So I was really as a twelve year old as close to broken as you can get, I think, so, Yeah, I kind of got diagnosed with anxiety when I was really young, and then it wasn't until my early twenties that I was diagnosed with depression, and then it wasn't until kind of a decade later where a psychiatrist rediagnosed me with bipolar. We recover loudly, so people don't suffer quietly.
Welcome to the Sees the Yay Podcast. Busy and happy are not the same thing. We too rarely question what makes the heart seeing. We work, then we rest, but rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than one way. So this is the platform to hear and explore the stories of those who found lives They adore, the good.
Bad and ugly.
The best and worst days will bear all the facets of seizing your Yea. I'm Sarah Davidson or a spoonful of Sarah, a lawyer turned fu entrepreneur who swapped the suits and heels to co found matcha Maiden and matcha Milk Bar. Ses The Ya is a series of conversations on finding a life you love and exploring the self doubt, challenge, joy and fulfillment along the way.
Yighborhood, we are back with a guest episode.
For you, and one that has been a very long time coming, but is well worth the wait. I'm so excited to have finally sat down with a dear friend of mine who a lot of Australia and a lot of you may know as Matt from The Bachelor, which is factual, but who I met outside of that context completely. I think this might be the first time I admitted
I never actually watched his season of Batchie. You guys know, I'm a true crime girlye, not a reality TV girly, and I deliberately didn't catch up on the season, even though normally I like to research someone within an inch of their life, because I wanted to focus on Matt not from the Batchie, a personality that maybe hasn't been as exhaustively covered everywhere else With all our guests, you know, I love to show us side people know a bit less about, and even more so when it's a friend.
But then the great challenge is squeezing all of that into an when you just want to showcase every single thing you think is great about them, particularly when there is impressive as a mat and when you feel like often that sort of isn't the focus of media, which obviously I didn't manage to do in a single hour. It's impossible with anyone, let alone someone with as many
facets going on as Matt. So heads up that this is part one of a two parter, should be really four or five, but at this stage definitely two, where we set the scene around the earlier days of Matt's WAITA.
You really should read his LinkedIn to understand why it's a little reductive to only refer to his TV stint, even though that is one part of him, rather than the five degrees he has in not just normal degrees, but maths, science, engineering, astrophysics, like literally the pinnacle of intelligence. That's why we say it's not rocket science. He actually knows about rocket science. He's a master five degrees, including an actual PhD on space, so an infinitely impressive human.
Then he added two books, an incredible business pash which we will talk all about. I didn't leave enough time for that, but we'll give much more detail in part two as well, a stint on Shark Tank, which might not have even come out by the time this does, but definitely will have by part two. Hopefully amongst all of this you do get a dose of a mat
you might not already know. But I also think astrophysics, AI, dating, both of our experiences with quitting drinking that in the context of dating as well, definitely deserve more time than we had in this part one. So you'll hear more about those in part two, and I think it's particularly fascinating. I've already had some DMS saying is you single? That's hilarious. We will definitely cover dating and how not having alcohol in that context has changed him kind of a social experiment.
I think that will be really fascinating, So that will
all be in part two. But perhaps it's fitting that a lot of Part one were spent on what Matt calls his salad of mental health issues about which we've bonded in the past, but also about which he speaks so vulnerably and powerfully, especially in an area where you'll hear us mention that a lot of mental health issues have become more common and well understood, but there are some that are still considered quite extreme or still quite stigmatized, and yet he is incredibly generous in how he speaks
about things like bipolar and manic episodes, and I think that's perhaps very fitting that this episode has a lot of that as we move into November, and a sharper focus on men's health. So a little content warning that we do briefly touch on suicide and similar in this episode, so please take care while listening, and I'll of course
include links to relevant resources in the show notes. Otherwise, this was, above all a wonderful chat between friends that did go off on many many tangents, but perhaps that give us even a better insight into who he is as a person outside of the Batchie, and I really hope you guys enjoy stay tuned as well for part two.
Matthew Terrence Agnew Welcome to.
The show, Terrence in trouble No.
I I just feel like your title almost everywhere is Matt from The Bachelor, which is factual, So like, you can't get mad.
At people for using exaccurate.
Yeah, it's factually accurate, but in my mind, I was like, I have to choose a different name because I met you not as Matt from the Bachelor, and I feel like you've been exhaustively interviewed and chatted to and about in that capacity, which again factual juicy. Yes, lots to talk about there, but that's sort of not the mat that I know. And I don't know if I've told you I've never actually watched your season?
Have I told you that?
I know, I don't think you have really Nah, which is not surprising.
Yeah, I'm not Why is that not spris well?
I mean it was more of a sense that I mean, I didn't even watch my season. I watched like three or four episodes interesting. I found it. I was like, nah, this is too weird, like this there was also incorrect representations of people, Yes, were they're mischaracterize based on the end since I was just like, that's not what happened, So this is uncomfortable and be inaccurate. So I didn't
watch it. So I guess it's not surprising in the sense that if I didn't watch it, it's you know, my friend's not watching it is not kind of you know, it doesn't stray too far from my own opinions.
Which I kind of think is has been really nice experience because often when you meet someone who is in the media and who has quite a public profile, you have already watched the show, so you come into the friendship with like preconceptions and like, you know, I know your staff sign, we've been through Gemini Gate, you know all that kind of stuff, right, And I came into it without any of that, bonded with you over totally different things. And then it's interesting because I knew it
was too much to watch. I was like, oh, I can't, like, that's giving me such ick And I've met Abby. I'd met a lot of people in that season without the context of the show, and then met them as like complete people, and then that's the person I wanted to like and trade on.
Yes, which your language there, meeting people as complete people? I think, is it rings really true? And is what is hugely missing from shows like The Bachelor or any reality TV really Instead of meeting a complete person, you get this single faceted, put in one bucket, one dimensional character. Yeah. And I think again the language character is probably accurate because that's how people see and that's why the trolling is so visceral. I guess, yeah, totally, because it's not
a complete person. It's a one dimensional character, and so it's very easy to separate. I guess the human element when it's a character.
Yeah.
Absolutely, And I think that our lives being so digital and online also lends to that one facet that you're seeing, even for people who are really authentic and try and share, like even me, I overshare majorly, and there's still so much that people wouldn't know.
So even putting the.
Battery side of your side, I still feel like there are so many facets that I almost felt more pressure than normally coming into an episode with a friend because I want to share the U that I know with everyone, and like that's extraordinarily difficult because I'm like, how do I do that in like a short amount of time when there's so many different things. So I will first say to everyone who wants batchy juice, because.
It's batchy juice, right, like.
Anyone who wants batchy juice, and absolutely fair enough, because there's a reason reality TV is, Like I just happened to be one of those you either go reality TV or crime junkie. I went crime junkie, right, So.
I went crime junkie like weird documentary.
Right like at UFOs, like, yeah, we'll be there. We're mutually bonded over that. But there's a reason why the nation loves it so much. So if that's your jam, Abby Chatfield on it's a lot.
Pod just did a two.
Parter with Matt that goes through everything, like literally dissects all the behind the scenes, the six months that you guys didn't speak, the six months after that, the reunion, like it clarifies a lot. So if you want Batchie juice, absolutely go there. There's like a place in different pods.
Right, you don't need to call it batchie juice if you want. You don't say I'm going to tune into Abby to listen to Batchie juice. You can, but you can also call it that if you can, right.
Like each choose your own adventure. Yeah right, But what I really wanted to do is Leah, like I said, explore all the parts of you that aren't the Batchie And also for Abby. Abby has also been on CZA and is just an absolute gem. Again, I think you see like one side of her. So go back to episode one hundred and fifty seven, which was a few years ago, or to her show and the two part of which is actually an amazing listen. It's so much fun,
you guys show the funniest sides of you. And I've learned a lot of stuff about recording as well, Like I didn't know that you record like over three nights the meetings of the women, so you didn't even meet them all in one go.
Like that's wild, yeah, kind of Yeah, And the first night you don't meet anyone is like, that's so weird. You just get done in this situation. That's really surreal. It's bizarre. You're talking to the first time I met Osha, you don't meet him before, so wild. Yeah, it's quite it's quite intense. And then obviously you meet all the women and then you kind of don't really get to talk to them after. And then on third night you finally get to actually you know, mingle with them and
get to know them. But again, it's you know, these short snippets. They are encouraged by producers to I don't want to say interrupt, but very much. You need to be proactive. You want to talk to Matt. You can't just wait your turn.
Wow, So it's hung again, Yeah, a.
Little bit for bat. So if I'm in conversation with Son, I'm acutely aware that I've only got you know, three to five minutes, probably before someone you know asks to have a chat with me too.
Well, guys, I will include the link in the show notes to the Abby two part of and you Know. A summary dot point is that Matt's experience was marginal below ourverages.
I think the way that you.
Described it largely diplomatic language also life changing.
But what I want.
To start with is what you just said that there are lots of articles that have come out of that that kind of are, like we said, factual, but I find them, as a friend quite reductive. You are Matt from the Bachelor, who also happens to have like literally five degrees. So when they say Matt from the Bachelor, who's also a nerd, like sure, actual nerd, actual astrophysicist. But I just want to list them to remind everyone.
We'll have already said this in the Buyer, but I feel like it needs repeating.
So you have.
Literally two bachelor degrees, which is already enough for most people.
Right.
In fact, most people only do one or none. So there's science and engineering. Then you did a master's in.
Astrophysics, got the bug, the astrobug.
Got the bug.
Then you did a PhD in astrophysics a dynamic search for habitable worlds and solar system analogue. That's just for anyone who needs to know how smart it actually it was. I've got some leave it and then went back and dio the master's I've applied artificial intelligence. Yes, so not only are you infinitely qualified, but when people like the pinnacle of intellect is when people say it's not rocket science, and.
Yet that is actually kind of what you do.
You've done mechanical engineering, you do astrophysics, you talk about space, and now artificial intelligence. Do you find it annoying when people continue to refer to you as Matt from The Bachelor, or is it just a factual thing that you're like, I put myself forward for that, and that's kind of people need context.
Yeah, there's a little bit of I made my bed, I'll sleep in it, so it's it's certainly part of my history. I don't it happened, you know, I'm not going to cover it up or anything a scandal, but yeah, I definitely I try not to lean into it. It's one of the things that's happened in my life. There's a bunch of other things where I guess I'm more proud of the achievement. I think reality TV is not
an achievement. I just did stuff on TV, right, And so I see the other things in my life that i've the goals that I've set, the things that I've achieved as things that I'm much more proud of. So does it annoy me? Not annoy I guess it's frustrating if that's the only thing they know about me, or if they introduce me, especially when it's within an academic context.
That happens less now, especially because typically if I'm doing things, you know, with museums or talking as a STEM keynote speaker, things like that, the Bachelor kind of doesn't really impact or as it's something that people aren't really I don't really care about. It doesn't really lend credit to why I'm doing these things. So yeah, it kind of doesn't come up loads. The other thing is, I think, and I've probably come around with this a little bit more, is it can be used a little bit to bring
people into the tent. And I saw this with when I was announced as the Bachelor. The astrophysicist. You actually could look in the Google search as the astrophysics and there was this huge spike that went up enormously, so you could see this huge kickup in people googling astrophysics. Yeah, okay, and so it kind of it shone a bit of a light on an area of science that people have
probably heard in passing. You know, astrophysics, Einstein, that kind of stuff astrophysicists, I know, yeah, so you know, yeah, that's that's people's probably. I think there was an arc early on saying something about his friends call him Sheldon Cooper or something. I'm like, no one's ever called me, but sure whatever. I heard that hard hitting journalism at Daily Mail. But so it kind of it drew attention to it, and I think now it does still a
little bit and I liken it too. You know, when you're giving a dog so medicine, you put the medicine inside a spoon of peanut butter. I think the Bachelor sometimes can be used as the peanut butter, and so sometimes it gets people to engage, and then I can use that engagement to kind of then start speaking about things that I'm really passionate about, which is largely science, but also things like mental health advocacy and other social issues that I lend my voice to and I'm passionate
and stand behind, so it's not annoying. And I think I've come around a bit more to understanding that there's I can leverage it to continue to make bigger impact in the spaces I want to make an impact. But when it's yeah, when it boils down to just mat from the batch, so it's like, Okay, hang on, I've got some machines. Yeah, and I've got other things that mean I can talk about these other things, all these important things, more authentically and with a bit of authority
as well. And so I think that's where it can be annoying when that's lost. It's not just I've done a reality here and now I'm trying to talk authoritatively on these topics that I've got no credentials or no
lived experience. So that's that's probably the annoying part. But that happens less and less, and I think obviously five years on now and in the spaces I've worked and people are more aware of the things that I've experienced, the things I've spoken about vulnerably and authentically, and the credential that I have that I can speak to with that sort of yeah, that qualification.
I love that you have been able to see it as a silver lining because it has given you a
bigger platform for the things that you love. And I got really honest with myself recently when I was doing keynote about imposter syndrome and self doubt, and I realized that the reason I leave lawyer turned entrepreneur in my title for everything is because I need that legitimacy, Like I don't want to just drop it off altogether, because I'm sort of positioning myself in a way that I've actually had multiple opportunities to pursue certain reality TV shows
and chosen not to because I thought I've worked so hard to have some of my identity, not all of it. Like I'm obviously you know, love true crime and love just airhead stuff and like a my total DIDs. But in one part of my brain, I am quite an intellect and I didn't want to let go of that. And it's interesting that I'm like, that's also my ego talking,
but I still leave it there. And I know that about myself, but I still have to lead with by the way, guys, I did do this and I do these other things.
Yeah, and I yeah, I can really relate to that. I still do that largely when people say what do
I do, Like, what's the job? And I've got, you know, kind of hands in a few different pies, and I always kind of start with well, up until the start of last year, I worked as a data scientist in big tech because there's this sort of you know, I do things like content creation, influencing basically, And I'm sure you're the same where you're like, well, I don't want to just be put in that box and people see you as, oh, just an influencer, which anyone who's worked
within as an influencer will know that it's it's quite a hard job, and it yeah, people have this preconceived idea of what it is, and it's like you post a picture old on a product and yet paid thousands of dollars and that's not at all. There's a real skill to creating compelling content and cutting through the audience in that huge kind of flood of information and content that everyone's exposed to you. So it's firstly it's it's
it's a harder job. But yeah, I think I've got that same sort of imposter syndrome where I'm seeking to maintain Yeah, and so that's something that I shouldn't feel, and I'm sure you feel the same, but it's kind of I guess the social pressure and commentary and that comes with being in the public eye and participating in the in the influencing world, that you feel the need that you need to still justify to people will hang on that.
Yeah, I'm not just an influencer, yeah.
Even though being I hate yeah, just an influence is such a reductive Yeah. And I hope that I've made it clear to people who are influencers that this is not a dig. I don't do anything nearly as well as full time influences to because it is a job, and I think once you've actually done it, you recognize how good they are what they do.
Yeah, And it's funny that we have actually had conversations in our friendship about that and like bandied around terms like pure influencer and how we're not in that bucket because I've done other things. But it's funny that we feel the need to do that, yeah, where.
There shouldn't be that at all, you know. Yeah, it's a completely legitimate career and it's in itself, but yeah, there's this sort of yeah, yeah, so no, it's funny and nothing. It's it's definitely something that I mean. I didn't even call it influencing because I felt this sort of being an impostor and that it was I was shame because I was doing this, and so what did I used to say? Branded content? I was like, I
do branded content. And it wasn't until a few of my friends get Ward's that, oh you know, like products, and like you mean influencing.
Yeah, influencing marketing spin in itself.
I think Nick used to have when he was in nightcl His business card said female public relations officer.
I'm like, so promoters put us that's a skill.
Yeah, absolutely, So yeah, now it's it's you know, that's a step for me in being able to confidently say, no, I'm an influence side. I do stuff on Instagram, creating content for brands, trying to as the name is it influence people.
Yeah.
So yeah, I think that's definitely it's a me problem in terms of being prouder to say that rather than having to say I used to work in big tech. Yeah. Yeah, so yeah, that's probably rambled a bit too.
No, oh my god, I knew that this episode was going to be a massive ramble because our conversations like guys. For context, we met again, not from The Bachelor. I
hadn't watched a season. We met in Electric Ladyland, so in a nightclub context, we were both not drinking yep, and we're the probably only ones in the whole venue not drink yeah, I would think, so like probably yeah, I would say, we would be the only ones nursing sparkling waters with lemon and ice, so we wouldn't be bothered by anyone asking why we weren't drinking.
And then I think the first thing we.
Actually bonded about was our mutual anti present medication, which is a really interesting thing to bond with someone over in the middle of a dance floor, like we both just did not belong there at the time.
Memory, Yeah, it was.
I was digging deep for this, and I thought I wanted to give context to how like the Mat that I met is such a different match to the Matt I would have met if I'd watched your season first.
And at the time I hadn't really spoken much about my mental health publicly, so this was a more vulnerable conversation. I think it speaks volumes to our friendship the fact that I felt comfortable with you to be quite open and vulnerable on our first meeting.
I feel like we both had a massive vulnerability hangover after because I was like, what did I just like tell this dude all my like random shit in my brain that I should not let out of the cage.
We got deep, ever, I remember we got deep, like we all going back to childhood stuff and it was great. But yeah, I think we both checked in the next hour. I was like, how are you feeling after?
Are you okay picking up all of.
These feelings and emotions? Yeah?
And I also think carn who's our mutual connect, was just like I'm just going to leave this conversation like I don't have a place here.
Yeah. Yeah, No, that's he was up and about and enjoying himself. Yeah.
So why I am so excited about this episode is because having met in that context and you have done I think in April last year, did an incredibly powerful interview with Jess Rowe, which I think is the first time that you had really spoken as much in depth about your mental health, the salad of mental health issues, I think you call it, which I love and as much as I do often like bandy, around laughter, around having many bees, and the breakdowns I have every week,
which you know in my season of motherhood is absolutely true. There is a more an actual serious definition of breakdown that in our friendship. I've seen you go through a couple of times. I've also gone through a couple of times myself, both before and after you. I think Abby
called it came out as having mental health issue. But why I'm so excited about this is because while the show is all about yay and joy, I think it's easy to tell those stories when someone has a really not breezy life but quite a straightforward journey to passion and joy and fulfillment. Whereas you're a shining example of the fact that you have a constant challenge to have a baseline that is not dangerous is the way that
I've heard you say it. So even just to have a neutral emotional safe space, let alone happiness and yeay, it takes you an enormous amount to do that, And that is just a biological unfairness in the lottery of life.
It's so unfair that you have to do that. It's so unfair that it costs a lot that you know, some people don't have the privilege to do that, Like You've covered it so eloquently in Jess's episode, but I want to kind of go through it more chronologically to show that while it started very early in your life, you can face the extremity of your mental health issues and still live a really happy life, which is something that I admire so much because I face that in
a much much smaller, much easier to manage scale, and yet still sometimes I think, oh my god, how do I find joy again? And it's a really refreshing friendship to have with you, where often you sort of will go for a walk and you'll say like, I'm not great, or you'll be like, I've just come out of I've gone to rock bottom, but.
I've back out of the loop.
It's a privilege to watch you go through these circles of really low and pulling yourself back to really high and still be able to come back and enjoy your life. And that's yeah, really, I'm really proud to be your friend and aught to do that.
Thank you. And yeah, I think it's I'm acutely aware of, Like when you mentioned the lottery of life, I've been dealt a very good hand in the terms of you know, objectively, I'm in a very privileged position from a number of different metrics, and this is just one of the shit parts that I was dell. But I'm acutely aware that compared to some people's positions, I'm still in a very luxurious position. I think it's well to your point with we deal with things in different I think you used
to a smaller degree. I think it's not really helpful to talk about degrees of it. I think everyone's going through their own battles and how you experience that relative to how you're living kind of isn't influenced or impacted by what someone else is going through. So yeah, I
mean it's the whole whole thing. And those people say, oh, you know, someone's got it worse, and it's like, well, that's saying there's one person on the planet who can be miserable, and everyone else has got some money that's got worse in them. So I think these kind of comparatives, Yeah, it's kind of an unhelpful way to frame things, And I think it's important people recognize that that whatever your challenge is or whatever mental illness you're battling through, whether
that's a mood disorder, personality disorder. Yeah, everyone's going through these things, and your experience is whatever it is. You don't need to say or think that someone else. Yeah, And I think some people do sometimes get stuck in that sort of spiral of thinking, oh, well, I shouldn't
feel bad because someone else has got it worse. And yeah, I think it's I think it's really important that people know that whatever your challenges and battles are, they're they're uniquely your and they're just as valid as anyone else's.
I'm also even more inspired by the way that you spoke out on Jess's podcast having so much I mean, it's already difficult to talk about for anybody, but having such a public profile. And secondly, you mentioned how there's sort of a spectrum of mental health. Illness is some are sort of not trendy but more acceptable, and then things like bipolar are probably still lesser known, more stigmatized.
And I don't think I can top that interview in terms of how well you both covered it, but I do think that the more conversation we had, the better.
So what I want to do with.
You is go through the fact that you have faced this since I think twelve years old was what you said. And I always go back to the very beginning to show that you meet someone at the chapter you're in, you're extremely qualified doing amazing things.
You were just at south By Southwest.
We talked about you are doing influencer work with the coolest companies and climbing the bridges, and people walk into that chapter and underestimate how what has taken you to get here, let alone, when the industry you've gone into is extremely existential and uncertain. And I would think that someone who's got extreme anxiety and then space do not necessarily tie together. So let's go back to your childhood.
Born in Adelaide, raised in Perth. Yes, first sort of started having anxiety at twelve years old, but then did the Mars Path find a mission project? And then space became a thing talker through your childhood.
Yeah, so born in Adelaide, lived therefore just up till the turn of the millennium. Actually, so I almost kind of.
Sound so old.
Circle the nineties. So yeah, born in Adelaide, and I think the the I was a very loud and naughty child, really, yeah, very loud and naughty. My mum or My parents both bring up that in was it kindergarten? It might have been year one reception, very early education year. Both my older brother when he went through had to sit next to the teacher, and then when I went through, I did as well, but he had to sit there because he was nervous and quite timid and shy where his
mind was. I was too naughty to be trusted not being.
Next to the two nice nice they got a bit of both.
Yeah, so I was. I was always very loud, very outgoing. Yes, very naughty. I was a bit of a naughty boy in school. And yeah, got hooked on space. It was a year four project, very young, and it was and I think prior to that, I love space. I think every child does. They go My nephews currently going through a space phase himself, so I've you know, I spoiled
him with things. And another one of my mates has a child whose he is a son who's three, and he's currently going through and popping up with all these science and space questions, and so I think all children have this space period. But yeah, this kind of translation from space phase to something I was a lot more interested in was Yeah, this year full project library project. I don't know if they still do them. Do you remember projects in primary school world, they'll kind of open
end it. It was like, you need to.
Research make a diorama?
What topic? Right?
A topic?
Yeah, I remember I did one on gorillas once because I really liked gorillas.
I did the tree kangaroo.
Yeah, I don't know what. Yeah, one on glaciers and icebergs. One.
This was a great time.
I loved primary school assignments compared to what eventually happened. All right, let's yeah, I loved But I digress. And so I didn't know what to do it on. And my mum suggested I do it on the NASA path Final Mission of Mars. And I didn't know what that was. And my mum both my parents are nerds. They both got science and mathematics backgrounds. My mum also loved astronomy. She did a bit of quite a few astronomy units
during her degree. She ended up getting a majoring in pure mathematics, not astronomy, which pure mathematics is that next les It's awful. Kudos to her for smashing through a pure math degree anyway, So she said, na's apart find a mission of Mars, and it just so happened at the time because it was topical. It was happening right then. There was in the advertiser, the Adelaide paper, there was a two page spread and I had pictures of the rover, had photos of images that they had taken on the
Martian surface, and I remember just being absolutely obsessed. Did my project on that, And then space has always been a big interest of mine since that. So it's this real, yeah, kind of turning point moment for me that I can pinpoint where it went from there, this childhood curiosity to I like space. Wow, my mum is almost entirely to blame for that.
Yes, I like that.
So that was that, And then I moved to We moved to Perth. The old Man some work over there, so we moved there, originally for three years, ended up staying thirteen. My folks are also still there. Three years has extended significantly. So moved there and I at the time, I remember in the lead up going I was excited about the change. I upon getting there, it struggled enormously. Obviously,
it was something I hadn't anticipated. I'd gone anythink it would be a really fun adventure and just I adjusted really badly. So I was I think I was twelve. This was around the Yeah, it was actually I might have been eleven. And so, yeah, this adjustment I struggled with. I had some bad experiences at the school, and I ended up going into this real anxiety spiral that essentially led my parents to getting me a psychologist. So I started seeing a psych and I missed a lot of
school where I was just in the morning hysterical. I'd be crying, I was throwing up before school, and there was a long period of time my mum was like, I can't send him. He's so I was really, as a twelve year old, as close to broken as you can get, I think from an anxiety perspective. And that
kind of lasted for most of year seven. I got a little better, but I still missed a lot of school, and then year nine again a little better but still missing a lot of school and seeing a psychologist and having kind of systems in place with the school that I could talk to certain counselors and teachers who I guess kind of understood how to support mental illness a little better than others. And so I had this Yeah, these real systems in place to kind of nurse me
through that period. And then from year ten to year twelve, I kind of got through a lot of anxiety. But I just was not this loud, gregarious fun boy that I was in primary school. I was really really quiet, very subdued. Everyone kind of just assumed he's just a quiet nerd, which was not accurate based on how I was behaving. Yeah, but it was like chalk and cheese compared to what I was like as a child, as
a young primary school child. So that's kind of I guess the story around my first you know, brushes with mental illness and how much it impacted my life, and I guess impacted my schooling quite significantly. I don't know how many days I would have missed in total, but it was huge numbers, three figures plus wow, quite easily across those those kind of year seven, year eight in particular. Year nine got a little better.
But that's such a formative time as well for a young teenager. You know, you're on the cusp of puberty, and as a mom of a young boy who's I mean only like basically just out of his blog phase, but already that part of my heart that just wants him to have such a good life and his childhood where he's un burdened by the weight of the world to last as long as possible.
It makes me want to cry thinking that at twelve.
You were facing concepts and feelings that I didn't even think about until much much further into adulthood. And I mean some people get through their whole life without a psychologist. Ever, Yep, sometimes it happens a bit later. But twelve, I think by most standards, is extraordinarily early.
Yeah, And I ended up years later. It would have been kind of late teens, I reckon maybe even twenty when I had another kind of battling with mental illness that I actually went back to my child psychologists the
same lie. Yeah, And so I was just within I think they hold records for I don't know, seven or eight years or something like that, and I was struggling again with because I kind of after that period up till about year ten eleven twelve, when I started moving into UNI, I started regaining my confidence and becoming much more gregarious and outgoing and far less anxious. And so there was this period where I probably and I imagine
this is not uncommon. It's like, oh, I fixed it, Yeah, not recognizing the fact that that mental illness and mood disorders they're with you for life. There's certainly management strategies you can implement, but it's a chemical imbalance, it's biologically you can't just fix it. And so I had this period where I kind of wasn't seeing a psychologist and
I hadn't started on medication then. But yeah, I ended up going back to my psychologist, and that was quite It was a weird sensation kind of going back to someone who had seen me through these several year struggling years that I was facing and then kind of coming back and you know, I'd kind of achieved a few things since then, So there was probably this element for him of Okay, he has kind of navigated this challenge quite well, but he's back, so obviously there's still things to grapple with.
You're even up just to this point, if anything, a great and reassuring example for people in their own journeys or parents for their children's journeys that even having missed at a lot of school and with challenges that do affect the brain of all things and motivation and interaction that you still can go into probably the most highly demanding pathway of academia that's possible, because I think that one of the big fears around any kind of mental
health struggle, but anything that really disrupts your schooling, is that you won't be able to do something high achieving. And I think maybe that's the reason why people often say my mental illness is a great burden and like a devil on my shoulder, But it can be a superpower because often brains that can feel great lows can also achieve and feel great highs. Have you felt that it has been both a burden and a blessing or
is it just been one or the other? Do you think it does your brain is high functioning like that sort of all tied together as one thing.
So yeah, I kind of got diagnosed with anxiety when I was really young, and then it wasn't until in my early twenties that I was diagnosed with depression. And then it wasn't until kind of a decade later where a psychiatrist rediagnosed me with bipolar and what he said was bipolar iiO in particular is very often misdiagnosed as depression because the hypermannic episodes are not as dangerous and risky and reckless as a full blown mania manic episode.
And one of the reasons they said that was because of I guess, partly some of the things I'd achieved in this level of high functioning that I had kind
of between these really bad lows. And so I guess to your question, in my case and now with a new more updated diagnos that seems to me more accurately characterize my mood disorder and my mental illness, I think, yes, it has kind of been not superpower, but I certainly have these these periods of very high energy and productivity, and everything's just kind of elevated and maybe not euphoric,
but not far off. Everything just is easier and just flows, just flows, and it just yeah, it's like, oh, this, I guess, is what life's meant to feel like. And obviously, now understanding bipolar a bit better and talking to my psychiatrist, he said, yeah, it's a slightly more elevated mood than what a baseline should be. And the dangers is that obviously there's a cyclicality to it. So yeah, to your point,
is it a superpower? Maybe there's elements of that with bipolar two, where you do have these areas of these periods of high functioning, productive, gregarious, and all these kind of really positive traits, but it's kind of coupled with this really shitty low period. So yeah, for me, that the maybe not super but the biggest benefit I've found from it, or the silver lining I really try and
hold on to, is by talking about it. And I think for me, the only upside of mental illness is kind of sharing your story and helping other people be seen and heard and helping them navigate the shitty part that they've been dealt in terms of mental illness. And I like the quote, you know, we recover loudly, so people don't stuffer quietly, And I think that's so important.
And I'm in a really unique position where I do have a larger audience that I can communicate with, and so I think there's a kind of social and moral responsibility I have to try and use this to help others. Obviously, there's a fine line where that can transition to becoming to my own detriment, and I do have to put in certain kind of guardrails and safeties and checks in that. And one of the ones I had with the jests Row interview was I had this outpouring of messages from
people who it was. It was really heartwarming to hear how many people it touched, but it was really heartbreaking to hear how comment was for people either themselves or a loved one or someone within their close circle was going through. And I did a story post where I just said, I am reading everything that's being shared to me,
but I don't have the capacity to reply. And I think you had a similar experience as well recently about a year ago, wasn't it with the pregnancy loss, And I remember you did a very similar thing where you shared I don't know if you replied to some of the messages, but my recollection is you shared a similar sentiment where it was I am reading them, I just can't because there's thousands.
And more than you ever expect.
Yeah, so I've kind of waffled in circles a little bit. But yeah, that's I guess I see that as kind of the upside to it, and side I think it's it's a responsibility I have, and it's one that I'm very glad that I can do what I do. In talking about and hopefully destigmatizing. Like you said, there's these sort of socially acceptable mental illnesses. Yeah, and so hopefully you know, bipolar and some of these other ones, schizophrenia,
borderline personality disorder. There's a lot of these these ones. Wheople are oh whoawn. Yeah, it's a bit too much. You've overshared here, and it's like, well, no, this is these are all under the umbrella of mental illness. Yeah, and we should be comfortable talking about them and understanding them and not ostracizing people who are going through whatever
mental illness they're going through. And so I think there's been huge strides with that understanding around depression and anxiety, but there's still more work to be done with basically anything beyond those two.
Yeah. And I also think even just the fact that neurodivergence is a word now that we're familiar with and that people use and understand, it's all the conversations are going in the right direction, which is amazing, But it's still interesting that there is so much Like it's funny you and I have mentioned many times the word mical imbalance in the brain and just accepting that it's not it's not something you can try harder with so when people are sort of I've always I think the thing
that frustrates me the most is that anxiety and depression are both major misnomers.
In my mind.
I think that anxiety makes you think of anxiousness, and depression makes you think of sadness. Yes, and anxiousness and sadness are normal emotions in a healthy mind's spectrum of day.
To day feeling.
Anxiety isn't just feeling anxious, so you can't just say, calm down, the world is fine, it's going to go away. And depression is not just feeling sad, so you can't just say go be happy, to get a massage, eats an ice cream, you know, cheer up it like suck it up and.
Saying that getting an ice cream always does help in your case.
Casina is a love like yeah, that's it.
But I actually remember one time I was having a really shitty down time and you uber eatst me a curton of messina, and I was like, this guy, I knows where it's at.
I've done this for yeah, I got random acts of ice cream. I've done this with a few people where they'll say they're having a bit of a rough trot. Yeah, and I organize it. Sometimes I've sent it and they're not home and so I'm like, well, there's going to be a melted puddle of ice.
I will go and pick it up and I'll eat it for you.
Yeah, I have to go. They drop it off and then I go to their house to pick it out. But yeah, I've done it with Yeah, it's something. It's it's not it's not a huge gesture, but I think it's almost the fact that, yeah, kind of the it's not necessarily ice cream, right, it's the fact that it's a gift, it's a thought. So yes, no, I'm glad I could give you a random act of ice cream.
It was. It was glorious and the flavors are amazing. But yeah, it was the thought.
And I think it's hard that even my own understanding of both those conditions before I was in probably the worst phase with both of them I had been in, was thinking that those things would help me. And then you get to the stage and one thing that was really interesting you said in Jess's interview. And I don't want to repeat to much because there's so much other stuff I want to ask you, Like UFOs I mean, dude,
I have to get there eventually. But on a more serious note, you said something in that interview and I've heard you also say it a couple of times about how and I will put a trigger warning at the start of this episode that your darkest moment was in twenty twenty one where you did try and end your life, which is just before I met you, and again makes me just it pulls on my heart so much thinking that someone with as much in their life, who has as much going for them as you, could feel like that.
I misunderstood it before hearing people like you put it in these words. People often say, look, it's really selfish to do that, to take yourself out of the equation and think not think about the people you're leaving behind, which I think is a huge misinterpretation of.
What that really is. But also that it's not that you actually don't want to exist anymore.
It's just that you want the feeling that you're feeling to stop, and that is the side effect. The only way you can do that make the pain stop is to not exist. It's not that you actively sit there going idealizing not existing. It's just you want the pain to stop and I didn't understand that. I was like, I just thought you were sad, and you just kept crying and crying and crying, and then eventually you know. And I just think it's so misunderstood how a depression
and anxiety actually manifest for people. And again, it's like, anxiety isn't fear. I'm not sitting there necessarily even worried at all. It's sometimes physiological. I think I'm having a heart attack. I don't think I'm emotional about anything, and I don't think people understand that. So how do they manifest for you? In a sort of I don't know, it sounds silly, but like in a practical sense.
Yeah, so for a dump, jump for a dump before I jump too deeply that Yeah. I think I share a similar frustration to you in that I think anxiety and depression are used as substitutes for being anxious or
feeling depressed or feeling sad. And I find that and this is a fine line because you've got to be careful not to be gatekeeping, but I do find it frustrating some of the language used, in particular on social media, where people talk about these things like oh, I was anxious, I was you know I had anxiety and you didn't
had it. You've got it or you don't, And that language is really damaging because it's spoken like it's something that you can fix, like I know did meditation psychologists and nun I don't have anxiety, or I did this that, meditation, yoga, and I'm not depressed anymore. And people who have anxiety impression will see that and hear that and feel what's wrong with me? Why can't I think my way out of it like they.
Did, or fix it or.
Fix it, And it's not something that is fixed, it's something that's managed. And so I think it's dangerous language that's used, I think often by people where they're substitute and anxiety depression for these things that are like you said that, they're temporary emotions. That all of our motions
are designed to be important for us. We have a whole spectrum of emotions and you should be experiencing them all at some to some degree, and being anxious and being sad are emotions, but there's a very significant difference to mental disorders like anxiety and depression. So it's I haven't figured out the best way to talk about that specifically. Because it does sound a bit gatekeepery, right, Yeah, and
so it's really important to say it's not that. It's just about being very very clear with the language that's used so as to not create a bigger problem for people because they see people fixing it and thinking their way out of it or doing these things. And so anyway, that was just on the side.
What was the origination, It was how it manifests, because I think the conflation of regular emotions versus the mental illness, the fact that you can have anxiety without being anxious and you can have depression without being sad, I think that's confusing. And also the fact that a lot of the conversations on mental health focus on what you can do as the sufferer to manage it, but not a lot addresses what's helpful to receive. So for friends who are listening, how.
Do they look after you?
Because you do sometimes think I'll just get you about your for a massage, and like that is lovely, it's a beautiful gesture. But sometimes that's Yeah, it's not a thing you're fixing.
It's just a.
Condition that's ongoing that you're holding someone through. And I think people often feel really helpless of how to support people. And like even Kann and I we have like Matt traffic light signals kind of thing of like if we think that you need extra check ins, like we might message each other and say, I think he's having a hard time, let's both trying to walk this week or
something like not in a like let's manage mad. But I like that's our way of being like we love you and so, and you might not reach out because that's not what you can do in that time. But it's hard to know that unless you know how something's manifesting for you.
Yeah, and that's beautiful. I do love I love you too, I love Khn, I love an Abby too, and Abby I love Abby as well. And yeah, I think there is a yeah, you do want to check in with people. I certainly know for me, probably more so with when I'm going through a depressed episode, when when the mood drops and everything becomes quite hopeless, I do become very reclusive.
It's really hard to reach out. I think that's another thing that often is really hard to understand for people who don't have kind of mental or mood disorders or mentally illness. It's like just reach out, just message, and that's like everest when you're in a hole, it's really hard to do. There's a lot of No matter what people say about loving you, there's still this shame and
fear of judgment. And there is no As a scientist, there is no evidence of anyone that loves me, my family, my friends from ever showing any sort.
Of judgment data match data science.
There is no, and so should be saying there's no evidence of that whatsoever. Stopped being a shit scientist.
You are being a shit austro business.
Do your job, but your brain becomes so uncooperative in those moments. And so yeah, I think, yeah, that the check ins are really important. I know they certainly are for me, and I imagine probably that's quite universal. It's the challenges. Like you said, you and can't can contact each other when you get to read that something might
be off. But it's really hard to know sometimes when something's off, and so I try to One of the things I try to do is when I'm feeling good and it's easy to talk to people, I try to be fairly you know, proactive messaging and organizing things so that when that drops off, it's almost like okay, the fact that I can't find the motivation and strength to reach out, that is a signal in itself to people, because it's like, hang on, haven't heard from Matt for
a while. He's usually quite good at contacting and checking in with with you know themselves, or organizing grabbing coffees or dinners or whatever. And so I think that's been a really useful thing for me because the fact that
I'm not reaching out is the signal itself. Is not reaching out is the reaching out that works, right, So that's kind of a strategy I f aren't really useful, but it's hard to know because everyone finds different strategies useful for them, and so it's it's there's a I guess a frustrating part with It's the same as when trying to get the right in medication or cocktail of medication.
It's there's so much variance in how different medications affect people, both in its efficacy and also in its side effects, and so trying to find the right thing for you there is an element of trial and error. There's things about a dozen of so different antidepressants. How do you know which ones for you? They will typically prescribed? Probably the one that has universally the lower side effects and then go from there. And I think similar with strategies
you're kind of developing, Okay, this might work. This is something you've either discussed with someone else or with your psychologists or psychiatrist or whatever your medical professional that you're working with to tackle these things. But then you know when you execute that strategy didn't work well enough. And so it's like, all right, let's modify, let's evolve, let's
try and get it right. And so I think over the period of several years, I've got some strategies that seem to be more effective than what I've had two, three, five years ago. But it's a constant learning experience, I think, and a constant battle trying to you know, trying to alt smart you get yeah, exactly. So it's yeah, it's tough.
I think that was the frustration I had was my brain is maybe my best weapon, and yet like how logically is it internally of its own accord working against me? It just is It was so frustrating for like a high functioning person to be like, this is actually delaying things I want to do. It's delaying like you know, studying or having friendships or starting businesses or whatever. And what you said is just accepting that it's not something
that gets fixed, it's something that gets managed. I love watching you because you actively show and share that you are managing it. You share when you're having a shitty time, and then that you can get back to having good times, and then you might go back to having shitty times. And I will include the link to Jess's episode because I think it's I can't top that it was. You were both just in the most perfect, vulnerable, supported, beautiful
space to share so much detail on that area. But here I want to just labor the point that you can manage it, and with great gaps in your productivity or happiness or ability to function how you want to, you have still managed to have an incredibly successful career.
And like if you look at Matt's LinkedIn the Bachelor, is not even a blip, Like it is literally, like sure, a huge chapter and there's a big before and after in terms of the platform you have and big emotional things that happened, But it's a blip compared to all the other things you've done. And it would be remissive me not to spend I have use so much of our time on just a waffling, but not to spend
time like people who interview you. I'm like, you have an astrophysicist, and you haven't asked about aliens.
You have not literally.
Asked about Elon Musk just landing something like how have you not asked about that stuff? Because it's such a waste of your challenge and not asking those questions. So
I have to move on to that. But I do like, thank you for always being so vulnerable and sharing, because you are someone that people probably expect that the least from you fit this mold of yeah, confident, Gregary is capable, successful, and it's a constant battle behind the scenes, but you do do an amazing job at sharing that you And speaking of space Uranus Khan.
He knew I was going to drop it in there at some point, just before we.
Do move on to aliens and UFOs which are actually called UAPs. Now in front of the austrophysicist, I have to get the term.
Two. People were thinking that UFOs two kind.
Of It's interesting that one of the things you do still face which is reductive, which is really annoying, is that when you're as a friend it's really annoying when your book came out, your first book, which is all about doctor Matt Agnew's Guide to Space, so hella intelligent, right.
Intelligence. So there is a literal.
Article announcing your book that was Matt Agnew's exciting news after denying Khannong, I was like, is that really how you are announcing an astrophysicist new book on space, as if it's like the next dude you're dating in your non literal, non homosexual life. People are deciding that you've denied khn not that you actually aren't in a relationship because you are heterosexual, but you denied him. So said no, like, your news is not a book, it's some other guy.
I was so enraged when I saw that, not in rage, but just like, yeah, totally baffled. But we have already covered this, so I don't want to spend time on it again, except that I get at least once a week, like it's almost like Gemini Gate. It comes up in my DMS gate once a week when I'm Matt and Karn gonna come out as a couple. Can you please clarify the fact that masculine affection is okay within a heterosexual males life.
Yes, I could confirm that.
Yes, can you, as a scientist confirm or deny the science?
Male masculine affection is okay, completely normal. I show affection to everyone in my life, women, men, non binary, whatever. I also am very liberal with saying love you to people. I finish a lot of phone calls with saying that I've almost let us slip out. In professional I'm also very liberal with yeah. I'm also very liberal with my use of exes, which sometimes got me in trouble because you.
Are an exit.
I'm an exit because I think it's passive aggressive if you don't include an X. I'm like, is Madam going on?
Yeah, yeah, that's about signal. It's so. Yeah. I'm very affectionate, and I think it's important that men are affectionate both with women and with other men, because it's this bizarre, I mean toxic masculinely. I feel like the terms overuse it's diminished some of its impact, but it is really toxic to suggest that men don't want to both give
and receive affection platonically or romantically whatever. And I always bring it up with such social creatures like millions of years of evolution has led us to being tremendously social creatures, and so to deny that biological imperative to receive and give affection is bizarre and just stupid and unhelpful.
Broadly speaking, people have so much of a hard time about your relationship struggling.
We spoke about it on a previous podcast, and I mean, it's a very art exciting kind of answer. No, we're not a couple. We're just very good friends who have no problem showing physical affection to one another. And it still comes out. And I've had people say to me, oh, because you're gay, aren't you.
I know what to say to that.
I'm actually Gemini and I'm very comfortable with my sexuality. I don't find it offensive or anything like that. But I just don't know where it's come from, because we've very clearly said we're not a couple. I've had people who I remember I was organizing a date with someone and this is last year, and she texted me before a date and said, oh, are you bisexual? And I said no, what was that? And she goes, because I was with a friend and or with someone, They go, oh, yeah,
Matt Agney, he's bisexual. And so there's this idea that's still permeating within the public discourse that I'm gay or bisexual, it doesn't matter. I'm not offended of it or anything like that. And I kind of I don't feel compelled to deny it other than I don't want to be accused of queer baiting or anything like that. But at the same time, I kind of I was torn about whether to deny it, because for me it doesn't it
doesn't matter. I'm heterosexual. I couldn't care less. But I don't want to create this pressure where someone is gay that someone can just ask publicly yeah, and.
Say you'll get point to you someone's.
Gay, that then they get forced to come out when they're not ready. It's I imagine, obviously I can't relate, but I imagine that's a tremendously personal and significant moment for someone to come out. And I didn't want to contribute to that sort of idea that it's okay to ask someone publicly you're gay or you're bisexual, and I should reply and give some sort of definitive answer. And so I kind of had this, you know, these battling things where it's like, well, I'm not queer bating, so
I need to confirm it. But also I don't want to create this situation where people who are queer. I'm kind of perpetuating this idea. So I mean by talking about it on the podcast with Khan, I let him kind of direct how much we should say. Yeah, I kind of want to be very clear that you don't
have the right to ask someone their sexuality. For me, it's it doesn't matter, but for someone who might be queer, it's it's you're you're robbing them of a very emotional and significant moment in their lives, and you shouldn't be putting undue pressure on someone to rush that moment. So I can't even remember what my what was the question here? But I think I'm just making it very clear that line of question that people keep putting to me. I don't care.
To me, I'm not the boss of them. What do you mean, I'm not their manager, their manager.
The manager it could be so yeah, I think, yeah, I don't care people ask me. But but I think it's very important that the public knows that that's that's a inappropriate line of questioning, because you're putting pressure unfair on someone who they need to do it when they're ready.
Yeah, I just still can't believe that the articles that have come out about it, like it's front page New.
There was still one can't shared it. We went to was it the ballet we went to? There was about six or seven of us who went to the ballet, and so a bunch of us got photos on the red car because we thought, oh, let's get some nice photos together that would be cute. Anyway, we got one photo together. I had photos with several of my friends, some women. I should highlight. The article that came out was Matt goes to ballet after cuddling KHN And it was a photo of us from like a movie night,
like three months prior. Even stories kn't have done, where we're both lying on the car and that was the photo. And it was like you went in the article and then halfway down it's got a photo of me with KRN and then a photo of me with some other people. But it's just ridiculous angles and like trying to force this narrative and I mean, I mean can't find it amusing now. And yeah, certainly not going to make us change how we behave and how we live out our friendship.
So yes, fascinating, it's so nice.
It's baffling.
But I just contributed to that because that frustrates me so much because I should be moving on to space, and I've used time on that question, but I just wanted to That's okay, cover it. So I'm going to turn to fast fire now in the world of intellectual pursuits and you know, aliens and all that fun stuff.
Fast Fire.
I know fast fire because I've just realized how much time I've used on everything else. And I started the conversation saying, I want to talk about your astrophysics, and then fifty five minutes in, I'm like, Matt, the astrophysicists, this is what happens when you into your interview. I know, I'm dumb, too excited. Okay, so very quickly, can you explain to a lay person who doesn't actually know what astrophysics is?
What is it?
It's the study of astrophysics. I mean, it's all in the name. It's the study of the physics that makes up the universe, and so that can be on smaller scales. So, like my research was around planets specifically, I was looking at the dynamics of planets. So when planets are in orbit around a star, what sort of interesting things can happen when you've got two planet systems and when you have There was a show called three Body Problem that
came out on Netflix. I wasn't a fan of the show, but it highlighted three body problem is a common problem in both maths and physics because it's unstable when you've got three bodies bound gravitationally. Anyway, I don't want to get too far into the weeds, but you can have the smaller scale, which is what I did, and I say smaller in the universe and astrophysics context, planets are still massive versus the larger scale where you're looking at
the structure of the universe itself. And so that's kind of what you call cosmology, the structure, large scale structure of the universe, but also the origins and ultimate fate of the universe, and cosmology is straight over my head. Even kind of smaller that things like classifying galaxies and the what's called the more phology of galaxies, so how you categorize them and the evolution of galaxies. Even that, while I do my PhD, so I'm doing an astrophysics PhD.
I could talk to another astrophysicist doing that research. It was like speaking in Russian saying, so's there's a huge breadth to astrophysics because the physics of space varies, not varies, still is governed by the same mathematics, but the physics when you're looking at something smaller like planets, is a different set of physics than when you're considering things on the larger scale.
Oh my god, I love that.
I love this.
I really seriously wish we could do a whole episode just on the astrophysics.
Did we land on the Moon?
Absolutely?
Okay, yeah, what do you think of the footage of the flags and stuff?
Like?
What the conspiracy theorist who are like, there's wound on the planet?
Yeah, So the footage of the flag is literally when they planted the flag, essentially you're going to have a bit of vibration in there, and without air, you've got nothing to damp that vibration. So when you slam a thing into the ground, like a flag, when you when you what do you even call it? When you plant it? But when you put it in the ground.
There's a really fancy there's a fancy word for the Yeah, whatever, you're going to get some.
Vibration, Yeah, exactly, just sitting here like so, yeah, you get some vibration, and that's what's what's happening there, because there's no way to stop it. On Earth, vibrations will eventually peter out because you've got things that are slowing it down, typically air resistance, friction, depending on the particular scenario you're looking at, but you don't have that in space.
You've got a little bit of friction where the flagpole meets the ground, so eventually that will dampen it down to nothing, but it will take a lot longer than
if you have air resistance. The other thing with suggesting that the landing of the Moon didn't happen, I think one of the most frustrating parts that is it's quite disrespectful thing to assert because people died trying to from the missions from kind of starting from Mercury all the way through to Apollo, which Mercury was the very early space missions, but it was all part of getting towards it was all part of the space race, and people died, and so to suggest that it didn't happen is such
a disrespect to these trailblazers. Yeah, the whole body of science that that happened, all the engineers and scientists that were behind the scenes working on these things. But yeah, the kind of the trailblazers, the cowboys that actually did the kind of outrageous things. Yeah, some of them died and so yeah, I find it quite a disrespectful assertion, and people make it and there's actually funny. I remember seeing this video. I'll see how I can find it
and send them to you later. But it's basically this guy who's like a seasoned not a director, but like a filmographer or something like that, and he's going through and weirdly, the technology for recording video at the time was not sufficient to create the footage that they actually recorded using. Because people are like, oh, Stanley Kubrick did a space o to see he created these fake landing imagery of videos, and this guy filmographer just highlights that.
Know that.
People are kind of confused now because it's such great CGI.
Yeah yeah, yeah, but the tech I couldn't have fake things like creating the movement of the astronauts and the slow motion movement.
And stuff like that.
They're like, it wasn't there.
It wasn't there. So weirdly, we had the tech to get to the moon and record twenty four frame for a second, you know, really low black and white resolution image video, but to create that artificially in a studio, the technology wasn't there. Wow, which is really fascinating. So
there's actually, yeah, one hundred percent happened. Yeah, and yeah, there's there's numerous ways to prove that, but yeah, that from a film technology perspective is a really unique way of doing that, and I find it quite fascinating.
I like that, Ye aliens in.
UFOs UFOs nonsense.
Like big spinning discs with like.
Stealing cows and.
Yeah, stealing why the cows know none of us have cows in our bacura.
No. I mean the thing I always say with with you know when when the discussion around you have both and your EPs crash crash land and all these kind of stuff, or even just their scene. A sufficiently advanced alien civilization that can create this sort of technology to traverse the huge chasms between worlds, makes it all the way to Earth and then crashes. It makes no sense, like the it's not it's snuck up on them, surprise, And they always crash in the US.
Yeah, always in Nevada, So that's always around a certain military complex.
Correct. But then you know, even if they don't crash, the idea that they have this brilliant technology to get to Earth and then they just kind of forget that they're there and get seen circle forgot to turn on the cloaking devices. Yeah, the UFO thing nonsense. Has or have aliens ever visited Earth? Who would know? Like it's been around four and a half billion years generously recorded history. You could argue, you know, ten thousand civilizations, ten thousand,
extend that to sixty or eighty thousand. If First Nations Australians recorded the first trend was recorded stuff. But even run up to one hundred thousand, one hundred thousand schemes four and a half billion years, you know, it's blink of an eye. So could aliens have come before First Nations Australians were recording stuff?
Maybe?
I do believe in aliens, but not in the little green mense. And I talk about this a little bit in my book about there's even places in our own soul system where it looks like we've got all the right ingredients for life and so I can imagine if life is as simple as A plus B plus C equals life, that being you know, water, energy, and nutrients. Then if that is as simple as it is, I think in our lifetime we will find evidence of fossilized
ancient fossilized life on Mars. If there's something more complex to life and there requires some sort of secret source, then we won't find that because clearly there's some special thing that happened here on Earth that won't have happened elsewhere. But if it is just as simple as the right ingredients, then I think Mars would have had all the right ingredients. And there's a few moons of Satin and Jupiter which
looks like they also would have the right ingredients. It's much harder for us to actually explore those locations though, So yeah, I do think that life is potentially not uncommon and that it is quite easy to kick off. You just need the right things in the right place.
The idea of life evolving to be smart, being intelligent, advanced civilizations all that, I think that's tremendously rare, and if it does happen, happening over the same time period also yeah, as us, but also the same distance kind of location, you know, whether it could actually we could cross paths or communicate, I think is much rarer.
But what an eloquent answer.
Yeah, I just wanted you.
To be like, yes, tiny green people in your home under the bed. Yeah, yeah, like a plant, really.
Really simplistic stuff.
Yeah. I can't believe I've left so little time for AI because that's what I really wanted to joke about, but I didn't. Yeah, I mean this was bound to happen. We'll have to come back for a part two. But you have just released an incredible book, and this one's aimed to morant children, and it's called Is My Phone Reading My Mind?
So that's I mean the question, what's what's the answer.
Is is how close is AI to like sentient robots who are going to take over the world?
Okay, so two. I feel like it's two part.
I'm asking it to literally con it's an entire master's degree.
Is it reading our mind? Sort of, it's not listening to us. But the idea of artificial intelligence and machine learning as it stands is sort of to try and read your mind and predict what you like, what you dislike, what you want to see what you want to hear. So you see that play out and things like Netflix, Thousands and thousands of things are available to watch on Netflix. The AI tries to predict what you are thinking, what you'll actually enjoy, and it serves those up as recommendations.
So is it reading our mind? I go into much more detail in the book, but the answer is sort of,
I'm certainly trying to. And that can sound creepy, but the idea that can it can tremendously enrich our lives and make things easier and ideally outsource some of the mental burden so that we have more time to ourselves and more mental capacity for the things we actually enjoy and are passionate about, and largely that I imagine will be relationships, family, friends, children, in all of those when you think about way you want to spend your time, it's typically going to be
those things. So the second part was what's the second part? Oh? Yeah, how close.
Are we to sentient robots?
So we are going to literally you do, a robot take over us and in humanity forever.
Yeah. So the problem you have with this is that there's no agreed upon definition of sentience and consciousness. Yeah, there's sort of kind of there's some definitions that sound right, but if you ask different scientists within these fields, they've probably all got slightly different variations on what it is. And so trying to say has an artificial intelligence achieved sentience or consciousness is quite hard to say right now.
Absolutely not, there's definitely not, just in the way that large language models, which is what most people are currently thinking of when they think of AI. They think of these llms like chat EBT, like perplexity, Claude lama, I think is metas one, and these are created to sort of make human conversation, and the way they're built, it's very very clever, sophisticated word predictors, essentially tremendously complex, and they are so good at what they do. They can
mimic human conversation. But they're just trying to guess what's probabilistically the next word I should say. When answering this.
Way, they're not doing it from feeling.
No correct And so some people argue, isn't that what the human brain does? And it's well not, maybe, but maybe not. We don't know we know what LM's how they work, we don't know how the brain works. Did we just happen to create the same architecture that the brain does. I'd be surprised if that was the case. But until we figure out exactly how the brain works, you can't rule it out. But I'd say that's very improbable.
So how close are we to sentence and consciousness? I subscribe to the idea that I think there's a missing piece to create sentence or consciousness. I think the architecture that governs large language models. You can keep scaling that, and that's what chat GPT is doing, it's or anthropics doing. They're all just you know, I think, what's the one
GROC that Elon Musk made. They just build a facility with one hundred thousand I think they're h one hundreds, which are these like GPUs or neural processing units that are designed to train and build really really complex lms. You can keep scaling and making them more sophisticated, but all you're doing is scaling it. You're not fundamentally changing the framework. And so I think they're still a missing piece in terms of creating something that would be considered
sentient or consciousness. But until we get to that point, you can create something that is remarkably good at mimicking humans, and even I think now the new zero what's it called one, the latest chat GBT. They haven't released the full version, but you can use it the preview. They've started trying to incorporate more reasoning and logic into their answers as well, so they'll get really close to creating very similar outputs to what a human would be able
to do. But I think the framework is still missing something that would be considered sentient or conscious, and even the fact that like it's not if you don't prompt chat GPT, it's not thinking, it's.
Not sitting there, well, you don't know, it just sits there.
It's like, yeah, listening, but you know, like a calculator is not doing anything until you use it, it's the same kind of thing. And so yeah, you can't say something sentient where it's just not doing anything until you prompt it. So how long hard to say. With the rate of technological progress, Depending on how close we are with what we currently have, it could be quite soon. But like I said, I think there's there's still research and there still needs to be some sort of breakthrough
in terms of the architecture. The machine learning architecture that will govern it. So look ten to twenty years. I don't know, I've just plucked that feeling that but yeah, that's based on purely that that there is an accelerating progression of technological development, but also kind of conservatively saying the twenty years because we still may not have figured out the secret of unlocking scent into consciousness yet and so that could be a bottleneck for some time as well.
So watch this space.
How good my prediction was, Yeah, Oh my gosh, we'll come back to it. I can fully understand why Abby did a two parter because I literally feel like I start, I'm so annoyed to myself. I started the episode saying, look at the complexity of a human and then I didn't even make it to Pash like and like, I'm already like why over the studio time. I'm so sorry,
gone on so many tangents. But I feel like this is also why I love our friendship, because there are so many facets we are like our tandents go in so many different directions, and the breadth of the conversation is why I enjoy our friendship so much. So thank you for letting me do that in this episode, having totally inaccurately promised that I would cover all facets, which
is impossible for the fabric of an entire human. But I hope that you guys listening have heard just a little bit of a mat that you didn't know already, and so much more to come from you. I'll of course include all the links to everything the new book, the first book, none of the articles about denying Khan crash, the incredible alcoholic free beer, and I will include more details about that in the intro and outro as well, and we'll have to come back for part two.
I'd love to this. I mean, look, this was inevitable, right, we.
Knew such strict notes, and then I just went, yeah, very very loose guidelines.
We knew we were going to go very tangential. Yeah, this is no Thanks so much, haining, this is really fun. Want me to come back for part two. I'd love to.
Absolutely. I literally feel like that was one percent of scrape in the surface. I can't believe I made you rush the actual astrophysics and AI part of it.
Because there's so I feel like there.
Is there's so much substance that just isn't covered anywhere, and I find it reductive, factual, but reductive.
But I do hope that yeah, you guys.
Were able to get a little bit of a glimpse into parts that you hadn't heard before. And if you do want part two, let us know and we'll come back.
Thank you.
Okay, So, as I mentioned, this is part one, with Part two definitely going to follow. I don't know how the time just got eaten up, and I was so frustrated at myself for the time management. But now that I think about it, Matt is so multifaceted, lending to so many different big topics and covering them any faster just wouldn't do him or them justice at all. So really I was unrealistic in thinking we could just do
this in one part. We have so much more to say, particularly on quitting alcohol, as I mentioned leading to his incredible business, the non alcoholic beer Pash, which then has led him to a recent stint on Shark Tank, the impact that quitting alcohol has had on his relationships and dating, and so much more. So stay tuned for Part two, and all the links we mentioned will be in the show notes. As I said, if you enjoyed, please do share and tag Matt to thank him for his time
and vulnerability. It's at dr matt Agnew on Instagram and in the meantime, I hope you're all having a great week and as seizing your yay. Part two will be coming soon and thank you guys so much again for listening.