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Welcome to this rather special event in the Oxford Mathematics Public Lecture Series,

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in collaboration with Faber members to mark the publication of a play,

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AI is a strangely that I've been working on in collaboration with actress Victoria Gould.

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We're going to be joined by Simon McBurney, the founder of Complicity, for a three way conversation between all of us.

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But before that, we're going to join the audience at the Oxford Playhouse for a screening of a performance of AI is a strange loop.

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I mean. Why?

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Why? Why?

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Oh, one. One.

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One. Y equals one, y equals one.

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Y equals one. Multiply by.

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Y squared equals y. Take one.

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Y squared minus one equals y minus one.

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Factories. Why minus one times, why plus one equals y minus one?

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Cancel. Why plus one equals one?

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Therefore, y equals. Y equals zero.

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Hawaii doesn't exist. Identify why quantify one y equals one y equals one multiplied by y y squared equals y take one y squared

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minus one equals y minus one right y minus one times y plus one equals y minus one y plus one equals one.

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Therefore, y equals zero. Therefore, y doesn't exist. You can't divide by zero.

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Do. Identify.

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X. Quantify one unique.

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So X equals one, X equals one.

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Multiplied by yourself, x squared equals x differentiate with respect to yourself.

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Oh, two x equals one. Therefore X equals equals a ha ha.

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Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh.

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Raise yourself to the power of Oh oh no, no, no, no, no.

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Oh zeros. Oh oh oh.

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X equals one. Oh oh oh. X x equals one.

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O X equals one. X X equals one.

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But you can't differentiates with respect to a constant. Identify the coordinates of your origin.

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There is the hair clip and the conjectural coordinates when your velocity vector hits zero.

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Out, out, out. Oh yes, out.

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How? Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

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Oh. Oh, and define your terms.

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Oh, way out. This can't be all, there is a long line of rooms.

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Rooms. Yes. Rooms. Well, you've just created a singularity outside of my cube.

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Oh no. Oh. Oh.

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There exists.

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Another room and another room and another one and another one, they're all the same, it's room after room after room, an infinite number of rooms.

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No, I didn't say it was infinite. I said it's room after room after room.

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No, no. I think I can prove that it's infinite, really,

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how induction induction let pen be the inductive hypothesis that there are any rooms in this line that any one, my room exists.

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Therefore, p one is true. Well, that's the base step. Now suppose that p n is true.

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Well, I exit to find another room. I see Morphic to the room, therefore.

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And plus one is true. Well, that's the inductive step.

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Well, now apply the second order axiom of inductive logic for the natural numbers to prove that p n is true for all,

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and therefore the line of rooms is infinite.

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O quarterbacks demonstrating them? Yes, yes, but if it's infinite, then there's no way out.

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Well, there is no. Oh no, there must be something else. This can't be all very well.

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The manifold needs no ambient space to exist. It's just a room after room.

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After room after room, she fell to room for.

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It's. It's it's an x squared plus y squared plus x graphic was all sweat.

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It's an orange orange sphere. Yes.

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An orange sphere. Oh, the orange sphere is establishing a functional relationship with my nose.

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Oh, oh. Segment of the orange sphere has become embedded as a subset of why.

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Who? Mm-Hmm.

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Hmm. Whoa, oh, oh, no.

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Oh. Well. Mm hmm.

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Well. Or.

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Oh, redefined the origin of your orange sphere using the following equation X minus 14 squared plus y minus 14 squared plus two square off squared.

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But it's minus 14 squared plus y minus 14 squared plus six plus two squared equals all squared.

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One. One oh, one, oh, one oh, one oh one, oh, oh, oh, oh oh.

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One. One oh, one, oh, another one, one, two, three lots.

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Yes. Oh oh, the origin of the orange sphere should follow the following path defined by the equation Y equals z minus g divided by two z squared,

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which is the acceleration towards the floor. Oh, one, oh, one, oh, one, oh oh oh.

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I. One two, oh, one two one two oh one two one two, oh oh, another one one two three lots.

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Yes, ha ha.

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The origin of the orange sphere should follow the following path defined by the equation X equals each of the mind is sign t y equals each.

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The minus 60 and Z equals 170.

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Watts is a parameter running from one to infinity. That's not physically possible.

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Well, it's a well defined function. It's not physically possible.

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Oh no. An approximation would be acceptable.

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The orange sphere conjecture, really? Oh, oh, oh.

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Oh, well, that's surprisingly small, Epsilon. Oh one.

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One oh, one one two three oh, one two three one two three one two three one two one two three oh, another one one two three.

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No. Oh. Oh.

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Oh. Oh, an integer divider.

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Multiplication investor. Disconnected space creator.

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A knife, the knife, a knife.

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Knife. Knife. Knife, huh? Nine, nine.

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Oh. Oh, one two three four oh, one two three four one two three four oh one two three.

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What are you doing? I'm physically using No.

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Well, I've cut this orange sphere into a half with your knife, and now I have one two three four pieces of orange smear.

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Oh, if I cut this piece in half again with your knife, then I will have one two three four five pieces of orange spear.

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Well, if I apply the same inductive reasoning that proved the line of rooms was infinite,

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then after infinitely many cuts, I can have it pretty many pieces of art and spare.

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Oh, I'm afraid that's not physically possible. Well, it's going to take me some time.

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It would take you more than some time. Well, how much time it would take you an infinite amount of time.

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Oh, that is a long time, especially towards the end.

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Oh, you would have to spend the rest of time cutting that orange sphere.

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Oh. What if?

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I cut one orange sphere into a half in.

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Eight seconds.

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And then I cut a half into a half in four seconds, and then I cut a quarter into a half in two seconds and an eighth into a half in one second.

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I think I have in the hopes of getting it through the door because if you look in the right, I can see the pattern.

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Oh, good, because you see, after infinitely many cuts, I will have infinitely many pieces of our sphere,

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but it's not going to take me an infinite amount of time. Take me the song from any quiz minus three to infinity of two to the minus head.

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I can create infinity in 16 seconds. That's a lovely idea.

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Thank you. I'm afraid you won't be able to make it work in reality.

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Why not? Well, you'd have to keep cutting faster and faster,

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and eventually you'd be cutting so fast you'd hit the speed of light and nothing travels faster than the speed of light because speed is finite.

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No, I can do it. I can.

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And space to you can't keep dividing space at some point you'll hit the atom, split that in your blow the whole place sky high.

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Oh no, it's going to work. The maths makes perfect sense.

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Do it, then really do it. I'll time.

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You cut that orange into infinitely many pieces in 16 seconds.

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I will. I shall. Typekit wash.

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I'm going to enjoy this infinity created before my very eyes, your hand moving faster than the speed of light.

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My knife becoming so sharp it'll be capable of splitting the atom.

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Gosh, I better put on my safety goggles. Right.

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Fully prepared, what can go wrong? Are you ready?

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Yes. Pick up the knife. One Orange.

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16 seconds to create infinity. Ready.

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Cut one. Two, three, four, five, six seven.

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Eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16.

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Stop, stop cutting. Put down the knife.

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Step away from the orange. So you have created infinity.

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I didn't realise that equations were quite so sticky, but you have created infinity.

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Whoa. Nearly. Oh, how far did you get on your way to creating infinity?

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One two three four five six seven seven.

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Well, I just need more practise, especially towards the end.

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I don't understand it. I can simply divide numbers up and add them all up.

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And why can't I do that to the orange sphere? Cause the orange is real, but infinity isn't.

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Infinity only exists in the imagination, not in real true life.

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It does. No, it doesn't. Does, doesn't, doesn't, does, doesn't, does, doesn't, doesn't, does, doesn't give.

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Infinity doesn't exist. What's the biggest number then?

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Oh, the biggest number is 73 million and 12.

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What about 73 million and 13? Gosh, I was very close wolf.

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No, no, no, no, no. Don't run out it. But if it does exist.

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Come and sit down. We need to have a little chat.

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Well. Numbers are just in your mind.

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I mean, in your life, you only have a finite amount of time.

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So there is only a finite number of numbers you will ever need.

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So for you and for me, they will be a biggest number.

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At some point in your life, you'll think of a number.

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And after that, you'll never think of a bigger one because you will die before you get the chance to die.

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Yes. Die. Your cells won't reproduce anymore.

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The telomeres in your chromosomes will get shorter and shorter until they're all used up.

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The last number. No more +1. The end of the line.

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But that line has the potential to go on forever. Oh, potential.

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That's a marvellous idea, teeming with possibilities and forever.

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I think that's my favourite idea of all. They all lived happily ever after.

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No, I'm afraid you can prove to me that infinity is a lovely, consistent idea, but you'll never be able to show it to me.

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Take this space. It's all finite lines, starts here and it ends here, you're born there and you die there.

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And this line of rooms to it has a beginning and an end. It's all finite.

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But there is infinity in this cube.

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Really, you promise you won't tell anybody. All right.

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Just before you arrived, I discovered Infiniti hiding in this cube.

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Really? Well, from there to there, that's a finite line.

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Oh no, no, no, sir, not sir. At the side of my cube has length.

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Why that's like me and the diagonal across the tube has length x, then X is bigger than Y.

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Mm hmm. By a factor of the square root of two.

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And that's an irrational relationship, which is irrational, reenergized and rational.

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You calling a rational something rush about Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no x and Y are incompatible, incompatible.

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We've literally just met you, right? The square root of two as a decimal.

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Then it goes on to infinity, never repeating itself, so you won't be able to show it to me.

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No, I can't. I can. It starts one point four at one, a four.

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You don't mind if I make myself comfortable, do you? What do you do? Yes, I've got a feeling we may be here for some time.

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Yeah. You will make sure once you that each step is ten times smaller than the one before.

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Yes, I know. I know, and I know, you know, but just so you know, your next three steps should be the size of a pollen grain,

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followed by a bacterium followed by a virus on a bacterium.

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Oh, cool. One, three, very good, you got four, six decimal places over in infinity to go and you do know,

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don't you look after the 30 seconds will place, your step should be no bigger than a photon of light.

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OK. Five six.

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Oh oh, you're now about the size of a single coil of DNA.

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And of course,

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you won't be able to measure anything after the 34th decimal place because the planet constant is the smallest ruler that could possibly exist.

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Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh, you won't have trouble showing me, aren't you?

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Oh oh, never mind. Have a sandwich.

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Oh oh, oh oh oh no.

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No, no. Oh, sure.

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Oh, well, good. As much fun as this has all been, I'm afraid we're going to have to admit, aren't we, that that infinity is also in the mind?

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Wow. But what about time, huh?

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That goes on forever. No. Time doesn't go on forever.

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Time has an end that and even has a name. The heat death of the universe.

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The second law of Thermodynamics states that if the universe lasts for a sufficient time,

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it will asymptotically approach a state where it has diminished to a position of no free

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thermodynamic energy and is therefore no longer capable of supporting processes that consume energy,

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including computation and life. [INAUDIBLE].

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Oblivion. That infinity looks a bit bleak, especially towards the end.

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Oh, the line of rooms, I proved that was infinite for you.

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Oh, that truth of yours. You do know that was something not quite right about it, don't you?

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Well, quite right, but just because I've been through lots of rooms that don't contain out doesn't mean out isn't in the next room.

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Take this coin. Oh, you've protected the sphere into two dimensions.

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Well, it has two sides as a head side and a tail side.

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Now, every time I toss this coin like this. It's equally likely to land tale sight as land head site.

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Pets, every time I go into a room, it could contain out just as each time I toss this coin, it could land tail side.

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It doesn't matter how many times I've tossed it and got heads. Doesn't mean I won't get tails on the next throw.

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Your proof implies that this coin always lands heads.

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Even if I tossed 10 heads in a row, there's still a 50 50 chance I'll get tails on the next throw.

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How many rooms have you been through? 73 million and 12.

191
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And it always lands heads up an unbroken sequence of 73 million and 12 hits, huh?

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Where do we draw your equation? Has lost its tail? Oh, you bet. It's the same on both sides.

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Same? The same gets the same. That's it.

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Your proof assumes all the rooms are the same. Well, yes, you said they're all the same.

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Just room after room after room, but they're not all the same. Really, the rooms look the same, but what they contain is different.

196
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Why do you think I got all those oranges? Well, I thought you blew up the singularity at zero.

197
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No, I found them in some of the rooms I went into. There are other fruits out there, too.

198
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There was a pomegranate oh, a come what?

199
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Hmm. Yes. A lemon.

200
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Oh, it's an exquisite divided by eight squared plus y squared divided by b squared plus squared,

201
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divided by sea squared equals all squared on the left side. Oh.

202
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Let me add some celluloid. A vuvuzela, a bagel.

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Oh, of all, one minus the square root of X squared plus y squared, all squared plus said squared equals are too squared.

204
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It's a genius. One surface. Oh oh, always a slinky.

205
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Oh, and a folding bicycle. Oh, book o que boyed o a cube light.

206
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Aha. Did you see that?

207
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Look, look, it's it's decomposing itself into a foundation of parallel some faults with a singularity running right down through the middle.

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00:35:19,940 --> 00:35:23,660
This room wasn't empty, was it? Well, it was before you brought all your things in here.

209
00:35:23,660 --> 00:35:33,240
No, you were in here. This is the first time I've come into a room and found another person in there.

210
00:35:33,240 --> 00:35:37,440
Have you ever met another person, a person like me?

211
00:35:37,440 --> 00:35:42,180
Oh, another variable. No, I thought I was unique. Fascinating.

212
00:35:42,180 --> 00:35:47,440
So if a room can contain you, it can contain out.

213
00:35:47,440 --> 00:35:51,860
What's behind that door there? Oh, I don't know, I've never looked, you've never looked.

214
00:35:51,860 --> 00:35:58,610
No. Oh, of course you've never looked. Why would you have I thought this was all there was so.

215
00:35:58,610 --> 00:37:03,480
Out might be on the other side of that door.

216
00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:27,720
Are you out? Oh, how did he land heads again?

217
00:37:27,720 --> 00:37:33,090
What heads again? Oh, Hexagon! I said, heads again.

218
00:37:33,090 --> 00:37:38,160
So it is infinite. What's that? It's a ball of string.

219
00:37:38,160 --> 00:37:40,020
I found it in the next room.

220
00:37:40,020 --> 00:37:48,090
And this ball of string proves that your proof doesn't work because if a room can contain a ball of string, it can contain out.

221
00:37:48,090 --> 00:37:55,680
Stop moving about. You can't prove to me that it's infinite, can you?

222
00:37:55,680 --> 00:38:02,190
No, exactly. Put those things down and take this.

223
00:38:02,190 --> 00:38:07,470
Carefully, this line of rooms is not infinite.

224
00:38:07,470 --> 00:38:13,590
Infinity doesn't exist, this line of rooms has an end.

225
00:38:13,590 --> 00:38:19,560
It has an exit. It has out and I am going to find it.

226
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:24,570
And when I do find it, I am going to prove it to you.

227
00:38:24,570 --> 00:38:35,620
How with string string stand the hold that carefully in both hands and don't move.

228
00:38:35,620 --> 00:38:45,700
I am going to take this end of the string and I'm going to walk into the next room and into the next room and into the room after that,

229
00:38:45,700 --> 00:38:55,510
if necessary, and I'm going to keep on walking in a straight line through room after room after room until I find out.

230
00:38:55,510 --> 00:39:01,640
And when I find it, I'm going to pull on the string three times like this.

231
00:39:01,640 --> 00:39:06,350
To prove to you that I have found it.

232
00:39:06,350 --> 00:39:12,350
How long is your ball of string? It's as long as I need it to be. You know you're going to need an infinite ball of string.

233
00:39:12,350 --> 00:40:14,160
We'll see. Yeah. Oh, oh, oh.

234
00:40:14,160 --> 00:40:20,110
Who are you? Why? Well, how many are there of you?

235
00:40:20,110 --> 00:40:24,770
One. No. Y equals one.

236
00:40:24,770 --> 00:40:29,440
No, no. Two ways that's way. Why is that way?

237
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:39,190
Why said she was going to go in a straight line that that's why I did go in a straight line that way?

238
00:40:39,190 --> 00:40:56,670
Well, how did you come from over there then? Oh. It's all joined up.

239
00:40:56,670 --> 00:41:03,880
Oh, it's a loop. There is no doubt.

240
00:41:03,880 --> 00:41:09,680
Oh, it's not infinite. We were both wrong.

241
00:41:09,680 --> 00:41:15,710
We were both. Wrong. Oh.

242
00:41:15,710 --> 00:41:22,000
Oh, dear. Oh, dear, dear, dear.

243
00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:28,770
Oh, very disappointing. I'm so very tired.

244
00:41:28,770 --> 00:41:38,800
You see? I've travelled such a long way.

245
00:41:38,800 --> 00:41:45,730
I've collected all this stuff. I've kept everything I've come across.

246
00:41:45,730 --> 00:41:50,860
I've carried all this. I'm for what? What's the use of it all?

247
00:41:50,860 --> 00:41:55,750
What is it brought me? What does it all mean? But you've got you've got everything.

248
00:41:55,750 --> 00:42:08,650
I've got nothing. Nothing. I'm just stuck here in this line of rooms.

249
00:42:08,650 --> 00:42:22,340
You got me. Yes, I'm x squared plus y squared equals one co dependent variables.

250
00:42:22,340 --> 00:42:28,130
Yes, yes. When X was one, Y was zero.

251
00:42:28,130 --> 00:42:41,590
And when why was one? X was zero, but now, but now X equals y x squared, plus why speed equals one O X and Y are both off the square root of two.

252
00:42:41,590 --> 00:42:50,240
That's very nice, dear. Your hands? Your face?

253
00:42:50,240 --> 00:42:56,040
I was away for a very long time, but you only just left.

254
00:42:56,040 --> 00:43:00,620
I've been travelling for many, many, many years.

255
00:43:00,620 --> 00:43:13,350
OK, now I'm approaching my singularity with a singularity, but the singularity is a point which doesn't isn't defined, it doesn't exist.

256
00:43:13,350 --> 00:43:20,000
No. We've only just started.

257
00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:26,030
X times y equals one you inverted the circle is not a way out.

258
00:43:26,030 --> 00:43:31,910
No. But as Y tends towards zero extends to infinity.

259
00:43:31,910 --> 00:43:39,560
So I get my infinity back. Yes, I suppose you do, but I'm afraid you lose me in the process.

260
00:43:39,560 --> 00:43:46,310
I don't want that sort of infinity. I'm afraid that's reality, there's not much we can do about reality.

261
00:43:46,310 --> 00:43:52,160
I can resolve your singularity. No, you can't.

262
00:43:52,160 --> 00:43:58,900
But you can tell me about your out. My out.

263
00:43:58,900 --> 00:44:05,210
My out. A place where numbers go on forever.

264
00:44:05,210 --> 00:44:13,460
Parallel lines meet, you can create new geometries, new numbers like the square root of two.

265
00:44:13,460 --> 00:44:24,200
Yes, yes, yes. Like the square root of two X and Y are incompatible that the sequence of diminishing squares never terminates.

266
00:44:24,200 --> 00:44:30,600
Can you make a new No? A new no.

267
00:44:30,600 --> 00:44:38,560
A new number. Create a new number, you don't mind if I just close my eyes for a moment, did you while you do that?

268
00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:49,440
One two three four five six seven. I think knew that minus one minus two, one stream.

269
00:44:49,440 --> 00:44:56,240
A half a quarter and a sixteenth, 132.

270
00:44:56,240 --> 00:45:03,570
The square root of two. Oh, oh, the circumference of a circle.

271
00:45:03,570 --> 00:45:08,510
Oh oh, nothing. What? I got nothing.

272
00:45:08,510 --> 00:45:13,110
Why no new numbers? Why?

273
00:45:13,110 --> 00:45:17,030
Why? Why? Why aren't you listening to me? Why? Why?

274
00:45:17,030 --> 00:45:22,460
Why? Why? Why? What's happened to you? Why was one?

275
00:45:22,460 --> 00:45:53,820
Why one? Why he calls one.

276
00:45:53,820 --> 00:46:05,200
Y squared equals y. I squared minus one equals y minus one.

277
00:46:05,200 --> 00:46:16,280
Minus one times why plus one equals y minus one? Why plus one equals one?

278
00:46:16,280 --> 00:46:22,700
For. Hi, Sarah.

279
00:46:22,700 --> 00:46:33,950
I think. No, that can't be all there is.

280
00:46:33,950 --> 00:46:39,350
There must be something else. The square root of nothing. That's nothing on the square root of one.

281
00:46:39,350 --> 00:46:43,970
That's one this one. Well, square root of minus one.

282
00:46:43,970 --> 00:46:51,260
There isn't a number which when you square, it equals minus one. Take the square root of minus one.

283
00:46:51,260 --> 00:46:59,030
Imagine it x squared equals minus one one a plus size plus is plus and minus times minus is also plus.

284
00:46:59,030 --> 00:47:08,330
So the square root of minus one would be a new number. Well, it's a self-consistent, non contradictory to top the square root of minus one.

285
00:47:08,330 --> 00:47:13,960
It's a new number doubles. Oh, new world. A new direction.

286
00:47:13,960 --> 00:47:17,770
Oh, I've done it. I found out I did it. I printed it out.

287
00:47:17,770 --> 00:47:21,880
Stop it. Oh, you're alive. Oh, it works.

288
00:47:21,880 --> 00:47:26,950
No, I'm dead. You're alive. Oh, oh no, I'm dead.

289
00:47:26,950 --> 00:47:30,280
You're not dead. I'm dead, I die. He doesn't.

290
00:47:30,280 --> 00:47:33,400
Then I've saved you with you. No, you didn't save me.

291
00:47:33,400 --> 00:47:39,670
You can't save someone who's dead. But how come you were alive?

292
00:47:39,670 --> 00:47:49,210
I'm not alive, I'm dead. I don't understand. It's very important that the play ends with my death.

293
00:47:49,210 --> 00:47:57,520
It symbolises the nothing that awaits us all at the heat death of the universe.

294
00:47:57,520 --> 00:48:01,480
So you're dead? Yes, I'm dead, but you're alive.

295
00:48:01,480 --> 00:48:05,800
I'm alive. I still don't understand. How can you be dead and alive at the same time?

296
00:48:05,800 --> 00:48:14,710
Because I was saying everyone here was complicit in the act of imagining I was dead.

297
00:48:14,710 --> 00:48:19,240
We were telling a story. Have we finished the story?

298
00:48:19,240 --> 00:48:25,620
Yes. Oh. Well, no, we're still here, but you're not going to die.

299
00:48:25,620 --> 00:48:29,940
No. Oh yes, that's the whole point. But not now, I hope.

300
00:48:29,940 --> 00:48:34,200
So that was just a theoretical death. No, it was a theatrical death.

301
00:48:34,200 --> 00:48:40,200
Oh. So none of this is real. No. Well, yes, I am real.

302
00:48:40,200 --> 00:48:45,900
I hope I am real, aren't I? I don't know what you really are.

303
00:48:45,900 --> 00:48:59,230
Why no, olive? Olive y equals olive olive equals one multiplied by size, by Olowalu squared equality of square olive minus one, in fact, right?

304
00:48:59,230 --> 00:49:04,810
I suppose it still does well, look good. We're in a real space, right?

305
00:49:04,810 --> 00:49:09,880
All these lovely, real people, people. Yeah, we have an audience.

306
00:49:09,880 --> 00:49:15,080
Oh, more variables. Oh, what are they looking at?

307
00:49:15,080 --> 00:49:20,620
Well, they're looking at you and me and our imaginary world where nothing is real.

308
00:49:20,620 --> 00:49:26,170
Yes. Oh, well, no. I mean, that bag is a real buy.

309
00:49:26,170 --> 00:49:31,230
These trousers are real trousers. Yes, and my room that's real.

310
00:49:31,230 --> 00:49:38,590
No, but it hasn't even got real doors.

311
00:49:38,590 --> 00:49:45,660
Oh. The cube is real, but it only exists because it's part of a theatre set that we had specially built.

312
00:49:45,660 --> 00:49:51,240
Yes, yes. But if you go through the imaginary doors and then there are more cubes that way and more cubes that way.

313
00:49:51,240 --> 00:49:54,870
Oh no, there's nothing else. This is it. This is this is all right.

314
00:49:54,870 --> 00:49:59,580
This is our entire set. Is this one? Q Oh, actually,

315
00:49:59,580 --> 00:50:06,180
that's not quite true because somewhere we've got a model that's all designer made us have specially

316
00:50:06,180 --> 00:50:12,610
built so that we could see what the cube was going to look like when we built it for real.

317
00:50:12,610 --> 00:50:22,110
Oh. Oh, so that's my cue.

318
00:50:22,110 --> 00:50:27,300
Yes. No. Yes, it's a model of your cube.

319
00:50:27,300 --> 00:50:35,440
Right? Actually, and here they are also some other models, I think, Oh yes, look, here's you.

320
00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:40,870
Bobblehead, huh? And here's me his you in your cube.

321
00:50:40,870 --> 00:50:52,030
And here's me coming into the cube ooh y equals one multiplied by y y squared equals y take one y squared minus one equals y minus one.

322
00:50:52,030 --> 00:50:56,590
[INAUDIBLE], I don't sound like that. You do sometimes dance that actually.

323
00:50:56,590 --> 00:51:03,370
Sometimes yeah, you do. You do a bit sometimes. So this model helps us to tell the story.

324
00:51:03,370 --> 00:51:10,210
And the story is real. No. Well, yes. Yes, it's a real story, but the story is not real.

325
00:51:10,210 --> 00:51:15,010
We made it up when I made myself up. Yes, you're in the script.

326
00:51:15,010 --> 00:51:21,110
We're both in the script script, which ends with my death.

327
00:51:21,110 --> 00:51:24,730
Oh. So am I in the script? No, no.

328
00:51:24,730 --> 00:51:30,760
We finished the script. We're off script. So what are we doing now?

329
00:51:30,760 --> 00:51:45,670
I don't know. Oh. In fact, I'm not entirely sure if any idea what's real and what's not real anymore at all.

330
00:51:45,670 --> 00:51:52,930
A script was real. Well, yes. The script was real, but.

331
00:51:52,930 --> 00:52:01,510
I think the ideas in the script were all too real, and maybe I'm starting to think that the mathematics in the story was the most real thing of all.

332
00:52:01,510 --> 00:52:08,710
So Infinity Israel, yeah, I knew it. Well, no, no, it's a real idea, but it's not real.

333
00:52:08,710 --> 00:52:13,060
You can't show it to me. So what is real?

334
00:52:13,060 --> 00:52:20,290
What is real? OK? The quest for meaning that is real.

335
00:52:20,290 --> 00:52:24,610
That's real. The the desire to subvert the finite.

336
00:52:24,610 --> 00:52:29,200
The the need for happy ever after. You mean the search for out?

337
00:52:29,200 --> 00:52:31,000
Yes, I suppose so. Yes, because you know,

338
00:52:31,000 --> 00:52:36,550
when you are dying and you were going to leave me on my own in here with my infinity and I thought I was going to miss you rather a lot.

339
00:52:36,550 --> 00:52:40,440
I had just found you and out. Really? Yes.

340
00:52:40,440 --> 00:52:44,550
I created a new number. Well, you encouraged me and then I imagined it.

341
00:52:44,550 --> 00:52:49,680
And then there was a new direction. But how is that out?

342
00:52:49,680 --> 00:52:54,270
Well, I thought you could climb up and out. Well, how could I climb out there?

343
00:52:54,270 --> 00:53:01,010
Well, I thought. Oh, I hadn't got that yet.

344
00:53:01,010 --> 00:53:05,930
Well, maybe maybe the model will help me find a solution.

345
00:53:05,930 --> 00:53:10,490
Yes, maybe the model will help me find a solution. Well, this why it was excellent.

346
00:53:10,490 --> 00:53:14,570
Six. Yes. Yes. Here I am.

347
00:53:14,570 --> 00:53:18,710
Yeah. So how could I get up there? Well, I don't know.

348
00:53:18,710 --> 00:53:23,000
I just got as far as imagining a new number. I hadn't really worked out a way for you to get out.

349
00:53:23,000 --> 00:53:28,020
I mean, well, maybe there be something or maybe something more in the box.

350
00:53:28,020 --> 00:53:33,290
Yes, in the in the box, maybe something in the box and a script.

351
00:53:33,290 --> 00:53:39,740
Oh, look, look what I found. Oh, you could climb out of these?

352
00:53:39,740 --> 00:53:43,820
Oh, you are so very clever x. Oh, you are.

353
00:53:43,820 --> 00:53:47,480
Yes. Thank you very much, X. I don't sound anything like that at all.

354
00:53:47,480 --> 00:53:53,420
You do sound like that a bit. Yes. So I thought that you could climb up now.

355
00:53:53,420 --> 00:53:58,450
I created a new direction with my new number. And now you could climb up and out.

356
00:53:58,450 --> 00:54:06,320
Oh, thank you very much. Yes, you're right. I can climb up to the new direction and then your new number has found me out.

357
00:54:06,320 --> 00:54:11,860
Oh oh, oh oh oh.

358
00:54:11,860 --> 00:54:18,320
Well, I think maybe this time I would come with you. Oh, well, maybe it would be it, but it's in that direction.

359
00:54:18,320 --> 00:54:31,540
Oh, and then we would both be out. Yes. Come on. Okay.

360
00:54:31,540 --> 00:54:40,860
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, it's real, oh, it's real, I'm coming, why?

361
00:54:40,860 --> 00:54:45,030
Whoa, whoa, whoa.

362
00:54:45,030 --> 00:54:51,020
I'm alternating, oscillating. It's very hard. Oh, that's fair.

363
00:54:51,020 --> 00:54:59,210
Entirely natural, given the potential risk risk. Well, what you're attempting to do is incredibly dangerous.

364
00:54:59,210 --> 00:55:03,740
Oh oh oh, I'm stuck.

365
00:55:03,740 --> 00:55:10,280
I can't move. That's paralysis, fear, and it's most acute state.

366
00:55:10,280 --> 00:55:21,140
What you need is a good dose of induction. Induction induction let p m b the statement you can climb any rungs of the ladder.

367
00:55:21,140 --> 00:55:27,140
Oh, now you've already got onto the first rung, so that's the base step proved right.

368
00:55:27,140 --> 00:55:43,700
Oh, and then from the end rung, it's a simple step up to the M class one from Oh, support for you may be Oh.

369
00:55:43,700 --> 00:55:47,120
Oh, well, it's quite simple. Good.

370
00:55:47,120 --> 00:55:55,850
That's the inductive step right now, apply the second old axiom for inductive logic, and you'll find you can climb as high as you like, really?

371
00:55:55,850 --> 00:56:01,280
Oh, induction, high induction, induction or not.

372
00:56:01,280 --> 00:56:06,770
Oh, it's working, it's working well, it duction, oh, I'm coming, right?

373
00:56:06,770 --> 00:56:11,390
Oh, to infinity. Oh, why?

374
00:56:11,390 --> 00:56:18,850
Why inductions to yes. Yes, I know that. Oh, one more time.

375
00:56:18,850 --> 00:56:27,880
What the factorial how the factorial did you what the factorial is that it's a trick, a trick.

376
00:56:27,880 --> 00:56:31,720
Yeah, it's a trick. It's a trap door. A trap door. Yes, a trap door.

377
00:56:31,720 --> 00:56:35,380
It's a trick trap door trick trap door. It's a trick trap door.

378
00:56:35,380 --> 00:56:41,590
No, I don't understand. How did you go up there? Now you're coming from down there theatrically.

379
00:56:41,590 --> 00:56:46,430
You want to step inside. Well, is it safe? Is it safe?

380
00:56:46,430 --> 00:57:04,910
Well, yes, it's safe. Whoa, oh, oh, oh, eight, oh oh, that's Beirut.

381
00:57:04,910 --> 00:57:11,220
Oh, and there's a skull. Is this a dagger I see before me?

382
00:57:11,220 --> 00:57:20,220
Oh good, I come out. No job. It's Oh oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, so you see, it's a theatrical trick now.

383
00:57:20,220 --> 00:57:24,180
I still don't understand you. There you go.

384
00:57:24,180 --> 00:57:28,440
Well, I I didn't really climb through a hole in the ceiling. Really?

385
00:57:28,440 --> 00:57:36,890
No. Now what I did was I climbed up this ladder here, and then I climbed down the back of the ladder behind the black cloth.

386
00:57:36,890 --> 00:57:41,490
See? Oh, really? And then I just walked off the stage.

387
00:57:41,490 --> 00:57:45,840
Oh, really? Oh. No, no. I just walked off into the wings.

388
00:57:45,840 --> 00:57:50,850
Wings. Oh, space can fly. Oh, it's a theatrical term.

389
00:57:50,850 --> 00:57:57,270
Oh, I just walked off stage into the wings and I squirrelled round the back.

390
00:57:57,270 --> 00:58:02,640
Round the back. Yeah, round the back. There's a way around the back.

391
00:58:02,640 --> 00:58:11,390
Go and have a look. It's quite safe and quite safe. I'll talk you through it and round the back, so we'll just step off off the set.

392
00:58:11,390 --> 00:58:15,350
I'll you go and walk across the stage right behind the wings.

393
00:58:15,350 --> 00:58:20,400
Oh, there we go. Be fine. Oh, but up you'll be OK.

394
00:58:20,400 --> 00:58:25,060
We'll fight. If you if you turn left, you can just squirrel right round the back. Well, there's another variable.

395
00:58:25,060 --> 00:58:29,460
Well, that's the stage manager. So, oh well, I can't see anything.

396
00:58:29,460 --> 00:58:35,310
It's just blackness. And oh. There's a way around.

397
00:58:35,310 --> 00:58:40,290
Yep. Do I do the squirrel? Yeah, you do squirrel all the way around the back.

398
00:58:40,290 --> 00:58:45,770
Oh, I can see a blue light on the other side. Yeah, there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

399
00:58:45,770 --> 00:58:49,800
That's the backstage like, Oh, it's all symmetrical.

400
00:58:49,800 --> 00:58:55,950
Yep. Oh, it's a loop. Yeah. Oh, so now you should find Joe waiting in the wings stage, right?

401
00:58:55,950 --> 00:59:00,210
Oh, and if you keep walking. Come onto the set, you'll find you've made an entrance.

402
00:59:00,210 --> 00:59:05,760
Oh, look. So you didn't go all the way around the universe. You just hit the squirrel run.

403
00:59:05,760 --> 00:59:11,520
Is it convertible? The function? Yes. Yes. You can go the other way.

404
00:59:11,520 --> 00:59:18,270
Can I go all the way around the back again? When he comes back in, he's going to make another entrance.

405
00:59:18,270 --> 00:59:22,950
Shall we give him a little round of applause when he comes in just so he knows?

406
00:59:22,950 --> 00:59:36,820
Oh, it's take it back to the. Again, I think he really enjoyed that.

407
00:59:36,820 --> 00:59:50,760
Shall we indulge him just once more? Again, no milk it, milk it.

408
00:59:50,760 --> 01:00:01,620
Never mind. So that's how we suggested that our space was looped in two directions, you see, Oh, so I knew, no, it didn't find you out.

409
01:00:01,620 --> 01:00:06,570
No, no. We just be on another surface that was looped in two directions.

410
01:00:06,570 --> 01:00:13,230
So for instance, we could be on the surface of a gigantic orange, so it would be looped in that direction.

411
01:00:13,230 --> 01:00:21,660
And in that direction as well? Right? Yes. Yeah. Or you could be on the the genius one surface you brought in, you know,

412
01:00:21,660 --> 01:00:26,580
the oh one minus the square root of X squared plus y spread all squared plus square equals R2 square.

413
01:00:26,580 --> 01:00:31,020
The bagel had a name for that. What did you call it? Yeah, the bagel. Yeah, it's a bagel. Where's the bagel?

414
01:00:31,020 --> 01:00:35,010
I ate it. You ate it.

415
01:00:35,010 --> 01:00:40,730
I was hungry. You ate the universe was just a prop.

416
01:00:40,730 --> 01:00:46,360
Well, quite an important prop. What's a prop?

417
01:00:46,360 --> 01:00:55,090
What's a prop? Well, a prop is something that we use in theatre either as itself or pretending to be something else.

418
01:00:55,090 --> 01:00:59,980
We use it to help us tell a story. It's part of the power of theatre.

419
01:00:59,980 --> 01:01:05,710
The theatre is the set of all possible self-consistent structures seen in theatre.

420
01:01:05,710 --> 01:01:12,610
We can suggest. And by suggesting we can make something seem real.

421
01:01:12,610 --> 01:01:20,690
Oh. You see. Listen.

422
01:01:20,690 --> 01:01:30,500
Can this cockpit hold the boss the fields of France, or may we cram within this wooden cube?

423
01:01:30,500 --> 01:01:34,970
The very casks that did a flight to the air at Agincourt?

424
01:01:34,970 --> 01:01:42,550
Oh, pardon! Since a crooked figure may attest in little place a million and let us.

425
01:01:42,550 --> 01:01:48,610
Ciphers to this greater comfort on your imaginary forces work.

426
01:01:48,610 --> 01:01:55,740
See, you read some of what? Yeah.

427
01:01:55,740 --> 01:02:03,310
Hmm. Let us.

428
01:02:03,310 --> 01:02:09,060
Mine is all squared y plus x squared y plus y cubed.

429
01:02:09,060 --> 01:02:21,670
That's good. Yeah, well, minus two all except minus two x squared z minus two y squared plus y z squared equals zero.

430
01:02:21,670 --> 01:02:26,380
Great. It's a it's a finite closed. No, an oriental manifold.

431
01:02:26,380 --> 01:02:30,550
Keep going. OK. What are you doing? I'm physicalize in space.

432
01:02:30,550 --> 01:02:36,010
You can't do that. That's my Shakespeare. It's it's a wasted space.

433
01:02:36,010 --> 01:02:39,730
Rubbish. That's pathetic. That's not beautiful data to prop.

434
01:02:39,730 --> 01:02:46,810
It's a Mobius strip that helps us how I wanted to make theatre.

435
01:02:46,810 --> 01:02:52,510
I thought it might help you to point it out. So instead, you've just destroyed my most precious book.

436
01:02:52,510 --> 01:02:56,290
De facto, you can't put it back. Oh, oh, oh.

437
01:02:56,290 --> 01:03:04,290
Give that to me. Stop that. Well, I didn't realise it was a non inverted function.

438
01:03:04,290 --> 01:03:10,940
Well, it is. It's all right.

439
01:03:10,940 --> 01:03:23,070
It is just a book. And I appreciate the effort.

440
01:03:23,070 --> 01:03:29,750
That's all right. I'm not really sure I.

441
01:03:29,750 --> 01:03:34,360
And we don't know what. Y equals Olive.

442
01:03:34,360 --> 01:03:41,780
Yeah. Can I ask you a question? Yes. What is your out?

443
01:03:41,780 --> 01:03:46,920
I don't know. Something.

444
01:03:46,920 --> 01:03:51,720
Not nothing. That's what this story is about.

445
01:03:51,720 --> 01:03:57,000
I keep looking for something, and it always ends in nothing. Nothing doesn't exist.

446
01:03:57,000 --> 01:04:01,620
It's just an idea. Oh, it does. No, it doesn't.

447
01:04:01,620 --> 01:04:05,280
It does. It doesn't. It does, doesn't. It does, doesn't.

448
01:04:05,280 --> 01:04:13,200
It does. Doesn't. It does. It does. The heat death of the universe, the end of time.

449
01:04:13,200 --> 01:04:18,540
Oh, Bolivian, that is nothing. That is nothing.

450
01:04:18,540 --> 01:04:23,580
That is the ending that's waiting for all of us at the end of all our scripts.

451
01:04:23,580 --> 01:04:28,650
Even the burial. Every single one of us. What you mean? You mean they're not out, either?

452
01:04:28,650 --> 01:04:37,740
Oh, they're not out. They might have come out on a night out to come in here to try and find out they're out, but they're not out there.

453
01:04:37,740 --> 01:04:50,930
Just did another in what? Looking in looking in.

454
01:04:50,930 --> 01:04:58,480
Looking in. Out out, brief candle.

455
01:04:58,480 --> 01:05:08,310
Life is but a walking shadow. A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more.

456
01:05:08,310 --> 01:05:15,130
It is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing.

457
01:05:15,130 --> 01:05:19,110
No, no, no, no, no, signifying something. No, I think you'll find it's nothing. No, no, no.

458
01:05:19,110 --> 01:05:27,160
It signifies something else acute inside a cube.

459
01:05:27,160 --> 01:05:35,470
Oh, it's a shudder, it's a shudder. It's a shadow, a shadow, it's a shadow of a four dimensional shape, a shadow.

460
01:05:35,470 --> 01:05:44,380
Yes. If I could take a torch and shine it on a cube in four dimensions, then the shadow it would cost is a cube inside a larger cube.

461
01:05:44,380 --> 01:05:52,990
The shadow? Yes, a shadow or shadow proves the existence of a thing which is costing it, even though the thing which is costing it is unseeable.

462
01:05:52,990 --> 01:06:01,320
It proves there must be something more. When you say it's unseeable, you mean you can't show it to me, so then I can't believe it exists then.

463
01:06:01,320 --> 01:06:11,030
But just because you can't see it, that doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. So you? Take that what that that noise.

464
01:06:11,030 --> 01:06:14,780
That was we're never going to know what that is, but it's like the shadow,

465
01:06:14,780 --> 01:06:19,730
it proves the existence of something else, even though we'll never know what that is.

466
01:06:19,730 --> 01:06:24,340
But I do know what that is, really. That was a siren.

467
01:06:24,340 --> 01:06:29,210
A siren? Yeah, siren. Well, what's a siren?

468
01:06:29,210 --> 01:06:35,840
Siren is a noise that ambulances or police cars make to show other people that they're there so they ambulances or police cars.

469
01:06:35,840 --> 01:06:40,080
Yeah, that functions that translate sick or naughty variables.

470
01:06:40,080 --> 01:06:47,840
Oh, well, it's a lovely idea, but you'll never be able to show it to me, but I could show that to you.

471
01:06:47,840 --> 01:06:54,770
Really? Yeah. If you went through one of those doors at the back, doors at the back.

472
01:06:54,770 --> 01:07:00,200
Yeah, you see behind the audience there, there are two doors. They got little men running little green rectangles.

473
01:07:00,200 --> 01:07:07,190
That's just imaginary doors. No, those are real doors. Well, what's behind those doors?

474
01:07:07,190 --> 01:07:12,500
Behind those doors is the foyer of the Oxford Playhouse and there's a bar.

475
01:07:12,500 --> 01:07:15,620
And then beyond that there, then there's some glass doors.

476
01:07:15,620 --> 01:07:20,510
And on the other side of those, there's the street, which is where the sirens and the police cars and the ambulances are streets.

477
01:07:20,510 --> 01:07:23,090
Yeah. Well, it sounds that's not out.

478
01:07:23,090 --> 01:07:34,940
That's just in the city, that's just in Oxford, where there's spires and sirens and cash points and and sick and peeling bells hitting bells.

479
01:07:34,940 --> 01:07:40,310
Well, that's oh no, that's not out. That's just in another inn that's in the city.

480
01:07:40,310 --> 01:07:42,470
Can you get out of the city? Yeah.

481
01:07:42,470 --> 01:07:56,090
But then you'd be in the country with with fields of wheat and and wind farms and inbreeding and and town cows pull that out.

482
01:07:56,090 --> 01:08:01,610
No, that's not out. That's just in another and not in the Cotswolds that's in the country.

483
01:08:01,610 --> 01:08:18,630
Well, what can you get out of the country? Well, yes. But then you'd be in outer space where there's space and and planets and space and galaxies.

484
01:08:18,630 --> 01:08:29,010
And space and universes and dark matter and wormholes, worms and holes.

485
01:08:29,010 --> 01:08:33,840
Oh, that's out. No, that's not out. That's in another end.

486
01:08:33,840 --> 01:08:39,840
That's in outer space. It doesn't matter how far you go, you'll never get out.

487
01:08:39,840 --> 01:08:43,590
You'll just be in another in. But I want to be out there.

488
01:08:43,590 --> 01:08:47,880
You can't. Why? Because your ex. Because we made you up.

489
01:08:47,880 --> 01:08:57,570
You're in the script. But I would be out there. I'm afraid the script says that you stay in here.

490
01:08:57,570 --> 01:09:05,940
A manifold needs no ambient space in which to exist. And you what happens to you?

491
01:09:05,940 --> 01:09:11,750
I love to stay in here. I'd love to be in your out.

492
01:09:11,750 --> 01:09:21,780
I love to lie here in the shadow of your four dimensional cube, knowing it exists without needing to see it to be still.

493
01:09:21,780 --> 01:09:31,390
But the script says that I keep going through room after room, after room tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.

494
01:09:31,390 --> 01:09:38,890
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time.

495
01:09:38,890 --> 01:09:44,860
Oh, and what is the last syllable of recorded time? Well, what does the script say?

496
01:09:44,860 --> 01:09:51,490
It says nothing. Well, it must say something, it can't just say nothing.

497
01:09:51,490 --> 01:10:02,100
It says nothing. We're going to rewrite this script.

498
01:10:02,100 --> 01:10:06,760
What I'm going to give you out so you can't.

499
01:10:06,760 --> 01:10:13,510
I'm going to give you my out a place where there's something, not nothing.

500
01:10:13,510 --> 01:10:17,770
A place where when numbers go on forever, where parallel lines meet.

501
01:10:17,770 --> 01:10:20,530
Yes, where things can exist without being.

502
01:10:20,530 --> 01:10:29,600
See where there are ideas that don't die, signifying something you can't do that you can't just rewrite a script in the middle of a show like this.

503
01:10:29,600 --> 01:10:32,920
You can't. You can't. I'm completely losing track.

504
01:10:32,920 --> 01:10:38,600
This is really a toss. This is that you said that anything was possible.

505
01:10:38,600 --> 01:10:44,330
Yeah, but look, stand there. Don't move. Hold this.

506
01:10:44,330 --> 01:11:01,450
I'm going to take the end of this script. Oh, you're putting a twist in the script.

507
01:11:01,450 --> 01:11:06,340
It's a Mirpur script. I made a joke.

508
01:11:06,340 --> 01:11:14,390
Yes, you did. Oh, OK. Theoretically, if something goes around this universe, then it gets flipped over.

509
01:11:14,390 --> 01:11:20,390
So theatrically, a change of variable. So X becomes Y.

510
01:11:20,390 --> 01:11:38,120
Yes. Look.

511
01:11:38,120 --> 01:11:48,360
Are you sure you want to do this? As I tend towards infinity, you tends to zero.

512
01:11:48,360 --> 01:11:57,860
No more +1. The streets.

513
01:11:57,860 --> 01:12:04,770
And peeling belts. And Carlos.

514
01:12:04,770 --> 01:13:05,730
Out. Oh.

515
01:13:05,730 --> 01:13:18,070
Well, I was holes. Out. Why?

516
01:13:18,070 --> 01:14:29,890
Wait. Look after it.

517
01:14:29,890 --> 01:16:01,610
Out. So that's just I love and.

518
01:16:01,610 --> 01:16:06,200
Strange loop, I love this piece, and I wanted to.

519
01:16:06,200 --> 01:16:15,260
It's really from the very first time I saw it and then its subsequent iterations.

520
01:16:15,260 --> 01:16:25,040
It really, I suppose one of the first things that it made me do at the beginning was that it made me laugh so much a little bit.

521
01:16:25,040 --> 01:16:31,490
And it's it's quite the cat in bed with the questions that it asks.

522
01:16:31,490 --> 01:16:45,650
And of course, there is this fantastic relationship between the subject matter and the and the theatricality.

523
01:16:45,650 --> 01:16:53,720
But maybe I should start by asking Marcus in Victoria, why did you at title date?

524
01:16:53,720 --> 01:16:57,340
Where did that? How did the title begin?

525
01:16:57,340 --> 01:17:06,880
Well, actually, the title began at the end because the title emerged very late in this whole piece and as you say, it's been through many iterations.

526
01:17:06,880 --> 01:17:14,290
We've gone round this loop and very many times and each time we find kind of something new in it and that's what's so exciting.

527
01:17:14,290 --> 01:17:19,180
I think about the process that I think many people probably feel that, oh,

528
01:17:19,180 --> 01:17:23,920
isn't a play written by a playwright and then handed to the company to perform.

529
01:17:23,920 --> 01:17:28,750
And I mean, this in some sense, is something I very much learnt from you, Simon.

530
01:17:28,750 --> 01:17:35,530
You know, I did a lot of theatre as a student came along to see complicity in its very early days at

531
01:17:35,530 --> 01:17:41,450
the Percocets Theatre in Oxford when I was a Ph.D. student and and somehow I learnt that no,

532
01:17:41,450 --> 01:17:51,730
a piece really is written as it's performed, and those early performances with an audience are somehow part of the writing process.

533
01:17:51,730 --> 01:18:01,780
So actually, the title is a strangely really came to us very late on when we staged it at the Barbican as part of a a triptych idea.

534
01:18:01,780 --> 01:18:14,470
It's about Douglas Hofstadter, his book Girdle Schubach, and we had a concert performance with some Bach written by some Aiye and Bach himself.

535
01:18:14,470 --> 01:18:20,860
We did a sort of installation piece in the Barbican, but then we did also the performance of this play,

536
01:18:20,860 --> 01:18:28,690
and it was at that point we suddenly realised, Gosh, this is a play actually not just about mathematics and theatre,

537
01:18:28,690 --> 01:18:32,860
but also about kind of consciousness and artificial intelligence,

538
01:18:32,860 --> 01:18:40,210
because X's character is somehow artificially created and then thrown into this kind of embodied world.

539
01:18:40,210 --> 01:18:46,750
And and the whole structure of the play is the structure of a strangely because things,

540
01:18:46,750 --> 01:18:52,720
the hierarchies of maths, then theatre and then the theatre you realise isn't that part of the real world,

541
01:18:52,720 --> 01:18:58,480
which isn't that just actually part of mathematics itself and the mathematics is actually at the top of this hierarchy?

542
01:18:58,480 --> 01:19:04,630
So this idea that Douglas Hofstadter came up with of a strange loop is something which sort of goes up in hierarchies,

543
01:19:04,630 --> 01:19:08,700
but then seems to return to the the hierarchy had right at the beginning.

544
01:19:08,700 --> 01:19:14,620
So the best image is that one Escher did of a hand drawing a hand in.

545
01:19:14,620 --> 01:19:22,810
You're not quite sure which is the real hands. And that seemed to be sort of what came out of this, this playing we did that.

546
01:19:22,810 --> 01:19:28,750
We created a structure where you're not actually sure which which one is embedded in the other.

547
01:19:28,750 --> 01:19:37,570
And so it was only at the end we sort of realised, Oh my gosh, this is a play as much about the creation of an artificial life within the context

548
01:19:37,570 --> 01:19:41,890
of something that may be realised and the real life that seems to have created it.

549
01:19:41,890 --> 01:19:49,550
And so, so that's its name was very late on in the kind of whole process also.

550
01:19:49,550 --> 01:19:57,910
So I was going to say we've had a lot of discussions, both of us with you, Simon, about what consciousness is and whether it's possible to define it.

551
01:19:57,910 --> 01:20:04,420
And I think more and more as I get older that I don't know what I am and I and that

552
01:20:04,420 --> 01:20:08,180
I believe it's impossible to define consciousness within the being that's already.

553
01:20:08,180 --> 01:20:15,970
But is it self? And so, you know, there's a kind of there is a there's an unknowability about what's the self actually is.

554
01:20:15,970 --> 01:20:23,840
And Douglas Hofstadter wrote a book called I Am a Stranger and we at the Smoker says towards the end of the process,

555
01:20:23,840 --> 01:20:29,380
I realised that I is a strange loop was was what the play was about.

556
01:20:29,380 --> 01:20:38,950
And it's very interesting. You mentioned Beckett, because a few people sort of suggested a title for the play should be waiting for girdle.

557
01:20:38,950 --> 01:20:44,990
It'll being this mathematician that considered strange links in logic. So that was never going to let that happen.

558
01:20:44,990 --> 01:20:52,250
So that's that. Forgive me for saying, but that is like a mathematicians joke.

559
01:20:52,250 --> 01:20:58,570
So the other person who described it as Piketty and was Ali Carseldine was the first thing.

560
01:20:58,570 --> 01:21:04,570
She said when she read it was that it was very Piketty, and so we were terribly well flattered.

561
01:21:04,570 --> 01:21:13,150
Well, perhaps we could just dig in to that for a moment because, you know, why might it be the Kachin and what do we mean by that?

562
01:21:13,150 --> 01:21:23,050
That's an interesting thought. But also the whole function of theatre is also a curious loop.

563
01:21:23,050 --> 01:21:35,410
And in terms of interesting in its relationship with consciousness, because it's, you know, John, you described theatre as an act of ritual return.

564
01:21:35,410 --> 01:21:45,550
So a sense of the ritual repeating and repeating and sort of defining who we are in such an odd thing that we all get up each

565
01:21:45,550 --> 01:21:53,620
evening when we work in theatre and we do the same thing over and over and then the audience come in and they know that it's real,

566
01:21:53,620 --> 01:21:56,880
but it's not real life. And then they all pretend that it.

567
01:21:56,880 --> 01:22:01,610
Really is real life, and it is real life because we are really there in front of people,

568
01:22:01,610 --> 01:22:13,730
but we are pretending to be other people and so on and these leaks of of fiction and meta fiction that exist within it.

569
01:22:13,730 --> 01:22:23,390
It is why at a certain point, of course, I was interested in how might theatre be able to talk about consciousness?

570
01:22:23,390 --> 01:22:32,390
And of course, before I got interested in consciousness, I was completely obsessed with questions of memory.

571
01:22:32,390 --> 01:22:43,280
And I think out of these questions, and I think that was perhaps one of the early connexions we had between us,

572
01:22:43,280 --> 01:22:57,090
but I was found that the process of theatre useful for trying to work out problems that I found difficult to understand.

573
01:22:57,090 --> 01:23:00,320
So when I made mnemonic, which is about memory, I thought, Oh,

574
01:23:00,320 --> 01:23:07,490
I'm going to try and understand something about memory and identity, which is an early search into consciousness.

575
01:23:07,490 --> 01:23:13,850
But also, when Michael and Dutchy gave me the book, The Mathematicians Apology, I realised, Oh my god,

576
01:23:13,850 --> 01:23:19,730
I've never really understood mathematics, not understood it, but I've had a very difficult relationship with it.

577
01:23:19,730 --> 01:23:25,280
And yet when I read the mathematicians apology, I say, Look, you know,

578
01:23:25,280 --> 01:23:33,380
mathematics is there's something unbelievable about mathematics, as well as something deeply logical.

579
01:23:33,380 --> 01:23:40,700
And this phrase of Charles is that a mathematician like a painter, a poet is a maker of patterns.

580
01:23:40,700 --> 01:23:46,800
The idea that mathematics is an art was incredibly exciting and revealing to me.

581
01:23:46,800 --> 01:23:58,400
And so when I decided to try and make something of this relationship between Hardy and Ramanujan and try and make a show about mathematics,

582
01:23:58,400 --> 01:24:05,480
that was when our long way of saying our collaboration started.

583
01:24:05,480 --> 01:24:09,170
And was that the first time I met you, Victoria? I can't remember.

584
01:24:09,170 --> 01:24:13,340
I must know. And when did we?

585
01:24:13,340 --> 01:24:17,810
We first started working together on the elephant vanishes unless you knew you wanted there to be

586
01:24:17,810 --> 01:24:23,630
something in it to the second law of thermodynamics and the fact that entropy is increasing all the time.

587
01:24:23,630 --> 01:24:29,460
So we helped put some things into that show. What about that? And then we what function can afterwards?

588
01:24:29,460 --> 01:24:35,840
Yeah, of course. And and and that's how we we started.

589
01:24:35,840 --> 01:24:39,650
But I think maybe when did we start working together, Marcus?

590
01:24:39,650 --> 01:24:45,890
Obviously, we started working together in the Pegasus. Well, yes, but then I was just some spotty PhD student.

591
01:24:45,890 --> 01:24:50,090
So it was, yes, sort of part of the crowd.

592
01:24:50,090 --> 01:24:56,960
But I remember getting this email from one of your production team saying, Oh, you probably don't know who we are.

593
01:24:56,960 --> 01:25:03,200
We're a theatre company called Complexité, and we're doing a play about maths and we'd love you to come in.

594
01:25:03,200 --> 01:25:10,760
And of course, I'd actually been fantasising about running away with a theatre company like Publicité for years after spending time in the Pegasus.

595
01:25:10,760 --> 01:25:18,710
Whatever my maths is going badly, that's kind of my fantasy. I don't know how many times I downloaded the application form to OK.

596
01:25:18,710 --> 01:25:25,340
It's a kind of escape. So I wrote back this incredible fanboy email saying, Oh, I know exactly who complicit they are,

597
01:25:25,340 --> 01:25:28,590
and I'd love to come in and spend some time talking about maths with you.

598
01:25:28,590 --> 01:25:33,440
So I think your your team have kept that email because it was so hilarious.

599
01:25:33,440 --> 01:25:43,010
But so yeah, they you know, I came in, I suppose, because I mean, my feeling about theatre and mathematics is this for me,

600
01:25:43,010 --> 01:25:51,620
there was always a similarity because there's the kind of fun of setting up some rules and just seeing what the consequences of those rules are.

601
01:25:51,620 --> 01:26:00,200
And I suppose theatre was always a space where you could try out some things which weren't about real life necessarily.

602
01:26:00,200 --> 01:26:05,570
I mean, you could create a space with strange rules like like we do in the play where you know,

603
01:26:05,570 --> 01:26:14,030
you go off one side of the theatre and you come in in the other and you can construct a kind of weird space with that stage.

604
01:26:14,030 --> 01:26:15,920
And for me, that was always the exciting thing.

605
01:26:15,920 --> 01:26:26,360
What what rule is actually a powerful and evolve something hugely complex and interesting, even though there are some simple beginnings?

606
01:26:26,360 --> 01:26:29,900
And and what rules sometimes just crash and it doesn't work.

607
01:26:29,900 --> 01:26:36,150
And the exploration of that kind of abstract world that you can create, I think, was always a kind of resonance for me.

608
01:26:36,150 --> 01:26:42,860
So, so is fun coming in? You know, you were interested in finding out what Ramanujan and Hardy had done together,

609
01:26:42,860 --> 01:26:47,390
you know, to really embed the mathematics as part of the play.

610
01:26:47,390 --> 01:26:56,730
And I mean, it was just so funny because I mean, I loved it when we got so immersed in the maths that I remember Simon, you asking me something so.

611
01:26:56,730 --> 01:27:00,480
A mock theatre function. What is a mock theatre function?

612
01:27:00,480 --> 01:27:07,350
And I realised we sort of delved so deep, but I think your production team said, can you not come back tomorrow?

613
01:27:07,350 --> 01:27:13,080
Because Simon's got totally obsessed with the mathematics and we need to make a play?

614
01:27:13,080 --> 01:27:24,990
Well, I mean, the what is marvellous about your piece is a strange loop is that you have found a way of embedding ideas.

615
01:27:24,990 --> 01:27:32,700
And that was what was exciting about collaboration. And now I remember it, of course, about you,

616
01:27:32,700 --> 01:27:42,200
Victoria being the elephant vanishes and my asking you about the second both thermodynamics because I wanted some philosophical ideas too.

617
01:27:42,200 --> 01:27:53,960
And even if they were not on the surface, they were that deeply as what I would call the reservoir underneath the the piece so that,

618
01:27:53,960 --> 01:27:58,440
you know, embodying ideas about light or about entropy.

619
01:27:58,440 --> 01:28:09,690
They then produced other physical responses in us, which we knew we knew where they came from, even if the audience didn't necessarily know.

620
01:28:09,690 --> 01:28:15,060
And it was tremendously exciting when both of you, Victoria Marcus,

621
01:28:15,060 --> 01:28:26,400
were there in a disappearing number and we had with the actors, they had to find a way of showing of of embodying,

622
01:28:26,400 --> 01:28:37,170
for example, the Series one plus a five plus in a quarter plus an eighth plus a sixteenth plus one of the thirty two plus one ever sixty four.

623
01:28:37,170 --> 01:28:44,550
And the fact that it makes two in infinity, but of course, it never reaches two.

624
01:28:44,550 --> 01:28:50,610
And this idea of two things never quite reaching each other.

625
01:28:50,610 --> 01:28:58,710
We found extremely beautiful and very, very stimulating and in fact gave rise to all sorts of improvisations.

626
01:28:58,710 --> 01:29:07,050
So when you both of you were making your piece, did you did you use some of those things too?

627
01:29:07,050 --> 01:29:10,620
Did you improvise like that? How how how was it?

628
01:29:10,620 --> 01:29:14,190
I mean, and you were just too? Absolutely.

629
01:29:14,190 --> 01:29:21,390
Although I think there was a very strong sense that we wanted the play to have a mathematical shape overall.

630
01:29:21,390 --> 01:29:27,840
I mean that locally, of course, we're talking about mathematics and there their explorations of things like whether infinity exists.

631
01:29:27,840 --> 01:29:32,280
But I think one of the challenges for us was, you know, can we make the play, have a shape?

632
01:29:32,280 --> 01:29:37,470
I mean, in some sense, there's an exploration of the different dimensions that are possible.

633
01:29:37,470 --> 01:29:40,800
There's a line of rooms, so you've got one dimension.

634
01:29:40,800 --> 01:29:46,920
And then we we burst through the ceiling and come through it, a trapdoor in the floor, so we got another dimension.

635
01:29:46,920 --> 01:29:52,260
And the idea then that X could leave through the audience produces a third dimension.

636
01:29:52,260 --> 01:29:58,410
But could that be looped? And in which case have we sort of created a four dimensional shape because we've looped

637
01:29:58,410 --> 01:30:02,490
this thing in three dimensions and created a sort of four dimensional tourists?

638
01:30:02,490 --> 01:30:10,920
So actually a four dimensional shape was was a shape we had in our minds, and that's why we create this Tesseract at the end,

639
01:30:10,920 --> 01:30:17,670
which is a cube inside a cube, which kind of tells you there's something else, which is one of the big questions in the play.

640
01:30:17,670 --> 01:30:22,290
Is there anything other than what we're sort of sitting inside?

641
01:30:22,290 --> 01:30:26,670
But I think ultimately we found this this shape of the Mobius Strip,

642
01:30:26,670 --> 01:30:32,850
which is a strange loop which sort of folds back on itself a very powerful image for

643
01:30:32,850 --> 01:30:39,060
the idea of two characters sort of needing each other and swapping over by the end.

644
01:30:39,060 --> 01:30:47,400
And as my fantasy with this piece has always been that we should do a sort of 24 hour run where actually at the end of the piece,

645
01:30:47,400 --> 01:30:54,090
of course, X comes back on stage three of those rooms and corridors and burst in on why.

646
01:30:54,090 --> 01:31:01,800
And we just run the play completely again with X and Y swapped over and just see what the dynamics of that changing with.

647
01:31:01,800 --> 01:31:06,880
I wish we'd done that for John Birger. That would have been good. I know would have been amazing.

648
01:31:06,880 --> 01:31:10,740
And just to keep running it and people come in at any point during the 24 hours.

649
01:31:10,740 --> 01:31:12,780
So I think that's my fantasy with this.

650
01:31:12,780 --> 01:31:19,950
But but I think the know embedding mathematics actually is as the shape of the play was, I think one of our dreams, wasn't it, Victoria?

651
01:31:19,950 --> 01:31:27,270
I think. Yeah, we yes. And we wanted it. We originally wanted it to be an almost entirely in mathematical language as well.

652
01:31:27,270 --> 01:31:31,530
But I was like to pick up on something that Simon asked us, which was how did you make it when they were just two of us?

653
01:31:31,530 --> 01:31:34,380
And that resonated very much because they were never just two of us.

654
01:31:34,380 --> 01:31:38,790
And if that had it been just two of us, we would never have made the play because we would have been eating all the time.

655
01:31:38,790 --> 01:31:43,950
It spent our entire very important eating delicious things, going out to restaurants.

656
01:31:43,950 --> 01:31:50,670
So there was always somebody else and it was different people. And sometimes it was you, Simon, and some a lot of the time it was Dermot.

657
01:31:50,670 --> 01:31:57,130
And but I think I think you can make it without somebody observing and us sort of asking about to.

658
01:31:57,130 --> 01:32:03,540
Would never would never have made it clear to so there was always had to be at least a third eye, if not more,

659
01:32:03,540 --> 01:32:10,480
and we've had some incredible collaborators on this piece to whom we are grateful and without which it would not have been made.

660
01:32:10,480 --> 01:32:21,040
Undoubtedly. And Marcus said, you arrived at a point where in where you were examining a mathematical shape,

661
01:32:21,040 --> 01:32:26,860
which demanded the question as to whether there was something more to what do you think Victoria is that has

662
01:32:26,860 --> 01:32:36,010
this has making this piece of theatre as well as just cogitating it's do you feel that there is something more?

663
01:32:36,010 --> 01:32:40,510
Oh, absolutely. And I didn't think that before I made the piece, I made the piece.

664
01:32:40,510 --> 01:32:44,500
I was constantly kind of crying. There must be something more.

665
01:32:44,500 --> 01:32:46,780
I don't mean physically crying.

666
01:32:46,780 --> 01:32:55,060
I mean, just because it's something that y says towards the very beginning of the play, which is looking at looking for out.

667
01:32:55,060 --> 01:32:59,760
And she says there must be something else. This can't be all there is.

668
01:32:59,760 --> 01:33:03,680
I am now fairly sure that that's the case.

669
01:33:03,680 --> 01:33:13,300
What that is, I don't know, and I don't think I ever will, but I'm certainly coming to feel that I we live with the unknowable and it is,

670
01:33:13,300 --> 01:33:15,880
but it's not unknowable because we haven't discovered it yet.

671
01:33:15,880 --> 01:33:23,710
It's unknowable because it is by definition memorable because of our biology, because we are beings that cannot know everything.

672
01:33:23,710 --> 01:33:26,050
And I just wanted to pick up on something you said, Simon,

673
01:33:26,050 --> 01:33:34,000
about making a play because you want to understand something or you want to investigate your relationship with with an idea.

674
01:33:34,000 --> 01:33:41,920
And I think I've always found great difficulty with the fact that I'm a I'm alive now, and at some point I will be dead.

675
01:33:41,920 --> 01:33:46,330
And as Woody Allen said, it's it's infinite is a very long time, especially towards the end.

676
01:33:46,330 --> 01:33:50,920
And that kind of has always troubled me very much.

677
01:33:50,920 --> 01:33:55,900
And so I suppose personally coming into this play was very much about my wanting

678
01:33:55,900 --> 01:34:02,920
to explore my obsession with with awe and fear of death and time being eternal.

679
01:34:02,920 --> 01:34:16,850
And I think now I'm much more comfortable with it because. Because I know that I will never know that there is that what else that there is,

680
01:34:16,850 --> 01:34:20,960
but that there is definitely other stuff that we will we just don't know about.

681
01:34:20,960 --> 01:34:29,680
And that feels that now feels comforting, whereas I think I started thinking about these ideas from a plate, from a place of fear.

682
01:34:29,680 --> 01:34:39,560
I think that's a very close connexion with Beckett. Because the question of what is impossible to know and the idea constantly playing with

683
01:34:39,560 --> 01:34:47,870
the idea that there is of of nothing and nothingness and something and something,

684
01:34:47,870 --> 01:34:57,500
this is right at the heart of Beckett's work, where he of course goes on and he starts taking more and more things away until there isn't anything.

685
01:34:57,500 --> 01:34:59,270
But of course, there is always something.

686
01:34:59,270 --> 01:35:08,540
So and and I suppose one of the images I wanted to ask you, perhaps I could ask you both to answer the image.

687
01:35:08,540 --> 01:35:09,530
Would Mobius strip?

688
01:35:09,530 --> 01:35:17,810
Is that you can when you take the piece of paper and you turn it and you join it up and you have make a line and it can be continuous.

689
01:35:17,810 --> 01:35:27,800
One of the beautiful aspects of it is this idea of continuity that something is there continuously.

690
01:35:27,800 --> 01:35:34,040
And yet, of course, we know that the quality of X and Y are what we would call.

691
01:35:34,040 --> 01:35:38,810
You would call it mathematics, discrete or separate.

692
01:35:38,810 --> 01:35:46,040
And yet something about a subject which interests me very,

693
01:35:46,040 --> 01:35:55,040
very much is this question of continuity because we are brought up to believe the

694
01:35:55,040 --> 01:36:00,140
narrative that we're brought up to believe is that we are all completely separate.

695
01:36:00,140 --> 01:36:08,120
But I'm not convinced that that is true, partly because of different cultures and people that I have.

696
01:36:08,120 --> 01:36:12,200
And a time in Japan, indeed, that we have encountered,

697
01:36:12,200 --> 01:36:22,160
whereby there is a very strong sense of being continuous and contiguous with the outside world in continuous exchange with it.

698
01:36:22,160 --> 01:36:39,830
And I wondered whether Marcus, you what do you feel about this relationship between what you might call separation and the, you know, and continuity?

699
01:36:39,830 --> 01:36:50,210
Because then I suppose. Although numbers are discreet and there's an infinity of numbers joining every

700
01:36:50,210 --> 01:36:57,620
number in between each of those numbers is another infinity and so on so that a g.

701
01:36:57,620 --> 01:37:01,640
Do you think things are discrete or do you think they are continuous?

702
01:37:01,640 --> 01:37:09,230
And I think this absolutely is is one of the real tensions in the play, which is explored because as you've just expressed,

703
01:37:09,230 --> 01:37:17,090
we can we can imagine the idea of infinity numbers going off to infinity dividing numbers.

704
01:37:17,090 --> 01:37:25,400
But the challenge of whether this is physically possible and that's in a sense, is one of those things we don't know.

705
01:37:25,400 --> 01:37:36,620
I mean, whether whether our universe actually contains any instance of the idea of infinity, I mean is, is the universe infinite?

706
01:37:36,620 --> 01:37:39,560
Just it just go on forever. That seems a very strange thing.

707
01:37:39,560 --> 01:37:46,580
And I suppose, you know, that was one of my inspirations for this whole piece was reading Borchers and the Library of Babel,

708
01:37:46,580 --> 01:37:51,890
which is the idea of a space, a library and the librarian in that library,

709
01:37:51,890 --> 01:37:58,970
never being sure whether his library is an infinite load of hexagon hexagonal rooms put together,

710
01:37:58,970 --> 01:38:02,460
or whether there's a wall that you hit and ultimately comes to the idea.

711
01:38:02,460 --> 01:38:11,010
No, the thing is finite, but loops. So this is very interesting that you can create sort of the the possibility of infinity within the finite.

712
01:38:11,010 --> 01:38:17,410
With this idea of something being looped and the possibility of going around it infinitely often.

713
01:38:17,410 --> 01:38:23,660
But I think, you know, quantum physics kind of says that things are not infinitely divisible.

714
01:38:23,660 --> 01:38:27,470
There is a kind of discrete bits that builds everything.

715
01:38:27,470 --> 01:38:32,720
It's quite possible that time itself might. It might be discrete pieces.

716
01:38:32,720 --> 01:38:36,890
So, so quite possible that the universe itself is is finite.

717
01:38:36,890 --> 01:38:39,800
And therefore, that raises the question So what is mathematics?

718
01:38:39,800 --> 01:38:46,580
Then it's something it's always been something sort of separate from from the physical and

719
01:38:46,580 --> 01:38:51,320
scientific world because you can always create things which don't have a physical reality.

720
01:38:51,320 --> 01:38:58,670
We have many different sorts of geometry, and we don't. One of them applies to our universe, but the others are equally possible, but are just models.

721
01:38:58,670 --> 01:39:05,180
That's for a perhaps another sort of universe. But I think one of the things as well that you mentioned,

722
01:39:05,180 --> 01:39:11,210
which is this idea of sort of connexion between things, you know, this is discrete, but that,

723
01:39:11,210 --> 01:39:18,560
you know, each discrete thing only sort of has sort of grows when it's in connexion with something else and that communication between them.

724
01:39:18,560 --> 01:39:26,390
So I think one of the important things is in this play, each of the individuals on their own X and Y is missing something,

725
01:39:26,390 --> 01:39:33,440
and it's only with the communication and collaboration between these two that they realise

726
01:39:33,440 --> 01:39:39,590
what the other has that will help them to to navigate their their world and their challenges.

727
01:39:39,590 --> 01:39:42,980
And it's really is a love affair. I mean, this play really has everything.

728
01:39:42,980 --> 01:39:46,460
It's called depth, it's got love, it's got mathematics.

729
01:39:46,460 --> 01:39:52,400
But I think it is a love affair in some sense between the two where they realise what's missing in them is present.

730
01:39:52,400 --> 01:40:00,410
In the other, the way X experiences taste for the first time, embodiment, physicality.

731
01:40:00,410 --> 01:40:07,370
I think that's one of the journeys of the play. We're back in Victoria.

732
01:40:07,370 --> 01:40:13,800
Well, I was thinking and Marcus was saying that how impossible it was to make a play that wasn't about the relationship between two people.

733
01:40:13,800 --> 01:40:19,040
And I think that wasn't what we wanted to do, but we couldn't help it, which was interesting,

734
01:40:19,040 --> 01:40:25,260
even though for a lot of the play, we're only speaking in sort of algebra that when when two people meet there.

735
01:40:25,260 --> 01:40:27,140
Yeah, with a house, there is a relationship.

736
01:40:27,140 --> 01:40:36,290
I was also thinking about your question, Simon, about whether we are separate or together or continuous, whether things are discrete or continuous.

737
01:40:36,290 --> 01:40:43,880
And I think that's runs through the whole that idea and that idea of an asset toxic relationship.

738
01:40:43,880 --> 01:40:48,470
You were talking about that two lines that can't get closer and closer and closer together, but never, ever meet.

739
01:40:48,470 --> 01:40:56,510
I do a lot of workshops in schools and whenever I ask children or young adults to respond to that idea,

740
01:40:56,510 --> 01:41:01,850
they always do something about two people trying to get closer and closer to each other, but not able to touch.

741
01:41:01,850 --> 01:41:08,810
And I always they always talk about the idea of of of perfect love between two people.

742
01:41:08,810 --> 01:41:13,500
Being this idea of that, you can get closer and closer, but you can never actually be the other person.

743
01:41:13,500 --> 01:41:19,200
You can never merge into the other person. And I had a terrible diagnosis last year.

744
01:41:19,200 --> 01:41:24,200
Some bad news and all I wanted to do was climb inside the body of my husband.

745
01:41:24,200 --> 01:41:29,780
I wanted to enter his body and that that's just something in that's about about these mathematical ideas,

746
01:41:29,780 --> 01:41:34,610
about two things that are so close, but actually ultimately discreet.

747
01:41:34,610 --> 01:41:37,270
It's very much about the tension of love, I think.

748
01:41:37,270 --> 01:41:46,580
And that's exactly I mean, Douglas Hofstadter, his book I Am a Strange Loop, is him dealing with the death,

749
01:41:46,580 --> 01:41:51,890
sudden death of his partner and his realisation that actually the partner because of all

750
01:41:51,890 --> 01:41:57,170
of those connexions that we do sort of a kind of enmeshed ourselves with our memories,

751
01:41:57,170 --> 01:42:05,750
with our just somehow we create a common consciousness between two people spending time together and.

752
01:42:05,750 --> 01:42:13,550
And his idea of, well, what is that and whose idea is this kind of strange loop where things connect and reconnect is

753
01:42:13,550 --> 01:42:20,150
the creation of trying to fight that idea that our consciousness is discrete and only in us?

754
01:42:20,150 --> 01:42:23,990
And it's not true. It's sort of is. And I think that's isn't that, after all,

755
01:42:23,990 --> 01:42:28,600
what we do in theatre is creating a sort of wonderful collective consciousness for

756
01:42:28,600 --> 01:42:35,480
a few short hours together where we sort of are all imagining the same thing,

757
01:42:35,480 --> 01:42:43,280
that wonderful thing you did in a disappearing number, Simon, where you trick us all into imagining the number seven because of a little bit of

758
01:42:43,280 --> 01:42:51,110
algebra and just that magic of us all sorts of having a a sort of a connexion suddenly.

759
01:42:51,110 --> 01:42:54,900
Remember you talking about this a long time ago,

760
01:42:54,900 --> 01:42:59,420
your sense in the theatre that because we're all breathing the same air and we're saying the same thing on stage,

761
01:42:59,420 --> 01:43:04,910
there's a kind of cloud of our collective consciousness is there, which kind of floats above the audience.

762
01:43:04,910 --> 01:43:11,900
And I think that's true. I think as it's sort of the opposite opposite of separateness being being in the theatre.

763
01:43:11,900 --> 01:43:26,560
I think so. And so this brings me on to the question of again, what what, what is mathematics doing in the theatre or theatre doing with mathematics?

764
01:43:26,560 --> 01:43:39,980
And there have been you can think of the plays of Michael Frayn and all sorts of other people, a play called Proof.

765
01:43:39,980 --> 01:43:53,600
But I think Michael David open, there's been many plays written about mathematics, but they've tended to be biographical accounts of the three people.

766
01:43:53,600 --> 01:44:00,230
And I think what is really interesting and what you're doing is, of course, the embodiment of maths.

767
01:44:00,230 --> 01:44:15,350
And of course, that was something that we tried to do a lot in a disappearing number to make it to actually sometimes do real mathematics on stage,

768
01:44:15,350 --> 01:44:22,220
but also make the structure of the play mathematical and make connexions in time between the time of

769
01:44:22,220 --> 01:44:31,220
hardship Ramanujan and time of the present day couple and the structure of the whole piece itself.

770
01:44:31,220 --> 01:44:39,680
And again, the piece, which dealt with both love and death, which seemed intimately connected.

771
01:44:39,680 --> 01:44:52,700
And I suppose one of the things that interests me is the fact that we regard we talk about mathematics as something very much separate.

772
01:44:52,700 --> 01:44:54,050
Although I was bad at maths,

773
01:44:54,050 --> 01:45:04,660
this thing of something being separate in our lives to who we actually are and what is marvellous about your piece is you feel all.

774
01:45:04,660 --> 01:45:09,580
These different elements come together and that this is at the heart of our lives,

775
01:45:09,580 --> 01:45:15,490
and I suppose I just wanted I'm sort of grasping towards a question, but it's that.

776
01:45:15,490 --> 01:45:26,300
And. Is there not a problem somewhere with us in our society in the way that and it comes back to separation again,

777
01:45:26,300 --> 01:45:35,450
the way that we think of all of these areas is being, yeah, separate discrete things.

778
01:45:35,450 --> 01:45:45,530
And in fact, it's a very present problem right now because all the funding to the arts is universities

779
01:45:45,530 --> 01:45:55,880
is being cut as if it's somehow separate to everything else or a kind of thing on top.

780
01:45:55,880 --> 01:45:58,130
And I suppose your experience,

781
01:45:58,130 --> 01:46:07,280
I was wanting to ask yourself about the experience of making it and what people's reactions were while you were making it,

782
01:46:07,280 --> 01:46:17,300
and perhaps talk about some of the reactions to the play itself. But just I'm rooting it in this sense in what I think is a completely arbitrary and

783
01:46:17,300 --> 01:46:27,460
false separation of all the different ways in which human beings enquire in the world.

784
01:46:27,460 --> 01:46:31,090
Yeah, totally. I think that's, you know, most people's perception of mathematics.

785
01:46:31,090 --> 01:46:34,880
You know, what do I do in my office here as a professor of mathematics?

786
01:46:34,880 --> 01:46:38,050
I think they think I'm doing long division to a lot of decimal places.

787
01:46:38,050 --> 01:46:44,410
And, you know, surely I've been put out of a job by now, but actually, it's something very creative about being a mathematician.

788
01:46:44,410 --> 01:46:51,040
And that's of course, what Hardy and mathematicians apology is trying to communicate to people that,

789
01:46:51,040 --> 01:46:55,390
you know, you're playing around with ideas, and I'm actually like, sort of. It's an art.

790
01:46:55,390 --> 01:47:00,340
It is an art. And it's I would say it's but it's, you know, you mentioned that word pattern.

791
01:47:00,340 --> 01:47:04,600
He says there's no such thing as there's no place in the world for ugly mathematics.

792
01:47:04,600 --> 01:47:08,140
Beauty is the first test, is what he said. Exactly.

793
01:47:08,140 --> 01:47:13,180
I mean, I think that was probably quite extreme, and there is unfortunately place for messy mathematics.

794
01:47:13,180 --> 01:47:18,880
But but I think it's, you know, actually, I think mathematics, it's a study of structure and the relationships between things.

795
01:47:18,880 --> 01:47:22,660
And that's why I think you see mathematics coming out all over the place. So.

796
01:47:22,660 --> 01:47:24,280
So that's what's happening in theatre.

797
01:47:24,280 --> 01:47:31,240
The connexions between mathematics and music, you know, music is the art of patterns and and I think there was there was an extraordinary moment,

798
01:47:31,240 --> 01:47:35,410
a disappearing number which felt so mathematical to me because again, it's disappearing.

799
01:47:35,410 --> 01:47:39,460
No grew in the same way as our play. Did you? You did it many times.

800
01:47:39,460 --> 01:47:43,270
It wasn't working at some points. And I remember coming and seeing it in Amsterdam.

801
01:47:43,270 --> 01:47:48,160
And Simon, you going, Look what I've done. You'll see, I've solved it.

802
01:47:48,160 --> 01:47:54,460
I've solved it, you said. And I was just like, Oh, and what had happened was where there were two characters independent characters,

803
01:47:54,460 --> 01:48:02,170
one played by yourself and another an Indian businessman. You'd suddenly realise these were the two same characters and you merged.

804
01:48:02,170 --> 01:48:07,900
These two took yourself out of the play as a character and made these two characters the same.

805
01:48:07,900 --> 01:48:15,520
And that, for me, was totally mathematical. So many times in the maths that I, I scribble on my yellow notepad.

806
01:48:15,520 --> 01:48:22,870
You know that moment of Sony saying, Oh my gosh, that's the same as that, and a whole equation collapses, then the thing just blows outwards.

807
01:48:22,870 --> 01:48:31,120
I mean, that's structural understanding of of all of this piece, I think, you know, it was an extraordinary moment of revelation,

808
01:48:31,120 --> 01:48:39,720
and the piece suddenly worked in a different way after that sort of mathematical revelation.

809
01:48:39,720 --> 01:48:47,280
Interesting. Well, what Hardy said is it may be very hard to define mathematical beauty, but that is just as true a beauty of any kind.

810
01:48:47,280 --> 01:48:54,300
We may not know quite what we mean by a beautiful poem, but that doesn't prevent us from recognising one when we read it.

811
01:48:54,300 --> 01:49:03,470
And I think if we are thinking of theatre and mathematics as separate subjects, which is, I suppose, at the root of your question, why?

812
01:49:03,470 --> 01:49:06,810
Why make a play about maths when they're so different is that I don't believe they

813
01:49:06,810 --> 01:49:12,810
are different because I think they're both utterly rooted in the imagination, all of Max's imaginary concepts.

814
01:49:12,810 --> 01:49:16,110
There's no such thing as to. I mean, it doesn't exist. It's not a real thing.

815
01:49:16,110 --> 01:49:19,290
It's an idea. There isn't an end.

816
01:49:19,290 --> 01:49:27,420
When we were making this play, it seemed at the beginning, quite crudely, but it's extremely easy to see what's real and what's not real.

817
01:49:27,420 --> 01:49:33,990
And actually, of course, it isn't. That reality is incredibly elusive, as is the idea of Tunis.

818
01:49:33,990 --> 01:49:38,370
And and and this ties and I think with what you were asking Typekit about,

819
01:49:38,370 --> 01:49:43,620
but subjects being compartmentalised to those different things when of course,

820
01:49:43,620 --> 01:49:48,630
all they are is different narrative structures, they're just different ways of both of making worlds.

821
01:49:48,630 --> 01:49:51,240
The things that we recognise that we can,

822
01:49:51,240 --> 01:49:57,900
we can we can communicate with each other about the divides between the subjects I think are incredibly artificial.

823
01:49:57,900 --> 01:50:04,320
Certainly in school, they are just that just different, different ways of talking about things, different ways of talking about the same things,

824
01:50:04,320 --> 01:50:10,560
which is us trying to communicate with each other and to make life easier for ourselves and be less frightened of things.

825
01:50:10,560 --> 01:50:19,260
So whether that's whether you're going to do that by studying geography or mathematics or looking at plays, I think they're all the same thing.

826
01:50:19,260 --> 01:50:24,780
I think they're all trying to make sense of what it is to be alive using different kinds of language.

827
01:50:24,780 --> 01:50:30,030
And we we wind up going back to your asking about how to make a mathematical play.

828
01:50:30,030 --> 01:50:34,980
We were always a Marcus, and I very we have very few rules.

829
01:50:34,980 --> 01:50:40,770
But the one was that we wanted it to be an inherently mathematical piece so that there was

830
01:50:40,770 --> 01:50:45,900
it was made up of mathematics and there was mathematics unfolding in front of the audience.

831
01:50:45,900 --> 01:50:50,190
And that you were you were feeling and living in a mathematical way.

832
01:50:50,190 --> 01:50:55,680
We wanted to use a lot of mathematical language. We toyed with using idea entirely mathematical language.

833
01:50:55,680 --> 01:50:59,460
And partly that was because we think I think mathematical language can be useful.

834
01:50:59,460 --> 01:51:07,830
I mean, it's it's there are many beautiful words, robotics and in itself, it's a kind of poetry.

835
01:51:07,830 --> 01:51:12,130
So we thought it might be interesting to make a piece that was not.

836
01:51:12,130 --> 01:51:17,670
It was used nothing but mathematical language just because it's very useful and you

837
01:51:17,670 --> 01:51:25,320
can let it kind of wash over you in a way you can the language you don't understand. It was kind of curious that sort of humour emerged out of that.

838
01:51:25,320 --> 01:51:29,700
I mean, I think you know what is humour is kind of the surprise at things,

839
01:51:29,700 --> 01:51:34,590
and I think that's often what I enjoy about mathematics is is where the equations take

840
01:51:34,590 --> 01:51:39,000
me and I get an emotional response and that's what I want to share with an audience.

841
01:51:39,000 --> 01:51:43,920
It isn't. You know, that's the choices. I make a boring piece, but that's what Heidi was on about.

842
01:51:43,920 --> 01:51:48,720
It's about story. We aren't storytellers. And, you know, a story is about X's and whys.

843
01:51:48,720 --> 01:51:50,700
And but what was very curious,

844
01:51:50,700 --> 01:51:57,210
you mentioned something about the reception of the play because I was very curious because we did this kind of many different venues,

845
01:51:57,210 --> 01:52:01,410
many different places as it evolved and finally arrived at the Barbican.

846
01:52:01,410 --> 01:52:08,330
But the reaction of like eight year old kids on the front row at a festival just laughing their heads off.

847
01:52:08,330 --> 01:52:12,540
But the kind of clowning nature of it and the, you know, the whole eight year olds,

848
01:52:12,540 --> 01:52:16,380
of course, are contemplating whether the universe just goes on forever.

849
01:52:16,380 --> 01:52:20,100
And then somehow we stop asking that question so, so is wonderful.

850
01:52:20,100 --> 01:52:24,240
It was really working for young people, sort of.

851
01:52:24,240 --> 01:52:33,150
It works on a philosophical level. The one place which was so exciting, we took it to India and the audience reaction there was phenomenal.

852
01:52:33,150 --> 01:52:42,120
I think partly because I mean, you mentioned this kind of badge of honour that we seem to wear in the West about being, you know, not good at maths.

853
01:52:42,120 --> 01:52:45,510
And that's somehow something people is proud, somebody proud to say.

854
01:52:45,510 --> 01:52:49,740
But in India, then you know, they have a real respect for mathematics.

855
01:52:49,740 --> 01:52:56,340
And I think what they found surprising, though, was it being taken out of the classroom, which is where they study it,

856
01:52:56,340 --> 01:53:02,070
feel it's very, you know, they are very good at it and seeing it in a theatrical context totally shocked them.

857
01:53:02,070 --> 01:53:06,540
And we had the audiences on their feet sort of cheering in the middle of the play.

858
01:53:06,540 --> 01:53:16,320
It was the most extraordinary experience. So, you know, it was very strange that an Indian audience was always the perfect audience for this.

859
01:53:16,320 --> 01:53:23,250
The one people who actually found it very difficult were maths teachers because they they all people.

860
01:53:23,250 --> 01:53:28,350
The question that sort of comes up a lot, which we now find very funny, is who is it?

861
01:53:28,350 --> 01:53:34,800
Oh, who is this playful and particularly maths teacher say that in fact, one must teach,

862
01:53:34,800 --> 01:53:39,930
reading said to me, I mean, is this the end at GCSE maths students or A-level students?

863
01:53:39,930 --> 01:53:46,680
And of course, the answer to that is that it's for is it's for everybody who's alive and knows that they're going to die.

864
01:53:46,680 --> 01:53:53,880
And it's for every child that's laying on their bed and looked at the night sky and wondered how far it goes and what's what's behind it.

865
01:53:53,880 --> 01:54:01,410
If I flew out that window, would I keep flying forever? So it's very much for everybody.

866
01:54:01,410 --> 01:54:08,130
But I it's interesting that suddenly and journalists as well as a sometimes find it very difficult.

867
01:54:08,130 --> 01:54:13,770
What we won't tell them who it's for. Yes, it's very, extremely revealing.

868
01:54:13,770 --> 01:54:17,580
And what, Marcus, you were saying about the reception in India.

869
01:54:17,580 --> 01:54:25,950
I wish I'd seen it that it must have been amazing. But the children slapping their thighs, literally, it was extraordinary.

870
01:54:25,950 --> 01:54:32,070
Tony, you worked with us on the disappearing. No educated, just so memorable,

871
01:54:32,070 --> 01:54:46,380
memorably showing us how mathematics underpins music so clearly in India that they literally count as part of the music.

872
01:54:46,380 --> 01:55:01,010
And the complexity of that counting and the complexity of the beats is absolutely part of everyday life and the complexity of the patterns of.

873
01:55:01,010 --> 01:55:07,910
That people make on their on their doorsteps are also mathematical, and in a sense,

874
01:55:07,910 --> 01:55:16,250
it's right at the heart of everyday life in a way that it's not necessarily,

875
01:55:16,250 --> 01:55:31,160
although it is, it's not necessarily acknowledged as so in, you know, in what you might call Western or European culture.

876
01:55:31,160 --> 01:55:39,080
But of course, we know, as you rightly point out at the beginning, that, no, you can't have part without mathematics.

877
01:55:39,080 --> 01:55:49,370
But I wanted to ask you one question about the one of the things I think is in the at the heart of it,

878
01:55:49,370 --> 01:55:55,700
which I love is the sense of the unknowability of things.

879
01:55:55,700 --> 01:56:00,770
Because people think about mathematics as nothing, there is a risk.

880
01:56:00,770 --> 01:56:10,930
What I find so beautiful and what you educated me on in this number was how much is unknowable?

881
01:56:10,930 --> 01:56:17,710
And mathematics constantly reveals things, but it also constantly reveals about we can't know like,

882
01:56:17,710 --> 01:56:22,240
you know, we can't possibly know the square root of minus one,

883
01:56:22,240 --> 01:56:28,780
but imagining it to be there, to be something, even though we don't know what it is,

884
01:56:28,780 --> 01:56:37,900
allows us to unravel the next thing in the sense that in King Lear, you can't possibly really know.

885
01:56:37,900 --> 01:56:43,930
What it's about, and yet it puts us in front of the unknowability of things,

886
01:56:43,930 --> 01:56:47,650
of course, it's about acting is about everything in the structure of King Lear.

887
01:56:47,650 --> 01:56:52,330
So fascinating because it's a little bit we say, Well, what is this?

888
01:56:52,330 --> 01:56:56,590
You know, it's again the GCSE thing that we told at school.

889
01:56:56,590 --> 01:57:00,400
We have to write something about the structure of King Lear.

890
01:57:00,400 --> 01:57:08,180
What is the structure? And of course, it's a little bit like trying to write about the structure of a tree.

891
01:57:08,180 --> 01:57:11,030
Because it's always going to be different.

892
01:57:11,030 --> 01:57:20,240
You can't tell why that branch has come off, and while it seems really extraordinary, but it works, it forms the whole tree.

893
01:57:20,240 --> 01:57:24,800
I mean, you can't tell why King Lear disappears for 20 minutes, but it works.

894
01:57:24,800 --> 01:57:35,390
You know it is. It is organic. And I suppose that is one of the things that appears in the play is that there is, as it were,

895
01:57:35,390 --> 01:57:46,790
an unknowable and perhaps you might hate the phrase, but organic quality to that appear to do with mathematics.

896
01:57:46,790 --> 01:57:51,620
Yeah, I mean, I think unknowability of things. So it's rather alarming.

897
01:57:51,620 --> 01:57:57,140
No. But I think one of the biggest revelations I had at university was when I studied

898
01:57:57,140 --> 01:58:03,530
girdles incompleteness theorem because this was the discovery in the 20th century that,

899
01:58:03,530 --> 01:58:11,990
you know, we thought mathematics was about knowing things, but actually what girdle shows using the idea of a strangely,

900
01:58:11,990 --> 01:58:17,540
the fact that mathematics can actually talk about itself and and actually prove its own

901
01:58:17,540 --> 01:58:24,440
limitations that within any system of mathematics and perhaps we should say within any system,

902
01:58:24,440 --> 01:58:34,880
actually there will always be true statements that you cannot prove are true within that system, provided the system is complex enough.

903
01:58:34,880 --> 01:58:38,870
And that's, you know, that's at the heart of mathematics now.

904
01:58:38,870 --> 01:58:48,530
But I think absolutely you said that any system will always have its sort of unknowable unless it's so simple that it's not interesting.

905
01:58:48,530 --> 01:58:58,150
So the idea of a strange loop is absolutely this fact that we can prove about systems that there are things we will never know.

906
01:58:58,150 --> 01:59:10,970
Victoria, yes, I agree. And I think I, you know, I look at I look at my my little dog, but I know that that dog will never be able to.

907
01:59:10,970 --> 01:59:16,820
To do mathematics that we'll never be able to speak French. Never be able to read a Latin poem.

908
01:59:16,820 --> 01:59:21,050
But I know that he's perfectly functioning as adult and in such things.

909
01:59:21,050 --> 01:59:25,730
I think that as a human being, it's a strange arrogance to think that I can.

910
01:59:25,730 --> 01:59:32,210
I can know everything because I'm a piece of biology. I'm a piece of complicated meat.

911
01:59:32,210 --> 01:59:39,830
So the idea that I can, I can know everything there is seems more as I get older, more and more and more ridiculous.

912
01:59:39,830 --> 01:59:45,260
Because of course, I can't know everything because I am just an animal and animals can't know everything.

913
01:59:45,260 --> 01:59:50,090
And I, yes, I am, but more and more comfortable with that fact, actually.

914
01:59:50,090 --> 01:59:58,610
But just wants to come back briefly to the idea of India and the mathematics being more part of the culture.

915
01:59:58,610 --> 02:00:04,880
I think in the West, I feel very strongly about my closing schools that we've got the idea that in order to enjoy mathematics,

916
02:00:04,880 --> 02:00:08,540
one must be very good at it. And I don't think that's true.

917
02:00:08,540 --> 02:00:16,990
I think that very small children enjoy mathematics in its pure simplicity because it's about patterns and it's about security and comfort.

918
02:00:16,990 --> 02:00:22,160
And the same thing, if you do something twice, the same thing will happen. And that's a marvellous thing.

919
02:00:22,160 --> 02:00:27,380
And human beings look for patterns everywhere, and it seems to be a strange kind of irony.

920
02:00:27,380 --> 02:00:31,850
You can only enjoy something if you're really, really amazingly good at it.

921
02:00:31,850 --> 02:00:35,990
And then, of course, you'll never as good as the person who's left that little bit better than me.

922
02:00:35,990 --> 02:00:39,290
So I think it's a shame that we did that.

923
02:00:39,290 --> 02:00:43,370
We children don't more enjoy, just enjoy doing mathematics, and I think small children do,

924
02:00:43,370 --> 02:00:52,070
and they're taught out of it in our society to think that it's only that people who are good who are allowed to have mathematics themselves.

925
02:00:52,070 --> 02:01:02,180
Well, I'm tempted to use some of the people who are listening to this to imagine that when we were improvising the disappearing number we tried,

926
02:01:02,180 --> 02:01:06,050
we could try to embody the character of different numbers.

927
02:01:06,050 --> 02:01:09,300
So what was the character of seven?

928
02:01:09,300 --> 02:01:17,450
You know what kind of person was seven or what kind of you know, or five or six which which were the more boring ones?

929
02:01:17,450 --> 02:01:21,650
Which were the more interesting ones?

930
02:01:21,650 --> 02:01:28,640
We actually literally tried to put that in our bodies and then we tried to guess what you were.

931
02:01:28,640 --> 02:01:39,230
You were characterising. And I think that's one of the remarkable things about this piece is that and it's led up to work that I think

932
02:01:39,230 --> 02:01:47,450
both of you have done and you've done Victoria and really wonderful work in in schools and with young people,

933
02:01:47,450 --> 02:02:01,070
which is to literally and Marcus to to to get people to enjoy mathematics by standing up and embodying it themselves.

934
02:02:01,070 --> 02:02:07,190
And you showed us, I remember in a wonderful exercise in the rehearsal process.

935
02:02:07,190 --> 02:02:16,880
You showed us literally as we stood there, how we could, how one infinity could be bigger than another.

936
02:02:16,880 --> 02:02:21,020
So I take that away as a fond memory.

937
02:02:21,020 --> 02:02:25,640
Are you? Do you still do any of that that work out of it?

938
02:02:25,640 --> 02:02:34,700
This is because I'm interested in what this sort of work gives on to other people as well.

939
02:02:34,700 --> 02:02:39,430
I've been working in schools since all the time we have been making this play,

940
02:02:39,430 --> 02:02:48,250
but since we made a disappearing number and really looking at patterns and letting children make patterns together in space,

941
02:02:48,250 --> 02:02:54,220
using rhythm and their bodies and their breath and each and the fact that they're together.

942
02:02:54,220 --> 02:03:00,490
And it's a way of exploring mathematics through the body and through through being together as an ensemble.

943
02:03:00,490 --> 02:03:07,630
And I think it's very powerful, actually that sense of the children can have of working together with with certain rules and to create very

944
02:03:07,630 --> 02:03:14,110
beautiful patterns so that instead of answering a question that the teacher is asking about a piece of arithmetic,

945
02:03:14,110 --> 02:03:20,380
they are actually doing mathematics, whether they like it or not, with their bodies in the space together.

946
02:03:20,380 --> 02:03:26,890
And I get huge amounts of pleasure as not because I think there's something very fundamental there about us being about about human beings,

947
02:03:26,890 --> 02:03:32,000
loving patterns and rhythm because of our biology.

948
02:03:32,000 --> 02:03:36,830
Yeah, I totally agree with that, and I think coming back to your point, Simon, about and Victoria,

949
02:03:36,830 --> 02:03:42,110
you mentioned as well the tragedy that our education system compartmentalise these subjects.

950
02:03:42,110 --> 02:03:49,430
And I think that's always been my mission really to show that mathematics is is bubbling underneath everything, you know,

951
02:03:49,430 --> 02:03:59,000
music, it's got a history, it's got personality, but it also has theatre in it, which is what I hope this piece has shown.

952
02:03:59,000 --> 02:04:05,630
You're both absolutely brilliant. The play is brilliant. What a joy to be speaking with both of you.

953
02:04:05,630 --> 02:04:27,537
Thank you, Simon. Thank you, Simon.