scientific revolution, many of the 17th century and everything is formed 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 occupy an island which is growing in the ocean. and the big in the i get the longer the shore line 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 at 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 does it torture its 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 scientific investigation. more than 95 percent of the 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 a counselor nicely or whatever. they always said the bible or the koran nature in later century the, these are not the true the, the, they open up questions and then there's a huge amount of ecumenical debate. is it really that needed the 5 percent was is the 95 percent dog mattress 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 controversy here. but you do have to remember that even at the bay go on the bottom age 1617 century, the church, the catholic church generate 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, because that 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 the world tells us about it itself. but of course, someone say those are catholic elite that were prosecuting galileo catholic elite.

they were sending their message out nowadays people say the science funding, obviously. and you do broach the topic is the elite being skewed towards elite again, is there that much of a change that we have really changing the way science is invested in. and of course, over time we've had, i know, class of managers in this book as well, i should say, well, i think there is a huge difference between the people who take the leading roles and scientific work and, 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 that they be replicated, complicates of different labs. for example, checking on the results of all the labs of the great competition there is to get the answer right and get to get settled. that is very healthy

aspect of the way that science develops. it develops 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 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, but it's 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 anecdotes about a space in connection, what you just said. 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 announce 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 a wonderful occasion. you must have felt so exhilarated and indeed the consequences offer for him personally. what 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, wash, 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 needed to look for. now dispatch

attitude is that we set to see that wonder that that, that 1st, that hunger for finding out more for digging into difficult mysteries of nature and the universe or of the cost for that matter or human nature. which is a distinctive of a best of our enquiries, not just in natural science, but i think he story ends who 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 presents. putting a parcel because you don't know what's inside. but you do know that whatever is inside is going to be part, at least of an answer to a question that you've got. and i should just say the range in this book between 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, i would say normally series in the news because we have the british and united states backing against the assad government by give islamists 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 and sell some elderly father said my father was born my grandfathers. i go and i was for my father was quite old. so i'm able to say that my grandfather was at school in the 181718 eighty's seems 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 is that mr. pertaining the great civilizations that flourished the

invention of writing the origin, patricia and so many technological advances, all that was actually known until the 2nd half of the 900 century. and we had to rochester, we had the books of the hebrew bible testament as christians core. it was wrapped up in legend. we had home ma'am, but factors regardless as 70 legendary, as as well. so before about the 8th, the 9th century d. c. the past was, if there was any sense of that at all was just really racked in the midst of knowing. but just on the origin of the middle east, from amanda, about mid to the 900 century, has revealed to us quite literally thousands of years of civilization all about a 1000000 in mister batavia also in reference civilization in this valley. the yellow river civilization of china learning much, much more about egypt and civilization, taking 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, you know, they knew stone age and be development in sacraments and settled agriculture. and then of course, the discovery of human ancestors chasing us by tens of thousands of years. hundreds of thousands, even indeed now was the discovery of generations. 6000000 years ago when the buried my earliest ancestors of the human 9 die, but be of a chimp and geez, says in this, a sparkling in a 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 our well, i mean we're really in a way i personally, you can see i binders. so fascinating concerning situation and feel that if people

had a sense of it should say understood it, i think would make them sense their own place in the universe rather different thing. i mean, i'm not sure what they wore plain pilots were thinking when they were bombing these areas. the reason it has to be said as they are subbing, they're more in the frontier of knowledge after this. your break. ah, i the war on drugs started as a way to come back, a great problem. what's the wonder? it's part of the attitude of the nation, not just of north dakota, and it got to be something that you could get elected. this time, the fight against drugs to good checks told us that andrew was competing short form. this is way too dangerous for him to be doing. clearly they put him in

harm's way. a rural college student does interest get shot in the head and found in a river like that. something else had to be happening rather driven by dreamer shapes control center was in me think we dare to ask me ah, the pacific leg around the world expedition by 1000

miles round the clock is given the dead calm as every country close by like the crew gavin's food and water to go to chat. those also need a little this thing is got everybody locked down or almost no food and no one really? sure. can somebody call me especially if you're still in the coven, you're living like the female of own. but in the 21st century, ah the

the, the, the welcome back, i'm still here with philosophy in 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 and thought has been uncovered and discovered and invented? you know, the human mind and human society is like geological strauser. there's a geological structure, and they have permission,

very apt to take quick, easy answers and superstitious views of the world down in the more or primitive layers of about understanding and then increasing the psyche more questioning, slightly 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. and so 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 lab, which is why we have rocket cigarettes in the moon now. and people used to read the astrological forecasts. hearing 2021. so, so 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 is always being 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 is died and the new is born and in that middle period called and it kind of interregnum. there is complexity and difficulty this this, you know, it's problematic. the pressure is always problematic in that break is recess, this mixture of the old and the new. so inter 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 of your 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 to read your invocation of it, but certainly say rusher isn't bad, china's bad as was biden would say change of it's, it's a trump thing x. but why is this questioning in intellectual circles accompanied the 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 simple, black and white. 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. fund methodism, anyone can persist it 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 wrong. the match 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 reach for the simple answers to human beings like a clear story appear beginning, middle, and then and lots of explanation that makes sense and want to have something big long 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 case voting system. this is a terrible, terrible verging system because the car from being made and then the project is going to provide for minority based government. it also means that you can get to political, partial, and new level get could arise ation. you get a, you know, 10 kind of position to use that results in slogans. and in simplistic arguments. you don't get didn't get people trying to compromise or cheryl work together. but you get division b, c s, at its most dramatic in the united states of america by the divide between the republican party and the big democratic party based and so deep as to be frightening. and we've seen way worse than the trunk. yes. that. so in the case of

something like, it's not going to be perfectly neutral about pressing charges, that i think it's disastrous. i've been pretty politic, 7000 years have been in the case of branch. 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, on me, you said back sovereignty. and socrates problems out the way you want, 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. they great from the things by the way, the rates are the sort of democratic agra conversation 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 him for elections. i'll give you for that. but then it for us johnson or donald trump, maybe in 2024. i mean, maybe if he rent, they read the books 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. well, it is evident that has worked in recent years. yes. and i suppose you could trace route you've just said i'm telling wrong center road flags. i'd be telling everybody else to watch that back when johnson spelled out more flags

because he trying to do them. so, you know, 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 and talking point is we should make ourselves literate across the fields in an inquiry and in particular. so then we can make ourselves better at thinking clearly critically and evaluation. what people claim people change in their business. 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 more sense, especially as we need to know the skill in life definitely, and careers. we should also have this general literacy, and i think cation and all of the thrust about education systems. thank you. that's

us. down in the u. k, we stopped to specialize after the age of 16. after you 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. asher located 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 landscape of things into which what they do. and that i think is in pounds attorney, part of a complicated story of this day, i talk you talk to the boss or this, this size culture debate or c p though is alive and well, it hasn't changed. i mean, i was talking about history you, you talk about christopher hill, who's 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 of the bad, plunging history like holocaust deniers that, that say and thinking about the power in much more exact and creative ways to try to make sense of it. looking at it in from the point of view, different frameworks and workers to be hill's dad. i think in a really significant is that he noticed that if you put the english civil war, what happened was that charles in parliament and the rest into this longer contracts with europe can history. you see, it is the 1st of one of the great revolutions. so we think of the french revolution, american revolution, we think that they both match the bolshevik revolution and indeed the revolutions

and forks as well that be enlightened, represents. 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 sent 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 shalean session. when the 2nd list came with, you know, after captain cook, back at the end of 18th century, they were guarded australian as what sometimes called a cara. maria's an empty land, you can just take it, is that for the,

for the taking. and it's only very recently. some historians and australia have said i on, you know, it was land with many, many different kinds of people living image. 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 factors and the aborigines, which only very recently ended and then to a 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 understand. 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, 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 judged in some way. and so he's, he's the kind of, well the shallow official version of churchill. whereas i run a deeper view of church show who had many characteristics which we can do. my, for example, is covered in this, during the 2nd war, and prior to it for decade after decade, he was regarded quite rightly i initially contemporaries as an absolutely, you know, boss, do it as some people say because he was so unreliable politically, switch sides and etc. so maybe bar something has some similarity to him in that perspective for the great, thank you. thank you very much. that's it for one of your favorite episodes of the season will be back on september the 8th for a brand new season. still uncovering the stories buried by the so called mainstream media until then, keep in touch with us for social media and let us know who you'd like to see. on the next season of going undergrad,

the drug started as a way to come back. a great problem, what's the wonder? it's part of the attitude of the nation, not just of north dakota, and it got to be something that you could get elected. this time, the fight against drugs took a check and told us that there was competence short form. this is way too dangerous for him to be doing. clearly they put him in harm's way. a rural college student does interest gets shot in the head and found in a river like that. something else had to be happening with the financial survival guide. daisy,

let's learn about fill out. let's say i'm, it's joy and your great grief on banks of the site. wall street broad, thank you for helping with joy. 6 that waiver aid in the pacific leg around the world expedition 5000 miles round the clock in the dead calm as every country close by with the crew to the governor's food and water and to go to church doors for sure.

the little blue on the little thing is got everybody locked down the rear? almost no food. no. what about that? only somebody either stuck, especially in the coven, your living like the female of own. but in the 21st century, i look forward to talking to you all that technology should work for people. a robot must obey the orders given it by human beings, except when the short or conflict with the 1st law show your identification. we should be very careful about artificial intelligence at the point obviously is too great truck rather than fear i would like to take on various jobs

with artificial intelligence. real summoning with a robot must protect his phone existence. with the a series of linked unconfirmed messages from the us military revealed a panic called the withdrawal with troops unable to rescue fellow citizens. we spoke to a full special forces, soldiers, shots of tax. our biggest problem getting people out actually in the us government is actually not the admin. i know that sounds crazy, but the biggest problem is not without the valley men. i'm actually in some cases of actually helped us only. so we called to the last us to a flight laptop kind of gone around a 100.