuck Shute: 41:53

Well, do you think that someone's already studying this that but it's in secret, like the government is studying this stuff secretly that we don't know about?

Unknown: 42:03

I really doubt that they're much further ahead than the physicists this. So I would guess that the if there are people in the government that are interested in this, they're they're just trying to keep up with reading the papers of the guys like me, Mark Cunningham, and Ed Witten, and one Malta Cena, these guys are super geniuses. And they're super creative. There's very, very few people in the entire earth that could do what they're doing so. So my guess is that if you go to the Institute for Advanced Study Princeton, where a lot of these guys are, that's where it's happening, and their collaborators around the world. But that's that's where the stuff has happened. I'm sure that the really brilliant physicists that are involved, reps and secret operations at the government are following this, I mean, the big, you begin to realize the implications of this and that even the quantum ism fundamental, quantum computing isn't fundamental. There's, there's this will, of course, go through quantum computing stations will be fantastic and liberating. But going outside of space time, that's a completely different and deeper game than than the quantum so. So Mike, Mike. And of course, I don't know, I'm not inside those government agencies or anything. But my guess is this stuff is so hard and so new, that any government agency right now is just trying to play catch up to find out what with with the ideas that are coming out of the the, the physicist labs that are really at the forefront of this, and the math is really hard. So I mean, there's very few people who could actually be contributing at a fundamental level. But you know, that will probably change in 20 years, in 20 years, when the groundwork is really established, then, just like we expect that, you know, the NSA probably has some of the best quantum computer hackers in the world, right, would expect that in 20 years, the the federal government will have some of the best spacetime hackers in the world, right? Because

Chuck Shute: 44:01

I would think, yeah, somebody's gonna use this technology, this kit for power. So it seems like it's always what happens with these kinds of things. If they're, I mean, if you really, because then you're talking about being able to control everything at a fundamental level. I mean, that's, that's some scary power.

Unknown: 44:19

Yeah, if you can play with the very structure of space time and even go around space time. You're playing a completely different game than anybody else. And I'm sure everybody else is just going to be completely vulnerable to you.

Chuck Shute: 44:35

Right, so. So if we talked about if it was a simulation, so it's either because we have not invented a full vote virtual reality simulation, like a very, really good one. So either we're the last one to do it. Like maybe there's billions before us. And then we're the last one or we're the first one, right? I mean, it's got to be one of the other.

Unknown: 44:57

You think about, like Nick Bostrom has ideas and so forth about some evolution theory and so forth. Yeah,

Chuck Shute: 45:01

we're like, I think it was Neil deGrasse Tyson's, it's like, if we're capable of making simulated reality on this planet, then the odds of us not being in a simulation are billions to one like it because either it's happened a billion times before, or and we are the absolute first conscious beings. So like, how do you distinguish which one it is?

Unknown: 45:20

Right. So the way that Nick Bostrom, and Neil deGrasse Tyson are thinking about this is fundamentally different from what I'm saying. So this is a good way to really contrast the ideas, what in the standard simulation kinds of theories that Nick and Neil are talking about, they still assume spacetime is fundamental. But there's this there's this the fundamental the base level, the first geek with their computer that's running the base level simulation, that's a physical world of space and time world, all the other worlds are simulations built out of this, right. And, and I'm saying something even wilder than that the base level is not in space and time, it's consciousness all the way down. So it's consciousness outside, at no point is spacetime, fundamental, and consciousness inside of it, is the other way around consciousness, and countless kinds of consciousness. I should say a little bit about what brought there but countless different kinds of consciousness are out there, only a few of them use space and time, most of the Morrigan use other kinds of ways of interacting with each other space time is just one of countless interfaces, and also countless kinds of experiences. So the kinds of experiences that we have of color, and smell and shapes and sounds and so forth touches our trivial subset of all the kinds of experiences and when you have psychedelics, you get a little hint that there's a lot more than than your normal experience. Well, that that is trivial compared to what this theory is saying that the, it's a boundless, endless variety of conscious experiences of kinds that you and I can't even imagine. And that's all out there. And they're all being enjoyed by various kinds of conscious entities out there. So. So yeah, it's a completely different thing than the simulation theory in that in that sense,

Chuck Shute: 47:19

okay. Yeah. So when we, when we have kids, and we open up the portal, and we create a life, that's one way but then so then when we die, then what does happen? What do we go back to through that portal into? Or is it another consciousness? Or what happens?

Unknown: 47:36

Yeah, that's a really interesting question. We all have some skin in the game. So we're all interested. Yeah, the answer to that question. And I'm very interested, the the answer is, I don't know. Here's, here's some some options that I'm playing with. One is that there's, there's two aspects to our consciousness that are important to you. One is just the raw, conscious awareness without any content. So it's just being like, if you are in a dark room, and you let go of all font. And you just are and you just, you're just aware of being but not aware of anything in particular, that's what I'm talking about. Or to put it another way, here's another way that you can get it get an idea of what I'm talking about. If you if you close your eyes, and just pay attention to your visual world in front of you. You'll notice that what you experienced just like dark, but it's a mottled gray or something like this. Okay, but now, with your eyes still closed instead of paying attention in front of you pay attention behind you. What is it like back there? Yeah, cat, mom. Great. It's nothing. Yeah. It's just being right. It's really when you do to sort of freaky like most of us never have even gone there. But if you can, you can go there and sort of freak yourself out in front of me. i Yeah, it feels like there's something gray in Ryan. But behind me, what is it like? Well, it's like nothing is just being without anything. That's what I'm talking about is that's what there's one aspect of us that I think will definitely survive. But now what about the the sort of the interface stories, you know, Hoffman son of so and so went to such and such place for school likes to eat such and such for breakfast? That kind of stuff. I don't know if that will survive. I don't know if that that kind of stuff. Maybe the stuff that just isn't needed anymore when you when you die? So maybe because there's this is gets a deep question, what is consciousness up to? If consciousness is fundamental? What is it doing and why? Right?

Chuck Shute: 49:45

Well, that's an that's my other question. Yeah. Is that why like so then what is the purpose if, if this is almost kind of like a simulation that we're in, and like, what is the what is the purpose of being here? What what are we doing here? If we're not even seeing the real reality that is this a game that we're in or what is the point.

Unknown: 50:01

Well, that would be like the deepest one of the deepest questions we could ask. The answer is I don't know. But But I have, I've only seen one idea that is deep enough to at least be worth thinking about. I'm not saying it's right. I'm just saying that no idea that I've ever seen is, is really deep enough for me to take it seriously. But this one idea is, and it's from Kurt girdle, a mathematician, logician who, like in 1930 1931, he proved that, that, effectively, there's no end to the exploration of mathematical structure. There's no end to it, no matter how so if you have your system of axioms for mathematics, he proved that that system of axioms, there will be things that are true, but cannot be proven within that system. If you add those new truths to your set of axioms, there'll be yet new things that are true, but can't be proven. So So mathematics has infinite job security, no matter how far you've gone, you've only effectively scratched the surface of the possibilities of mathematics. Now, how's that related to your question about what is consciousness up to? Well, if consciousness is all there is, then the only thing that mathematical structure can be about is about the possibilities of consciousness. That's all there is for it to be about. So that means that there's endless possibilities for the varieties of conscious experience. Endless in principle, no one can be omniscient about it. So maybe what consciousness is up to, is enjoying the exploration of all of its possibilities, and that that, that exploration is endless, literally endless. And, again, I'm not saying that this is right, but this is the kind of thinking we're gonna have to do out of the box to answer these kinds of questions. So I don't want anybody to take what I've just said, and use it to stop their creative thinking. I would rather say this is just the first idea, let's think even more wildly about what consciousness might be up to. But it's not going to be any simpler or any less profound than that. But hopefully, it'll be we'll see something even more profound and deep than the idea that I just put out there. So consciousness may be up to the exploration of all of its infinite and boundless varieties. And what consciousness does is it tries on different headsets, it tries on a chuck shoot headset in a space time interface, it tries on a Don Hoffman headset in a space time in your face, and plays with that and learns what it can do and part of your neck case, it also has itself do a little podcast between this Don and his Chuck headset of guys and, and learn something more about yourself in that process. So that would be a very different way of looking about everything that we're doing with people, it certainly sort of takes the fundamental notion of competition out of things is rather we're all part of consciousness exploring itself. And it's very interesting, the consciousness would then be allowing itself to fight itself. What is it learning by that?

Chuck Shute: 53:20

Right? So maybe then it's to go out there and to have as many conscious experiences as you can to go out and smell the flowers and take a hike and go to a concert and taste the chocolate and everything. Try it all.

Unknown: 53:34

Yeah, that's exactly right. And everything that people are doing, exploring music, exploring creative writing, writing novels, exploring with drugs, doing exploring science, all these things is just consciousness. Playing and why call girdles candy store girdle is where he said there's this infinite variety of possibilities mathema so there's this infinite candy store and there's and so what you don't want to do is get stuck on just one candy. If you get stuck on one candy, you're missing the rest of the store so so the idea Yeah, so maybe that's what death is about. So it needs to do the Don Hoffman thing for a while but don't get stuck on it. Now we'll we'll get rid of the Don Hoffman thing and move on to something else.

Chuck Shute: 54:12

Okay, wow, deep stuff really fascinating. Amazing. I got a lot to think about now. Now, can people donate to your research?

Unknown: 54:22

Well, that would be be great. If they wanted to. There, you can give gifts to the University of California Irvine. So

Chuck Shute: 54:31

yeah, I always end each episode with a charity of the of the guests. So I just figured that would be the best thing for you as people could donate to the research. I think that'd be amazing.

Unknown: 54:38

Oh, that's that's a really good idea. So if you send a check to the University of California, and say that it's to support the research of Donald Hoffman, okay, then the money would go to the university, and it would then 100% of it would go to fund this research. So I'm Yeah,

Chuck Shute: 55:01

they can also buy your book that helps you as well. I'll put the link to that in the notes. I listened to it on Audible. So it's it's kind of nice. If you don't like reading books, you can listen to him, but it's the same material.

Unknown: 55:14

Yes, absolutely. Yeah. So the case against reality goes into all these ideas in in some detail. It's more about the evolutionary thing that we talked about. It has a chapter of consciousness at the end, when I plan hopefully to write a book on consciousness and go into more detail later.

Chuck Shute: 55:29

Okay, well, yeah, you'll have to come back when you finish that one, we can talk about it. And how could we you have not done Joe Rogan yet? Have you? You need to get on Joe roll. That's like the one show you haven't done.

Unknown: 55:40

I haven't been invited to be on Joe's show. I just had the pleasure of talking with Lex Friedman, on his podcast show hustle days ago. So that'll probably come out in a few weeks. Okay. But you know, if I mean, I'd be happy to talk with Joe if he if he's, if he finds it interesting. You

Chuck Shute: 55:58

know, for sure. It's a fascinating topic. You've done some great work. And thank you so much for taking the time to come on my show. Appreciate it.

Unknown: 56:05

Excellent. Chuck is pleasure. Thanks for Buddy.

Chuck Shute: 56:07

Fascinating stuff from Dr. Donald Hoffman. I think I have more questions and answers now. But if you want to learn more, check out Dr. Hoffman's book The case against reality. Or if you want a bit of a different take, you can check out my dad's book ultimate reality. And check out the episode I did with him. That's number 115. And Dr. Hoffman is on Twitter. I don't think he's on the other social media. But I'm on everything. So you can follow me on there that helps us support the show, as does your likes, comments and shares. Make sure to subscribe to the show on YouTube or wherever you listen to get updated on future episodes. And if you really want to go out and support the show, I'd love for you to write me a review on Apple podcasts or give me a rating on Spotify or wherever you listen. That kind of stuff helps, helps it so more people will find the podcast and we only grow through you. We don't have a big corporation backing us up here. It's all just grassroots. So I appreciate any support you can give me it helps out a lot. Thank you so much for listening. Have a great rest of your day and remember to shoot for the

Unknown: 57:08

moon