All language subtitles for NTLive The Hard Problem by Tom Stoppard ENG ITA Subs_Subtitles01.ENG

You're looking at two years

The jewellery was under the floorboards. The police
have nothing to connect you to the scene of the robbery

I'm going to vomit

If you stick to the story,
they can only charge you with receiving

With good behaviour, you'll be out in a year.
On the other hand...

I'm warning you, Spike.
Projectile vomiting

If I hear the words 'prisoner's dilemma',
I'm going to puke into that bin

You're being childish.
The Krohl is a plum ticket

And the psychology department has published
a dozen papers on the Dilemma, so hang in

- The question is, can you trust Bob?
- Who's Bob?

Bob is who smashed the jewellers window
while you grabbed the rings and watches

- Oh, Bob
- Bob is who's sticking to the story, you hope

Bob is who's asking himself...

- ...can I trust Luanne to stick to the story?
- Luanne?

There's never been a smash-and-grab
jewel raider called Hilary

If Bob turns state's evidence
he'll get off and you'll get seven years...

...because you stuck to the story, you muggins

Why would Bob do that
except in the Ladybird Book of Game Theory?

In case you do it to him. That's what this is about.
That's why the game is called The Prisoners Dilemma

Two rational prisoners will betray each other...

...even though they know
they would have done better to trust each other

Rational? You have to be a person to be rational.
You've left out everything about Bob and me

Except we're each out for ourselves,
and we've got Mo buttons to push

- Actually, Bob loves me
- Hold on

I did it. Bob had nothing to do with it,
he wasn't even there

That's not one of the options

I smashed the window, grabbed the jewellery
and hid it under the floorboards

It's not an option in the game

I'm confessing anyway.
I'm going to give Bob a chance to go straight

- Why?
- Because I'm good

Right. Promise me one thing.
Don't pull this one if it comes up in your interview

The game is not about you and Bob,
it's about a statistical tendency

It's about survival strategies
hard-wired into our brains millions of years ago

Who eats, who gets eaten, who gets to
advance their genes into the next generation

Competition is the natural order,
self-interest is bedrock

Co-operation is a strategy.
Altruism is an outlier unless you're an ant or a bee

You're not an ant or a bee, you're competing
to do a doctorate at the Krohl Institute

Where they're basically seeing first class honours
degrees and you're in line for a two-one

So don't be a smart-arse,
and above all don't use the word 'good'...

...as though it meant something
in evolutionary science

Horrible.
Haven't you even got sweetener?

- Don't you believe in good, Spike?
- I believe in it, it's just not what you think it is

- What do you think it is?
- Behaviour

It takes millions of years to evolve, but it's evolved
behaviour, whether you're a person or a vampire bat

Every night, vampire bats leave the cave
in search of warm blood

When they get back to the cave, the ones who were
lucky cough up for the ones who weren't. Literally

They regurgitate some of the blood
to feed the bats who came home hungry

Do you think these are good vampire bats?

No, I don't. But I don't think
they're little people with wings and sonar, either

I didn't want to be the one to break it to you

How many times do you think a bat
will refuse to share its dinner...

...before it finds out next time it comes home hungry
the other bats won't cough up?

- I don't know
- I don't know either, but off the top of my head, four

Four times, say.
That'll teach the selfish little bastard how to behave

I don't see that we have much
to feel superior about, as a species

Altruism is always self-interest,
it just needs a little working out

Like you going miles out of your way
to give me a lift home?

Exactly. It's a cost-benefit thing. I go miles out of
my way because you might invite me in for coffee

- And I throw in a tutorial to get into your...
- Pants?

Good graces, I was going to say.
But you're basically right on the biology

- I'd rather not complicate...
- Hey, I'm your tutor

it would be an abuse of trust
without precedent in higher education

It's a cost-benefit thing.
I'm sorry about the coffee, too

But giving something to get something
isn't altruism, anyway

- That's what I'm saying
- No, you're not

You're saying there's no such thing,
and I'm saying there is

I'm saying Rose of Sharon giving her milk
to a starving man is different from bats

- Rose of Sharon. Is she in the Bible?
- No, she's in The Grapes of Wrath, you pillock

Oh, fiction. If you want a tip,
don't cite works of fiction

Rose of Sharon's baby is born dead, so she gives
her breast to an old man dying of hunger

A stranger, just some old man they find lying in a barn
where the family are sheltering from the rainstorm

That's how the story ends, with Rose of Sharon
holding a starving man to her breast

Altruism means being good for its own sake

Didn't it make her feel better, though,
about her life, her baby

Didn't it give her the courage to go on,
and have more babies?

- Fuck you, Spike
- Darwin doesn't do sentimental

If you want something cuddly, try business studies.
Here, there's nothing but evolutionary biology

Breast-feeding a starving man? Evo-bio.
The Good Samaritan? Evo-bio

Culture, empathy, faith, hope and charity,
all the flip-sides of egoism, come back to biology

Because there just ain't anywhere else
to come from except three pounds of grey matter

Wired up in your head
like a map of the London Underground

With eighty-six billion stations connected
thirty trillion ways, hard-wired for me first

How many times do you think I'd drive you home
for a mug of what isn't even proper coffee...

...before I give up on the sweetener
and let you go home on the bus?

- Four?
- Yeah. At least

- At least?
- Yes. At least four

- Sony
- What?

- Were you praying?
- Yes

Sony if I came in at the wrong moment

I was saying my prayers,
I wasn't putting in my dentures. Thanks

- I'm glad you did that after, not before
- I feel the same way about what you're wearing

You're lovely. It was lovely.
Afterwards, you said, muttered really, did you know...?

You said, 'Thank you'.
'Thank you'. I thought that was so...

- You don't have to say thank you
- Actually, I wasn't talking to you

Oh. Sony

- So... so you, as it were, pray to God, then?
- Yes

- Do you pray every night?
- Yes. Usually before I get into bed

- Does it work?
- Yes

- You find prayer works?
- Yes

- What, every time?
- Yes. Every time I say my prayers I feel better

Oh, works, fight. Psychological

Wow, Spike, I never thought of that before,
missed it completely, shit, that explains it

Hello, hello.
When I clap my hands you'll wake up...

...and find you're in bed with a student,
wearing a negligée

Lucky me.
Better than when?

- What do you pray for?
- Forgiveness

Forgiveness?
I thought it was me who should be doing that

What you need to pray for
is getting into the Krohl Institute

How does God feel about your model
of Nature-Nurture Convergence...

...in Egoistic and Altruistic Parent-Offspring Behaviour?
Does he think you're on the right lines?

I tell you what, Spike,
if I were up for a back-and-forth about God

...I'd rather not have it with an arsehole

Where we were was, you were supposed
to be checking the maths for me

To tell you the truth, I feel a bit thrown now.
I wasn't expecting to deal with a rival hypothesis

That's not what I'm saying. I'm not thrown
by sharing an ancestor with a grunting chimpanzee

Evolution by natural selection, bring it on

It's only that millions of years later the chimp is
still grunting and you're using words like hypothesis

So I'm wondering if there's something they missed out.
It's nothing for you to be bothered by

If not me, who? I'm Darwin. I'm Mendel. I'm Crick
and Watson. I stand for all the science that's taught

We've scraped you clean of gibberish,
we've taken you to bits and put you back together...

...from the atoms upwards so you understand
how you work and how everything around you works

We've accounted for every particle in the universe
except for dark matter, and we are working on that

And here you are on your knees to what? To who?
You might as well pray to Peter Rabbit

- Explain consciousness
- Apart from consciousness

'Explain consciousness'.
There's no baby, there's only bathwater

I've got nothing personal against God,
except the usual, but I expected better from you

When did your mind tum into a party balloon?
You made it nearly to the end of the journey

Give it a few more years, we'll have gravity
wrapped in with the other forces...

...and there'll be nothing for science to do
except collect new beetles

Well, I don't believe that entirely, in fact
I'm so disgusted I've started talking bollocks

Explain consciousness

Flame - finger- brain
Brain - finger- ouch

- Consciousness
- Brilliant. Now do sorrow

Flame - finger- brain
Brain - finger- ouch

- Consciousness
- Brilliant. Now do sorrow

You think you've done pain. If you wired me up
you could track the signal, zip-zip

If you put my brain in a scanner
you could locate the activity. Ping! Pain!

Now do sorrow. How do I feel sorrow?

- Do you feel sorrow?
- Yes

- I'm making you sad?
- Not everything is about you, Spike

- Right
- Scaredy-cat

You can explain the mechanics.
You should work in a garage

'It's yer big end's gone, mate.
Does it hurt when I do this?'

And answer came there none,
because it's a bloody car

I don't go locking for an argument with science.
Tell me my DNA is seventy per cent banana, and I think...

Well, tine, there are more things in heaven and earth
than are dreamt of in your philosophy, Hilary

But with consciousness,
with the mind-body problem...

...the God idea shoves itself to the front
like a doctor at the scene of an accident

Because when you come right down to it, the body
is made of things, and things don't have thoughts

Bananas aren't thinking...

...'Hey, seven eights is fifty-six',
or 'I'm not the king of Spain'

And when you take a banana to bits
you can see why

Don't publish till you hear back from the Krohl

Same with brains. The mind is extra

The human brain, for its size, is the most complex...

...complex object on the planet, in the galaxy,
the universe. Forget it, Spike, I've got the T-shirt

If organising enough components
the right way is all it takes...

...maybe a thermostat is a kiddie-step
towards being conscious

- Maybe
- ...which is what I'm reading

- Did you say maybe?
- I don't see anything obviously wrong with that

You believe a thermostat has consciousness potential,
but you find God a bit of a stretch?

Uh-huh, but you should stick with God.
Your way with an equation would need his collaboration

That's what you're here for.
God can only do so much

I put in for six research slots in industry, plus
Imperial for the hell of it and the Krohl for sheer cheek

- And only the Krohl offered me an interview
- The Krohl didn't know about your maths

I'm not even doing what I'd call brain science

You must be.
Seeing as it's the Krohl Institute for Brain Science

Which means neurobio,
neuropsycho, neuro-everything

Plus its own gym, organic vegetables
and free Pilates, I'm hold

All paid for by a squillionaire with a masters
in biophysics who decided to try hedge-funding

Which raises the interesting question,
is Krohl an altruist or an egoist?

- What you've got here is a wonky co-variance, miss
- What's wrong with it?

The model works okay for behaviour one-on-one
in an idealised sort of way

Think Raphael's Madonna and Child, which I
personally call Woman Maximising Gene Survival

But it won't generalise,
because you haven't allowed for future offspring

And if they have different fathers,
you need to differentiate...

Can you fix it by Wednesday?

I'll do my best, miss,
but I'll have to strip her right down to get at it

- And that's just the customer
- Can you?

Also, it's not good science to call mother-love
a virtue, or even mother-love

You don't think mother-love is a virtue?

You don't call it a virtue,
because at root its virtue consists in its utility

- Utility. Mother-love?
- Genetically selected behaviour to maximise...

Spike, do you know anyone
who believes that, really and truly?

I don't know anyone who doesn't believe it

Parental behaviour. Hard-wired when we were roaming
the savannah in small groups of hunter-gatherers

Mother and baby are in a cost-benefit competition

Have you ever seen a new-born infant screaming
to be fed? The anger, the noise, the face?

The kid is laying it on,
and it probably started in the womb

Oh, probably. The kid doesn't know up from down
but it knows how to maximise the survival of its genes

And mummy's genes are working out
the odds of their survival in the baby...

...against her chances of having more kids

It's a cost-benefit competition, and the genes,
unlike some of us, can do the maths, is that right?

- Well...
- Just shut up

It's not personal

Obviously, genes have no intentions,
it's as if, it's a metaphor

- A metaphor for what?
- A reflex. A survival reflex

Genes don't have a survival problem, Spike,
they're genes

They're little tiny things,
like, I don't know, molecules

Metaphorically, genes want to hop the next train
before the train they're on conks out

As if they know life has a value
which extinction doesn't have

But the science has no underneath,
it's tortoises all the way down

I agree with you, Spike. Virtue is not science.
You can't get an ought cut of an is

Morality is not science. So there must be something
else, which isn't science. Which science isn't

- What is it?
- Wait

Moral rules are the stable strategy
evolved by millions of years of jockeying...

...between humans in real-life situations
like the game of Prisoners Dilemma

That's right. Better out than in

You don't like the idea
that you're nothing else but an animal

It's a conceit. You're an animal.
Get over it

Hilly... What?

- What happened?
- Nothing happened. I'm okay, Spike

- Of course you are. It'll be fine
- Oh, that. Forget that

I need a miracle

- Hi
-Hi

Are you here for an interview?

- Dr Reinhart
- Same here. What time?

- Eleven-fifteen
- It's nearly twelve

- I know
- Maybe he forgot about you

- ls your doctorate in psychology?
- If necessary

My degree is in maths,
and I'm doing a masters in biophysics

Which is actually a neurobiology
research project I managed to latch on to...

...to make myself beautiful for the Krohl. We already
published a paper which I've got my name on

- I'm Amal, by the way
- Hilary. Wow

- How about you?
- Yes. Psychology. I haven't graduated yet

- So you like the Krohl Institute?
- What's not?

It's small, it's not industry, it's not academia,
it's state of the art for imaging and all the toys

It's got a gym, it's elitist but in a good way,
and after five years of Cambridge it's not in Cambridge

- Where are you?
- Loughborough

- Where is that?
- Loughborough. We must be up for the same job

- Well, good luck
- I'll say

- Thank you. Good luck to you, too
- Thanks

Psychology is a side-show at the Krohl. You need
a hard-science crossover to improve your chances

- A lot of what they publish is on mice and macaques
- Parrots?

- Monkeys
- Oh, fight

Monkeys are great.
Scan the hell out of them, open up their little heads

Try this, try that, see what happens,
and they don't sue

Yeah, that wouldn't work
with behavioural psychology

I've submitted to do an experiment
tracking unconscious readiness potential...

...move-by-move in two subjects
playing a repeated Prisoners Dilemma

- They're going to love you
- It's just to get me through the door

The Dilemma is cleaned out, it was oversold
in the first place with the one-shot game

- That's just what I said
- I wonder what's happened to our...?

- Perhaps this is it. Candid Camera
- Do you think so?

Apologies. I'm Leo Reinhart

- Which of you is my eleven-fifteen?
- I am, sir. Hilary Matthews

- Then you must be my twelve o'clock
- Amal Admati

I have to ask you a favour, Hilary.
I can save a few minutes if I take Amal first

So, Amal, come with me and tell me
why you believe a machine can think

Or why you believe it can't,
whichever you prefer

Can a machine think...?

Hilary... I knew it was you.
Do you remember me?

It's Julia. Redcliffs High.
The Purple Gang

Julia... Julia Chamberlain.
Gosh, hello

- Do you work here?
- Yes, nothing brainy, surprise, surprise

I do a Pilates class for who wants it

My partner works here, she's the brainy one.
You'll meet her in a minute

- How are things with you, Hilary?
- Fine, thanks

- The Purple Gang! Do you hear from anyone?
- Christmas cards. Not really

- What did you do after Redcliffs?
- I had the baby

- Oh, I wasn't asking...
- It's all right

- The Head hold us, just the seniors
- Awful warning, was I?

No, honestly, she was really sympathetic.
She said you might come back and do your GCSEs

I suppose that's what girls do now,
with a bucket under the desk

- Not at Redcliffs. What was your baby?
- A girl. Catherine

I don't know if she's still Catherine.
You don't get to know. Anything

She was six in November.
Bonfire night. The sky was exploding

- Oh, Hilly
- Yes. Well. You know

The adoption was all arranged beforehand. No granny,
and my poor dad wasn't about to take it in his stride

I was quite relieved, actually. I wasn't into babies.
It was different when it came to it

But, I don't know, everything just went ahead,
it seemed like the best thing

- What about the, your... well, boyfriend, was he?
- I didn't have a boyfriend. it was stupider than that

I never saw him again, and didn't much want to.
Really stupid

- But here you are
- Reading psychology at Loughborough

So everything turned out all fight.
I'm sorry. I'm an idiot

Here's Ursula coming.
Listen, good luck

- Ursula, look. Hilary Matthews
- Hello. Ursula Tarrant

- Hilary's here for her interview
- I was amazed. I think it must be a mistake

Usually is, but picking a winner
from the slush pile is Leo's little vanity

Sorry, that sounds rude. I bet your application
was brilliant. How did you get on?

I haven't had it yet.
Dr Reinhart is in there with the other candidate

The men's room?
That could be good. It could be bad. Hard to tell

- What's the competition?
- Mathematician

- Ooh, that's bad
- I know

- Where's your degree?
- Loughborough

That's definitely good. That's inclusive, Loughborough.
The intake here is way too up itself

- Don't mind Ursula
- Oh, I don't

God, I wish I had an earthly now.
I wish my model had a neurobiology cross-over

Forget your model,
he just wants to hear what you're thinking

- Good luck
- Come to the gym after if you can

He doesn't like neurobiology.
Obviously he likes it...

...but it's not what he likes, do you see?
- No

The Krohl mostly does brains.
Matter. But Leo likes minds as the way to go

What he likes, what he really, really likes,
is the Hard Problem

- Which hard problem?
- We do brain science

There is only one Hard Problem

You appear to be talking about a brain
rather than a machine

Sure, but the brain is a machine,
a biological machine, and it thinks

It happens to be made of living cells
but it would make no difference...

...if the machine was made of electronic gates and
circuits, or paperclips and rubber bands for that matter

It just has to be able to compute

Computers compute. Brains think.
is the machine thinking?

If it's playing chess and you can't tell from the moves
if the computer is playing white or black, it's thinking

What it's doing is a lot of binary operations
following the rules of its programming

- So is a brain
- But can a computer do what a brain can do?

Are you kidding? A brain doesn't come close

- Do you want to jump in?
- Not much

- Really? Why?
- It's not deep. If that's thinking

An adding machine on speed.
A two-way switch with a memory

Why wouldn't it play chess? But when it's me to move,
is the computer thoughtful

...or is it sitting there like a toaster?
It's sitting there like a toaster

- So, what would be your idea of deep?
- A computer that minds losing

If I made a computer simulating a human brain
neuron by neuron, it would mind losing

- Do you agree?
- No

- Amal's machine wouldn't be conscious?
- No, but how would you tell?

You can't tell by watching the wheels go round.
Just like with a brain

I couldn't tell what you're thinking by watching
what your brain is doing, or even that you're thinking

I'll tell you what I'm thinking. There is overwhelming
evidence that the brain causes consciousness

There's overwhelming evidence that brain activity
correlates with consciousness

Registers consciousness. Nobody's got anywhere
trying to show how the brain is conscious

This is mysticism

- So, how would consciousness come about?
- I have no idea, nor does anyone else

I thought that's why we're here.
To crack the Hard Problem

It is. It is why we're here.
Thank you. Apologies again

Jerry.
As you see, I have a pressing engagement

There is an excellent eatery,
lavishly subsidised

After lunch, you can hang around
in the department and see what's going on

Excuse me.
Was that my interview? In the toilet?

- Yes. Good luck with your career
- Good luck with yours

I'm sorry, but if you separate
what you can't understand from anatomy...

...you're going backwards to Plato

The brain is physical,
and there's no other kind of stuff out there

There are no beans that haven't been counted

The maths to try and explain what's going on
in the brain is like trying to write the equations...

...for a waterfall as big as... I have no idea
how big, as big as a million Niagaras maybe

And so far we can write a short-term prediction
for two variables in a mixer-tap, probably

But the only way to go is to map brain activity...

...in greater and greater detail
against conscious experience

There is no hard science in a psychology test
if it's not plugged into a brain scan. Neurobiology

- Amal, you're bright, you're going to do fine
- You go ahead, Leo, I'll be right there

I don't think you can write a prediction for a
non-linear complex system, even for a mixer-tap

Short term, you can
if you have some earlier values for the variables

That gives you a history of the system's behaviour,
like a library of the patterns it made

Because there is a pattern, a chaotic system
isn't really random, it just looks random

So you look in the library
for previous states of the system

And where you can find some similarity
to what you're looking at now...

...you can expect to see similar behaviour
in the short-term future

You're not the tennis coach, then.
Do you work here?

Not really. I visit.
My office is in town. Come and see us

- Oh, okay
- What's your name?

Admati, Amal Admati.
What's yours?

It's on the building.
But people call me Jerry

Hey, what a coincidence!
Enjoy your dinner, my friend

Morning, Lollipop.
How was the birthday party?

We went on the London Eye,
and had pizza and afterwards The Lion King

Dad, what's coincidence?

A coincidence? You know what a coincidence is,
it's like a long shot

- A long shot?
- No, wait

A coincidence is two things
happening at the same time

There's lots of things happening
at the same time all the time

That's true. So normally you don't bother
to call that a coincidence

But if two things which you don't normally expect to
happen at the same time, happen at the same time...

Like your friend having dinner when
you're having breakfast? You don't expect that

You do if he's in Japan, where it's dinner-time

But say you're walking down the street and you bump
into your school friend, you'd call that a coincidence

- You'd say, 'Fancy seeing you here, what a coincidence'
- Specially if I was walking down the street in Japan

Especially then. You'd say,
'Wow, that's a one chance in a million coincidence'

But there's reasons why you were both in the
same place at the same time, so in another way...

...the million-to-one coincidence had to happen.
You just didn't have the information

Like what?

Suppose your school friend was Japanese,
and suppose you were both crazy about... dinosaurs

Then, maybe, instead of a million times,
you'd only have to go to Japan a hundred times...

...before you bumped into her
at the dinosaur park in Tokyo

- Though I wouldn't bet on it personally
- I would. I could win a hundred pounds

- Or lose your pound
- Oh. Yes

You need more information. Everything
that makes the coincidence smaller and smaller...

...till you decide it's worth betting your pound,
is information

- Did you have more information?
- Oh, yes

- Did you bet on your coincidence?
- Oh, yes

In fact, it wasn't really a coincidence any more,
and I didn't need to go to Japan

- Will you show me how?
- I will

Eat up. The cars downstairs
and Marie-Cecile has got your bag

- Can I sit in from with Arthur?
- No, Sam has to sit in from

- Why?
- Because Sam is in charge

- And he wants you in the back with Marie-Cecile
- Boo

- If mummy says I can, does it mean I can?
- Definitely

Hannah, good morning, but that's it, goodbye

Because I'm not talking to you.
You wrote yourself into Siberia

Can I sit in from with Arthur?

It was inaccurate online,
and you're not looking pretty-in-pink, either

All fight, I was only asking

When Krohl Capital calls the top of the market,
we won't be calling it in a blog, you bottom-feeder

- We went on the London Eye
- You should have listened to me

- He's on the phone
- Have a nice winter

Mum... Rude!

Hi, sweetheart. No, don't wait dinner,
in fact don't wait up

Hold on...
Did you give Sally her present.) Yes

Ne, I'd rather wake up in the country.
Here she is. Big kiss

- Mummy...
- Simon

- Am I an orphan?
- What?

An orphan. Sally said if you're adopted
it means you're an orphan

Does this look like an orphanage?

So here's what, Simon.
I'll write you a cheque for a hundred and ten million

Then you can shop worrying about me,
and I can shop worrying about you

- Ok
- Only, don't ask to come back in

- Ok
- Well, it's your call

- Pizza. And we went to The Lion King
- I don't know, because she's a journalist

- All fight, I'll ask him. Bye mummy
- I'm gone... Wanker

- So ask me
- What?

- Do you want to ask me something?
- Why?

- You said...
- Oh

I have to ask Sam
to stop in the village for dog-biscuits

Dog biscuits. Right

I've got a meeting with some people coming.
Give me a kiss and get going

- What kind of people?
- People-kind. Don't I get a kiss?

- Will you show me where you work?
- I will

- When?
- When you find it interesting

But I'll take you to a place I know where there's
lots of interesting things, machines, monkeys...

- When?
- Soon, Cathy

- Ok. Bye, daddy
- Sayonara

Yeah... Ne, the dining room.
And let me know when my visitors are in the lift

Jerry. Beautiful apartment

Shut the fuck up, and where do you get off calling me
by my first name, you miserable piece of shit?

Oh Christ

Alright...
You need to put your head between your knees

Sit down.
I want to ask you something

- What did you pay for that watch?
- Seven grand, sir

- Exactly how much?
- Seven thousand, one hundred and forty pounds

- What do you pay for a haircut?
- A hundred and fifty including a tip

And this is - what? - five years since you came
in here with your ass falling out of your trousers...

...and found money pouring through the door

Do you know what brings that money through the door?
Confidence. Belief

- Can I say something, please?
- No, you can't. You're not here to say anything

You're here to read this and sign it

it says you agree not to look for or accept
a job outside the firm for two years

With no salary increase, no bonus,
and meanwhile you sit in your corner...

...and share your limp-dick, short-the-market
wisdom with nobody except your supervisor

With a sign round your neck saying 'Asshole',
but that's not in the letter

Then maybe you'll think Mice before
dumping your unbelief with our name on it...

...on a scumbag analyst selling his dope
to high-rollers like for example our clients...

...for whom pessimism is the bubonic plague,
you brain-dead quant

What in fuck's name did you think you were doing?

- Getting your attention
- Well, you got it

- Can you stand up?
- Yes, sir

Then sign and walk

Two years? The arsehole sign will be around
a lot of people's necks before two years

The market is acting stupid,
and the models are out of whack...

...because we don't know
how to build a stupid computer

The market is a belief system
with a short memory

And it's leveraged
on highly correlated billion-dollar bets

And trillions on side-bets,
which are going to go wrong together

I mean to zero.
You pay me for my research

I don't pay you to post it
like a fridge magnet on the reception desk

- But I'm not wrong
- You're early, which is the same thing

- You're going short the market?
- Use the service stairs

- How is it, Dr Matthews?
- Good

Elaine, those shocks are coming
at regular five-second intervals

Keep an eye on the red light,
keep the reactions fairly even

It's your distress which increases,
not over-dramatic

Hello

That's good. Take a break

- Who...?
- Is that lady being hurt?

- No. We're playing a trick. It's a kind of game
- Did she know it was a game?

Yes. She's my friend Elaine. She was pretending

- Why?
- It's all fight. It's what we do here. Sometimes

We... it's difficult to explain

My name's Hilary. Hillary Matthews
I don't know your name

It's Cathy

- Your dad's looking for you
- Jerry's here?

He's giving his daughter the tour.
She wants all the animals let out

So he thought he'd better show her
we're nicer to people

Oh dear

He's come to hand out medals. The Krohl
is going to have the cover of Nature, did you know?

It's Ursula's team, working with Stanford,
infecting neurons with a photoreceptor

I understood it when she explained it,
but not so I could explain it to anyone else

She can get a single brain cell to spike
by flashing a blue laser on it

- Mouse brain?
- Yes, a mouse brain

- What?
- I didn't say anything

I won't tell anybody

I think it's a big step forward
in the study of mouse brains

That's mean

Well, they're doing optics with mice
and calling it consciousness

A mouse is a bundle of behavioural responses
to physical stimuli

Poking it with a stick is the same thing bigger

Light photons hit the retina,
smell molecules get the whiskers twitching

And improved technology will show the mechanism
all the way to cheese response

It's only amazing, it's not counter-intuitive

But cognition - reasoning, imagining, believing -
that's hard

How does the brain do self-consciousness?
Reference? Metaphor?

'I wandered lonely as a cloud'.
As a what?

'Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins,
which feed among the lilies'. Like two what which what?

That's hard.
Where is it happening? How?

If you had a choice,
would you choose a mouse?

Would you choose optics? Would you spend your time
looking at a brain while you poke it with a laser?

Not me, boss. It's a no-brainer.
The psyche in psychology is Greek for soul

You need something with a mind
which can talk you through

Still, the cover of Nature is pretty sexy.
Do you have anything that sexy?

It would do wonders for the department's fitness
in the struggle for survival at the Krohl

- Seriously?
- Seriously. The ground is moving under us

- What would be that sexy?
- A predictive theory of human behaviour, for instance

If there were a Nobel Prize for psychology, that
would do it. Why are predictions wrong half the time?

Being wrong about human behaviour half the time
is our guiding star, Leo

It's what's telling us
the study of the mind is not a science

We're dealing in mind-stuff that doesn't show up
in a scan: accountability, duty, free will, language

All the stuff that makes behaviour unpredictable

You're not listening.
It's the Jerry Institute for Brain Science

And I'd like to have something that gets his attention
before there's a genetic algorithm...

...that will do our job in a computer
- It won't

- I bet they're working on it
- It won't compute

At Loughborough we did a child custody test

You describe two parents. Parent A is across-the-board
average: health, wealth, social life, everything

Parent B is positives and negatives: richer, but travels
a lot, great rapport but minor health problems, etcetera

When you ask which parent should be awarded custody,
you get a fat majority for Parent B

When you ask which parent should be denied custody,
you get a fat majority for Parent B

it doesn't compute.
We did it over and over, and it didn't compute

- You never brought that up at your interview
- Leo, do you remember my interview?

- What do you think of Bo?
- Who? Oh, Bo. I haven't had time to...

She's unqualified in psychology, and over-qualified
in maths but I've a good feeling about her

And here you are

- Come by later. Something you might like
- Oh, yes? What?

I'll see you later, too, Bo

- I've got the questionnaires, Dr Matthews
- Hilary is tine. All done?

- Yes. The guinea pigs are doing coffee break
- Test subjects. The guinea pigs get lettuce

Sony. I brought you one

ls Elaine a research assistant?

No. That would work if we used real electricity.
She's an actor

We're doing a variation of a well-known experiment

The test subjects don't know
they're the subject of the experiment

They think Elaine is.
I'll fill you in as we go

- How did you get on with Leo?
- Dr Reinhart? He seemed very nice

- I really enjoyed the interview
- Well, so you know what this day is about

- Well, to see if I'm smart, I guess
- No, that's a given

It's to see if you'll be happy here.
For you to see, for us to see

Thank you

- Oh...
- We don't look at them

The questionnaires have to be convincing but
they're a charade for the benefit of the test subjects

We divide the subjects into two groups randomly

We tell group one they scored high for empathy,
we tell group Mo they scored low for empathy

Se, when we get to the experiment we can allow
for suggestibility. But we're not testing for empathy

- What, then?
- Motivation

Egoist motives and altruistic motives.
Selfish and unselfish

There's a common-sense view
that we're selfish by nature

And unselfish when we override our nature,
basically by culture. What do you think?

I think it's good to be good,
I don't see that it matters what makes us good

It might matter if people who are out for themselves
think they're justified by biology

Yes

We're trying to understand other minds,
and we don't really understand our own

Why did you bring me this coffee? Perhaps
you thought I looked as if I needed some coffee

So that would be an altruistic motive. Or perhaps
your ultimate motivation was that you wanted...

...to make some sort of good impression, which would
be an egoist motive for bringing me a cup of coffee

I could ask you. But how do I know the answer is
honest? And if it's honest, how do I know it's reliable?

- What do you do with these?
- Shred them. Confidentiality issues

The data we collect from an experiment
is kept anonymous

A lot of detail here, personal detail.
Not to be using it...

The reason we don't look
is once you look...

...you find the special cases
who will skew your precious results. Outliers

But the point is, the subjects are a random sample

If you're tempted to weed out the outliers
you're rigging the experiment, and that's a sin

If there's a hidden bias in the design of the experiment
the results are not information, they're misinformation

And understanding the human mind
is difficult without that

It's like trying to catch a sunbeam
in your cupped hands

You're testing for motivation, one on one with Elaine,
and you're what? Adjusting for empathy?

Yes. What?

- It just seems kind of approximate
- Really?

- Empathy-wise, you've made two groups of clones
- Well, how else?

You can match every subject with their own Elaines,
with very high or medium high empathy, or low, whatever

We haven't got a lot of Elaines

Ne, you describe Elaine each time different,
to tit their questionnaire

There's this one here who's a middle child,
so Elaine can be a middle child

I wasn't doing egoist or altruist anything

The man said to bring you this cup of coffee
so I brought you the fucking coffee

I'm sorry. I don't swear a lot

- Do you swear in Chinese?
- No, never. My grandmother would have killed me

- Where did you graduate, Bo?
- Shanghai and Caltech

- Then my masters at Cambridge
- Really?

Then I got a job offer from Krohl Capital Management
I was a quant for a year at Krohl, but...

Well, the money was good, I'll say that,
but it wasn't good money, you know?

Good money?

Gaming the market to make more money
for people with money

- This is Jews money, so that's good, isn't it?
- He did something good with it

But I'd like to do something good with math
without turning math into money first

A friend at KCM said I should try for a psychology
doctorate here, a quant, Amal. He knows you

Who?
Oh. Yes. Amal. Yes, he would do that

- Do you see Amal?
- Yes. He's... who I'm seeing

- Coincidence
- Did he tell you about us?

- Really?
- No!

- We were both up for this slot
- Oh. And you got it

Yes. It was a miracle

- You're not right
- Sony

- Leave your work in the office
- Yes

We've got this test going. Escape options from testing
for pain thresholds on a volunteer, that's the story

Using electric shocks.
And Jerry Krohl's daughter walked in on...

- I didn't know he had a daughter
- Nor did I, but he does

School-age like Catherine. Her name's Catherine.
She saw, she was upset seeing...

She thought the girt was being tortured.
You should have seen her face

- But you explained, didn't you?
- Of course. I think so. Yes

Then why are you holding on to it?

It must have happened often enough,
girls with the same name

- You don't get used to it
- I suppose you don't

- Julia, can you remember?
- What?

- The Purple Gang
- Yes

- We were bullies, weren't we?
- No, no more than we were bullied

We used to gang up on the ones who were...

- You know...
- Gimpy

Peggy Potter was gimpy
because her mother knitted her school jumpers

I used to make Gillian Meadows cry because
the gang said I had a crush on her, which I did

- Stop it. Schoolgirls
- But who can I trust her with?

Who can I trust not to make her cry,
flicking her behind the knees with a wet towel...

...like we used to, rampaging
through the changing rooms after games?

Buck up, Hilly.
If that's Catherine's only problem...

I missed her like half of me
from the first day

And the worst thing was, there was literally
nothing I could give her, do for her, she'd just gone

And then I thought up something I could do
just to... just to be good

So that in return someone,
God, I suppose, would look after her

- Do you believe in God?
- I have to

But I'll tell you what, though. Everyone should say
a prayer every day, anyway, for who you love...

...just because it puts them in your diary

For ages now, I've gone for weeks
without thinking of Catherine. Months

I've been letting her go,
as though I'd swapped her for a doctorate

Oh, Julia...

Git yer haynds off mah woman

Ursula! I need to ask you something.
Could the cosmos be teleological?

Oh, fuck a duck.
No. Why?

Teleological, sweet pea, having a purpose,
nothing to do with the telly

Don't patronise me, you dyke,
you're on my patch

- How about panpsychism?
- No. Nature isn't conscious. Trees are not conscious

- Functionalism?
- No. A thermostat is not even a tiny bit conscious

Have you been reading after lights out?

What about quantum-level brain processes
to explain consciousness?

She has

Could you show me how Gödel's Proof
means a brain can't be modelled on a computer?

You wouldn't know Gödel's Proof
if it had suspenders in Selfridge's window

- Ursula, I need you to show me
- Now?

No, not now.
Sundays and evenings, tutorials

- Oh, thanks
- Why?

For a conference paper, sort of, with
a summer vac stitched on, is what I'm thinking

- Lovely. Where?
- Venice

Leo's giving the status paper for the Krohl,
big psycho conference in June

And he blagged them into giving me a place
on a round-table on consciousness

What?
No way. Leo? No way

So... how've you been?

- Have you got a date?
- I did have

Drinks party for UCL's new Nobel,
but it's in the hotel. I'll catch what's left of it

- I can come back if you like
- I'll be asleep

In case I don't see you,
good luck with the physiology of... what?

- I can't be there. I'll be at Leo Reinhart's session
- 'The Physiology of High Stakes'

We took saliva samples at the world
poker championship. The cortisol levels went crazy

Is that good? I don't mean good

I haven't heard from you for years

- I haven't heard from you at all
- Really? That's bad

- ls the sex better at UCL or Loughborough?
- UCL. Or it's to do with being a pref

- Won't I see you on the boat?
- Boat?

The Krohl party. It's on Jerry Krohl's boat, an eyesore,
frankly, but I had an invitation under my door

No, I'm taking off after my round table.
Florence, Pisa, Siena, on the cheap

- Do you want to come?
- Don't you have anyone to go with?

- You're anyone
- Hilly

- Did you read my...
- Yeah

Let me make three points
about your round-table pre-print

Don't circulate it

If you circulate it, don't put your name on it

If you put your name on it,
don't put the Krohl's name on it

Four points. If you circulate it with your name
and the Krohl's name on it...

...don't call it 'ls God the last man standing?'
- Why?

Because it will make you unemployable.
You'd have to do philosophy

I haven't written anything
which isn't in plain sight

Materialism is in trouble,
and we're all materialists now

Everything is matter. There is no science
that says beauty is truth or truth beauty

But the gondolas are heaving with name-tagged
materialists having their minds blown by Venice

What is to be done with the sublime
if you're proud to be a materialist?

To save the appearance of value,
no theory is too unlikely...

...no idea too far-out to float,
so long as it sounds like science

Elementary particles with teeny weeny
consciousness, or a cosmos with attitude

Or the life of the mind
as the software of a biological computer

These are desperate measures, Spike.
What does materialism remind you of? It's a faith

But it's pathetic to rely on a supreme being
to underwrite what you call your values

- Why are you afraid of making your own?
- You don't claim to make your own

What's the difference between a supreme being
and being programmed by your biology?

- Freedom. I can override the programming
- Who can? Who's the you outside your brain? Where?

I wish I'd pulled that primatologist with the
thigh boots who was hitting on me at registration

Why don't you leave me alone?

At least change the title, will you?

- All fight
- At least

- But you didn't write these equations, I know that much
- I might have done

- No, not these. You shagged a mathematician
- No, I didn't

But there's a Chinese gilt in the department
who's phenomenal. She was a quant at KCM before

- Krohl's hedge-fund? That's a come-down
- She doesn't think so. I'm mad about her, actually

She's designed an experiment like nothing
in the literature. Ninety-six kids in four age-groups...

- Ninety-six?
- Close to, probably

We've got pretty much an entire school
participating, thanks to Jerry

- So you liked her equations?
- I liked them, but they're not tied into hard data

They show there isn't enough geological time...

...for the living world to have been selected-out
by chance mutations

Really? Look around

- You're just hung up on your personal incredulity
- Well, where's yours?

Someone tells you you can run the film backward
billions of years...

...to an enormous bang and nothing but particles
joining up into big clumps like this one

Except not like this one, because on this one
the chemistry came alive and kicked into an algorithm...

...that kept unspooling till there was you collecting
spit from a poker game, and you don't bat an eyelid

Yup. Love it. Now do God,
and see which one of us looks credulous

I went to Tuscany once.
A conference in Pisa, by Easy Jet

The control tower was a disappointment.
A missed branding opportunity, one felt

You wouldn't want someone
hanging on to your skirts...

...who thinks when you've seen
one town in Tuscany you've seen them all

I wouldn't know what to do with myself
if there's no conference

I get antsy if there isn't a new journal
to look at every day

- I thought you were going to the party
- Do you mind if I change my mind?

Why? You're not going to spoil your record
by worrying about me, are you?

Anyway,
don't you want to meet the Nobel laureate?

I met him, he's a force-of-nature type who's realised
he can act modest now. It's quite irritating

All right... But I'm going to sleep

Still saying our prayers, are we?
Still God, is it?

Whoever's up for it. I wish you'd stop saying
'God' like that, as if I'm talking about someone...

...who created the world in six days and then
had a rest, he'd think I was a complete idiot

But there are things we believe
are right or wrong like, say, cruelty

And if this belief is a brain-state, that's fine by me,
but the brain-state is about something

It's about cruelty, which is right or wrong
whether we're thinking about it or not

You don't need God for that

But you need something for it to be true,
some kind of overall moral intelligence...

...otherwise we're just marking our own homework.
That's what I pray to for Catherine

Because somewhere between ape-men
and the beginning of religion...

...we became aware of an enormous fact
we didn't understand

We did. Its name was death.
Who's Catherine?

- Oh, sorry. She's my daughter
- You haven't got a daughter. Have you?

Yes. Don't worry.
She'll be thirteen in November

- Thirteen? So...
- Fifteen

- What?
- I was fifteen

God, Hilly. Where is she?

Catherine was possibly the last 'shame' baby

Nowadays the babies are mostly taken away
from mothers who neglect them or can't cope

But shame is pretty much extinct

When she's eighteen she can ask to see her birth
certificate. If she wants to. If she knows she's adopted

- Hilly, I'm sorry
- Thanks

- Would you do something for me, Spike?
- Anything

- Promise?
- Should I get dressed or undressed?

- Will you, though?
- Yes. Okay. Sure. What?

- Will you say a prayer?
- What?

Pray for her. Just for a moment

No. You mean like pray-to-God pray?
No. Why?

- Just because. If you, of all people, if even you...
- No. I mean... Hilly...

- It would be meaningless, wouldn't it?
- I don't know. That would be up to you

- It wouldn't be up to me. It just is meaningless
- If it's meaningless, what's your problem?

- I'd be betraying everything I believe in
- And that's a problem, is it?

Is that why you pray for forgiveness?

I just want to be allowed to know,
to stop imagining, and I pray for her

Please God let Catherine be all right.
Please God let her parents be kind to her

Oh. So what happened to
'Please Overall Moral Intelligence?

- Aren't you embarrassed?
- Yes

- Do you want something from the minibar?
- The minibar?

You already had...
Are you having a shower?

You're crying in the shower, aren't you?
I know you are

It's lovely. Thank you

- Has Leo seen this?
- I wanted you to see it first

Quite right. I'll want to go through the raw data,
all of it, and to be taken through the maths

It checks out. The mathematics is basic

This is bloody sensational.
But I wish you'd waited for me, Bo

No offence, but we're going to have to be
bullet-proof, immaculate

I was ready. The kids were ready

Well, it's great. Eighty-eight kids is damned good

- And I wanted it for you when you came back
- You...?

Leo. Beautiful day

Fuck the beautiful day. What do you call this,
and why has it got our name on it?

- You mean my Venice discussion paper?
- Yes, I mean your Venice discussion paper...

which is the subject of several e-mails
from the comedians among my friends and colleagues

We do science here, Hilary

This is about science,
the psychology of the scientific mind-set

- Psychology of bullshit. It's about God
- It's about the Hard Problem

It says every theory proposed
for the problem of consciousness...

...has the same degree of demonstrability
as divine intervention

So, psychologically, they're equivalent

What it says is that if you're an atheist,
you're in denial

No, it says we maybe in denial
about mind-body dualism

Oh, well, that takes care of the Hard Problem

The reason it's hard, you pig's arse,
is that mind-body is the problem

I could have done without this at the minute

Welcome back, I think.
Sony about my language

- Also me in Venice. I apologise
- I took it as a compliment, Leo

- Has something happened?
- I think so

The Krohl is taking on another
behavioural psychologist, starting September

Well, that's good, isn't it?

He's not coming to my department.
He'll have an office in Biochem

- Who's paying for him? Is he on our budget?
- No

- That's not so good
- I'm impressed you understand

If you hadn't outed yourself as a Cartesian dualist
you could have ended up as a head of department

But... Psychology as an enterprise
is on its way out, is what they're telling us

We're on a count-down to the embedded brain
answering all the questions about the disembodied mind

- What's his angle, this...?
- Humane-related performance in human subjects

- Hormone-related performance? Like what?
- Like working on the trading desk at Krohl Capital

- Am I going too fast for you?
- No

- Jerry is smitten
- I can see. Where did all this...?

- On his boat
- His boat?

Jerry read this man's paper in Venice. The paper
was nothing to do with the financial market

It was poker players,
but Jerry got it in one

it was about risk-taking and risk aversion.
So he invited Spencer to the Krohl party

- Spencer?
- His name is Spencer something

it was a love match, Jerry in a yachting cap,
and Spencer. A trading desk is next up

- I'm trying to follow the money. Where's the money?
- Stress releases a cocktail of hormones

By getting your traders to spit into a paper cup, you
can predict who'll get risk-happy and lose his gains

Or, contrariwise, predict
who will be paralysed by risk-aversion...

...in a roller-coaster market
where there's money to be made

Do we like this? We adore it.
it monetises the hormonal state of your trading desk

So it's behavioural,
but I'll be damned if it's psychology

There are people here who wonder why we're
in the building. Jerry, isn't one of them, so far

But it's a long time since the department
published anything that went viral

For Jerry that's like trading at a loss

Do you want to see something sexy?

That's a very good question.
I don't think I've ever been asked this question before

In fact, you may be the first person
who's ever asked it. Congratulations, Julia

- So, yes indeed, what exactly is a hedge-fund?
- Sony

Well, I don't know what a hedge-fund does.
Do you, Spike?

- Yes
- Go on, then

- No. I want to see if Amal knows
- What? But I work in a hedge-fund

- I prefer to be the judge of that
- But I really want to know

Well, let's say you have ten million pounds
which you'd like to put to work

You decide to invest it in Krohl Capital Management.
First, Jerry Krohl takes...

per cent per year, £200,000,
as his fee for taking your money to gamble with

Then he gambles with it, and he keeps twenty percent
of the winnings. If he loses, the losses are all yours

Do you work in a hedge-fund?

But why would anyone give... Could you explain
what you actually spend your day doing?

Do I have to?
I don't ask you about Pilates. No offence

- None taken
- It's me who does Pilates. You can ask me

With Pilates, it's very difficult
to think of anything to ask

- I suppose so
- Dump him

What have you done to my flower?
Honestly

He spends his day staring at...
how many computer screens is it, Amal?

- Call it seven
- Seven. That would be...

...stocks, bonds, commodities, currencies,
pornography, Sky Sports and e-mails

It doesn't explain
why anyone would give him their money

- Amal?
- Because Krohl Capital Management...

...averaged sixteen per cent per annum
return on capital. Averaged, after expenses

- That's a lot
- Yes, I do know that

The ultimate motivation is that banking regulations
don't apply to hedge-funds

In fact, getting round the rules is the reason for
hedge-funds. Like Basel rules for capital reserves

I could explain that, but I decline.
First it's Basel Rules...

...and before you know where you are,
it's arbitrage, leverage, securitisation... I refuse

Amal doesn't mean to be rude

- Something's burning
- He's embarrassed

Sony it's a bit overdone.
Everyone help yourself. Give me a glass, someone

Oh, who brought that beautiful flower?
Bo, thank you. And champagne

- How much does this cost, Amal?
- That is so crass. A hundred quid

Pay attention a minute.
This evening is for Bo

And The Journal of Cogntive Studies.
To Bo's first publication!

- Has everyone got a glass?
- Thank you

- Mine is not the only name on this paper
- Only the first

You all understand,
there would be no paper without Hilary

Not true. This is Ho's paper, it's her experiment,
and it's going to cause a stir

It doesn't look good if the authors
are getting out from under. Let me

The toast is 'Ultimate Goods.
B. Sheng-Tsu and H.J. Matthews'

Done. Eat

- Did Leo Reinhart ask to see the raw data?
- Do you really think he wouldn't?

- He called it a beautiful experiment
- A work of art

- Oh, shut up, Spencer
- What sort of stir will it cause, Hilly?

The sort where an experiment comes up
with the wrong answer for a lot of people

Especially when it's the wrong answer
to its own question

Spike is the sceptic at the feast,
but Bo and I don't care

I'm sorry about the feast, though.
Don't eat it. I'm so sorry, Bo

- It's really tasty
- I don't mind

Interesting.
Was the recipe in 'Cognitive Studies?

There's a certain sort of absent-mindedness
about it, you mean?

Oh, bugger it! Cheese. Cheese and biscuits,
coffee and I've baked a cake

'Ultimate Goods'. Hilary makes altruism sound
as if it had something to do with morality

- She was always like that
- Doesn't it mean being good?

- No
- Well, it's probably because she is good

- How do you work that out?
- I didn't work it out

Well, shut up, then.
Oh dear

Altruism just means increasing
someone else's fitness at the expense of your own

Now you're making it sound
as if it's got something to do with Pilates

- And you shut up, too
- So sorry

Tell her about vampire bats

I'll tell you the miracle of the brain worm,
that'll cheer you up

To begin with there's a parasite that lives
inside a cow. The eggs come out with the cowpat

Problem: how does the parasite get back
inside the cow to complete its life cycle?

First, the eggs get eaten by a snail, and develop
inside the snail before being ejected in a mucus...

...which is eaten by ants. About fifty
of these tiny creatures are now inside an ant

They bore a hole in the stomach wall, and one
of the fifty works its way up into the brain of the ant

This is the brain worm.
it changes the behaviour of the ant...

...causing the ant to obsessively climb up
to the tip of a blade of grass over and over again

Thus increasing its chances
of being eaten by a cow

But the brain worm's life is over

- Now, that's what I call altruism
- Well, I don't. It's horrible

- Stilton
- No thanks

- What are we talking about?
- About you, of course

Did you read it? It's a corker

Eighty-eight kids in a sort of creative writing class
with alternate-choice modules...

...scored for egoist slash altruist values

Which shows, or is supposed to show, or
could be said to show when held up to a strong light...

...that six-year-olds are nicer than eight-year-olds

Who are nicer than ten-year-olds,
who are nicer than twelve-year-olds

- it does show that
- Which, our authors conclude...

...points to a strung indication
that we start off nice and learn to be nasty

Instead of the received wisdom
that we start off nasty and learn to be nice

Ergo, good, or ultimate niceness,
has its root in nature. Or rather human nature

Or rather human nature
from when it separated from animal nature...

...which is actually a problem
for people like me who can't see the join

Does H.J. Matthews think it happened
in earthquake, wind and fire?

- Feel free, Spike
- And, by the way...

Figure 3, showing an orderly transition
from niceness to nastiness...

...gives off, if you don't mind me saying so,
a distinct whiff of week-old fish

- Excuse me?
- Spike

I'm going to get the coffee

- Don't imagine for a moment you're staying the night
- I didn't like the sound of that

- I suppose a fuck is out of...
- Hey!

I don't think you should drink any more

Sorry, have I given offence?
Last thing on my mind. Sorry. Terribly sorry

I don't suppose... No

- I think you should eat something
- Is that your best offer?

To be fair to Spike, I actually understood
your paper, the way he explained it

I'm going to read it again.
I never got to the end

- I'm going to have a cigarette
- Nice one

Have I missed something?

- Ah, coffee. Can I help?
- No

I've been trying to imagine
everyone I work with as eight-year-olds

- Really, why?
- Trying to imagine them as nice little boys and girls

The thing about the market is, it consists
entirely of transactions between egoists

An altruistic trader, salesman, broker, customer...

I mean, forget black swans,
we're talking African polar bears

So?

I just can't imagine them
sharing their toffees with each other

I did. Opal Fruits...
Opal Fruits are the Ultimate Goods of confectionary

- Where's Bo?
- Went outside for a smoke

She doesn't have to do that

Julia is the Opal Fruit of Pilates

Could you pour the coffee for me?

- Are you all right, Hilly?
- Yes

Guess what? I burnt her cake, too

You'd never have guessed
it's my first dinner party

- Are you crying?
- Fireworks make me cry

it doesn't matter about the dinner

- ls Spike your boyfriend?
- I hope not

- Why is he being like that?
- Because he is like that

We never agree about anything

You don't seem to care what he said...
about the paper

I don't. He said a lot more before you turned up.
I'm used to Spike

- What sort of lot more?
- The same sort

But I went through the data, and the paper is solid.
Don't lose confidence, Bo

I wish it wasn't published! I didn't do it
for it to be in some journal where anyone can...

That's silly. Publication is how you get on. Sometimes
it gets to be a rough-house, but that's part of the game

- I think I may have done something bad
- Like what?

There were ninety-six children to start with

Well... okay.
But you went with eighty-eight, right?

- Eighty-eight participated
- No, they all did

But wait...
they all ninety-six participated?

And eight kids couldn't stay the course, so you
crunched the data for the rest. Is that right?

- No, I did the math across all ninety-six
- And then what?

Then I eliminated eight kids,
and did the math again

- Then what?
- Then I showed you. When you got back from Italy

How did you choose the ones you eliminated?
Was it random?

Shit. You took out two from each group
who were spoiling your result

- They were freak results!
- They were outliers, Bo

That's what random does, that's why experiments
tend not to come out with every hair in place

Why did you do it?
How can you be so stupid?

- How can you?
- Bo...

I wanted to give you what would please you

Yes.
But ultimately, you wanted what you wanted, Bo

- It's my fault. I missed it
- I'm sorry

I'm good.
I've been sitting on my hands for a year...

...watching the market bet on water flowing uphill
and flying pigs farting Chanel No 5

I have to hold my mouth straight to shop
laughing, because I'm the official arsehole

And it's all starting to look good for Amal

I don't trade. I don't pitch. I work on the computer
models which are supposed to manage risk

In theory, the market is a stream of rational acts
by self-interested people...

...so risk ought to be computable

So long as the market is correcting itself,
the models look as if they're working

And they can be proved mathematically
to crash about once in the lifetime of the universe

But every now and then,
the market's behaviour becomes irrational

As though it's gone mad, or fallen in love.
it doesn't compute. It's only computers compute

So I'm thinking about that

Did you think of keeping quiet?

- No
- Did she?

- I'm very, very sorry, Leo
- I'm sorry, too

The data sheets for ninety-six test subjects

It took me a while to work it out. You can't get there
by taking out two from each group

With group one, the youngest kids...

...you have to eliminate the three
at the high end for egoism, selfish little bastards

With group four, the oldest kids...

...you eliminate the one at the high end
for altruism, annoying little Mother Teresa

With the two middle groups...

you have to eliminate from both ends
and further in, or the curve goes back on itself

Start with Bo, then. I'll talk her down,
she can have some paid leave, but she's toast

- I'm the principal investigator
- That's a title, not a fact. Necessarily

- You were in Italy for nearly three weeks
- What are you talking about? It's my paper

- Bo is first author
- And I'm senior author. I'm mentoring her

She's one year in, and I gave her first author as
a gesture because she works hard, and I like her

- I wanted to encourage her, but it's my paper
- it was her show, though, wasn't it?

No, it's mine. She contributed, she did
a decent job caretaking but it was all ready to go

There isn't a line in the paper which didn't
come across my desk. I wrote the paper

- So which of you took out eight...
- I did. I cleared it

After she...
What's the difference?

What we're discussing here is Bo,
and whether you're going to drag down with me...

...a beginner who took a big pay-cut to work here,
and had nothing in the paper I didn't sign off on

She was milking the family buffalo when she was eight,
and she's the best mathematician in the house

Do you want to lose her?
She can survive this

Why? Why are you wasting my time
with this fan-dance? Are you in love with her?

She's in love with me

Well. Finally, something I understand

- All fight
- All right what?

- All fight
- Thank you

- She gets a formal warning
- Thank you

- All fight
- Thank...

- Stop saying that. It's you I don't want to lose
- I'm going back to school

- What does that mean?
- I want to do a degree course. Philosophy

Don't get ahead of yourself, Hilly.
There's some wiggle room here

I'm retracting a paper from a major journal
with the Krohl Institute's name on it

A correction, not a retraction.
An addendum, not a correction

You're not seeing straight, Leo. I'm packing.
Watch your own back, is my advice

- Jerry said the paper was wrong
- He read it?

It pissed him off that his daughters group
scored low on nice, and high on not so nice

He said Cathy was the nicest person in his family

You'd think Jerry would approve
of a bit of egoism in his genes

His genes don't come into it.
Cathy's adopted

- Since when?
- Since when? She's twelve, I think

- Does she know?
- Jerry's wife is Japanese, so... probably

Do you know Catherine's birthday?

I'd like to tell him his daughter
was eliminated for being too nice

But with the data sheets being coded,
and the questionnaires shredded...

- We don't shred them now
- You don't?

She's thirteen

Why not?

Leave the data sheets.
I'll cross-reference

I'll wait to call Jerry

Listen, I'm going to have to write you
a formal letter. Transparency

It's a damnable thing,
and I'm sorry about it

- I can't tell you how sorry
- Thank you

Thank you

Billy, I got your pitch,
but with the greatest respect, you assholes...

...if you haven't got the liquidity to pay your debts,
why would I want to own your loan book?

- Sony
- ls something happening?

Reality. Reality so far out on the distribution curve,
it wasn't supposed to be possible

But that's where Cathy was, too, an outlier

Do you think it's nature or nurture
that's responsible for Cathy?

You brought her up. ls altruistic behaviour
a big thing with you and Mrs Krohl?

- Well, if philanthropy counts for anything...
- I'd need to test you for ultimate motivation

On the other hand, you doing your best
to bring Leo's department down around his ears...

...sounds more like egoism to me
- It was irrational

Guten tag, Hans...
Shop, talk slower

I'm sorry, that is tough. I can't trade it on, Hans,
there's no one taking the other side of the trade

Yeah, good luck

Charlie...
Eat it. Eat it, or default. Let me know

What is happening?

- A fire sale
- Why?

Well, a lot of people were selling fire insurance
on a house that was burning

- But not you?
- No. I was buying it

Cathy and I are going to the country.
Would you like to come out to the car?

I don't think so. Thanks

Did I thank you for keeping her name?
I meant to, in my letter

You did. Mika liked the name.
She said to say, you'd be welcome to visit

That's very kind.
Perhaps when I'm back

- From where?
- NYU, I hope

- You'll be in New York for...?
- Three years, anyway

There's someone teaching philosophy there
whose ideas are... undemonstrable

- Are you sure?
- Yes, I'm sure

Thank you.
Philosophy? Well, serves you right

We didn't make a drama out of adoption
and she hasn't made a drama out of it

But if she asks, of course we'll tell her
what we know, and then it's up to her

Yes, that's best

- If you change your mind...
- I'll try not to

The very last thing I imagined
was that Catherine was a rich kid

Well, what would you rather?
She's hit an awkward age

- I mean, she's normal, don't imagine she's a saint
- I don't

- So. Have you got any money?
- How much do you need?

I'm fine. I am so fine

I've been carrying my own weather all these years.
It's like the first day of spring

- You know it's a miracle, don't you?
- A miracle? No. A long shot. A coincidence

I don't believe in miracles. As a matter of fact,
I don't believe in coincidence either

You didn't have the information

- Dad, I am so bored waiting
- Perfect. This is Dr Matthews

- I know. Hi
- We're going

- How are you, Cathy?
- I'm good

We're gone. Good-bye

Hey, David...

- Bye
- Good bye

Sorry to hear that...
a one chance in a million event...

A trillion? Really?

If your model was telling you the market was going
to do this once every four billion years, David...

...there's probably something wrong with your...
Yeah...