Episode 01 - Why It's Pointless to Start a Podcast in a Pandemic

In the first “real” episode Jeff and Darron consider the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their Beautiful Illusions project, and how it makes explicit some of the major ideas they had already planned to explore prior to its occurrence. They discuss the way the reality we perceive is mediated, the effect this has on our perception of what is “normal”, and how the ongoing pandemic strips away certain layers of reality that we had perhaps taken for granted, which makes dealing with the implications of COVID-19 and aligning around solutions that much harder.

Notes:

• 2:33 - See article by Alissa Wilkinson published by Vox on April 13, 2020: “No one can opt out of this pandemic. And that will change us forever.” 

• 9:17 - See article by Charles Yu published by The Atlantic on April 15, 2020: “The Pre-pandemic Universe Was the Fiction”

• 11:25 - The Michelle Obama Podcast “Protests and the Pandemic with Michele Norris” - Michelle Obama’s guest was Michele Norris, a journalist who currently writes an opinion column for the Washington Post, and formerly hosted from 2002 to 2011 NPR’s evening news program “All Things Considered” (not “Morning Edition” as I erroneously stated in the show). Notably, Norris was the first African-American female host of the show. 

• 20:41 - For more on “Dunbar’s Number” see “Social network size in humans” and “Optimising human community sizes” - Also of interest, “The human socio-cognitive niche and its evolutionary origins”

• 29:57 - See “New IHME COVID-19 Forecasts See Nearly 300,000 Deaths by December” from The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) 

• 32:48 - See “Dumped Milk, Smashed Eggs, Plowed Vegetables: Food Waste of the Pandemic” from The New York Times, April 10, 2020

• 41:29 - See book by Yuval Noah Harari - 21 Lessons for the 21st Century

• 46:26 - See article “Hundreds of thousands in CT lose power as Isaias’ winds topple trees, wires” from The Connecticut Post, August 4, 2020 and “PURA to investigate Eversource and UI’s preparation for and response to Isaias” from the WTNH News 8 website, August 5, 2020

This episode was recorded in September 2020

Jeff and Darron consider the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Beautiful Illusions project, and how it makes explicit some of the major ideas they had already planned to explore prior to its occurrence.

Episode 00 - Introducing Beautiful Illusions

Jeff and Darron ponder the intersection of reality, consciousness, and culture through conversations that comprise an ongoing attempt to construct meaning by exploring art and science, develop understanding of the context underpinning our current moment in time, and imagine possible futures for human civilization. No expertise here, just two guys who enjoy learning, thinking, and talking about big ideas, deep questions, and the “beautiful illusion” that is the subjective human experience. In this introduction to Beautiful Illusions we lay out some of the major ideas, questions, and thinking that have led to the development of the project, discuss what Beautiful Illusions means to us, and we introduce a few areas of thought that will be further expounded upon in future episodes.

Show Notes:

• 1:46 - Friedrich Nietzsche’s concept of the Overman (Superman, or Ubermensch) as presented in the prologue of Thus Spake Zarathustra: “I TEACH YOU THE SUPERMAN. Man is something that is to be surpassed. What have ye done to surpass man? All beings hitherto have created something beyond themselves: and ye want to be the ebb of that great tide, and would rather go back to the beast than surpass man? What is the ape to man? A laughing-stock, a thing of shame. And just the same shallman be to the Superman: a laughing-stock, a thing of shame.”

• 2:40 - Jean Baudrillard , Hyperreality, and Simulacra and Simulation

• 4:56 - “Of 2 Minds: How Fast and Slow Thinking Shape Perception and Choice” from Scientifc American, excerpted from Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (book overview from Wikipedia)

Jeff & Darron ponder the intersection of reality, consciousness, and culture through conversations that comprise an ongoing attempt to construct meaning by exploring art and science, develop understanding of the context underpinning our current moment in time, and imagine possible futures for human civilization.