Yeah, it's interesting, right? Because sometimes you can feel like the physical sensation of being anxious is like really unpleasant. But then when you think about it, it's sort of it's really similar to feeling excited, right? Yeah.
Yeah. It's kind of the body's way of telling you to be ready. Yeah, we're so catching up with what is actually worth being nervous about and what's not. So, yeah, yeah, yes. Okay. I'd first like to acknowledge the Jagera and Turrbal people as the Traditional Custodians of Meanjin, from where I record today, as well as the Boonwurrung and Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation, from where my guest Grace chan joins us this morning. I pay my respects to Elders past, present, and emerging.
Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. I'm chatting today with Grace Chan. Grace is an award winning speculative fiction writer. She writes about brains, minds and space. Her debut novel every Version of You won The University of Sydney's People's Choice Award and was shortlisted for the New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards and The Age's 'Book of the Year'. It was longlisted for the Stella
Prize and Indie Book Awards. Her short fiction can be found in Clarkesworld, Escape Pod, Going Down Swinging, and many other places. Many of Grace's short stories have been shortlisted for the Aurealis Awards, Australia's premier speculative fiction awards, her story 'As Though I Were A Little Sun' winning Best Science Fiction Short Story in 2022. In her other life, she works as a psychiatrist. Welcome, Grace Chan.
Thank you so much for having me, Krystle. It's a it's really cool to be here.
I've been so excited for this chat for the longest time.
Oh, that's so nice. And thank you for the kind introduction. I'm really excited to chat about science fiction and cool science with you today.
Yes, me too. First, I just thought I'd give a bit of background on my experience with reading Every Version of You. I think things like books and music - in my experience anyway - they've always found me at the right time in my life. So there have been certain genres of music or bands that I might not have connected with maybe two years prior. And then when I go back, I go, 'Oh, okay, I get it now'. You know, I admit, I didn't actually think I liked speculative fiction and sci fi.
I think it's that I just didn't get it. And I don't think I had found the right fiction. So when I read Every Version of You, it's so person-centred and character-driven - which some of my sci fi enthusiast friends, they've mentioned that sci fi is very... it's like, the environment is its own character. And it's very plot driven. And it's about world building, and then the the characters kind of... they're sort of tools in that. And your short stories, and Every Version
of You is very different. I also have to admit that this is one of the hardest books I've ever had to read. It's... and I've read Ulysses! (laughing) And I don't, I don't mean that in that it's - it's not a dense book. And it's not particularly... it uses simple language, it's very accessible, very relatable, you know, the characters are
well-drawn and vivid. It's honestly taken me over two months to read it, because every time I would open it up, I would find myself, essentially, bursting into tears, because it just touched on so many nerves. That's a complete compliment, by the way! Because there was just so much in it that I could relate to, in my personal life, and even, broadly speaking, a lot of contemporary issues. The book forced me to go away and
reflect a lot. And I really did have to sort of close it and come back to it when I was ready to, sort of, feel a lot again when I would sit down, so - I do want to say thank you for that because I've spent a lot of my life kind of avoiding a lot of that stuff, in a way. I do recall you mentioning that your experience and writing Every Version of You was... perhaps the most difficult parts were writing about Tao Yi and her mother. We should probably introduce the characters so -
Yeah, I mean, I want I just want to say thank you for, like, spending so much time with the book and taking the time to read it with such care. I think that's such an honour, to hear a reader do that. And, you know, when I wrote this book, certainly, I mean, it's so interesting to hear you talk about, you know, things arriving in your life at certain stages. And I think that very much applies to writing projects and creative projects, as well,
right? They're sort of, the sort of things that reflect where we're at, in certain years, or who we are at certain periods of our lives. And Every Version of You, certainly falls into that category. I was, like, trying to work through so many thoughts and feelings of my own as I, as I wrote the book, and those sorts of feelings changed and transformed as I worked on the book as well. So yeah, it's really cool to hear that it inspired thoughts and feelings in in, in you as you read it. Yeah.
I think having said that, it's quite interesting that the descriptions of the book - you describe it as, well, the story is about 'staying in love after mind-uploading into virtual reality', which struck me as quite... almost like a tongue-in-cheek oversimplification? (laughs) of what it's about. I feel like maybe that was on purpose. Because...
(smiling) Yeah, I think at that stage I'd been so,
The picture you've painted for the... what's you know, how you're... after you write the book, you're supposed to try and summarise it into, you know, a half a page synopsis and then come up with an 'elevator pitch' for the book. I think by that point, I was so tired of trying to think the term? I want to say 'flesh world'? Or sort of like the of an elevator pitch for the book, I decided to come up with something a little bit tongue-in-cheek. So that's where
'staying in love after mind-uploading into virtual reality', because I think it does touch on some of the core elements of the book, like staying in love. It is, at its heart, a relationship drama, in many ways. The relationship between Tao-Yi and Navin is the physical world, the physical environment - emotional core of the book, and the way that they both change and their relationship changes as well throughout the course of the novel. And then the mind uploading into virtual reality.
Well, that that's the 'sci fi' part of the book that I really
(laughs) 'Meatspace'? wanted to embrace. You know, I wanted to show that sci fi can often - many sci fi writers write - I mean, there's a whole spectrum of science fiction. I think there's science fiction
'Meatspace', yeah!
I think I stole that from 'the internets'. that's much more plot-driven, and worldbuilding-heavy. And then there's science fiction that is much more, that is also very character driven and theme focused. And yeah, I really wanted to sort of pay 'homage' to science fiction and all the things that it can can do in terms of making you think about life and what it means to be a human.
So it's essentially set in Melbourne in the future, and 'Gaia', which is sort of a virtual-reality space... perhaps we won't go too much into it, because I think another powerful thing about these kinds of novels is people will bring so much of their own meaning to these books and their own, sort of, whatever they're passionate about, or whatever is sort of sentient to them at the time - I think is going to come through when they read a book
like this. And so put simply, Melbourne is sort of a reflection of the devastation of climate change. And people have adapted to that. And Gaia offers people, to some degree, a diversion from that. While they're in Gaia, they can work, eat, play - and not have to worry about their physical bodies in 'meatspace'. I think what I really wanted to touch on more is some of the ideas that come through in the book - many of which have come up before in
your short stories. A lot of these have to do with identity, self, evolution of self, consciousness, life trajectories, even heritage. These are powerful themes, and it's clear from your history of short stories that, you know, these are themes that you've explored for a very long time.
Is it, is this something that you, sort of, consciously introduced to Every Version of You in terms of, you know, you're kind of like, 'These are the themes that I want to explore', and then, 'This is the setting in which I choose to explore them'? Or is that, sort of, so integral to your writing process? That it's...
Yeah, yeah. I like that you touched on one aspect, at the start of what you said, which is that this novel is not meant to be prescriptive - like, I didn't want it to advocate for a certain point of view, or be, you know, push a certain... push a certain perspective. I really wanted to open it up to the reader to draw their personal
meaning from the story. And make meaning of whatever element of the story speaks most to them, whether it's like, the relationship with technology, or the grief of, you know, the environment collapsing, or the elements of migration or family stories that are lost along the
way. So that was a big thing that was important to me not to... to present, like, a multiplicity of responses, like, through the characters that I used, and to leave it really open to the reader to draw their own conclusions from the story. So I'm honoured that you touched
on that. I think that there's both conscious and unconscious themes that I try to work with in my writing; certainly, with stories like Every Version of You, and with many of my short stories, there is an intentionality, like there's often a, a theme or something that I'm grappling with, that I really want to explore. It's often... I often turn to something science fiction to help me explore that, for some reason - my brain just gets
wired that way. So certainly, when I was coming up with the idea for Every Version of You, I was thinking a lot about impermanence, right? Like, the fact that, oh, my goodness, you know, our lives are so brief. And the experiences that we have are so brief. And even the people that we are - like, I believe that we change so much during the course of our lives.
I think we're very different, you know, as children, as adolescentsm, as adults, and I think we do change a lot to the point that we are almost many different 'selves' throughout our lives - I feel that. And our relationships change as well, in the way we, you know, we attach and bond with the important people in our lives - parents, lovers - that also really transforms, and so I was grappling, I think, with the sadness and the grief of that change - that nothing... nothing
lasts. But also, I think the way the creative project of working on this novel was a way for me to sort of immortalise that, to share that - that impermanence is also something that is precious, and in a way, lends meaning to the human experience. And so contrasting that impermanence, somewhat with, like, the digital permanent utopia of Gaia, and the possibility of, you know, immortality and a completely different kind of existence with
the digital beings. That was an interesting way to play with different... you know, what it means to be human. So, absolutely, like, impermanence was a big theme that was semi-conscious, when I was, you know, drawing together the core elements of this novel. And then I think a lot of other themes worked their way into the book - probably unconsciously - like, I think a lot of the relationship between Tao-Yi and Xin-Yi, her mother, and their story of my creation and the family history
there. I think a lot of those elements just came more subconsciously as I... as I got to know the characters and got to know their, their stories. So yeah, I think that a lot of myself went into the novel. And I think a lot of the themes... it changed and grew as I worked on it over, over a period of a few years, as well it - it took on different versions of its own (laughs) I know that sounds very cheesy - but it changed and grew.
I mean, and you can tell, I think, that, you know, it did evolve over time, even just how the characters engage and Tao-Yi's reflections on where she is with work and her relationship with Navin. And that is something that, I think, besides the mother-daughter relationship - which was really hard for me to read, because it really did make me think a lot about my own mother, who was a Filipino immigrant, and, sort of, also struggled a lot with
mental illness. So it was really hard to not, sort of, identify with that. With the other relationship between Tao-Yi and Navin - the grief was so... I mean, it's a different grief. But the grief was so evident there, which I think was really interesting thing to explore is, is Tao-Yi's grief that Navin is changing, that their
relationship is changing. And I think that's a very real fear in relationships - something that perhaps not a lot of people even consciously think about - is how scary it is for someone that you love, to change, or to surprise you. Because we create this narrative of a person and we think we know them, and then, when they do something that... in contrast to that, it can be so confronting, and it brings about a lot of anxiety, I think.
I think, too, it challenged my expectations in terms of - I'm not going to, I'm not going to do any spoilers - but it challenged my expectations in terms of what I believed the conclusion of the novel may be, particularly based purely on the title. So, bravo for that! I thought that was very cool. I like it when when I'm challenged.
I'm glad that there was still a bit of, like, 'suspense' around what the ending would be in terms of their relationship. And it was, like... it was fun to write their relationship - I feel like we don't see that many stories where we see a relationship that has been in place for many, many years already, and we see that relationship, change and grow apart. And the struggles, like,
within that relationship. So I thought it was interesting, like, it was challenging and interesting to write about that - a relationship that was already very well-established. And the two people had already kind of grown around each other
for many years. So I did still get to write, like, fun and more exciting parts in flashback scenes where they (smiling) meet and they fall in love, but it was much 'meatier' and much, much more rewarding, actually, to write the latter stages of their relationship, yeah.
And you convey so much in so many of the little things they say and don't say to each other, or the things, you know, in the in the body language or mannerisms or... I felt that how you packed so much into this book was partly due to how much you could pack into 'the little things' that happened between Tao-Yi and Navin, and also when they were present with each other or not present with each other physically, or mentally,
spiritually. I really enjoyed reading Tao-Yi's sensory experience of Navin - I thought that was so powerful. Because that, and a lot of those memories - some of which she's able to access in a 'technical' sense, which is, which was a very cool spin on remembering - these are things that you... you almost don't notice until you've lost someone. And it was really something to, to read about the the way a person smiles and the
way a person smells. And those are precious things that I think really comes back to that idea of - part of the reason why life is so precious is because of the fleeting nature of those things and impermanence and that... yeah.
Well, thank you, Krystle. That's so nice. I mean, I know that one of the things that I did a lot in this book was draw on sensory language. I think I did a little bit 'too
much' at times. I know when I was editing, I had to be like, 'Oh, let's not talk about smell and touch tha- again!' So I did fall back on it in the editing process, but I really wanted to like, put the reader into the character's body, so, like, you're there - you're Tao-Yi, you're smelling Navin, and you're feeling what it feels like to feel the, the temperature of the air in Melbourne blasting your skin or, like, the gel of the 'Neupods' sliding into all your private
parts and making you feel icky and squelchy. So, I think sensory language is a very powerful tool. And it can draw on that sense of... it can really, like, use empathy to transport you in- into the character. And I think drawn also, like, elements of body horror as well, which was, o or disquiet or eerieness, or uncanniness. So you can use...
Yeah, I feel like you can use sensation to create really, both subtle emotions, like a subtle sense of dis-ease or unease or, or conversely, a sense of being safe. You know, like when she's around Navin, there's a sense of safety - of coming home. I was thinking a lot about attachment and bodies as well when I was writing this book. And so the relationships that Tao-Yi has with Navin, with her mother - I wanted those relationships to
feel quite 'embodied'. So there's a physicality to them, that is lost, I think, when they go into the digital world. So I'm glad you, you felt that in the relationship.
No, that - I definitely felt that,
(laughs) I love it. particularly when Navin first uploads, and you just feel the
It, well, it just helped... It sort of helped me absence in their little apartment, and Tao-Yi's aimlessness and sort of just filling the time, and one of the griefs that I realised then was that Tao-Yi, in a way, had already 'lost' Navin in some sense before that happened... Perhaps this is a good a good opportunity to talk about bodies, and AI, and
consciousness. Because just in the last three months, there have been so many quite momentous things, in my opinion, that have been happening, that, when I would go through and read, it just made me think about some of the ideas presented in your novel and some of your short fiction. So I actually did sort of like a mini timeline. put in chronological order just how also how quickly this stuff is happening. I was reading about Neuralink - that's Elon Musk's -
- implant, right?
Yes, his implant.
Okay.
Yeah. So from what I can understand, it's no bigger than maybe, like, a five or 10 cent coin. And it has wires that... well initially, kind of - they were more 'tickling' the brain, in a way. So it was an implant, but the wires that are actually inserted don't... I think was three to five millimetres into the brain. And they initially, they sort of admit that some of the issues with that were that a lot of those wires ended up sort of just coming out almost immediately after implant.
(laughing) That's not very reassuring!
Well, the funny thing is, though, that - I read an update recently, and the FDA have just approved... Let me backtrack - I'm getting too excited. So the first Neuralink candidate, a fellow named Noland Arbaugh - he's a paraplegic. And he... well they sort of, I guess, 'live-streamed', they reported, you know, I guess, success with the Neuralink implant. So Noland streamed his playing chess, initially, as sort of like their first public announcement. And then I heard that he played Mario Kart
overnight, also. And then he went on to play other games. And he one of his statements was essentially saying, you know, 'I'm kicking everyone's butt with my mind playing these games', and that's one of his big successes from the Neuralink implant. And the FDA just approved a second human candidate for advancing the Neuralink technology, and that actually means that they will be able to insert those wires
deeper into the brain. I couldn't help but think about this - some of the tenuous correlations between this kind of technology and the 'Neupod' technology in Every Version of You where it's, like, assisted - I don't even know what you'd call it - it was kind of 'assisted living', you know, you're free... particularly the things like... living free of physical ailments, and disability, and that sort of thing. So that was something you explored, mainly through Navin in the novel.
Yeah, yeah. It's always hard to think about medical technology, isn't it? 'Cause - I'm not a Luddite about it - I think that technology is important. We can use technology to benefit people's lives in many ways. And technical, technological advances - super exciting. But also, a technology that implants itself into your brain and interfaces so closely with your brain is pretty scary. And pretty full on, pretty
serious. It's something that needs a lot of thought, before you start doing this to a lot of people. And especially, I think two things - like, who's making the technology? And why Elon Musk? Why is he making this technology? You know, who controls it? Who controls upgrades of it? What data is stored from it? What accesses they have? And then I guess the other side of it is like - which is a bit more, probably a bit more complex is - is it
beneficial? Is it fair? Is this technology something that is helpful for...? Is it something that does good? Is it something that is that helps the person receiving the technology? And I guess that, that is a trickier question, when it comes to medical technology, right? It comes down to the individual who can access the technology, how it's used, what impact it has, how safe it is. So I feel like those kinds of things are really important questions to think
about. And sometimes people can get, I think, like, really caught up in the hype of tech. And, you know, corporations obviously, are in it for profit and have their own motives. And so I think the reason why, I think some of the stories that I write, well, Every Version of You has Gaia, and the Neupods controlled by a corporation - which is supposed to be quite...
vaguely sinister. But it sort of speaks to a future where science and scien... scientific advancement is largely controlled by corporations, which is probably not the future that we want. And so it's... we don't want - I don't want a future where scientific advancement is, sort of, in the hands of people who, whose primary goal is to make money out of it.
Yeah, I should say, I should explain for the listeners that 'Neupods' in Every Version of You are, essentially, the technology where one could immerse their body in a gel that sustains the physical body while a person temporarily uploads their consciousness into the virtual world. So, just to clarify,
Yes it's a bit 'Matrix', isn't it? It's sort of got that cyberpunk feel to it. The gel was supposed to be - I get I get quite geeky in Every Version of You. And even more so in my short stories - I'm really quite a science fiction writer at heart. But yes, the gel is an interface for the virtual world to, to actually, like, interact directly with the person's mind. And so you can pretty much transport yourself directly into, into Gaia by lying in the Neupod.
And, you know, as you were saying, the concerns really lie with who is controlling this technology, who governs this technology, and questions of autonomy and that sort of thing, that you, that you do, you do touch on in the novel because, as you said, if we can only access this kind of technology through these large corporations, how much of that is our choice and within our control? And how much of that is
in someone else's hands? And I think similar thoughts came up concerning Neuralink in terms of if, if someone were to rely on this technology, say, someone paraplegic, how much control do they have over their own experience with that technology? And how much of that is entirely governed remotely? As you said, these are really big questions.
I mean, it's almost a bit like medications, right? Like, you have people take medications, and then they might have been taking it for years. And then perhaps the medication is discontinued, by the company that produces it, because it's maybe not profitable anymore. And so how do they get the medication that they, that was
benefiting them? I guess a similar question could arise with this technology, like if, if you've had the implant, and it's been beneficial for you, what if they don't upgrade it anymore, and they decide to take it away? You know, it's worrying if it's in, sort of, the hands of (laughing) Elon Musk...
- which is terrifying. From the recent interview, when they were sort of explaining Neuralink, there was a neuroscientist sharing his feelings about the Neuralink technology, and he was really excited. Again, it's one of those things where you'd probably have to go digging and see, what is his hand in this? Because I believe that he was the leading neuroscientist on the Neuralink project. So obviously, he's going to endorse it and say, you know, this could
change change lives. And, and he did, he did raise a fair point about how something, like, this was... it being led by someone like Elon Musk, by companies, did put money in medicine and neuroscience - where that tends to be a lot harder to generate. And it was pushing research in a forward direction, which is a really positive thing. But
again, at what cost? (smiling) And interestingly, though, the last report was that over 1000, paraplegics have already signed up for the next phase of trials, whereas I think it was less than half actually qualify for those trials, were they to go ahead, so it'll be interesting -
-that's interesting to hear, yeah. And I'm guessing, like, when you say that he could play chess and he could play Mario Kart - that was done virtually, I'm guessing? Like, he was using his, his brain essentially, to control the chess pieces in a virtual game?
Yeah. So they originally developed the technology - I think what they were doing was... they'd identified parts of the brain... was through a pig originally, they had implanted something similar into a pig's brain and, you know, picked up on the different... what lit up in the brain when the pig was walking or doing different things. So I think they've kind of mapped that over. And they were really just picking up on very fundamental... that's just
movement. But it should be interesting to see where that goes.
I mean, it is exciting in many ways. And I can see why many people with, you know, would be interested to, to access that kind of technology. Yeah.
Yeah. So the next one's April, FKA Twigs - I hope I'm saying that right - a very recognisable figure in music. She was advocating for AI regulation in a speech to the US Senate, and she essentially announced that she had created an AI version of herself. She'd really tweaked it quite finely. And this was with the intention of that AI version of herself engaging with fans and social media, so that she could focus on creating music and art.
Oh, interesting. So she created an AI doppelganger to do the fan-facing work like... (laughing) Yeah, I kind of love that, in a weird way (laughing)
It made me think of your short story, 'He Leaps
- yeah, yeah, yeah - for the Stars, He Leaps for the Stars' with, sort of, a 'Korean popstar' type figure and he's, it's... he lives almost a
- and there are a lot of actors and musical claustrophobic life, and he's bound by his stardom. And, again, I'll link to the story so people can read it for themselves. But I think a lot of it really made me think of that story when I heard that she is, you know, she'd said that - I artists that have already signed documents, sort of advocating thought it was interesting, too, that she was using the AI to engage with the 'people' side of
things. And then she herself was going to remain the creator of her music and her art because, I think her argument was how unregulated AI is currently, is that so many people are able to emulate a voice or even, you know, a style of music. And it's so convincing that people might think that that's a genuine FKA Twigs song - for higher powers to regulate AI for this reason.
It sort of touches on a lot of the hype, a lot of the... I think, hype? But also worry and fear that was kind of going around, around the time that I wrote, 'He Leaps for the Stars, He Leaps for the Stars'. There was a lot of talk around, like, deep fakes and the fakeness of the internet,
really. I feel, like, with AI, and deep fakes technology, there's a sense that reality, or the reality that's presented to us in online spheres - which is so much of our reality now - has lost its truthfulness, its reliability. And it's, you know, I guess it's true, because we can't really rely on, like, the videos that we watch now, or images that we watch now.
There's often times where people will share a picture on social media and people, other people will be like, 'Oh, that's just AI generated', you know, and it can be so difficult to tell to the casual person scrolling past that it is an AI-generated image. So I think there's... it introduces this element of 'fakeness' to the news to everything that we see - it's lost its sense of truth. And it's, I think that's a little
bit terrifying. That deep fake technology can... is becoming so advanced, and AI technology is becoming so advanced, that it can, like, replicate a person, personality, or create a video of the President speaking that is not actually the President. So I think I wrote this story as a sort of antidote, in a little way, to that all the pessimism
around deep fakes. I really wanted to just play with the deep fake technology and, and write about a K-pop star who manages to harness the deep fake technology in a way that does a little bit of good, or is a little bit fun. But yeah, it's that's so interesting to hear about her creating this AI persona.
I think it was a way for her to reclaim authority over her... over her likeness, and over her voice, and her music. She was saying that a lot of it had to do with autonomy and authenticity.
Interesting. And it's interesting that she presented that y-... she wanted to use the AI persona as a front so that she could almost 'retreat' behind it and do her creative work inside, inside a bit more of a bubble. It also makes me think about - I didn't read too much about this - but was it Scarlett Johansson recently who protested about her voice being very closely imitated for the voice of ChatGPT?
Yeah.
Yeah, a lot of imitation and, I think, 'replication' happening.
Yeah....You know, even to bring it back to Every Version of You, I do recall there being a comment on - when it comes to Gaia, the virtual world - there being, sort of, a 'devaluation' of authentic and a devaluation of what's real. So if you can sort of get whatever Gucci bag you want, you know, in the virtual world, does it really matter if you have a genuine physical version of that item? Because then it's arbitrary. It doesn't matter. It doesn't carry the same cultural
cache. And I think that's a very interesting idea as well, is - how much do we value authenticity? Or do we just, are we content with simply consuming the 'thing'?
Yeah. I think, I think I was thinking a lot about how we attach value to things, like, 'What makes us value something?' Is it because, like, the market tells us to value it, you know? And, you know, capitalism tells us to place value on this, this exclusive item that everyone wants. So, yeah, what is it that makes us want something, treasure something and assign meaning to certain objects? Yeah.
Yeah... So we'll move on to May, just because I'd really love to gauge what you think about this particular advancement. So, Chinese researchers have developed a technique to freeze and thaw human brain tissue without damage.
That's interesting. Just in May? That's, like, couple of weeks ago! (laughs) Is it like a... I assume it's just, like, a small amount of brain tissue? Like, perhaps some cells?
Yes. So I believe it was - I'm certainly no
(laughs) neuroscientist, so I can only give a layman's perspective on
- you know, something enough to generate this - but I think it was on a cellular level, they were able those cells being alive - to preserve these cells in some sort of... I think it was maybe a sugar or alcoholic solution? And then freeze them and thaw them without their function being significantly affected. And I do think it actually had something to do with... they weren't mature cells - I do believe that may have to do with
- it might've been, been like a little bit earlier some kind of, not a stem cell, perhaps, perhaps you, you'd be better speaking about this kind of thing - along the line of development, it was maybe a pluripotent sort of cell. That becomes a brain cell later? (laughs)
Yeah, I think it was something like that. But yeah, that kind of spooked me, because it made me think about the whole consciousness thing. And questions about what they were likely to do with that technology, I suppose.
Yea... Yeah, I feel like that's the question that pops into my head - or anyone's head when you hear about a wacky new technology, right? Why are they doing it? It's fascinating that they can do it, but why are they doing it? And often, I feel like sometimes we do things just because we want to be able to, like, want to be able to do something. And that's what we do as human beings as an... and as
scientists, sometimes. But it's also a big part of being scientists to think about, 'Why are we doing it?' And what potential applications are there for this sort of technology? So yeah, what could you do with a brain tissue that could be frozen? Could it be potentially used in some sort of therapeutic application? Like, if there was damaged brain tissue? Could you potentially freeze it so that, you know, you could pause the damage, slow it down, and then
give it a chance to heal? To preserve it so that, you know, maybe if someone's had a stroke, you know, you can stop the progress of the stroke and maybe reverse the changes, or stop the progression of some sort of neurological disease? Could you do it to healthy brain tissue?
So I did think in the therapeutic sense, it could be quite powerful, possibly even mental illness, that kind of thing. But I was also thinking, in terms of, to go to the other extreme is, would this mean that you could essentially take what some people might consider the 'essence' of a person? And go, 'Okay, well, this body is no good, or this body is ageing
now'. But if we are able to freeze what we consider to be the 'roots' of a person's personality and character, you know, quite some time down the line is that potentially an application, so...?
Yeah, that - absolutely, my mind absolutely goes to sci fi spaces. You talk about that - it's not a huge leap of the imagination to think about freezing your whole brain. And what, what would that mean, you know, to preserve a human brain? I mean, we already have people who want to live forever. Whatever motivates that - I'm sure that's a whole other conversation. But yeah, what are the potential implications, right, of being able to preserve even parts of a human brain or a
whole brain? Why would you do that? And what would it mean to keep a human in stasis for such a long time and then revive the human again, or revive the brain again after so many years. Gosh, that's a minefield - and also great fodder for science fiction! (laughs)
(laughs) I guess the other part of it that I considered was why, as you said - it's, it might be one of those things where we're just seeing if we CAN do it, how far can we push this - but also, it had me think, perhaps human tissue is not the most reliable... substrate, I suppose. Something that I have been trying to familiarise myself a bit more with, since reading the novel is this concept of
'mind-uploading'. You know, say, theoretically, we were able to freeze the essence of a person via their brain tissue - perhaps that's not the most reliable or sustainable way to do that. What if we're able to 'emulate' a person and, I guess, store all of that information - memories, personality, character - onto an incredibly powerful hard drive, and transfer that into a different 'vehicle', whether it be a different body, or you could you could even say, sort of a... an enhanced version of a
person. And one idea that I thought so fascinating, in a video that I watched recently - the channel was called 'Science and Futurism' - and the narrator raised this idea of being able to 'upload' minds onto hard drives, so that you could colonise the galaxy. And then you could later transfer those - well, that information - into biological bodies after the fact. Because transferring all of those physical bodies through space would be very impractical... - but, if you were able to, sort of, just
(laughs) 'mass ship' that information to somewhere else in the galaxy, and then once all settled, and the technology had caught up, you could put that back into a person. So that's incredibly sci fi, but I think it's so interesting that a lot of people have considered this to be a 'computing problem', consciousness. Mmm. It's an interesting sci fi thought
experiment, isn't it? To think about, I guess, in Every Version of You - so I do play with similar ideas, like the mind being 'uploaded' or 'transposed' from a physical body into a digital substrate. And even within, like, the digital realm, the digital people can, you know - they have this freedom that they don't have in the physical world - they can do lots of things at once and be in lots of places at once, and the constraints of being in a
physical body removed. And so I think the humans change and transform in ways that they never anticipated. And they can also download themselves into robots or machines and interact with the physical world, even as digital beings. So it's kind of fun in sci fi to play with these
ideas. But I think what's more fun is to also think about, you know, what DOES happen to being a person if, if you do live as a bodyless digital sprite for centuries, with no conception of death or change - unless you know, you... you, you have a level of control over yourself that you don't have in a physical body. And you have a level of control over pain and suffering that you didn't have
in a physical body. So what happens to being a person, like what happens to humanity with all these changes to the mind and the brain that technology allows, and it's... it's fun to think about it on a grand scale, but it is also fun to think about it in near future science fiction as well with, like, smaller advances in technology.
For example, with AI, like, I think you have AI now that can, like, recreate your personality based on like your social media footprint, or, like, your emails, or they can take, you know, the 'footprint' that you leave online and reconstruct an imitation of who you are, or 'model' of who you are based on, like, what kind of things you search, or what kind of things you like online, and I think it's quite - it's scarily accurate, because, you know, you can draw a lot of inferences
about a person based on what they do online. And so, there's lots of other ways already that I think AI is recreating people. Recreating loved ones who've passed away, creating AI recreations of, of them, or, you know, people are making, maybe, copies or 'bots' of themselves in, in many ways as well. So, I
don't know. It's, it's... it can also be interesting to think about these near future applications of technology and how they impact on us as humans, like, how they change what it means for us to be humans, or how we interact with technology - like, what does it mean to interact with an AI or a recreation of a loved one who's passed on? Or a digital child that you look after in a digital
space? You know, there's, I think there's possibly a whole market emerging - or that will emerge - around taking care of digital pets and digital children. And I think that's a weird and wacky thing to think about as well.
Because I suppose, depending on, on who you talk to, people ascribe different value to the physical version of something or... I do think humans value authenticity on a very deep level. But I think that's something that definitely came through in how Tao-Yi's, I guess, 'philosophy' - for lack of a better term - evolves in Every Version of You,
because... You know, I actually went back and reread the beginning of the novel where Tao-Yi and Navin meet, and it's interesting how there's sort of an 'inversion' of attitudes through, throughout the course of the novel, where initially, Tao-Yi's kind of advocating for AI music being 'superior' because it can be so dialled in, you know, it can tap into what humans are naturally drawn to and enjoy - which is very
powerful. However, Navin argues that - without even being able to articulate it - there's just something about real music, and he asks her if she's heard of The Strokes. And if anyone's listened to The Strokes - that's not about vocal perfection. That's not about technical prowess. That's, you know, raw, youthful, rock'n'roll vibes. That's... and that's something that AI can't replicate. You know, like you said, what...
what is the value of things? Or what is the value of life and moments if we're given the option to live forever, or were given the option to live without illness or material burdens?
Yeah, I love that you touched on that, because I've thought about it that much. But I did want to kind of highlight the imperfections; like, in Every Version of You, it's often the imperfections in things like food, you know, real food, music, relationships, people - it's often the imperfections and the way that things fall short, that give it texture and meaning, a sense of reality, and specialness in, in many ways. So, I like that you
brought that up. And I think there's one scene where Tao-Yi's like, like savouring all the imperfect textures of the chewiness and the, the various sensations that she has, while she's eating a dish in the real world - that the food in Gaia is so uniformly pleasurable that that she doesn't have that experience, that same experience, in Gaia. So I think imperfection, and also, like, real connection is something that lends meaning, right? To
our experience. And I think a lot of technology gives us a sense of false connection or false gratification. I think a lot of technology is... it's, like, convenient. It's very easy for us to slip into using social media to feel a sort of false connectedness to people or to the world, or to get a sense of self esteem when you get 'likes'
or whatever. And so, sometimes I think that technology can be escapist, or can be a bit of a denial of reality, because it provides that sense of, that very convenient, immediate gratification of our needs, but not so much a satisfying meeting of our deepest needs - which is that need for true connection and true relationships with all of their messiness and imperfection.
Yeah, yeah. It's... I think it's philosopher Alan Watts, mentions this idea of life being what it is because of the 'contrast' - that you couldn't possibly relish the pleasure without having experienced discomfort. You know, 'How do you know what pleasure is? Or how do you know what good is when you haven't experienced the opposite of it?'
Yeah.
And, you know, as you said, I think you use the word - this kind of a 'denial' of, you know, how things are. If we're meeting a lot of needs, temporarily, on a very superficial levels through things like social media, and... Quite early, when I was reading Every Version of You, I asked my partner - because I really wanted to know - there were actually elements of Navin that kind of reminded me, in a
strange way, of my partner. And I think, actually, it was really in a very general sense - it was more like engaging with a very... just the visceral, the visceral aspect of it - your, your partner's smell, or like, you know, like the texture of their skin, or the, the greasiness of their hair - all
of these sorts of things. So I asked my partner, 'If you could upload your consciousness to live part time in a virtual world free of pain, physical limitation, and worldly burdens - would you?' And I was almost afraid to hear what he was going to tell me. Because, admittedly, we've both had our own issues with, particularly mental illness and that sort of thing, which I think a lot of people... it does make their experience of the day-to-day a lot harder. And
I was kind of relieved to... He really thought about it, which he does, because he wants to give me the 'truest' answer. So he said, 'No, because that's just a distraction from your real problems; it's a distraction from doing the 'real work'.' Every Version of You - - you, and well, just that you, you inject so Tao-Yi's journey, the choices that she makes - I think, really, kind of speak to this idea of actually confronting - confronting and engaging in discomfort as opposed to
avoiding it. Which I think is so much easier to do. And I do like that. In the novel, you don't, you don't push one or the other, you don't sort of say that, 'It's better to upload into Gaia. Why would you remain in meatspace, when the world is in decline, and there are so many limitations?' And then, you know, on the other hand, even Tao-Yi, admits that, technically, this is an 'evolution', what is happening
- that's so nice, Krystle - with mind-uploading. So as you said, it's up to the reader to much sensory information into the book, which is an bring their own interpretation and their own experience to interesting contrast to the fact that a lot of these people inform what they make of the novel. Yeah, it's just, it's are... a lot of the experiences that occur in the book are virtual and perhaps have no root in reality.
such an incredible book in terms of you - And I definitely wanted to present that there was no single 'right' answer. Like, there's a different right answer for Tao-Yi, and a different right, a different right answer for Navin, and a different answer for each of the characters for their own reasons. And I love that you touched on Tao-Yi doing difficult things. Because I think that often technology can make life easier for us, like, it can make things much more convenient and seamless for us -
which is great in many ways. You know, we can save a lot of time, on repetitive tasks. But I think there is also value in not having everything be convenient and automatic, and frictionless. And so I love that you noticed how Tao-Yi's journey is also one of embracing difficulty at times and struggle at times. And I don't want to give away too many spoilers, but she does go on a journey in the latter stages of the novel and that journey isn't easy. It's uncomfortable. It's
challenging and confusing. But it's also very meaningful. And I think some of the things that we do in life that are most meaningful are ones that are also really challenging. And so that I think the, the way that certain things can challenge us, and push us to find where our limits are, and question, you know, 'Why are we doing something when it is challenging?', whether that's, like, writing a book, or raising a child or, you know, making a
journey somewhere? It's... I think the challenge and the friction of those situations, like, forces us to grapple with, what is important to us. Yeah.
And as humans, that's often irrational (laughs)
(laughs) Yeah, that is so true. We are not rational beings, right?
Yeah.
We're like, we're irrational beings and emotional beings who like to tell ourselves that we are rational, and justify our actions to ourselves (laughs)
(laughs) I think that's, essentially, what gives so much colour to life, I suppose.
Yes. Totally for embracing our 'big feelings', and the fact that we are emotional beings.
I think that... that's probably a really good spot to leave it -
- that's a nice note to, yeah, to end on.
- absolutely. Have people go away and question -
- who they are? And yeah, their big feelings
(laughing) Actually confront them, and (laughing) engage with them, instead of avoid them. Because it is worth it. It is worth having a good cry every now and then (laughs)
Absolutely.
(laughing) - which your book evoked in me in the best way. (laughs) So I suppose we'll leave it there.
(laughing) Thank you so much, Grace, for this book. And for talking with me today. I've been looking forward to this for a really long time. And this is definitely the kind of book where it reconnected me with a lot of the bigger questions and had me question again, 'What is important? What matters? What doesn't matter?' The best books do that. And this is one of them. So, thank you. Thank you, Krystle. That's so incredibly kind, and I'm really honoured that you read the book with such care and
thought. It was so nice talking to you, too.
Thank you. Okay, so...