Episode Description

This one has a lot of bits sprinkled in. Here is some more info:

• 1:00 – Difference between a toad and a frog? - Toads crawl, frogs hop. Frogs are smooth, toads are warty. Toads are poisonous, frogs are not.
• 5:00 – Sketch-to-human machine learning lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN7Ydx9ygPo&ab_channel=ScottEaton
• 10:00 – Text-to-image does exist and you can play around with DeepAI’s open access model: https://deepai.org/machine-learning-model/text2img
• 13:00 – Vid2Game was the controllable self-in-video game model: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.08379.pdf - The controllable character is created from video sequences, not from single images like we said, but still would be possible to try with yourself.
• 17:00 – A good video summarising procedural atmospheric effects: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxfEbulyFcY
• 33:30 – More on Fermi Paradox: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox. At one point Fermi Paradox and the Drake Equation were confused. But they are related as discussed on the linked page.
• 37:00 – The astrobiology lecturer is Charles Cockell and this is the specific lecture we mention: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kdra3ap5TU
• 38:00 – Nearest star system, Proxima Centauri, is 4.2 light-years away (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxima_Centauri)
• 42:00 – Radio waves do travel at the speed of light in a vacuum (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_wave).
• 46:00 – We forgot to mention the name of this “favourite book.” It is A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge.
• 48:00 – The relevant book is The Clockwork Rocket by Greg Egan (details and derivations on the physics of the “Orthogonal” universe: https://www.gregegan.net/ORTHOGONAL/ORTHOGONAL.html).
• 50:00 – We are referring to the “Allegory of the Cave” by Plato (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_cave). The allegory is that our perceptions are similar to humans chained facing a wall their whole life and only perceive the motions of the shadows projected onto the wall in front of them by the fire behind them. This is their entire reality and they create meaning from it.
• 52:00 – More on Boltzmann Brain: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain
• 1:08:30 – Effective altruism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism