Daniel and Kelly’s Extraordinary Universe - The SF Universe of Blake Crouch's "Recursion"

Episode Date: March 24, 2020

Daniel and Jorge discuss the science fiction book "Recursion" by Blake Crouch. Blake comes on for an interview to discuss his thoughts and method. Pickup your own copy of Recursion. It's a thrilling novel!First live stream from Daniel and Jorge airing Friday, March 27th at 10am pst or 1pm est.Streaming at https://www.youtube.com/user/phdcomics Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System

On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want or gone. Now, hold up.

Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate. Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast and the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman, host of the Psychology Podcast. Here's a clip from an upcoming conversation about how to be a better you. When you think about emotion regulation, you're not going to choose an adaptive strategy, which is more effortful to use.

unless you think there's a good outcome. Avoidance is easier. Ignoring is easier. Denials is easier. Complex problem solving. Takes effort. Listen to the psychology podcast on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, this is Daniel and Jorge from Daniela Horheh, Explain the Universe. We interrupt this podcast for a special announcement. This Friday, March 27th, we were having our first ever Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe live stream event. So join us as we record an episode in real time and take questions from listeners like you. You can submit your questions live on air or send them to us ahead of time

at questions at danielanhorhe.com. To tune in, just go to YouTube.com slash Ph.D. Comics this Friday, March 27th at 10 a.m. Pacific. That's 1 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Europe. That's 2 a.m. in Tokyo and 4 a.m. in Australia. What time it's out on Mars, Daniel, you know, in case aliens want to tune in? Do you think aliens want to ask us questions?

Maybe not you. They might have engineering questions, you know? Well, I got questions for them. So tune in this Friday, March 27th at 10 a.m. Pacific at YouTube.com slash Ph.D. Comics. And bring your questions about the universe. Hey, Daniel, what's your fondest memory? I have a lot of great memories of finishing a wonderful book. Oh yeah? That's your happy place sitting down, reading a sci-fi novel?

I love reading a science fiction novel and being totally confused, like what's going on? How does this make sense? And then coming to the end of it and getting some incredible idea that the author had to pull it all together and deliver it to the reader. That's wonderful. Do you remember the bad science fiction novels? Do you have less than fond memories of sci-fi novels? I don't remember finishing bad science fiction novels because I usually don't. I often toss them across the room and say, I'm not reading that anymore. Oh, really? You're not a completest. I do not finish every novel I start. No, if I get too fed up because the story doesn't make sense, I'm just done with it.

Well, do you ever wish you could maybe go back in time or at least go back in your memories and wish that you hadn't even started the book? I do. In fact, there was one set of novels as a kid that I deliberately never read the last page of because I didn't want to finish it. I didn't want to be done with it and have it in my past. These days, I love seeing my kids read some of those books because it's sort of like getting to re-experience them.

That's right. Kids are sort of a replay button. Yeah, except they're guaranteed to just remake all of our mistakes. Well, there might be a universe, Daniel, where that is possible. Hi, I'm Jorge. I'm a cartoonist and the creator of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist, an avid science fiction reader, and apparently I take science fiction personally. I've seen you get worked up about interesting novels you read and novels you like less. Yeah, well, you know, a good work of art will make people get worked up. It'll evoke reactions in them.

It'll make them think. And to me, the wonderful thing about science fiction is that when it makes me think about, another science fiction universe and the laws of physics there the laws of physics here how does it all fit together well i wonder if you're sort of a science fiction writer's worst nightmare you know a particle physicist a trained physicist read trying to make sense of a science fiction work if it wasn't fiction it would just be called a science book probably and fortunately for those authors there are not a lot of us particle physicists around so we don't sway the market very much well welcome to our podcast daniel and horhe explain the universe a production of eye hard radio A podcast in which we usually explore the real universe and take you on a tour of everything that's out there.

That's incredible. That's amazing. Peel back a layer of reality to show you how things actually work. That's right. This is part of a genre called Science Reality or Science Nonfiction. Is that a redundant word? Reality nonfiction. It's a podcast in which we do try to sort of explore the universe and take you to all the furthest reaches of the cosmos and all the smallest places in this place that we call home. That's right, because we think that the intellectual questions of the universe are questions for everybody. We think everybody wants to know how the universe got started and what its fate will be and what it's made out of. So normally our job is to take you there and explain it to you in a way that we hope educates and entertains.

Yeah, so it's a big universe and actually nobody really knows if this is the only universe or if there are other universes out there. But there are sort of people in this universe that create whole universes, not just in their heads, but also. on the page. And we are big fans of people who do this sort of mental exploration who wonder what kind of things could happen in this universe. What other laws of physics might there be? And I've long thought that science fiction authors are sort of on the vanguard of intellectual exploration. They're the ones out there wondering what we could build in our universe and how the universe might be different. Really? You put them at a level higher than scientists. Oh yeah, absolutely. You got experimentalists trying to discover stuff,

theorists trying to think about what experimentalists should discover and then science fiction authors thinking about the things the theorists should be thinking about. Isaac Asik Asimov to Isaac Newton to Daniel Weitzin. Well, that's an illustrious group, but sure, I'll take it. No, I think that science fiction authors, you know, they're not as constrained by reality like particle theorists are. They just sort of think broadly and they get to consider they're unchained. They get to consider what other universes could look like and how things might work. And not just that. They also write technology fiction. They think in our universe, could we do this? Could we have tricorders? Could we build teleporters? Could we travel faster than light? It's fascinating and important work.

They think of stuff and it makes physicists. It tickles the imagination of scientists and maybe that it spurs ideas about what to explore or what kinds of questions to ask, right, about this universe. Yeah. And it gives real scientists, real ideas. And they're real examples of people reading something in science fiction and then trying to make it real. But there's a challenge. there. You know, when you are writing in another universe, you don't just get to follow the rules of the universe. You know you have to make up the rules and then tell a story in that universe. So you're sort of playing both sides of the equation. And I think with that comes some extra responsibility. Yeah, with great pros comes great responsibility, right? Isn't that what

Spider-Man said? Yeah, well, they are sort of gods of that universe. You know, they get to decide what the rules are and then they get to tell the story, you know, that follows those rules. Well, we thought it would be interesting for our listeners to talk to some sci-fi authors here on the podcast. And so we have this series now where we talk to science fiction authors who are doing really great and interesting work out there right now. That's right. And we don't just talk to them about their book. We are interested in how did they build that universe? What laws of physics happen in their universe and why did they make those choices?

Or if they are living in our universe, do they think that the technology that they're creating is really? really, something that could actually happen. Yeah, and so a little bit recently, we had an episode where we talked, Daniel talked to Anne Lecky, and we talked about the science in her science fiction book. And so if you've heard of Anne Leakey and are interested in her book, Ancillary Justice,

check it out in our archive. But today, we're talking to an author that we've mentioned in this podcast before and that Daniel has thrown a little shade at, maybe. That's right. I don't remember exactly what we were talking about, but somehow Blake Crouch's book, Dark Matter, came up, And I made a not necessarily positive comment about the science in that book. Yeah, because you were saying that the title was called Dark Matter,

but it sort of didn't feature Dark Matter in it. I kept waiting, where is the Dark Matter? I kept waiting for it to show up. I think it's ironic that a physicist would complain about the naming of something, not being accurate, but I digress. I'm hunting for Dark Matter in real life, and so then I'm reading a book about Dark Matter, and I'm like waiting and looking for the dark matter,

And so I'm left unsatisfied at the end. I still have not found dark matter. And is dark matter actually dark, Daniel? Is it really? Do you know for sure? It doesn't emit anything? We are not aware of any emissions from dark matter. Either the book or the actual kind of matter.

Is it matter actually, Daniel? It does matter. It is matter and it does matter. And I think it also matters to get the science right in your book. I think go ahead and create a universe. That's fine. But make sure the rules make sense. Make sure you follow those rules.

Or if you live in our universe, universe, get the rules right, you know? Don't do science miscommunication. Well, it's this sort of label as science fiction. So I don't think anyone sort of reads it and thinks that it's necessarily real. A lot of people just read it because it's fun and it's interesting to sort of bend the rules, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. And you're free to create whatever universe you like and make up whatever rules. But I think a story is only good if you're following the rules. You know, if you're telling a detective story and you're looking at the clues and wondering who could have murdered Mr. White in the library or whatever, then you want there to be rules. Otherwise, you have no chance of figuring it out.

And if it comes in the end, it was a magic genie that appeared and disappeared. And so all the clues are irrelevant, that's not really a very satisfying story. So I like it when it follows the rules. Anyway, so to the end of the program, we'll be talking to Blake Crouch and talking about the science in his book called Recursion. And so to the end of the program, we'll be covering the science fiction universe of Blake Crouch's Recursion. So this is a book you read recently, Daniel? I did, yeah. So after I mentioned Blake Crouch on air

and invited him to come on the program and defend his universe, we reached down to Blake and said, hey, would you come on the podcast and talk about the science fiction universes? And it turns out he has a more recent book than Dark Matter. It's called Recursion.

And so I read it and talked to him about it. Was he aware that you're sort of a picky physicist before he agreed to talk with us on air? I thought about this carefully. I didn't want to antagonize him or attack him or insult him. So I made sure that he knew that I was not going to be throwing him softball questions about what's it like to be a famous writer, but instead that I was going to be probing him kind of deeply about the science of his universe. Oh, I see.

So you gave him advance, the questions kind of, or gave him a flavor for the questions. Yeah, I didn't tell him the questions in advance. because I wanted his sort of spontaneous reactions and thoughts to them, but I did let him know that we would be going a little bit deeper on the physics than maybe his typical interview. Well, if you're interested, please check it out. The name again is Blake Crouch, and the book is called Recursion. And so, Daniel, let's step me through before we listen to the interview about what this book is about. And what is the basic idea of it?

So Recursion is a really fun book to read. It's sort of near-future fiction. It takes place in a universe you will find familiar. It's not some kind of thing that takes place in a galaxy far, far away with crazy stuff happening. And the book starts out where a scientist is working on memory. She's trying to essentially find a technological solution to Alzheimer's. The idea is build some device that can map your brain and, like, record your memories digitally somehow, and then later re-inject them.

Like, let's say you and I have lunch and we had a great time. Then you get Alzheimer's and you forget it. And then later, you want to remember that lunch. because it was so good, but it's faded from your memory. Then in this book, they've developed a machine that would let you do that. You sit in this special chair. It re-implants those memories and you can re-experience them. Wait, it reads your memories first, or do you have to remember it?

And while you're remembering, it sort of reads those memories. Yeah, you call it up in your mind, and while you're remembering it, it stores it. And then later you can come back and it'll reinsert them. And as I was reading this, I was thinking, wow, this is technically pretty hairy. I mean, we don't understand the brain, like, at all. to interpret what's going on inside of the brain with neurons firing and translate that into digital code that you can then re-upload. That seemed pretty crazy to me. But, you know, suspension of disbelief, assume there's some technology that can do that. And he did a good job

of investigating like what kind of technology you would need in order to probe the brain and re-implant this stuff. Using like a scanner. And he has like, you know, magnets and all sorts of stuff. You would need to focus the energy and induce these spikes. That is sort of how they do these neural prosthetics. I don't know if he knows, but I worked at Caltech on a newer prosthetics lab. And that is sort of how they do it. They just kind of record you moving your arm, for example, or looking sideways in different directions. And they just sort of record the raw data. And then you don't have to make sense of it, but you just sort of take it in as raw.

And then you interpret that and say, that means right, that means left. That relies on like understanding which part of the brain to record. Like, you could record the entire brain. And, but then you don't want to replay the entire brain, you want to record the entire brain and somehow pull out the memory part of it and then re-inject just that part. So that part, I don't really know if we could, you know, you know, interpret some random person's brain patterns to know which part was the memory and which part was, you know, them breathing and which part was them controlling other parts of their body. Isn't the brain pretty separated? Like there are memory parts and there are

breathing parts. So, I mean, it's, I'm just saying it's, it doesn't seem technically impossible. No, not technically impossible. Like, you know, maybe stretching the ability. of what we could do, but you could imagine people could figure that out. So that's cool, that's clever. So the idea is you sit in a chamber and you think of it a memory

and it records it. Yes, but then the book takes a big twist. And this is a bit of a spoiler, but the book's been out for a while so I don't feel bad spoiling it. But it turns out that when you re-insert the memory, you go back and you say, oh, I want to re-experience

that memory of having lunch with Daniel. You sit in a chair, you turn it on. You don't just remember it. it actually takes you back to those events. It, like, transforms the universe somehow, so you are back at that lunch. And so I need to sit back down in the same chair. It flashes, and then suddenly I'm transported to that time. Yes, transported, teleported, time ported, memory ported, something ported back into that memory.

That memory becomes real again. And not like virtual reality, I'm experiencing it, but I'm not really there. But, like, you are really there. You can order something different and have a different. different future play out. Okay, so I'm transported through this memory machine to that time, and I still have my memories that I've gained since. Like, I'm wiser now, and I'm replaying the moment,

and I can do different things. I can order something different for lunch. That's right. You can decide, you know what, that didn't work out so well. I had stomach cramps all afternoon, so I'm not going to get the beef tartar. And the world you left behind is sort of like, well, it's not gone. It's weird because say you go back in time 10 years. In his novel, you then have 10 years to live your life and do things differently.

After 10 years have passed, when you come back to the moment that you jumped from, then everybody else in that new universe, that new sort of memory line that you're now in, gets the memories from the old timeline, and they suddenly all remember them. Suddenly everyone remembers your new choices. Everybody in the new timeline suddenly remembers all the old stuff that they never actually experienced. Okay, you kind of just lost me. Yeah, it gets complicated. Wait, so let's go back for our lunch.

So I went back to lunch. I ordered something different. And then I hung out in my office. Not that I have an office, but I hung out. And then it was time for, we reached the time where I sat down on the machine originally. So then what happens? So let's think about it from my point of view. I'm having lunch with you in the new timeline.

I'm not aware that you've jumped back. It's just Daniel having lunch with Jorge. And you're like, oh, I'm glad he didn't eat my banana this time. Well, I don't know that this is any other time. New Daniel, right? I'm Daniel prime. You're just glad I didn't eat your banana. No, so new Daniel, it just lives his life. But then we get to later that afternoon, the time when in the original timeline, you jumped back into the chair. And then when we crossed that moment, I get old original Daniel's memories. So I'm new Daniel in the new timeline, but then I remember all this stuff which sort of like never happened to me, but happened to a different Daniel. And so suddenly you have two memories. Yes. You remember having lunch with me, one where I took your banana and you remember. having lunch where I didn't take your banana. That's right. How can I have two memories?

It's confusing. And one of the themes of the book is sort of like memory makes you who you are. And if you don't have your memory or if your memory is corrupted or manipulatable, then who are you really? And that's a lot of the theme. And, you know, there's elements where characters go back in time and redo things so they avoid tragedies or, you know, don't make mistakes they made the first time around and it changes their lives.

and, you know, it has all sorts of ripples downstream and changes things. And it gets very complicated because then there's multiple chairs and different people are jumping back and forth and trying to erase other people's memories of the chair because they want to control the chair. And it got pretty tangly, pretty quickly. I have a sheet of notes I kept to try to, like, map the timeline of this thing. It was crazy. Wow.

You had to take notes. Oh, yeah. I had to take notes because I want to know, like, wait, is this right? Is he just making this up? Like, I wanted to make sure we were following the rules. For me, it's important. Like, he set up some rules for this universe, whether the physics of it makes any sense at all.

We'll talk about it in a minute. But he set up some rules for this universe. And I want to know that the characters are constrained by those rules. You know, like, you won't actually know this at this moment. So you don't know to jump back or you can't erase this other person's memory of the chair because they didn't know it yet or something, you know? You used to get sci-fi writer's nightmare to a new level, Daniel. Now, now they're all imagining,

This is not just reading their books, but like reading it and taking notes. And taking notes. Or I am like the perfect reader. Drawing diagrams. Yes. This guy spent more than a year of his life imagining this universe, taking characters through it really carefully. You know, and I'm sure he prefers to people take his work seriously. They don't just sort of like skim it and go, I don't really understand what's happening, but whatever.

I'm sure it's fine, you know? He probably wants people to deeply engage with it, no? Maybe that's a no. You sounded so sure, but now I know it seems like a question, Daniel. Let's get a little bit more into the science in whether or not it makes sense. And then we'll play the interview with Blake Rouch. But first, let's take a quick break. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport.

The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently, the explosion actually impelled metal glass. The injured were being loaded into ambulances, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism. Law and order, criminal justice system is,

Back. In season two, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly and now I'm seriously suspicious. Well, wait a minute, Sam, maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, it's Back to School Week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her.

Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate. Well, according to this person, this is her boyfriend's former professor, and they're the same age. It's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them. I mean, do you believe him?

Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants. wants them both to meet. So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not? To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, sis, what if I could promise you you never had to listen to a condescending finance, bro, tell you how to manage your money again. Welcome to Brown Ambition. This is the hard part when you pay down those credit cards. If you haven't gotten to the bottom of why you were racking up credit or turning to credit cards, you may just recreate the same problem.

a year from now when you do feel like you are bleeding from these high interest rates i would start shopping for a debt consolidation loan starting with your local credit union shopping around online looking for some online lenders because they tend to have fewer fees and be more affordable listen i am not here to judge it is so expensive in these streets i 100% can see how in just a few months you can have this much credit card debt and it weighs on you it's really easy to just like stick your head in the sand it's nice and dark in the sand even if it's It's scary. It's not going to go away just because you're avoiding it. And in fact, it may get even worse. For more judgment-free money advice, listen to Brown Ambition on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

We're talking about Blake Crouch's book Recursion, in which you can sort of store your memories. When you replay them, you're reliving them. Yeah, you are really there again. Like time travel, but memory travel, sort of. At first glass, it sort of sounds like we just jump into fantasy. But, you know, maybe I'm thinking, you know, maybe there's something about that. Like, what would make this possible? Like, what if we're all just in a simulation, Daniel? And so, you know, when you remember something, you're somehow skipping the software code

that we're, you know, all based on. And somehow you are sort of reliving it. Going into your memories is like hacking the source code of the universe. Yeah, you somehow, like, you know, you cause some kind of, oh, recursion, there you go. And it's how about breaks the code. And somehow the code is not meant to handle that. I guess that requires like some flaw in the coding of the universe. If the simulated universe is correctly coded and accurately coded or well written, you shouldn't be able to break out of it.

Shouldn't be able to break those rules. That's sort of like a breaking of those rules. Right. But you're assuming it's well coded. You're assuming it's well coded. Yeah. I mean, the universe has a hack. Yeah.

And, you know, that's a. an interesting, plausible idea, but it requires basically breaking the rules of that universe or revealing that the universe is a larger one with different rules. I guess that wasn't in the book. He didn't say that the world was a simulation. It wasn't in the book. Also, I'm not sure that would work because you have multiple people with multiple memories and each of them can change the universe. And so it's more of a branching, right? It's not, you can't have one consistent picture of the universe anymore when multiple people can use their experiences to change the external reality. What if it's something like the multiverse, you know?

Because in an infinite multiverse, there are an infinite number of universes. And so there is a universe in which I sort of have the memories of having gone back and you have the memories of me having gone back. Yeah, that's plausible. There could be a multiverse. Of course, we don't know. And it could be that multiverse contains other things that might have happened in our universe. And so it's not that you're actually going back to your memory, but you're like jumping to another version of the universe that's a little bit. bit different. And that that's plausible. But then the question is like, well, how are you getting there?

And how is it that remembering that somehow gets you to the right location there? There's this, you need a connection somehow between what's happening in your brain and what's happening in the external reality. You know, normally, just thinking about something doesn't change what's happening out there, right? I can think there's ice cream on my counter. I can really imagine it doesn't make ice cream appear on my counter. At least, I've tried it a bunch of times and it's never work. You try it every day. All right.

Well, it sounds like a pretty interesting premise for a book. And just to kind of get you to think about memories and, you know, I guess it's sort of a mix of like a time travel story where you sort of wonder what you would do differently and how you can hack that and affect other people. But it maybe also has this layer of like thinking about your memories and what makes you you and, you know, what if someone changed your memory, right? Yeah. And there's a lot of nice things to say about this book. like it's really fun to read. It's exhilarating. Blade Crouch is really good at writing fast-paced, exciting stuff. Like, I'm turning the pages. I want to know what happens next. And there's not a slow moment. Like, there's stuff happening. And I definitely finished this book. That was not going to be a

problem for me. And you're right, he's created a universe where there are new rules and those tell you different things about the characters, right? What does it like to have this option? Would you rather go back and relive this stuff or just make the same mistakes? Lots of really fascinating questions to answer there. So that was really fun. But, you know, I feel like there's there's a layer of the science that could have been, you know, handled a little bit more deeply. Like, you know, this question of can you really control your external reality from your memories bothered me a little bit because, you know, if we all believe in one external reality, how do we each individually control it, right? There's a lot of conflicts there. Like, can I change the reality, but you can also change the reality?

Like, how many realities are there? Are we jumping into different multiversis or the same one? that whole bit was kind of confusing to me. There's sort of the question of whether we are all in the same reality, right? Well, there is sort of a deep philosophical question. Like, I know that I'm in my reality, and I don't know if the external reality exists at all. But from that point of view, you're all just in my reality. And there's no way that if you sit in a chair should somehow change where I am and what I know

and what my experiences are, right? You sitting in a chair and frying your brain in this machine shouldn't change the universe for me. But in this book, it sort of does. I see. So it's more of a cause and effect. You were you were thrown off by the cause and effect that the rules in his universe seem to follow. Yeah. And I wasn't 100% sure that it was always, that it always made sense, you know, like this bit where the memories from the old universe can somehow get transported into the new universe at a certain moment. But, you know, that's fine. He made up some rules. And I think he really did a good job of trying to follow them and telling the stories that came from that. All right. Well, cool. Well, you actually got the chance to talk to Blake. You interviewed him over the phone, right? Or over Skype?

Yeah, I talked to him over Skype, and we had a really fun conversation about the science of his universe and how he thought about it and also about technical consulting with a physicist that he talked to. Oh, interesting. Yeah, he talked to Cliff Johnson,

who we both know at USC, yeah. So we're going to play the interview with you now, and so, Daniel, what can we expect from the interview? Was it fun? It was a lot of fun, and he was a great sport answering, you know, what you might consider grumpy questions

about physics from basically nobody. And, you know, for those of you who don't know, Blake Crouch is not just some random guy. He's a New York Times bestselling author. And so he doesn't have to take his time and answer people's questions about his work, but he was nice enough to do so. So thank you, Blake, very much for taking your time to talk to me.

Yeah, thank you. And so here is the interview with Blake Crouch. Hello, Blake, and welcome to the program. Would you introduce yourself to our audience? I'm Blake Crouch, a novelist and screenwriter. I wrote the trilogy, Wayward Pines, and more recently, Dark Matter and Recursion. Well, thanks again for coming on the program. I've been looking forward to talking to you.

But before we dig into your novel, I'd like to ask you a couple of warm-up questions to sort of get to know you a little bit in how you think about science and science fiction. So the first question is, what technology that you see in science fiction would you like to see become real? And the stuff in my books is so disrupting and, you know, it might take your life if you play around with it too much. I can't actually recommend those. But I love like teleporters and things like that. I would love someone also to finally, like, build a tricorder from Star Trek. I happen to know one is actually being contemplated right now. And they're trying to kind of put it together, obviously not on the spectrum of something in Star Trek, but something that you could actually take out.

into the field and immediately diagnose a variety of illnesses just by a scan. I don't know. I think that's, I think that'd be pretty cool. On the topic of Star Trek, I have a philosophy question for you. So where do you land on whether Star Trek transporters actually move you from place to place or whether they disassemble you, kill you, and create a clone somewhere else? Oh, I think they kill you and create a clone somewhere else. Yeah, for sure.

And yet you still like to see them become reality? Would you be willing to use a teleporter? I would, yeah, absolutely. To not have to engage in commercial airline travel, absolutely. Would be worth death? It would be worth death, yeah. And maybe worse. This is really fascinating stuff, but let's take a quick break.

We'll be right back for the rest of Blake Crouch's interview. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys. Then, at 6.33 p.m., everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Apparently the explosion actually impelled metal glass. The injured were being loaded into ambulances, just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new kind of enemy emerged, and it was here to stay. Terrorism.

Law and Order Criminal Justice System is back. In Season 2, we're turning our focus to a threat that hides in plain sight. That's harder to predict and even harder to stop. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious. Oh, wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit.

Well, Dakota, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend has been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now, he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Now, hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That sounds totally inappropriate. Well, according to this person, this is her boyfriend's former professional.

and they're the same age. And it's even more likely that they're cheating. He insists there's nothing between them. I mean, do you believe him? Well, he's certainly trying to get this person to believe him because he now wants them both to meet. So, do we find out if this person's boyfriend really cheated with his professor or not? To hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

Hola, it's Honey German, and my podcast, Grasasas Come Again, is back. This season, we're going even deeper, into the world of music and into the world. With raw and honest conversations with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition? No, I didn't audition. I haven't audition in like over 25 years. Oh, wow. That's a real G-talk right there.

Oh, yeah. We've got some of the biggest actors, musicians, content creators, and culture shifters, sharing their real stories of failure and success. You were destined to be a start. We talk all about what's viral and trending with a little bit of chisement, a lot of laughs and those amazing vivras you've come to expect. And of course, we'll explore deeper topics dealing with identity, struggles, and all the issues affecting our Latin community.

You feel like you get a little whitewash because you have to do the code switching? I won't say whitewash because at the end of the day, you know, I'm me. Yeah. But the whole pretending and code, you know, it takes a toll on you. Listen to the new season of Grasas Has Come Again as part of My Cultura Podcast Network on the IHartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Let's talk about your book, Recursion. In my mind, the core concept of this novel, the idea that you built this story around,

is this concept of vividly reimagining a memory and then having the universe actually take you there, like time traveling to the moment the memory was created. Is that a fair description of the core nugget of the story scientifically? It is. It is the notion of, you know, remembering something so vividly and essentially just being transported back into this memory by some quantum or time-associated phenomenon that maybe we're not 100% sure of what it is. when I was working on the back half of the book, I kind of was trying to play around with notions of what it might be. And, you know, there's some talk of wormholes, especially tiny little wormholes and getting sucked into other dimensions, just little portals into these old, old memories. Yeah, that is the true conceit. I really don't think of the

book as a time travel novel. I think of it very much as a memory travel. One of the things I came away with, just, it wasn't even so much from the research or anything that I stumbled across it was just more from living in this space for several years where memory was such the focus I know I just started to think of of memory as being in some ways maybe more fundamental than time and we have these things like we have time and and we have matter we have space and we look at these in sort of isolation but I said I try to look at them as what is the underlying feature that gives rise to it in other words like if we think about consciousness if And I subscribe to like what Max Teckmark says, where an infinite complexity gives rise to consciousness.

So what is the thing that is giving rise to the to the notion or to the illusion of time? Memory seemed to fit that bill really, really neatly. Then in your book, you take it one step further because it's not just an exploration of what you remember and who you are. It's a journey into that memory, literally physically transported into those moments. What made you take that extra step? Did you start from the story you wanted to tell, and that's sort of the science fiction bit you needed? Or did you start from what would happen if you could do this cool science fiction thing and then find the story? With recursion and with most of my books, they don't start with the character.

It doesn't start really with a setting. It starts with a notion of a kind of a very large concept. When I had finished Dark Matter, I was like, I want to do something else big. I started thinking, like, what is like the most sort of fundamental element of humanity and not just humanity, but consciousness? And I just kept coming back and back to the idea of memory, because you can take a lot of things away from us. I mean, you take our bodies away. And theoretically, if we have some mechanism to upload us to the cloud, we could still be us. You take a lot of things away from us.

But if you take away our memories, you really start taking away identity. and you start taking away the notion really of time itself. When I kind of landed upon just the idea of memory as the central core of the novel, I knew that that's what I wanted to do. Early on, I didn't know that I would have my characters actually returning to a memory and sort of living their life forward again from that point. That came a bit later. Because that's quite a leap, right?

It makes a lot of sense to imagine exploring your memories and to think about how your memory is to find who you are and, you know, that's quite rich and fascinating. But then to say that your memory is reality and if you change your memory, you can change your external reality, that's a big leap. So let me ask you if you believe in an external reality beyond like your experience of it. In other words, would the universe be here if we weren't here to experience it? Are you saying that the universe is here because we observe it and without our observation? it doesn't exist.

It seems to me that your book is suggesting that because it makes this connection between memory and reality. If you change your memory in your book, you actually change the external reality. I guess I do believe that. I'm not sure I've ever explicitly thought of it in those terms.

But as you say it, yeah, that it lines up exactly with sort of just the general theory and worldview that I put forward in both dark matter and recursion. I mean, consciousness is so weird. unbelievably weird. The idea that it kind of our consciousness is the engine behind giving life and breath to the universe. And if you take us out of it, what does that look like? Or if you take

any sort of conscious entity out of it, does it still exist? Yeah, I mean, that is what I'm basically writing about over and over again. It's fascinating. And it's a question that's deep and important, but also difficult to probe scientifically. I mean, how do you do the experiment of a universe without observers. You literally cannot observe that experiment. Once AI becomes truly sentient and we can start having AI almost be a stand-in for this, maybe we can start to get around that. We can ask the AI philosophers to chime in on that question. Yeah, or we, you know, there's some experiment you can use where, you know, once you have, you know, I think synthetic or digital consciousness is the same thing. I don't think it's any less than bio-consciousness.

So maybe down the road we get some truly digital scintiate beings and there's some experiments to be had. This is the concept that I had a bit of struggle with digesting when I was reading the book, the idea that if there's an external universe, how can me remembering something different change that external universe? How can I influence the facts out there just by thinking about things. It made me wonder, how do you think about the physics of it? Do you try to limit yourself to the physics of our universe in your book? Or did you think, hey, there's a spectrum of different universes that might exist. This could happen in some universe. Another way to ask this is, what are the laws of physics in your universe? Well, I knew or suspected I was maybe infringing on

some of the laws of like creation and destruction of matter. Theoretically, people, could be going back into their memories as often as they use this uh you know the chair then they're kind of creating a new universe at the point in which they returned so you know it's described in the book that sort of the universe that they leave becomes this dead timeline it's kind of grayed out noir atmospheric thing that is sort of like i don't know how what you call it matter um in state in pure stasis it's probably in a universe where the laws of physics are a little different than ours is because I am technically creating kind of a lot of new matter each time, right? And so how deeply did you think about the laws of physics of that universe

and try to apply them consistently, or did you sort of leave some of those details aside? Well, I thought about it to a point. The whole notion of dark matter, dark matter, not the book, but dark matter and dark energy, it's still so unknown and it's still so speculative. I feel like it gives sci-fi novelists like me a little bit of cover to mess with what we think of as the laws of physics.

Good point. I mean, like, what's the other 96% or whatever it is of unobservable matter that's out there? Are those other universes, other worlds, other dimensions wrapped up in themselves where matter is a fraction of itself out here? I don't know. Well, that's certainly a fair point. I think there's a lot we don't know about this universe. And so a lot of questions remain about what the laws of physics actually are and what they

allow. Speaking of which, I see in the acknowledgments that you worked with Cliff Johnson as a consultant. I have great respect for him, of course, as a colleague. But tell me, what was that like for you? Did he shoot out a bunch of stuff? Or did he give you ideas? What's it like to work with a science consultant? He's so fantastic.

He also did work on Dark Matter with me. So there's this thing called the Science and Entertainment Exchange. And it puts people like me and screenwriters and showrunners in touch with people like Clifford, who it gives you a subject matter expert who is attuned to working in the entertainment industry which means they're not coming in to just break down what you've created they're trying to help you take in the spirit of what you want to do and make it as plausible as possible so yeah with recursion i finished my first draft without basically telling him at all what was going on and then we had a phone call and i was like here's kind of what's happening i'd love to just send you the book

And then you hit me back with, you know, anything that you think you can improve on or that I'm completely off base. And he helped me a lot with the technology behind the memory retrieval process. And he also helped me a little skirt some of the speculation of how someone might return to the memory because there's some talk deep into the book about wormholes, black holes. I can't remember. I think I took out white hole. I honestly don't remember if that's there anymore.

He gave some suggestions for how to talk about it. much more plausible, not getting anyone's backup kind of ways. All right, so he was okay with creating entire universes. Yes. All right, great. Well, again, thank you, Blake, very much for your time and for coming on our podcast to answer our rather nitpicky physics questions. It's been a pleasure.

Of course. All right, pretty fun interview with Blake Crouch there, the author of Recursion, which is a sci-fi novel. And so, Daniel, what were some of your takeaways, from talking to Blake. I thought he made a lot of really good points. You know, he clearly thought about the universe he was creating, and he thought about it sort of up to a point.

He didn't worry about whether physicists today had an idea for how this might actually happen. He was like, you know, here are the rules, and I'm going to tell the story. And I was also impressed with the point he made that, like, we don't know much about what's going on in the universe. As we like to say on this podcast all the time, there's a lot about the universe we don't know. And so did he throw you off a little bit when he said that? where you like, oh, I have to concede that point. I was happy to concede that.

I love that point about the universe that we don't know what's going on. And as I said earlier, that's one of the roles of science fiction authors to imagine what else is in those gaps and to be creative about it, to think outside the bounds of what sort of academia is considering. And so absolutely that's wonderful. And I also really enjoyed hearing about his experience talking to Cliff and what that's like to try to incorporate the comments from a real working physicist. into your fiction universe. I wonder if a lot of what you take away from these sci-fi novels has to do with the language, Daniel.

Like, I feel like, you know, if it wasn't called science fiction and maybe it was called speculative fiction and, you know, maybe didn't use some of the same words that you use in your work in real science, you would maybe, you know, enjoy this book a little bit more and just be more open in your disbelieve and just going along for the ride. I can't tell if that's a question or a suggestion. But, you know, I also like fantasy novels, and the ones I like the most are the ones where they think careful about what the rules are. You know, like Robert Jordan, his world, he has magic, and that magic follows rules, which means, like, you can cast the spell in these moments, but you can't in those other moments. Okay. I think I'm getting more of a sense here, Daniel.

It's all about the rules for you. Well, look, I'm a physicist. My entire goal in life is to figure out what are the rules of the universe, because it's those rules that constrain our lives. Why can't I go to Alpha Centauri right now? Because there's a rule against that. Otherwise, I would totally be there. So it's all about bumping up against the rules and figuring out how they constrain the stories we tell and the lives we live. So if we find out that the universe doesn't have consistent rules, Daniel. Are we going to be critiquing it on our podcast as well?

Yeah, right. I'm going to talk to the creator of the universe and give him my notes or her my notes or it. On the podcast, Daniel talks to God, bestselling author of The Universe. Daniel's got some. And its sequel, the other universe. The universe without Daniel after God deletes me for making comments. God, why isn't the universe hard science fiction? Anyway, to wrap up about Blake Crouches Recursion is a totally fun book.

If you're really interested in sort of like fast-moving stories with cool technology that take place in other universes, I really recommend it. I wouldn't consider it like the hardest of science fiction. It's not like Alastair Reynolds that really, delves deeply into the physics underlying the story, but he did a good job of making it consistent and telling a fun story sort of within that universe. But thank you to Blake Crouch for coming on the program. It's great to hear from him and learn from him, and it's great to think about the ideas in his book, about memory and about time travel.

Yeah, so it's a lot of fun. Thank you very much, Blake. All right, we hope you enjoyed that. See you next time. you still have a question after listening to all these explanations, please drop us a line. We'd love to hear from you. You can find us at Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at Daniel and Jorge, that's one word, or email us at Feedback at danielandhorpe.com.

Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. December 29th, 1975, LaGuardia Airport. The holiday rush, parents hauling luggage, kids gripping their new Christmas toys.

Then, everything changed. There's been a bombing at the TWA terminal. Just a chaotic, chaotic scene. In its wake, a new, kind of enemy emerged. Terrorism. Listen to the new season of Law and Order Criminal Justice System on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My boyfriend's professor is way too friendly, and now I'm seriously suspicious.

Wait a minute, Sam. Maybe her boyfriend's just looking for extra credit. Well, Dakota, luckily, it's back to school week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, my boyfriend's been hanging out with his young professor a lot. He doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't trust her. Now he's insisting we get to know each other, but I just want her gone. Hold up. Isn't that against school policy? That seems inappropriate. Maybe find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, it's Honey German, and I'm back with season two of my podcast.

Grazias, come again. We got you when it comes to the latest in music and entertainment with interviews with some of your favorite Latin artists and celebrities. You didn't have to audition? No, I didn't audition. I haven't auditioned in like over 25 years. Oh, wow. That's a real G-talk right there. Oh, yeah.

We'll talk about all that's viral and trending with a little bit of cheesement and a whole lot of laughs. And, of course, the great Vibras you've come to expect. Listen to the new season of Dresses Come Again on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an I-Heart podcast.