Fiction: Eric Schwitzgebel

[00:00:09] Welcome to Ten Thousand. I'm your host Ben Scofield, and this is a podcast about expertise.

[00:00:13] It isn't about experts though, it's about the journey. My goal with Ten Thousand is to talk to

[00:00:18] people at all stages, from absolute novices to world-cross performers, to find out how they

[00:00:21] think about what they do and what it means to excel, and especially how what they think changes

[00:00:24] as they get more experience. With that said, let's get into it. So I'm very excited for this episode.

[00:00:33] I'm going to be talking to Eric Schwitzgebel, who is a professor of philosophy at University

[00:00:37] of California Riverside, working in philosophy of psychology and mind, moral psychology, technology,

[00:00:42] ethics, and AI, among other topics. More relevant for this series though, he's also a short story

[00:00:46] author exploring philosophical themes through science fiction and publications like Clark's World,

[00:00:50] the magazine of fantasy and science fiction, The Dark, and though it's not typically a science

[00:00:53] fiction venue, Nature. So welcome to Ten Thousand. Yeah, thanks for having me on.

[00:00:58] Yeah. So I, this is, this is a very interesting sort of bridge to the last series, which was with

[00:01:05] philosophers talking about expertise in philosophy. And so, so when I, I followed your blog for quite a

[00:01:11] while and when I saw your, your post on your science fiction and why readers of the blog might not like

[00:01:17] it, I was like, hey, that is a, that is a perfect segue into the new series on expertise in, in writing fiction.

[00:01:26] A little moment of serendipity in the internet, which is always a fun thing.

[00:01:29] Yeah, sure.

[00:01:31] Yeah. So I start almost all of these interviews with, with us, a basic question. What does good

[00:01:37] mean in the context of writing fiction?

[00:01:42] Yeah, that's a tough one. That is a really tough philosophical question.

[00:01:45] So we're starting off in the deep end. Yeah.

[00:01:51] I actually think there's two kinds of good. The more obvious kind of good is good relative

[00:01:58] to a certain kind of reader or audience. What will a particular reading reader or audience enjoy,

[00:02:05] appreciate, derive aesthetic or intellectual value from. So, and that kind of good is,

[00:02:14] of course, by its nature, highly relative to the target audience. I do also believe in something like

[00:02:23] objective goodness. And the criteria for that are much more obscure and they're murky to me.

[00:02:32] Yeah. Let's talk about context. So you started off saying that the first notion of goodness was

[00:02:37] a work of art or a work of fiction relative to a specific audience, possibly to a specific purpose,

[00:02:43] trying to convey some message, which I think actually is relevant for your work, right? Where

[00:02:48] you're trying to explore philosophical themes. Like let's explore goodness in that context a little bit.

[00:02:53] Sure. Yeah. So the simplest first pass, which is by far too simple, right? Is to just think in terms

[00:03:01] of the amount of pleasure produced in the reader, right? So if you have an audience that just

[00:03:10] derives pleasure out of the work, then relative to that audience, the work has value insofar as it does

[00:03:18] that. I think that's a super reductive over simple view of the value of fiction, right? But it's a

[00:03:26] component of the value. And so already you get some audience relative value just with that simple first

[00:03:33] step, right? I also think that, and this is a little more complex and gets a little closer to

[00:03:41] the value of philosophical fiction, right? The audiences have different levels of disposition or

[00:03:54] preparedness or readiness or interest in thinking about certain things, right? So if you have an audience

[00:04:05] member who for whatever reason is primed, prepared by their life experience to question orthodox,

[00:04:18] their orthodox religious upbringing, then a piece of fiction that's targeted in the right way to kind of

[00:04:26] challenge that orthodoxy and push against it could really resonate with them. In a way it might not

[00:04:32] resonate at all with someone who's just deeply committed to that orthodoxy, not interested in

[00:04:37] questioning it, or someone who has no temptation toward religion is just not interested in something with

[00:04:43] a religious dimension. Right. And you could generalize that across all kinds of philosophical

[00:04:49] issues and all kinds of personal issues, right? You know, if one of your parents just died, you might

[00:04:53] be very ready for a piece on, you know, aging and death in a way that you might not at a different

[00:04:59] point in your life. Yeah. So, so, um, different audiences will take different things from what they

[00:05:07] read. Uh, so, uh, if I read the golden compass as a 10 year old, I'm going to miss like the meditations

[00:05:15] on theism, uh, that are in it. And if I read it as a, an, uh, evangelical when I'm 20, I might find it,

[00:05:24] uh, challenging in a way that I wouldn't, if I were a newly converted atheist, for instance.

[00:05:29] Right. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, one of the wonderful things about some of the best children's

[00:05:34] literature is that it can work in so many, at so many different levels for so many different audiences.

[00:05:40] Yeah, absolutely. Something like, something like Winnie the Pooh or Charlotte's Web, right? Those,

[00:05:46] they just work for so many different people coming from so many different places, you know?

[00:05:52] Yeah. So I actually have like right there, those are, I think the 50th anniversary editions of Lloyd

[00:05:59] Alexander's Prudain Chronicles. Oh yeah. Which I read a few different times through my life and,

[00:06:04] I found that every time I read it, a different book resonated most strongly.

[00:06:08] So maybe this is, if not an objective measure of goodness of fiction, uh, at least a context-related

[00:06:15] one where the fiction accomplishes different things or carries different messages that can be

[00:06:21] appreciated by different people or by one person at different times in their life.

[00:06:25] Right. Absolutely. Yeah. Um, and maybe that's a place where actually this brings us back to

[00:06:31] formulaic fiction, right? Uh, formulaic fiction is probably less likely to do that. Uh, because that's

[00:06:37] a, that's a complex endeavor, right? To, to layer messages. And maybe there's a formula for doing it

[00:06:43] that we just have a hit on. Um, right. I also wonder if being formulaic allows you to

[00:06:51] explore certain things, right? So they're the, the constraints breed creativity mantra. So if I know I'm in

[00:06:57] a romance and, and at 50% through the book, uh, my leads need to kiss then getting to them to that point

[00:07:04] in an interesting and unique way is an interesting challenge that can be satisfied with more or less

[00:07:11] quality and craft. Right. Right. So I, yeah, I, I, I agree with that. And I think that to some extent,

[00:07:19] that all writing is a little formulaic, you need typically a beginning, middle and end that readers

[00:07:29] kind of know what to expect depending on what the genre is. And, um, if you don't have a kind of

[00:07:38] structure of expectations as a reader to kind of carry you through, um, it's just, what are you doing?

[00:07:47] And you just completely bewildered. So different works can, can have to different extents and

[00:07:54] for different audiences, kind of the level of, I mean, you could be writing a sestina,

[00:08:00] a romance novel slash sestina where there's a really rigid structure you have to, to follow. And then you

[00:08:07] can find, I would think non-formulaic micro moves within that structure. Right. So it might not be,

[00:08:18] it might be very formulaic at a kind of broad structural level. Um, but if it's formulaic

[00:08:24] also at the micro level, then, you know, you might as well have something generated by chat GPT or something,

[00:08:31] you know, uh, sometimes the, having a set pattern at the macro level can allow you to be a little more

[00:08:42] adventuresome even at the micro level because the reader already knows where the plot is going and

[00:08:48] what the formulas are. So you can kind of play with them a little more inventively perhaps.

[00:08:53] Right. Well, and this is retellings, right? So Romeo and Juliet set on Saturn. Uh, we know how Romeo

[00:09:00] and Juliet goes. We just need to know what are the, the analogs of the families and the, the major

[00:09:05] conflict and how they're going to die basically. So maybe one way, not to say this is the only way,

[00:09:13] one way of being a good writer of fiction is knowing where to hew to the formulas and where to diverge.

[00:09:22] Yeah. And that's probably of a piece with knowing your audience in general, right?

[00:09:30] Knowing, I mean, one of the biggest challenges of writing in general, whether it's fiction or

[00:09:36] nonfiction is knowing what you need to explain to your audience and what can go unsaid.

[00:09:45] Right. Right. In philosophy, you could provide a definition for every term you're using,

[00:09:51] and then a definition for every term you're using in those definitions, you know, it's an infinite

[00:09:55] regress. So you kind of have to have a sense as a mature philosopher of, okay, what words can I use

[00:10:05] without having to explain? What things can I assert without having to defend? And what do I need to

[00:10:11] explain and defend? And that's, that is so culturally contingent. And it's so much a matter of

[00:10:19] acquired expertise by living in the philosophical culture. So you know who your readers are and what

[00:10:27] you, what you do and do not need to explain and defend. Right. And the same kind of thing is going

[00:10:32] to go for fiction. Right. Right. And the narrower your audience and the more, you know, formulaic,

[00:10:39] the more you can assume about what your audience is expecting and doesn't need to be explained.

[00:10:44] Mm-hmm. And science fiction and fantasy are both really good examples of this, right? So if the world

[00:10:51] is different in fundamental ways, the physical laws are different or the technologies that have

[00:10:56] been developed or even possible are different, then to some extent those have to be explained.

[00:11:01] Yeah.

[00:11:01] Um, but then you also get cases where they merely need to be pointed out and, and you accept,

[00:11:09] and just accept it by the audience. Uh, right. Right. I mean, this is one of the big challenges as a

[00:11:15] science fiction writer. And also I think, you know, as a fantasy writer who wants to have worlds that

[00:11:22] aren't just your standard kind of generic swords and sorcery world, right? How do you convey to the

[00:11:34] reader the differences between this world and that or, uh, and you know, the thing that's easiest to do

[00:11:44] is what people in the trade sometimes call the expository lump. Yep.

[00:11:50] Right. So you go, you just drop in a paragraph that says, oh, this is how this technology works.

[00:11:55] Right. And some readers have a high tolerance for that and others just do not want to read that kind

[00:12:01] of stuff. Right. So it can be elegant if you can find a way to bring the reader to understanding these

[00:12:11] without feeling like they're reading an expository lump or, or as another phrase for this is the,

[00:12:17] as you know, Bob, right. So Asimov did a lot of these, right. So it's like, as you know, Bob,

[00:12:23] this is how the such and such works, right. Then you get the expository lump in a quote.

[00:12:28] Uh, you know, so the problem is that the inhabitants of those worlds, that's the water they swim in.

[00:12:34] Right. So you would never explain how a car works to somebody who lives in America. But if,

[00:12:40] if I live in, in fake Russia in the 1700s with weird magic, why would they explain how their,

[00:12:46] their demon drawn carriage works or whatever it happens to be?

[00:12:49] Right. So as someone who writes in this craft, I really appreciate the craft of authors who can

[00:12:57] speak authentically through the characters and through the narrator's voice in ways that are

[00:13:04] natural. Like if you lived in this world, you would not bother to explain this. And yet they managed to

[00:13:11] get the reader to understand it. Right. That's, there's a real, there's a real craft in that,

[00:13:17] that some authors do just really impressively well. And as one of the, one of the really

[00:13:24] distinctive challenges. I mean, I think all fiction has, this is a challenge, but science fiction,

[00:13:29] especially it's, it's one of the, one of the bigger challenges. Yeah. Yeah. The, the things that are

[00:13:35] different can be much bigger and more fundamental. Uh, and so there's a bigger lift to, to understand them.

[00:13:42] Yeah. Uh, um, so that's interesting, right? So that, that's a specific skill that people

[00:13:47] can be better or worse at. Do you think that there is a way to practice that?

[00:13:51] I think you write it and then you show it to readers and then you see the readers, you know,

[00:13:57] disappointed reactions. Oh, you send it to Frank, Frank critics, uh, Frank, but kind. Yeah.

[00:14:08] Yeah. Yeah. I wonder about writing in general and practice. So I know, I know the standard advice is

[00:14:14] to write and write and write, uh, and get feedback and write some more, but is there,

[00:14:22] is there a more targeted kind of practice that you do or have done?

[00:14:28] I do not do things that I conceive of as practice when I'm doing them. Okay.

[00:14:35] I just write something that I want to write. Mm-hmm .

[00:14:39] And then later I decide whether it worked or not. Sometimes with feedback from others and sometimes

[00:14:47] just on my own. Mm-hmm .

[00:14:49] And I try to have an attitude of if it didn't work well, it was a, it was practice. In retrospect,

[00:14:55] it proved that it proved to have been practiced, right? Yeah.

[00:14:58] I could see how other people might engage in things that are more, you know, explicitly

[00:15:02] practiced from the beginning, you know, like a, a writing exercise of a certain sort. I think those

[00:15:06] can be useful for people. That's not how I do it though. Mm-hmm .

[00:15:12] So when you find one that didn't work as well, or when you find one that did based on feedback

[00:15:17] from your own review or from others, do you deconstruct why or why it did or did not work?

[00:15:25] Yes. That's the learning process. Right. Is to think about-

[00:15:29] I think that's the thing that makes it actually practice as opposed to just

[00:15:32] a tissue paper, right? That you wrote and then threw away.

[00:15:37] Right. That's right. You got to, or this is how I do it, right? I think about, okay, what went wrong?

[00:15:44] What went wrong here? You know, and can I repair it or is it just kind of fundamental to how it was

[00:15:50] created? A lot of times I think it can repair it, but then it just, I can't.

[00:15:57] Well, so, so what happens in those cases? So you had a goal that you were-

[00:16:02] Yeah. Oh, you're drunk and tired.

[00:16:04] I'd drunk the whole thing. Yeah. Right. So every writer, so this is again, you probably know the

[00:16:10] writer jargon and it varies between genres, I suppose, but yeah. Everybody's got a trunk of

[00:16:19] things that they tried and they decided are not good enough to further pursue.

[00:16:24] Do you find yourself looking at your trunk? So I'm actually making an assumption here that may be

[00:16:30] wrong. I get the feeling that when you go into a story, you have sort of the themes that you want

[00:16:37] to explore already in mind. I could easily be wrong about this. Do you go into the trunk to see the

[00:16:42] things that you were trying to explore and then try a different story to explore those same themes?

[00:16:48] Or is there something about, do you think there's something about the combination of things that

[00:16:52] helped it not work?

[00:16:56] Usually if there's a story on the trunk on a certain theme, there's a reason I wanted to write on that

[00:17:01] theme. So I will try another story on that theme. I don't need to go to the trunk to still feel like

[00:17:07] I want to write on that theme. It's just like that theme is still bugging me. You know, so my most

[00:17:13] recent story came out in Clark's world was set in an elder care facility. And ever since my father

[00:17:20] moved into an elder care facility in 2014, I've wanted to write a story set in one because I think

[00:17:28] there's such strange, fascinating places that a large number, a large percentage of the population

[00:17:37] spends some time in, but are kind of invisible to people who, to so much of our culture, right? And

[00:17:44] are so little portrayed in fiction. So I've, I've, I've got so many trunked stories where I'm trying to find

[00:17:51] a way for someone near the end of their life in an elder care facility to like, kind of recover

[00:17:59] meaning and value. Right. And not just sit and watch TV. So I've tried, I tried that so many ways. I got a lot of

[00:18:09] trunked drafts and half drafts on that before I finally came up with something that I, that was

[00:18:16] good enough for me to submit. And this is how to remember perfectly. This is how to remember

[00:18:21] perfectly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, so I think maybe we've hit on another aspect of good fiction

[00:18:29] is one that satisfies the author's goals. So you were trying to explore this particular context.

[00:18:39] And you had failed attempts and then you had an attempt that you were happy with enough to put

[00:18:45] out into the world. So, I mean, there, there is a lot of talk in aesthetics about voice of the author

[00:18:50] and how important that is. Maybe this points to two different, another two different notions of good.

[00:18:56] One is good for the audience and one is good for the author.

[00:18:59] Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. I think there's some

[00:19:04] value for the author in the work. And of course, some people will say, I think this is

[00:19:11] too much for me to endorse, but some people will say, you should just write for yourself.

[00:19:14] Mm-hmm.

[00:19:16] Mm-hmm.

[00:19:45] I don't know that you really can write successful fiction only for yourself, but it is partly for

[00:19:55] yourself. Mm-hmm.

[00:19:57] And I, I try to write stories that when I look back on them, I love them. In fact, I, I, all my

[00:20:07] published stories I do love, and they're the kind of thing that, you know, I wish other people were

[00:20:14] writing. Right. If I was like looking for an author who like pleased my aesthetic palette,

[00:20:21] right, they'd be writing this kind of stuff, stuff that I write. Right. So I'm trying to be

[00:20:26] the author that I wish was out there. Right. And there are other authors out there who are,

[00:20:31] you know, doing amazing things and very much please my palette. But no one has quite the combination of,

[00:20:41] of features that I have. Right. Right. So I'm kind of like my own ideal, in some sense, reader.

[00:20:50] Right. In terms of like, ah, yeah, that is exactly my taste. Oh, wow. Who is this? Who is this

[00:20:57] Schmitz Gable guy? He's writing the, exactly the kinds of stories I like. Right. Well, I think that's

[00:21:02] the, the standard, uh, explanation for the, the advice to write for yourself is the idea that you,

[00:21:09] there are enough people like you that other people would also find it meaningful or valuable or,

[00:21:14] or what have you. Right. And I think the, the, one of the good things about that advice is that I

[00:21:19] think if you go too far toward trying to please other people, then, um, you can't really write

[00:21:27] anything that's going to please everybody. Right. And the closest you can get to pleasing it,

[00:21:33] everybody is to write something pretty generic. And then basically everyone will think it's okay.

[00:21:39] Now, once in a while, there is a story out there that it seems like every single person who reads it,

[00:21:47] loves, you know, but that is the peak story of a great author rather than like something that's

[00:21:54] realistic to aspire toward. Yeah. I think, I think you aim what I, what I call it is aiming for the 10%,

[00:22:00] right. Thinking about, um, not you as an individual, right. But the, the smallish minority

[00:22:07] of readers, the 10% who are close enough to you in taste that, that they're going to like this story

[00:22:16] and try to get it to be a story that that 10% would love. And who cares about the 90% instead of a story

[00:22:22] that say 60% of people will think is okay. Yep. Yeah. This is the 100 true fans idea, right? You want,

[00:22:30] you want to connect deeply with, uh, a small number of people, or I mean, ideally without huge number of

[00:22:36] people, but if you can connect deeply with a small number of people, then that is success. And that

[00:22:40] can lead. I think there was, um, one of my favorite blog posts ever, I think was from the director of

[00:22:46] analytics for okay Cupid early on where he was talking about the people whose profiles received

[00:22:52] average ratings versus the people who showed great variants and the people who showed great variants.

[00:22:56] Some people loved them and some people hated them and they were way more interesting overall.

[00:23:01] Right. Right. So like Borges is a great example of this. Like not very many people are going to like

[00:23:09] the pyramid story for Borges. Right. But those who like it, it's like so weird and distinctive,

[00:23:16] you know? Yep. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, Italo Calvino is like that as well. You start reading,

[00:23:20] if on a winter's night, then every chapter is a different book and you don't, you don't understand

[00:23:25] what's going on. And you either are like, I am super into this and I didn't know I would be,

[00:23:28] or you put it down after the second chapter. Right. So yeah. Yeah. And I think actually the

[00:23:35] idea that writing for everybody, um, is writing something generic is, is particularly relevant.

[00:23:42] Right. So we talked about formula. It's going to cue to a formula and it's going to cue to a

[00:23:46] formula at sort of every level. Uh, because when you start to diverge from the formula is when you

[00:23:53] start appealing to smaller audiences. Yeah. You know, maybe it's worth thinking just a little bit more

[00:23:58] about philosophy through fiction, which is a kind of distinctive aspect of my fiction. Um,

[00:24:10] I mean, I think almost all fiction is to some extent philosophical and that there is a worldview behind

[00:24:16] it and their values being conveyed or portrayed. You know, one of the things that I'm very conscious of

[00:24:24] doing when I write fiction is thinking of fiction as a tool for doing philosophy.

[00:24:33] I think you're right that all fiction is expressive of ideas that are fundamental to it. Right. So

[00:24:39] authors are trying to get across some notion of, uh, or exploration of like love in our society or

[00:24:47] social issues or, and I think this is very common in science fiction where you're often people are

[00:24:53] exploring social or political or current issues through a different context. And so you explore

[00:25:00] more explicitly philosophical themes. Uh, right. So do you think that your fiction is particularly

[00:25:06] well-suited for that? Well, one of the things I like about doing it in fiction is

[00:25:15] exactly that it's not expository philosophy. Right. So if I want to, if I know what I think about

[00:25:24] something and have an argument for it, then I write an expository essay. I was just thinking that,

[00:25:32] but if I want to dive into something that I find confusing and multi-dimensional,

[00:25:42] and I don't really have an argument, but I've got more of a set of feelings of

[00:25:51] doubt and confusion and wonder about it,

[00:25:55] it can be more fruitful for me and maybe for the reader to explore it fictionally because you

[00:26:05] don't have to say, here's my thesis. Here's my argument. Instead you create a world in which that

[00:26:15] thesis is vivid. And if you include arguments at all, they're always in the bracket of being either

[00:26:23] in the voice of a character or a narrator who might not be believable. So it gives you a chance

[00:26:31] to think things through without the expository element and using kind of different parts of your

[00:26:37] mind, more, more intuitive, emotional, and imagistic, uh, faculties.

[00:26:44] Mm-hmm. Do you think that there's a continuum from like the standard philosophical literature

[00:26:49] thought experiment to a short story?

[00:26:51] I do. I do think exactly that. Yeah. You can think of philosophy as kind of being on a spectrum

[00:26:57] from on one end, you have very abstract general statements like maximize good consequences.

[00:27:04] Mm-hmm.

[00:27:05] And on the other end, you have a fully developed, richly imagined, emotionally engaging fiction.

[00:27:13] And then somewhere in the middle, you've got thought experiments and short stories and,

[00:27:20] and those kinds of things. And I think both ends of this spectrum have some

[00:27:27] advantages and disadvantages in thinking about philosophical issues, right? So when you're

[00:27:33] thinking purely in terms of abstractions, there's no unnecessary detail that could be potentially

[00:27:40] confusing you. There's no kind of emotional engagement that might be causing emotionally driven bias,

[00:27:48] right? But on the other hand, we're really not very good at abstract thinking about philosophical issues.

[00:27:59] And our, we're better at social cognition and imagination and those sorts of things. And that's

[00:28:07] why philosophers need to use thought experiments, right? Maximize utility, maximize good consequences

[00:28:13] sounds good in the abstract. And then you give people a trolley problem and you say, okay, well,

[00:28:17] you need to kill one person to save five others, right? That's maximizing good consequences. And

[00:28:21] suddenly like, wait, wait, maybe now let me think about that slogan again. Right? So as soon as you

[00:28:27] start thinking about examples and getting some kind of imaginative depth and some social cognition going on,

[00:28:33] then, uh, then you're engaging a different part of your mind that might help you see the problems that

[00:28:39] were otherwise not visible in the abstract state. So that, so I think philosophy is best served by

[00:28:47] doing the full kind of range of resources across the spectrum rather than confining ourselves toward

[00:28:55] the more abstract and, and the paragraph long thought experiment. Yeah. Well, I think there's another

[00:29:02] aspect of that continuum that, that is important to appreciate as well. Right? So if you are working

[00:29:10] in purely formal logical axioms and arguments, um, then they can be either valid or not. And presumably

[00:29:19] you can detect that by inspecting the propositions involved. Um, when you're working in fiction,

[00:29:26] like I can write a fiction in which it's possible to square a circle, even though that is logically

[00:29:30] impossible. Right. Uh, so, so there, there is a risk and I think, I mean, there's literature on this

[00:29:36] in thought experiments, particularly where we can apply whatever assumptions we want onto the

[00:29:41] thought experiment, but that doesn't mean that that's actually reflective of what is possible.

[00:29:46] And so the, the ideas we come out of it with are, they're less secure. Right?

[00:29:51] Right. So, I mean, the thesis of my nonfiction book, the weirdness of the world is basically that

[00:29:57] both philosophical argument and intuition and all those things are really, once you get outside of

[00:30:05] the range of things for which it's well tuned, like ordinary social interactions and middle-sized dry

[00:30:12] goods at low speeds and energies, right? Once you get outside of that domain, you start thinking about

[00:30:17] fundamental issues in cosmology and consciousness and ethics and basically anything.

[00:30:24] Um, then basically all of our epistemic tools turn out to be pretty weak.

[00:30:32] Mm-hmm. Uh, and the world proves to be pretty weird.

[00:30:36] All right. Yep.

[00:30:37] So the world is weird in the sense that things that are radically contrary to common sense must be true

[00:30:45] of it, I think. Uh, and yet we don't know which among the various radically

[00:30:50] non-commonsensical views is the correct one for a lot of these foundational questions.

[00:30:56] Yeah. We need someone standing outside the system to drop the expository wump upon us. Right?

[00:31:01] And I, and I'll, I loop this back into my interest in science fiction in the following way. I mean,

[00:31:06] part of the power of science fiction in particular, whether it's science fictional philosophical

[00:31:12] thought experiments or like short stories of science fiction is that it can get us to think a little

[00:31:19] beyond the ordinary run of experience. Mm-hmm .

[00:31:25] And we can start to see how our ordinary presuppositions about things begin to fall apart.

[00:31:31] Mm-hmm .

[00:31:32] Once we go beyond that run. So the kind of,

[00:31:35] Borges is again, great at this, right? But one of the things I love best about philosophically

[00:31:42] themed fiction is when it confuses. And not when, okay, I've written this fiction as a way of

[00:31:49] delivering you this philosophical truth. Here's the message. Right.

[00:31:51] Right. But instead like, let's, let's change the world. So that's different than we ordinarily think.

[00:31:59] And now what follows from that? And then it just kind of makes your head explode. Like,

[00:32:05] well, I don't know what to think about it anymore. Right. Yeah.

[00:32:09] Yeah. I mean, I think anytime you can be made to question your assumptions,

[00:32:15] that implicitly licenses you to question other assumptions.

[00:32:19] Yeah. So, so one thing science fiction is great at is pointing out assumptions because it

[00:32:24] actually like explicitly questions some of them. Right. But that, that sort of gets you thinking

[00:32:30] about, okay, what is the world in which I currently exist and the ways that I'm taking it for granted?

[00:32:35] Can I question those? And maybe that's a, that's a social justice issue, or maybe it's an economic

[00:32:40] issue. Like what would a non-capitalist system look like? Or there, I think once you are,

[00:32:46] once you are aware that it's possible to question things, you're more likely to be actually question

[00:32:50] things. Yeah. Right. Exactly. So this, I mean, this is how I think of speculative fiction in general,

[00:32:56] right? So I would define speculative fiction as, as fiction that's, that's set in environments that

[00:33:02] are outside of the ordinary run of human experience. So whether that's fantasy or science fiction

[00:33:10] or horror or something else, right? As soon as you're in that world, you're beyond the ordinary

[00:33:17] run of human experience. And that stretches your mind to think about the boundaries of, you know,

[00:33:26] it's like you see the water, right? The fish don't notice the water until they get a different kind of

[00:33:32] experience. Right. And so you swim in while is in something that's not quite the usual water. And then

[00:33:38] okay. And it makes you think about your own, your usual water in a little bit of a different way,

[00:33:43] maybe. Yeah. So I think you're right that speculative fiction sort of explicitly does this.

[00:33:48] I think non-speculative fiction also does it, but for sort of a different set of things

[00:33:54] on average, right? So if I'm, if I'm raised with a certain attitude towards, towards law enforcement,

[00:34:00] and then I start reading like noir, uh, even though that's not speculative fiction,

[00:34:05] it can dramatically change how I think about the police, for instance. Right.

[00:34:10] Uh, acknowledging the possibility of corruption or something like that. Right. Um, so it was outside

[00:34:14] the run of your normal experience, even though it's not outside the run of a normal human experience.

[00:34:20] Yes, absolutely. So, so, and that can be, that absolutely can be mind altering and mind expanding

[00:34:25] in all kinds of ways. Yeah. Excellent. This has been a fantastic discussion. Thank you so much.

[00:34:32] Yeah. It's a pleasure chatting with you. Thanks for having me on this, on your podcast.

[00:34:41] Thanks again to Dr. Eric Schwitzgabel. And thanks to you for listening. We'll be back soon

[00:34:45] with another episode of 10,000.