ortho ac grayling, his new book, the frontiers of knowledge, explores the progress, barriers, and future of humanity when it comes to enlightenment. thank you so much, professor grayling for coming back on. if anyone thinks that they don't need to read this book, you imply that they have the only themselves to be to blame for not being blown to bits by a pentagon in the nation drone. why? why is this not as it's eric? well, because i'm here. i can quote, the graph that enforced always used in his novels, you know, only connect that if you are able to connect things together a bit, make better sense of them, your much more likely to make good decisions about what to do. you know, there's a wonderful anecdote told about the great physicist, steven wineburg nobel prize winning physicist who when ronald reagan was contemplating putting anti ballistic missiles up in space. you may remember a kind of defense that was installed on satellites. weinberg said, it doesn't bother me that president reagan doesn't know any science,

but it does bother me if he doesn't know any philosophy and history. and of course, the point was precisely that if you don't have context, don't put scientific development into context or see how science is changing history. if you didn't do that to way joining up and you're going to get into trouble. well, little known fact, you know, i was cradled on the enforced his knee. that's how old i am. pretty we're. but i, i do the with the quote from using which you don't use in the book. when he said, i maybe it's apocryphal. all he saw himself was finding a smooth pebble or a pretty shell, the great ocean of truth before him. central to this book is what the more we know the less we know. yes, i mean, it's really very striking fact about the history of knowledge. if you like about until the beginning of modern times, that is in the $1617.00 century people for there's an increase of knowledge ment, diminishment of ignorance and moving you the less weight more involved that implies

that one day we would know everything, we would understand everything we have a complete picture of the universe and we would have a grip on the truth. and of course, this is inspired by the model of knowledge, truth and certainty, which is provided by the great religions because the great religion say that they have the final place story about everything. but what's happened since the scientific revolution, many of the 17th century and everything is funded for matches at the more we discover, the more we find out, the more knowledge we accumulate, the more questions are prompted. and it's been like occupying an island which is growing in the ocean. and the big in the island gets the longer the shoreline of ignorance becomes. and we realized more and more and more how little we know give you one very striking example of that. if you think of the enormous explosion of scientific knowledge, particle physics, quantum theory at one end of the scale, cosmetology as the other end of the scale or understanding of the universe just in

the last 100 years, huge explosion of knowledge about that. and what is the torture? it's torture. we have access to less than 5 percent of the mass density of the universe. less than 5 percent. the physical reality is accessible to to be investigation more than 95 percent of it didn't matter. doc energy, no idea what it is, we can see some of its effects, but we don't know what it is. and so this is a beautiful example of how the more we know the more we realize the last minute. but of course, those who are religious around the world and you've had spectacular debates with maybe maybe actual clergymen, i will say, you know, ever since the counselor nicely or whatever. they always said the bible or the koran nature in they 2 centuries. these are not the truly the they open up questions and then there's a huge amount of ecumenical debate. is it really that me the 5 percent was,

is the 95 percent dog matter? isn't that comparable to the divinity of christ and whether he is 3 people and so on. well, and the easiest thing in the world is to get mad in the swamps of the controversy here. but you do have to remember that even the to bay go on the balkan age 1617 century, the church, the catholic church, the center. it was quite literally putting people to death for love excepting the literal truth of scripture. and you may remember that galileo was put on trial for saying that the move flies around the sun, and he had to deny it in order to save his life. i mean, to extent under age, the old idea, that's the truth about things that the complete picture was available to us in our traditions. that was the thing that was revolutionized really by the rise of science and philosophy. and in the early modern period, we different world now,

which is the inheritor of that very healthy kind of skepticism inquiry, asking questions, probing not carrying desires to believe, to the world and looking for ways of justifying them, but taking out curiosity to the world and finding out what tells us about it itself, but of course, someone say that those are catholic elite that we're prosecuting galileo catholic elite that we're sending that message out nowadays. people say the science funding, obviously, and you do broach the topic is the elite of being skewed towards the leads. again, is there that much of a change that we have? it's changing the way science is invested in. and of course, over time we've had, i know, class managers in this book as well, i should say, well, i think there's a huge difference between the people who take leaving roles and scientific work and discovery. and people who occupy hierarchies and religious traditions. and the big

difference is that in the science hierarchy, if there is such a thing, the idea of critical skepticism, the idea of challenging people's results of demanding if they be replicated complex of different labs, for example, checking on the results of other labs, of the great competition there is to get the answer right and get to get the fact settled that is very healthy aspect of the way that science develops. it dependents to this tremendous dialectic, if you like, of, of, of criticism, investigation of scrutiny of results. and that is something which is very difficult to do if you, in a tradition where you have a central received truth and the virtue is to believe them accept them live by them . so a very, very different kind of mindset. i mean, i know everyone relies on quantum mechanics for their mobile phones and the

positioning and einstein's theories. but i mean, is it really replication no one at school? if they get the experiment, did they come up with a different value for the percentage of oxygen or something? in some way experiment is going to go. we've got, we've disproved a huge amount and with the higgs both on its own. isn't it? if they hadn't found it, they would have just said, well, we'll keep looking for it. it's not that it doesn't exist. isn't there something on to logical about that? you know, i can tell you and interesting little anecdotes about the space on in connection. but you just said that rather good friend of mine is one of the lead scientists on the children colanda. he was on the compact me on some experiment. that's one of the 2 experiments of just looking for the haze itself. and when they announced that they were satisfied, they spotted it. this is in 2012 after a number of years of going over and over and over the results and being absolutely sure that they really got it right. i said to him, it must have been

a wonderful occasion. you must have felt so exhilarated and indeed the consequences are perfect and invest in the work grade. she was knighted and you know, 100 tremendous metal and so forth. but he said to me, he said, oh yes, yes, yes, it was great on that day. but you know what? if we hadn't found it, it would have been so exciting because it would have meant that there's a whole lot of different physics out there that we need to look for. now, despite attitude is that we set to see that wonder that that's that 1st, that hunger for finding out more for digging into difficult mysteries of nature and the universe or the past for that matter or human nature, which is fade distinctive of the very best buy inquiries, not just in natural science, but i think he story and to look at antiquity and try to make sense of how things work for people. then people look at the brain and how it functions into human psychology. these are exhilarating, exhilarating inquiries. and you know,

it's like opening christmas present the 2nd putting apostle because you don't know what's inside. but you do know that whatever is inside is going to be part of least of an answer to a question that you've got. and i should just say the range in this book in physics, archaeology neuroscience is it's all this summarizing, summarizing the field actually before we return to the, maybe the, the class elements and the, what it means today, i'll just give you talk about ogre it in syria, which you normally say is in the news because we have the british and united states backing against the government back in his limits and so on. meanwhile, on the ground in syria, in recent years, we've discovered amazing things about the history of civilization. just tell me a little bit about that. yes, you know, it's a very striking folks for me about my grandfather was an elderly father said my

father was barbara my grandfather's, i go and i was born at my father's quite old. so i'm able to say that my grandfather was at school in the 181718 eighty's seem sort of her stomach thing. and he would have known nothing of what we now know about the past. because all the discoveries made about syria and iraq about that. the 1st question mr. pertaining the great civilizations that flourished with the invention of writing the origin to the teacher. and so many technological advances, all that was actually known until the 2nd half of the 19th century. and we had to go to the books of the hebrew bible testament, as christians call it back, all wrapped up in legend, homer but backers, regardless of 70 legendary as well before about the 8th or 9th century d. c. the past was, if there was any sense of that at all, was just really wrapped in the midst of knowing. but just on the origin of the

middle east, from around about mid 19th century, has revealed to us quite literally thousands of years of civilizational development in mr. batavia also in reference civilization in this valley. the yellow river civilization of china learning much, much more about egypt and civilization, taking us back 4000 years before rogers and the old testament. and that's pretty remarkable is that only got a ball rolling and the ball rolling was a discovery of the whole new period. so a new stone age and the development of in sacraments and settled agriculture. and then of course, the discovery of human ancestry taking us by tens of thousands of years, hundreds of thousands, even indeed. now it says the discovery of genetic 6000000 years ago when the buried my earliest ancestors of human 9 diverge, be of a chin from jeez,

this is sparkling in the way in which time and the past has opened up so dramatically and so tremendously. just very by recently transforming our view of ourselves and now well, i mean, we're really in a way, i personally by just so fascinating and concerning situation and feel that if people have sensory issues, they understood it. i think would make sense their own place in the universe rather different p. i mean, i'm not sure what they wore plain pilots were thinking when they were bombing these areas. the reason the it has to be said as something more in the front, you have knowledge after this, your break you can go to

a 6 day marathon of creativity, a multi cultural festival. and the biggest variety is the competition for a few days, became a russian cultural capital, $28.00 categories. ahh, from filing a piano to the parenting and data protection night years just throwing up over the water in georgia. if you could give them as the got the request of a 3 or 4 to be here, they filled out a when reading or content the delta games only take the very best of the best buy i

when i would chose the wrong, why don't i just don't have to shape out this thing because the african and engagement equals the trail. when so many find themselves, well the part we choose to look for common ground in the welcome back. i'm still here with philosopher and public intellectual professor. ac grayling discussing his new work, the frontiers of knowledge. there will be some view. it may be in the american south right now watching this and not taking they have ex nations against corona virus and so on. who be subjected to

a different version of history financed by particular interests. would you do? do mentioned the book. what are the dangers of this as this amazing revolution in thought has been uncovered and discovered and invented the human mind and human society is like geological strauser, as geological structure. they have permission, very apt to take quick, easy answers and superstitious views of the world down in the more primitive layers of about understanding. and then increasing me psyche more questioning, psyche more open or skeptical and more rational i think. and the concept of rationality is very important here, because as i say in the book, if you look at the word rational, you see the 1st part of it is ratio, which means proportion. and so a rational belief is one which is proportional to the evidence you have for it,

or the strength of the reasons that you then off before it and say that tends to be rather upper level of that you are eligible, stronger people. and society is in groups with in societies, find themselves to different levels of this geological laugh, which is why we have rockets figures in the moon now. and people used to read the estrogen and forecasts hearing 2021. so can, it's not surprising in a way that there is this kind of mixture and it's a mixture because history is always on the move. the past is always dying and the new has always been born. if i remember correctly, in fact when i was, i'm thinking a bit about this interview today. i remember that you chose not to go to your agreement the decade novels. i think you'll read that you chose your enough from graham she i seen through a pool and we she talks about how the old has died and the new is born and in that

middle period called in a kind of interregnum. the complexity and difficulty this, this is problematic. the presence is always problematic in that reg is recess, this mixture of the old and the new. so chris might want because you know, a traditional belief might use very, very mobile means to carry out some act based on that traditional belief. and that's just the mixture that we're in at the moment. and it can sometimes be a very dangerous mixture. i mean, we don't go through breaks it again. there were complex breakfast here, argument and complex remain a human famously. but how is it that if, as you say, things become more and more spectral, in terms of our understanding and the questioning of the world and the universe has political, some elements of political theory appeared to get more certain certainly amongst maybe it's just the read your invocation of it, but certainly say rusher isn't bad,

china's bad it was biden. would say change it's, it's a trump thing x. but why is this questioning in intellectual circles accompanied more certainty, arguably, amidst politicians there is a very, very direct relationship between increasing complexity and increasing simplicity or the propensity to reach for simple quick concepts and more complex things are. the more a lot of people are driven to look for something checkup, simple black and white. and this is, you know, an example of how it is that could be just one dimension isn't like, you know, christian fundamentalism in the southern states and the u. s. will fund methodism anyone can persist? it's because you can tell a person, anybody fundamental team, it's doctrines and plans of any of the major religions in less than half an hour.

but it takes a bit longer than that to understand physics. and this is a really good example of how if understanding of the world is increasingly complex, there's a lot to know a lot to understand when people will reach for the simple answers to human beings like a clear story appear beginning, middle, and then, and lots of explanation that makes sense. they want to have something that they belong to. and the simple answer is the one that you you reach for when you start creating, getting lost in the complex, in politics that happens as well. so, you know, if you think of a system like the one in the u. k, which like canada and united states of america and india, or have the 1st 13 system. this is a terrible, terrible voting system because coughing, being a democratic is going to provide for minority based government. it also means that you can get to political conscious. and you get polarization. you get a, you know,

10 kind of position. the views that results in slogans and in simplistic arguments. you don't get didn't get people trying to compromise or share all worked together. but you get division b. c. i said it's most dramatic in the united states where the debate between the republican party and the big democratic party, so bitter and so deep as to be frightening. and we have seen it at its way worse than the trunk. yes. that. so in the case of something like it's not going to be coughing, he neutral about pressing charges, that i think it's the most disastrous idea and pretty politics, 7000 years. in the case of breakfast, they will see a phenomenon which is in terms impact on the idea that but if people worried about all sorts of things in their lives, you can find one simple wouldn't be putative explanation for it. blame it on the,

on the you take back sovereignty, socrates problems out of the ways one, if you can do that. and if you can use these incredible new techniques of communication because i think social media, the internet, what's happened and google and facebook and so on. have been very, very malign, influences on politics big great from the things by the way. they're great for the sort of democratic agra compensation people sharing news and views and putting people in touch with one another. yes. but they're also really bad aspects of them because you can micro target people with false messages that people can't see and call out. i'm sure they direct them for the elections. i'll give you for that, but then it for us johnson or donald trump, maybe in 2024. i mean, maybe he read, they read the book and they would come out with the alarming idea that they're on the right path. because this questioning of knowledge accompanies seeking for simplicity. so you'd be, they're going obviously, i don't agree with it,

but johnson get more union. jack's get flags round, you have more simple messages. people are looking for answers and this is a good political maggy, valley and strategy which evidence has worked in recent years? yes. you could trace round, but you've just said i'm telling you wrong center wrote out more. i'd be telling everybody else to watch their backs, when johnson spelled out more flags because he trying to beat them. so you know, that is the message that what we want to be, what we want to be doing. and this is a point that i wrote the book for parking been talking point is we should make ourselves literally which across the fields have been inquired and in particular. so then we can make ourselves better at thinking clearly critically and evaluation . what people claim people change and we can make some connections we can see

across the landscape of understanding about doesn't mean that we have to become part of the system. we work with become ancient historians or anything, but will they, each of us needs, of course, special that we need to know the skill in life definitely in our careers. we should also have this general literacy. and i think occasionally all of the thrust about education of systems. thank you. let's just them in the u. k. we stopped to specialize after the age of 16 after jesse redo, few subjects of a level you might be once up that university. and this is not great. and the old model, the one which is kind of been chips away as you're locked in the us is that you provider, general education. and then people specialize on the basis of that interests and talents afterwards. but if you, if you specialize to early people, new sites of the context of the wider and landscape of things into which what they

do and that i think is in pounds attorney, part of a complicated story of the day. i talk, you talk to the pastor, this, this science culture debate and c b though is alive and well, it hasn't changed. i mean, i was talking about history. you usual at christopher hill, who is, i'll give you a marginalized figure of the great marxist historian at oxford. i mean, i was taught, there was a civil war here. he talked about the english revolution. is that an example of the kind of way history is skewed? it's a very good example of the difference between revisionism and a bad time in history. where like holocaust deniers, that, that say and thinking about the past in much more exact and creative ways to try to make sense of it looking at you can, you know,

from the point of view, different frameworks. workers to be hill's dad, i think, and really significant is that he noticed that if you cook the english civil war, what happened was that charles and fast and parliament and the rest into this longer contracts with europe in history. you see, it is the 1st one of the great revolutions. so we think of the french revolution, american revolution. we think that they both tribute match, the bolshevik revolution and the revolutions and forks as well that the right represent. and you see this as part very, very significant and instructive process. so he was able to put it into context, which makes us see it a fresh and interesting the fresh using this perspective that a marxist interpretation of history office that's very valuable. i thank you. in the book as a, as a way of showing how revisionism in history,

that issue revising our understanding of something is different from historical denial and can be used to inform us much, much more sensitively about things. another example i use, of course, is feel strongly and sessing when the cyclists came with, you know, after captain cook, back at the end of 18th century, they regard it australian as well, sometimes called and tara, and really use an empty land. you can just take it a step of the, for the taking and it's only very recently, some historians in australia said i on, you know, it was land with many, many different kinds of people living in age. and in fact, it was an invasion that wasn't a settlement, and it was of a violent one because there was a long drawn out war between the sexes and the aboriginal, which only very recently ended. and that is a way of revising our view of history, understanding things different be and trying to do something better now and in future on the basis of that better understanding. and in this dichotomy between

revisionism and denial, ism is boris johnson. on the denial list side, well, i don't know what johnson's views about history. i have very, very bad, be sinking feeling about his views of the present to say, well, he does, he does. but i think if i may be frank and rude at the same time about it, i think it's bigger see which model himself on church in some way. and so he's, he's a kind of well the shadow official version of churchill. whereas i run a deeper view of church show who had many characteristics which we entered. my for example is covered in this during the 2nd war. and prior to it for decade after decade, he was regarded quite rightly bye of his contemporaries as an absolute boss to it, as some people say, because he was so unreliable, politically, switch sides and etc. so maybe,

or something has some similarity to him in that perspective. press, great, thank you. thank you very much. that's over the show will be back a wednesday for our last episode in the season, 44 years to the day of the detention of an engine re fighter. again, to get back to south africa, the african socialist nico, up to his rest, you'll be beaten, tortured and eventually dine, comes to be a killing, emblematic of the horrors of the margaret thatcher armed about a system. until then keep my social media and get in touch. so let us know if you think it is too late to save. humanity. the the unexpected upside of the pandemic kenya's experiencing. and elephant baby boom. 200. why does kenya have so many cars?

and how has the panoramic impacted people's lives? there's a wall, it's fairly big, long in a bunk. any fact? he end up killing himself. i don't live on a leon when you go buy a car. well, and i will make a little was i did him in the media if they get, i say, let me mean it will cause a nice out of the when a neighbor who did the they didn't even notice whether the calls you do isn't local. but i know the company just wasn't going order with me

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