Episode 237: Glitches Ain't Shit

Very Bad Wizards

Tamler Sommers & David Pizarro

Society & Culture, Philosophy

4.8 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 24 May 2022

⏱️ 103 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

David and Tamler explore the many variations of simulation theory, the view that our universe is just a computer generated model created by an advanced civilization that has reached “technological maturity.” What does the growing popularity of simulation theories reveal about contemporary life? Are any of the arguments for simulation theory compelling or are they just post-hoc ways of justifying what you already believe on faith? If we are living in a simulation, does that mean we can go around killing people? Would it change anything about how we should live? Rodney Ascher’s (Room 237, The Nightmare) excellent documentary "A Glitch in the Matrix" gets the discussion going.

Plus the return of the VBW does conceptual analysis segment - a careful, rigorous, systematic inquiry into the concept “cringe.”*

*Note: if you think the opening segment is itself cringe, that’s because we’re doing seventh dimensional Zoomer meta shit and you just didn’t get it.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Very bad wizards is a podcast with a philosopher, my dad, and a psychologist, Dave Pizarro,
0:05.9	having an informal discussion about issues and signs and ethics.
0:09.3	Please note that the discussion contains bad words that I'm out of love to say,
0:13.6	and knowing my dad some very inappropriate jokes.
0:17.0	Yeah, because you're searching for perfection, and perfection is the enemy of perfectly
0:21.4	at all. That's the bar here. Add a quid.
0:51.4	Welcome to very bad wizards. I'm Tamler Summers from the University of Houston, Dave.
1:16.9	I mean, when you think about it, how do we know we're not in the matrix?
1:26.8	I thought of a really terrible answer, but that'll have to wait for the main segment, I guess.
1:32.4	We never will. I mean, I don't know. Have you ever had deja vu?
1:38.9	You know what that is? It's a glitch.
1:41.9	It's like glitch on that matrix. I'm trying to think. So the matrix was the very first movie
1:50.0	that I ever purchased on DVD, and I was so excited, and it was so cool, and it's just not that cool anymore, is it?
1:58.2	People think it's still cool. I have never, like, this is a somewhat, I guess at this point,
2:03.9	almost embarrassing admission, I probably had, took it as a matter of pride before, but I've never
2:08.7	watched the whole matrix. I keep trying to start it, and I give up halfway through, through
2:14.7	two-thirds of the way through. Actually, what we're going to talk about in the main segment,
2:19.6	which is simulation theory, the strange attractions people have towards it, and then this
2:25.0	documentary by Rodney Asher called the glitch in the matrix, and that made me appreciate the matrix
2:31.2	more than trying to watch it every single time. Because it got at the griminess of it.
2:39.2	I didn't fully think I appreciated that aspect of the matrix enough.
2:44.1	I think we've talked about this before, but I think if you didn't watch it within the sort of like
	...

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