Episode 125

The tenth and final episode in a series discussing free will with Mark Taylor. Mark brings up Yuval Noah Harari's book Homo Deus in connection with the evolution of artificial intelligence, and how potential AI treatment of humans ties in with the ethics around human treatment of animals. We then get back to Peter Godfrey-Smith's writings on the octopus mind, arguably the closest thing to an "alien" consciousness we can encounter on this planet. I bring in Terence McKenna's ideas about octopus communication and psychedelics before we wrap things up by contemplating whether octopuses (not octopi!) have free will. This episode has an extended Moment of Ecological Wonderment featuring commentary from McKenna himself.

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• Yuval Noah Harari
• Y.N. Harari, Sapiens: A brief history of humanity (2014 book)
• Y.N. Harari, Homo Deus: A brief history of tomorrow (2016 book)
• animal rights
• artificial intelligence
• futurology
• cuteness
• empathy
• Peter Godfrey-Smith
• P. Godfrey-Smith, Other Minds: The octopus, the sea, and the deep origins of consciousness (2016 book)
• Peter Godfrey-Smith TED talk on octopus minds
• octopus nervous system
• octopus evolution
• convergent evolution of eyes
• belemnites
• Terence McKenna
• Terence McKenna on octopus visual communication
• compatibilism