WEBVTT
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Let's get ready to discuss Star Wars! I'm going to
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regret this.
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Welcome to the Nerd Party.
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Hi, this is Nick Anastasio, lead editor and writer on
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Maul Shadowlord, and you're listening to Aggressive Negotiation. Aggressive Negotiation.
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Thank you, Nick.
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Yes, welcome to Aggressive Negotiations, the Star Wars podcast that
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prides itself on prying into the corners, nooks, crannies, and
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all the other crevices of the Star Wars galaxy far,
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far away. I am one of your hosts, Jedi Master
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John Nelson. Joining me for this journey of discovery and
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exploration and whatever other synonyms you might want to throw
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out there in your own brain is my esteemed friend,
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Jedi Master Matthew Rushing. Matt, it's another surprise topic tonight.
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Based on the ramblings of my insane in the brain brain.
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You ready for this?
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I mean, is that the beginning to like a boxing match?
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Are you ready for this? Anyway, no, I'm super excited.
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Let's get ready to discuss Star Wars.
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No, I'm ready. I love these.
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It's always a lot of fun when the other person
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doesn't know what's coming, but- Man, you know what should
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be coming is reviews and star ratings for us over
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on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Because that helps people when
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they're perusing podcasts to listen to, to find us. The
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other way that you could help us grow is, and
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one of the best ways to help podcasts grow so
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it doesn't die, is personal recommendations. So if you listen
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to this show and you run into a Star Wars fan,
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you should tell them, hey, I know a great podcast.
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It's called Aggressive Negotiations. You should listen to it. And
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you can also do that through social media by following
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us over at the Jedi Masters on X Twitter. We're
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on Facebook at facebook.com slash the nerd party, the nerd party.com.
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You can find us. We're on Instagram at the nerd
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party and could also find the entire network at join
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nerd parties on X Twitter. So there's so many places
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where you could share us and help people see what's
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happening and what's going on with the network and especially
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just our show. So we'd really just appreciate your support
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in that way. And so that's really what you can
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do for us. But John, what is this surprise topic?
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Well, I was thinking because Blade Runner 2099 is, it's
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either out or it's just coming out or whatever. So,
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but I start thinking again, we've talked about this in
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passing because we've talked about Shadows of the Empire, obviously,
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and Gurry is a humanoid robot that happens in that,
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an android. And Androids are something we don't really encounter
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in Star Wars. Like we've talked about this. Lucas comes from...
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He's older than we are. He comes from a mechanical
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engineering world. Computer engineering is backed into from.
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That, grows out of it sort of thing.
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So there's very much still that mechanical engineering mentality reflected
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in Lucas's world. But I wanted to put out to you...
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I know that Shadows of the Empire is now no
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longer canon, but... As I sit here and I think
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about these things, replicants are all the rage. Androids are
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all the rage. We're talking about robotics now with AI
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and blah, blah, blah, all the marketing stuff so that
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the IPOs can go off crazy and everything like that.
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So the simple question I have is this, why have
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we not seen androids, replicant style androids in Star Wars?
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And do you think that there's a backstory there to tell?
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In the galaxy far, far away.
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Yeah, I mean I would say that the most interesting
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part of that is that the closest that we kind
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of come is General Grievous, right? Because it is a
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person who their consciousness and their being has been transplanted
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into a artificial body. And so– That's that's really almost
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like the closest we come to that. And it's almost
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like we kind of like skip over that in Star
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Wars because, you know, we do clones.
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Right.
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And so, you know, what would be the point of
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kind of like Blade Runner replicants or any of those
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type of things when you've got droids and you have
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the ability to clone oneself if you wanted to or
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to create clones? And.
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You know, it.
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Seems as though to create something that is, you know, semi-human,
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maybe human, kind of like human. We're not sure if
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they're human. It's almost tricks you if it's like human
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or whatever. That just seems like a place that it's
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It almost like, I don't know, it doesn't seem like
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that idea just fits in Star Wars in general, except for, again,
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like Grievous, I feel like, is the closest character that
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we come to playing with that idea.
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Well, I don't, you know, I mean, Grievous is, you know,
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he's the person becoming machine. He's a foreshadowing of Vader,
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how you can stay alive even though you should be dead.
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Yeah, he's a.
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Grievous is a sack of organs and a brain with eyes.
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Kind of creepy, sort of terrible villain sort of thing.
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Still one of my favorites. But I like with invoking
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the clones, I think that gets at something that Lucas
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was already exploring with what the replicant angle goes with,
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which is once.
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You can clone... you have.
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And I know some people might bristle at this word,
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but you have slaves already. And the whole point of
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making androids or making LLM agents or anything like that,
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and I know this is going to sound very, you know, brusque,
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but is to make slaves. Something intelligent enough to do
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what you tell it to do, but never question you,
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never rebel, which is, you know, I mean, obviously, Clone Wars,
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we explore some different stuff with Rex and everything like that.
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But that's the intent. Clones can think creatively, but the
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intent of creating a clone army is not that they
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will go on to become fully realized individuals. They do anyway,
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as we find out in the Clone Wars, but they
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want to make meat robots. That's the whole idea, is
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they already have a droid army over here. We want
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to make a meat army over here. but they're both
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just doing what we tell them to do. And to
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your point, once you cross the quick cloning barrier, would
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you say you've removed the need to create the humanoid robot?
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Because like, in a sense you have, and you don't
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need to invest all of that technology. You can just
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grow the thing like a, you know, like lab grown
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meat or something.
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Yeah. I mean, the other thing I was thinking about
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this is, you know, I just actually watched Blade Runner.
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the original, because it was back in theaters. It was
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great to see it in the theater for the first time. And,
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you know, I thought what was most interesting about that
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in many ways is that, you know, the replicants are
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created to serve humanity and specifically in possible environments where,
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you know, it would be dangerous for humans, right? The
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jobs are more dangerous, you know, and I kind of
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was thinking about that idea. And, you know, look, like,
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You even think about Mustafar, right, that there is a
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species that is evolved to live on Mustafar. And so
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you don't need to create a replicant to work there.
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You already have beings who live there. And so if
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you want to do trade with them, you know, and
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so in that sense, like I think that one of
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the things about the. galaxy like star wars is that
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you have so many different aliens who can do so
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many different things the need for this type of being
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really isn't necessarily there in that way um you know
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you kind of think about that you know even in
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in star trek right where data is your most famous
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android like even there in that sense um unless you're
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talking you know star trek picard the series where season
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one deals with the idea of human beings and replicant
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beings like that, you know, like a plethora of androids.
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You don't really see that as much even there, right? One,
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because nobody can recreate the technology that was there. And two,
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in the end, those societies don't really utilize them as
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like you were talking about. The reason you would kind
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of create these type of beings is to do jobs
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that humans need to do, but they don't want to
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do most likely in really dangerous situations. And so that's
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the other interesting aspect about this. I feel like in
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Star Wars, where when you've got so many different types
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of beings in the galaxy, there's almost always somebody who's willing.
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To do that.
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I mean, like, you know, right? Like, they do all
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of these types of jobs that, you know, other beings
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wouldn't want to do. But one, they're good at. And two,
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they their whole culture is kind of like baser at that.
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Or You know, Jawas with being scavengers and like you
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just kind of think about that the Star Wars galaxy
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has already created all of these different races and beings
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from different worlds that kind of fit within these little
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molds where you might, if you were just a more
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humanoid society, want to create something to do that type
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of work because you wouldn't want to or couldn't do
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it just because of who you are.
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So, I mean, you're saying that Star Wars doesn't have
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the problem of wanting androids specifically because we're in a
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thousand thousand worlds. There's a million worlds and there's always
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going to be somebody who can work in the environment,
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who can do that. So basically the problem doesn't exist
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that an android would solve for. where you would have
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situations where humans or some other being wasn't suited to
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do that. I like that thought because again, it gets
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to the fact that they want, when people want to
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make robots, all they're thinking about is I want something
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intelligent enough to do what I don't want to do
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that can never.
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Tell me no. It's a very base impulse. It's not awesome.
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And I like your idea as well because it leans
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into the idea that at the core, humans are uncomfortable
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with that idea. And so they would rather, I would
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rather go to Mustafar and say, oh, people live on
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Mustafar that can do the job of harvesting lava or
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whatever it is that they're harvesting. And why wouldn't I
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just pay them? Why wouldn't I just work with them
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to do it? Hey, you live in here anyway.
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Sure.
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I'm not going to create the droid or whatever to
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go in and take care of it. I like that
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thought because it actually, if anything, ennobles the Star Wars
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galaxy a little bit and says that people want to
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deal with others. And I mean, if anything, it's a
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better ideal than Star Trek even.
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Right.
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Where it's like, oh, hey, I'll deal with you on
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your terms.
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And I think the other part about this is, and
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this is the thing where for the most part, the only,
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you know, we've really only seen one droid who's, you know,
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claimed sentience and that's L3, right? And every other droid
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we've seen It has the feeling of that while at
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the same time just being a tool, right? And one
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of the interesting parts of Star Wars is that even
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how you use your tools reflects on who you are
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as a person, right?
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Right. Exactly.
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Which we saw with Anakin and the way that he
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treated R2 and the way that– and the way Obi-Wan
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kind of sees them again more as tools. He's not
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rude to them, but he's not going out of his
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way to be necessarily kind to them in that sense.
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He doesn't anthropomorphize droids the way that some like someone
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like Anakin does. And yeah, Luke does the same way really. Um,
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in the end you, you see him, you know, having
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kind of more of a relationship with, with them in
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that sense and seeing them almost as friends, uh, I mean,
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I guess, you know, that makes sense when you're spending
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all that time in Dagobah and who else you got
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to talk to, you know, when Yoda's not around. It's R2. So,
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you know, I hope you know binary.
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It would look funny if he started talking to one
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of the lizards.
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This is, yeah. Which maybe he did.
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You know, who knows?
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Maybe he had bad shrooms one day and just like
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started talking to a lizard and had a great conversation.
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I mean, so.
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Okay, listen, that's a whole other topic as to how
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many hallucinogenic plants were on Dagobah.
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Because maybe, like, everybody's like, oh, poor Yoda lived there.
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I'm like, was Yoda just, like, tripping balls the whole
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time that he was there until Luke showed up? Like,
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he wasn't sure that Luke was actually there when he
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first showed up. Where he's like, whoa, like, maybe that's
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what drove Yoda nuts.
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No, no, see. And then it was like, oh, he's back.
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No, I don't think he needed that because, you know,
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I think Qui-Gon was just a frequent guest just chilling.
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You know, I think they just had lots of long
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conversations together and, you know, that was really fun.
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No, but see— But see, we got a whole sitcom
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situation here where Qui-Gon is like, oh no, I've been
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here for a very long time.
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That's fine to eat. Eat that one.
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And he's just pranking the hell out of Yoda.
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There you go.
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There you go.
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And Yoda keeps falling for it for the first five years.
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And eventually he's.
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Like, fall for that. I will not. Exactly. I think
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it's great.
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But no, I mean, I think, you know, that.
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What is interesting is that, you know, there are a
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lot of, you know, sci-fi universes that kind of play
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by similar rules. But I think that this is one
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of the other things that makes this different, right? And
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it really does, you know, Star Wars itself, you know,
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people kind of will tend to think of it as like, oh,
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it's kind of a sci-fi franchise, but really it is
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space fantasy. And so therefore the things that it's dealing
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with and the questions that it's dealing with It has
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so much more to do with the type of questions
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that a fantasy series would ask you more so than
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a sci-fi series. And so therefore the questions of like
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what does it mean to be human and trying to
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experience that through the characters we're writing, it's asking the
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more mythic questions, right? It's asking more about values and
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beliefs more than it is like this idea of exploring
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what it means to necessarily be quote-unquote humans. And I
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think that's the reason that we don't have these type
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of questions, because, you know, when you have a replicant
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type character, what they tend to be is for us
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some sort of mirror. And we don't that's not the
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type of of storytelling or structure or thematic element, really,
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that George Lucas is going for in his stories in
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the first place.
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Well, what's also interesting is, you know, you touch on
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the whole mimicking human behavior thing, which is what we're
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going through with the LLM slash AI sort of stuff
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right now, as we're recording this, I'm sure that in
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20 years, so it was like, Oh, those were fools.
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I didn't know what they were talking about. Whatever. Okay.
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I'll be dead by then probably.
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But anyway, um, uh, like I'm looking at it through a, um,
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another lens as well, because what you're, you're talking about
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touches on Brian Daly when he did the star Wars
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radio dramas, which we should talk about at some point
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here on the show. Um, Bernard Barron's as Obi-Wan talks
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with Luke at one point and like 3PO says something
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like walks out of the room with R2. And I
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don't remember the exact circumstance, but he says words to
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the effect of humans don't always think of the after
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effect of instilling their machines with personality. Like he, like
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to speak to your point, Obi-Wan's never rude to a droid.
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But Obi-Wan also doesn't befriend a droid on the level
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that Anakin and Luke do. There's something different going on
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that happens there. And Brian Daly himself picked up on
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that all the way back when he wrote the Star
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Wars radio drama. And I think, though, that it's interesting
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because you also mentioned L3.
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So my question.
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To you would be, is there room for Star Wars
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to explore what they did with the, I think it
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was Tales of the Bounty Hunters, where, now, this is
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the thing.
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So I'm going to call him Zuckus, although.
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I know they later changed his name to 4LOM, even
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though when I was growing up, 4LOM was the insect-looking dude,
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and Zuckus was the droid, and then they flipped it.
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for whatever reason, I know the reasons, blah, blah, blah.
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But in that, the droid of that duo achieved a
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sort of sentience and a connection to the Force. Now,
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going back to a Dragon Con that you and I attended,
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where I sat on a panel about droid sentience, inspired
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by the L3 stuff and everything like that. Do you
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think that there is room with the way the conversation
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is going now for Star Wars to explore that idea
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of a droid achieving some sort of force connection? Would
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that even be possible in the Star Wars galaxy?
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Yeah, I think in the end, you know, um, the
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force as understood by George Lucas and, you know, now
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with the Dave Filoni in charge, I don't see this
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ever happening. And because there, I agree just for the record,
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because there is something about the idea of, um, The
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embodied existence of a flesh and blood being and its
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connection to the force and that yet– that there is–
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and I think this is something that's never really truly
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been explored. But as– that the midichlorians are the things
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that live within the cells of beings that exist in
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what we would consider flesh and blood, right? And not
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in the– animate material that makes up a droid in
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that sense you know the forces and everything in the
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sense that in the rocks and the trees and all
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that kind of stuff but I think that it seems
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as though the midichlorians themselves seem to reside and this
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is just my guess only in quote-unquote flesh and blood beings.
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Well, I mean, if they're symbiotic, if they're symbiotes, what
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could they live in in metal or rock? That would
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change the entire... If you're able to tell midichlorians through
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a blood test, that is exactly right. This is why
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I said early on, while you were talking, I was like, yeah,
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for the record, I agree. Because it's an energy field
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created by all living things. And I think that that's
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the thing that sometimes gets... missed is they're not living.
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Even if it becomes intellectually indistinguishable between myself and a
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robot in Star Wars, it's not alive.
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It can't be alive.
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Something that's alive has to eat and grow and change.
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Like it's all a thing where, um, if you remember
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the Ron Howard movie backdraft, they talk about fire as
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a living thing because it moves, it grows, it consumes
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and it changes. And it's like that, that's some sort
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of definition of life. Um, and I think that, uh, you.
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Know, a, a droid.
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00:20:32.829 --> 00:20:37.710
Is also limited because it's, let me just to sort
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of like close it out because I'm sort of, this
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is occurring to me as we talk about this. Right now,
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you can't go a couple of months with some new
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model of LLM being released.
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00:20:50.460 --> 00:20:51.980
It can do this now. It can do that now.
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How would you go.
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About updating a robot to become more than it is now? Like,
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00:21:03.349 --> 00:21:06.910
is there a Situation like we know that Threepio is
368
00:21:07.029 --> 00:21:10.509
built by Anakin and he's essentially the same parts.
369
00:21:11.349 --> 00:21:12.730
It's not a ship of Theseus thing.
370
00:21:12.789 --> 00:21:15.549
He's essentially the same parts at his core, at least
371
00:21:16.089 --> 00:21:19.109
by the time he gets to Luke decades later. How
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do you craft a growing and learning situation for that
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00:21:24.890 --> 00:21:28.569
mechanical being? Like, let's say we even say that it's
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00:21:28.690 --> 00:21:31.779
a replicant thing. Like it has to learn and grow,
375
00:21:31.839 --> 00:21:33.460
doesn't it? And is there a cap?
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00:21:34.920 --> 00:21:38.740
Therefore, on what R2 and 3PO and other droids are
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even capable of.
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00:21:40.240 --> 00:21:43.069
I think there is. Now, I think that the most
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00:21:43.119 --> 00:21:48.630
interesting aspect of this is that we also get the
380
00:21:48.710 --> 00:21:53.390
understanding in Star Wars that most droids are wiped frequently.
381
00:21:55.029 --> 00:21:57.490
And so the droids that we have seen that have
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00:21:57.569 --> 00:22:00.849
more personality are those droids who are not, right? And
383
00:22:00.910 --> 00:22:06.039
it does create this sense of a personality. and it
384
00:22:06.140 --> 00:22:09.619
feels more real and organic in that sense, right? And
385
00:22:09.640 --> 00:22:11.700
a part of that also has to do with the
386
00:22:11.759 --> 00:22:15.390
way in which their owner treats them too, right? And
387
00:22:15.430 --> 00:22:19.490
it's almost as if they can mimic the way in
388
00:22:19.549 --> 00:22:22.890
which their owner treats them, and that creates that symbiotic relationship.
389
00:22:23.410 --> 00:22:27.380
But I think what you're asking is 100% correct. There
390
00:22:27.519 --> 00:22:32.690
is always going to be a limit to how far
391
00:22:33.569 --> 00:22:38.369
a binary being can go because they can only think binarily.
392
00:22:38.890 --> 00:22:43.410
And therefore, one of the hallmarks of being human, just
393
00:22:43.430 --> 00:22:45.759
to speak in that way, is the idea to think
394
00:22:45.819 --> 00:22:48.359
outside the box, to think about all of these other things,
395
00:22:48.410 --> 00:22:52.599
to imagine, to all of that. And so even when
396
00:22:52.619 --> 00:22:56.039
I think of L3, to me, it seems like her
397
00:22:56.579 --> 00:23:02.170
thought process of sentience comes from her Possibly having read
398
00:23:02.569 --> 00:23:06.759
works by beings and have and and then imposing that
399
00:23:06.880 --> 00:23:10.319
thought process on her and her own existence in the
400
00:23:10.480 --> 00:23:15.680
existence of like, you know, other droids. Right. And so, yeah,
401
00:23:15.759 --> 00:23:19.259
I mean, look, I think in the end, to answer
402
00:23:19.299 --> 00:23:23.259
your question, yes, there is an absolute limit to what
403
00:23:23.680 --> 00:23:27.299
a binary code can do.
404
00:23:27.660 --> 00:23:29.740
Although I will say that the one wrinkle.
405
00:23:30.319 --> 00:23:34.009
With what we agree on there is that Lucas himself
406
00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:40.670
said that if you track the journey of the robots
407
00:23:40.930 --> 00:23:45.509
of R2 and 3PO, their journey is toward a more
408
00:23:45.609 --> 00:23:50.470
human state than Anakin, who has a reverse journey toward
409
00:23:50.529 --> 00:23:53.849
becoming Darth Vader. But then what I would layer on
410
00:23:53.910 --> 00:23:59.759
top of that is that, How different are 3PO and
411
00:23:59.880 --> 00:24:04.660
R2 between when we see them in the original trilogy
412
00:24:04.680 --> 00:24:06.940
and the prequel trilogy? Because we even know for a
413
00:24:07.339 --> 00:24:12.329
fact that 3PO' s mind gets wiped after episode three. But
414
00:24:12.369 --> 00:24:17.569
when we encounter him, he's still essentially 3PO. So that
415
00:24:17.630 --> 00:24:18.910
speaks to the idea of a limit.
416
00:24:19.390 --> 00:24:20.589
He is who he is.
417
00:24:23.359 --> 00:24:27.759
What nuance do we see for how he changes through time?
418
00:24:28.400 --> 00:24:31.299
That might even be an interesting one to delve into
419
00:24:31.380 --> 00:24:32.880
in a 3PO focused episode.
420
00:24:32.920 --> 00:24:35.789
And I mean, the biggest one is that, that really
421
00:24:36.190 --> 00:24:40.269
changes and grows is R2, right? You know, he has
422
00:24:40.349 --> 00:24:43.230
the most personality and in some ways as a droid,
423
00:24:43.589 --> 00:24:46.269
it feels the one that is most human. I mean,
424
00:24:46.289 --> 00:24:49.250
he's the one that's worried for himself. He's the one
425
00:24:49.289 --> 00:24:53.279
that's worried for, you know, his master that he would
426
00:24:53.319 --> 00:24:57.599
consider a friend, you know? Um, so yeah, I mean,
427
00:24:57.779 --> 00:25:00.180
and part of that again is because his mind is
428
00:25:00.220 --> 00:25:01.160
not wiped. Right.
429
00:25:01.339 --> 00:25:03.960
So, well, I would still, I would still say that
430
00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:07.140
he's not as human as chopper who is capable of murder.
431
00:25:07.869 --> 00:25:11.069
And that to me is definitely a very, very clear
432
00:25:11.130 --> 00:25:13.509
indication of humanity when you're capable of great evil.
433
00:25:13.529 --> 00:25:14.109
This is true.
434
00:25:14.509 --> 00:25:17.470
And, uh, you know, I mean, let's be honest, chopper
435
00:25:17.910 --> 00:25:20.799
living forever close to my heart. But you know what
436
00:25:20.819 --> 00:25:23.380
else lives close to my heart, Matt, is all of
437
00:25:23.400 --> 00:25:26.319
the ways that I can reach you online. That transition
438
00:25:26.339 --> 00:25:27.960
made absolutely no sense whatsoever.
439
00:25:28.039 --> 00:25:30.180
But here we are. So where can people find you
440
00:25:30.599 --> 00:25:31.259
out there in the wild?
441
00:25:31.299 --> 00:25:33.440
Well, my friends, it's not a binary decision. You can
442
00:25:33.480 --> 00:25:36.109
find me all over social media under the name MattRushing02.
443
00:25:36.289 --> 00:25:37.910
Of course, here on the network, you'll find me on
444
00:25:37.930 --> 00:25:39.710
a show called Owl Post, as I talked about every
445
00:25:39.750 --> 00:25:41.829
single chapter of the Harry Potter series one chapter at
446
00:25:41.849 --> 00:25:44.329
a time over on the TFM network. We've got a
447
00:25:44.329 --> 00:25:46.730
lot of shows in the 602 Club talking about all
448
00:25:46.750 --> 00:25:49.150
the franchises that we love. And then a lot of
449
00:25:49.190 --> 00:25:51.710
great Star Trek talk with my good friend Chris Jones
450
00:25:51.809 --> 00:25:54.470
over there. So I hope you'll enjoy all of those shows.
451
00:25:55.130 --> 00:25:57.190
But John, you know, when people aren't trying to figure
452
00:25:57.230 --> 00:25:59.690
out what you're saying because you sound just a little
453
00:25:59.710 --> 00:26:01.849
bit too much like Chopper, where can people find you?
454
00:26:02.069 --> 00:26:04.750
Well, gosh, I sound like a drunk Chopper, honestly. And
455
00:26:04.769 --> 00:26:06.069
you can find me out there on the wilds of
456
00:26:06.089 --> 00:26:11.119
the internet. It's Kessel Junkie, K-E-S-S-E-L-J-U-N-K-I-E. And every so often
457
00:26:11.220 --> 00:26:14.000
I write on KesselJunkie.com. And then you can find me
458
00:26:14.059 --> 00:26:18.279
here on the network, co-hosting a show with two lovely gentlemen,
459
00:26:18.740 --> 00:26:21.960
Darren Moser and Tristan Riddell called House Lights, where we
460
00:26:21.980 --> 00:26:24.200
look at the work of directors. And every so often,
461
00:26:24.660 --> 00:26:26.900
We cover a director that I have to whine months
462
00:26:27.029 --> 00:26:30.329
and months to cover. As we record this, we're covering
463
00:26:30.349 --> 00:26:32.390
the works of John Carpenter, who's one of the greatest
464
00:26:33.309 --> 00:26:37.789
maestro directors of my lifetime. And I will not be
465
00:26:37.809 --> 00:26:40.809
taking any questions after that. But Matt, I have to
466
00:26:40.849 --> 00:26:43.220
go and I have to watch some more movies because
467
00:26:43.259 --> 00:26:46.000
it's spooky season as we record this by Mr.
468
00:26:46.039 --> 00:26:51.720
John Carpenter. So I think it's time to close these negotiations. John, negotiations. Negotiations.
469
00:27:04.230 --> 00:27:05.250
Join the revolution.
470
00:27:05.930 --> 00:27:07.150
Join the nerd party.
1
00:00:00.670 --> 00:00:04.769
Let's get ready to discuss Star Wars! I'm going to
2
00:00:04.809 --> 00:00:05.660
regret this.
3
00:00:07.280 --> 00:00:09.140
Welcome to the Nerd Party.
4
00:00:11.240 --> 00:00:14.619
Hi, this is Nick Anastasio, lead editor and writer on
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00:00:14.720 --> 00:00:18.989
Maul Shadowlord, and you're listening to Aggressive Negotiation. Aggressive Negotiation.
6
00:00:23.010 --> 00:00:23.789
Thank you, Nick.
7
00:00:23.850 --> 00:00:27.649
Yes, welcome to Aggressive Negotiations, the Star Wars podcast that
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prides itself on prying into the corners, nooks, crannies, and
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all the other crevices of the Star Wars galaxy far,
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far away. I am one of your hosts, Jedi Master
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John Nelson. Joining me for this journey of discovery and
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exploration and whatever other synonyms you might want to throw
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out there in your own brain is my esteemed friend,
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Jedi Master Matthew Rushing. Matt, it's another surprise topic tonight.
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Based on the ramblings of my insane in the brain brain.
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You ready for this?
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I mean, is that the beginning to like a boxing match?
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Are you ready for this? Anyway, no, I'm super excited.
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Let's get ready to discuss Star Wars.
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No, I'm ready. I love these.
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It's always a lot of fun when the other person
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doesn't know what's coming, but- Man, you know what should
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be coming is reviews and star ratings for us over
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on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Because that helps people when
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they're perusing podcasts to listen to, to find us. The
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other way that you could help us grow is, and
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one of the best ways to help podcasts grow so
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it doesn't die, is personal recommendations. So if you listen
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to this show and you run into a Star Wars fan,
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you should tell them, hey, I know a great podcast.
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It's called Aggressive Negotiations. You should listen to it. And
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you can also do that through social media by following
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us over at the Jedi Masters on X Twitter. We're
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on Facebook at facebook.com slash the nerd party, the nerd party.com.
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You can find us. We're on Instagram at the nerd
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party and could also find the entire network at join
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nerd parties on X Twitter. So there's so many places
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where you could share us and help people see what's
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happening and what's going on with the network and especially
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just our show. So we'd really just appreciate your support
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in that way. And so that's really what you can
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do for us. But John, what is this surprise topic?
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Well, I was thinking because Blade Runner 2099 is, it's
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either out or it's just coming out or whatever. So,
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but I start thinking again, we've talked about this in
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passing because we've talked about Shadows of the Empire, obviously,
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and Gurry is a humanoid robot that happens in that,
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an android. And Androids are something we don't really encounter
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in Star Wars. Like we've talked about this. Lucas comes from...
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He's older than we are. He comes from a mechanical
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engineering world. Computer engineering is backed into from.
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That, grows out of it sort of thing.
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So there's very much still that mechanical engineering mentality reflected
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in Lucas's world. But I wanted to put out to you...
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I know that Shadows of the Empire is now no
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longer canon, but... As I sit here and I think
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about these things, replicants are all the rage. Androids are
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all the rage. We're talking about robotics now with AI
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and blah, blah, blah, all the marketing stuff so that
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the IPOs can go off crazy and everything like that.
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So the simple question I have is this, why have
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we not seen androids, replicant style androids in Star Wars?
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And do you think that there's a backstory there to tell?
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In the galaxy far, far away.
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Yeah, I mean I would say that the most interesting
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part of that is that the closest that we kind
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of come is General Grievous, right? Because it is a
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person who their consciousness and their being has been transplanted
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into a artificial body. And so– That's that's really almost
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like the closest we come to that. And it's almost
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like we kind of like skip over that in Star
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Wars because, you know, we do clones.
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Right.
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And so, you know, what would be the point of
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kind of like Blade Runner replicants or any of those
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type of things when you've got droids and you have
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the ability to clone oneself if you wanted to or
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to create clones? And.
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You know, it.
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Seems as though to create something that is, you know, semi-human,
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maybe human, kind of like human. We're not sure if
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they're human. It's almost tricks you if it's like human
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or whatever. That just seems like a place that it's
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It almost like, I don't know, it doesn't seem like
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that idea just fits in Star Wars in general, except for, again,
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like Grievous, I feel like, is the closest character that
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we come to playing with that idea.
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Well, I don't, you know, I mean, Grievous is, you know,
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he's the person becoming machine. He's a foreshadowing of Vader,
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how you can stay alive even though you should be dead.
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Yeah, he's a.
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Grievous is a sack of organs and a brain with eyes.
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Kind of creepy, sort of terrible villain sort of thing.
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Still one of my favorites. But I like with invoking
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the clones, I think that gets at something that Lucas
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was already exploring with what the replicant angle goes with,
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which is once.
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You can clone... you have.
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And I know some people might bristle at this word,
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but you have slaves already. And the whole point of
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making androids or making LLM agents or anything like that,
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and I know this is going to sound very, you know, brusque,
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but is to make slaves. Something intelligent enough to do
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what you tell it to do, but never question you,
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never rebel, which is, you know, I mean, obviously, Clone Wars,
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we explore some different stuff with Rex and everything like that.
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But that's the intent. Clones can think creatively, but the
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intent of creating a clone army is not that they
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will go on to become fully realized individuals. They do anyway,
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as we find out in the Clone Wars, but they
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want to make meat robots. That's the whole idea, is
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they already have a droid army over here. We want
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to make a meat army over here. but they're both
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just doing what we tell them to do. And to
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your point, once you cross the quick cloning barrier, would
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you say you've removed the need to create the humanoid robot?
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Because like, in a sense you have, and you don't
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need to invest all of that technology. You can just
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grow the thing like a, you know, like lab grown
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meat or something.
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Yeah. I mean, the other thing I was thinking about
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this is, you know, I just actually watched Blade Runner.
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the original, because it was back in theaters. It was
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great to see it in the theater for the first time. And,
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you know, I thought what was most interesting about that
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in many ways is that, you know, the replicants are
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created to serve humanity and specifically in possible environments where,
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you know, it would be dangerous for humans, right? The
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jobs are more dangerous, you know, and I kind of
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was thinking about that idea. And, you know, look, like,
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You even think about Mustafar, right, that there is a
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species that is evolved to live on Mustafar. And so
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you don't need to create a replicant to work there.
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You already have beings who live there. And so if
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you want to do trade with them, you know, and
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so in that sense, like I think that one of
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the things about the. galaxy like star wars is that
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you have so many different aliens who can do so
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many different things the need for this type of being
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really isn't necessarily there in that way um you know
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you kind of think about that you know even in
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in star trek right where data is your most famous
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android like even there in that sense um unless you're
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talking you know star trek picard the series where season
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one deals with the idea of human beings and replicant
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beings like that, you know, like a plethora of androids.
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You don't really see that as much even there, right? One,
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because nobody can recreate the technology that was there. And two,
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in the end, those societies don't really utilize them as
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like you were talking about. The reason you would kind
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of create these type of beings is to do jobs
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that humans need to do, but they don't want to
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do most likely in really dangerous situations. And so that's
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the other interesting aspect about this. I feel like in
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Star Wars, where when you've got so many different types
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of beings in the galaxy, there's almost always somebody who's willing.
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To do that.
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I mean, like, you know, right? Like, they do all
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of these types of jobs that, you know, other beings
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wouldn't want to do. But one, they're good at. And two,
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they their whole culture is kind of like baser at that.
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Or You know, Jawas with being scavengers and like you
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just kind of think about that the Star Wars galaxy
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has already created all of these different races and beings
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from different worlds that kind of fit within these little
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molds where you might, if you were just a more
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humanoid society, want to create something to do that type
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of work because you wouldn't want to or couldn't do
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it just because of who you are.
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So, I mean, you're saying that Star Wars doesn't have
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the problem of wanting androids specifically because we're in a
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thousand thousand worlds. There's a million worlds and there's always
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going to be somebody who can work in the environment,
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who can do that. So basically the problem doesn't exist
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that an android would solve for. where you would have
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situations where humans or some other being wasn't suited to
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do that. I like that thought because again, it gets
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to the fact that they want, when people want to
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make robots, all they're thinking about is I want something
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intelligent enough to do what I don't want to do
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that can never.
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Tell me no. It's a very base impulse. It's not awesome.
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And I like your idea as well because it leans
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into the idea that at the core, humans are uncomfortable
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with that idea. And so they would rather, I would
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rather go to Mustafar and say, oh, people live on
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Mustafar that can do the job of harvesting lava or
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whatever it is that they're harvesting. And why wouldn't I
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just pay them? Why wouldn't I just work with them
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to do it? Hey, you live in here anyway.
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Sure.
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I'm not going to create the droid or whatever to
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go in and take care of it. I like that
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thought because it actually, if anything, ennobles the Star Wars
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galaxy a little bit and says that people want to
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deal with others. And I mean, if anything, it's a
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better ideal than Star Trek even.
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Right.
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Where it's like, oh, hey, I'll deal with you on
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your terms.
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And I think the other part about this is, and
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this is the thing where for the most part, the only,
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you know, we've really only seen one droid who's, you know,
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claimed sentience and that's L3, right? And every other droid
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we've seen It has the feeling of that while at
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the same time just being a tool, right? And one
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of the interesting parts of Star Wars is that even
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how you use your tools reflects on who you are
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as a person, right?
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Right. Exactly.
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Which we saw with Anakin and the way that he
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treated R2 and the way that– and the way Obi-Wan
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kind of sees them again more as tools. He's not
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rude to them, but he's not going out of his
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way to be necessarily kind to them in that sense.
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He doesn't anthropomorphize droids the way that some like someone
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like Anakin does. And yeah, Luke does the same way really. Um,
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in the end you, you see him, you know, having
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kind of more of a relationship with, with them in
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that sense and seeing them almost as friends, uh, I mean,
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I guess, you know, that makes sense when you're spending
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all that time in Dagobah and who else you got
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to talk to, you know, when Yoda's not around. It's R2. So,
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you know, I hope you know binary.
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It would look funny if he started talking to one
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of the lizards.
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This is, yeah. Which maybe he did.
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You know, who knows?
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Maybe he had bad shrooms one day and just like
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started talking to a lizard and had a great conversation.
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I mean, so.
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Okay, listen, that's a whole other topic as to how
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many hallucinogenic plants were on Dagobah.
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Because maybe, like, everybody's like, oh, poor Yoda lived there.
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I'm like, was Yoda just, like, tripping balls the whole
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time that he was there until Luke showed up? Like,
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he wasn't sure that Luke was actually there when he
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first showed up. Where he's like, whoa, like, maybe that's
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what drove Yoda nuts.
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No, no, see. And then it was like, oh, he's back.
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No, I don't think he needed that because, you know,
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I think Qui-Gon was just a frequent guest just chilling.
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You know, I think they just had lots of long
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conversations together and, you know, that was really fun.
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No, but see— But see, we got a whole sitcom
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situation here where Qui-Gon is like, oh no, I've been
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here for a very long time.
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That's fine to eat. Eat that one.
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And he's just pranking the hell out of Yoda.
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There you go.
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There you go.
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And Yoda keeps falling for it for the first five years.
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And eventually he's.
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Like, fall for that. I will not. Exactly. I think
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it's great.
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But no, I mean, I think, you know, that.
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What is interesting is that, you know, there are a
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lot of, you know, sci-fi universes that kind of play
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by similar rules. But I think that this is one
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of the other things that makes this different, right? And
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it really does, you know, Star Wars itself, you know,
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people kind of will tend to think of it as like, oh,
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it's kind of a sci-fi franchise, but really it is
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space fantasy. And so therefore the things that it's dealing
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with and the questions that it's dealing with It has
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so much more to do with the type of questions
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that a fantasy series would ask you more so than
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a sci-fi series. And so therefore the questions of like
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what does it mean to be human and trying to
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experience that through the characters we're writing, it's asking the
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more mythic questions, right? It's asking more about values and
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beliefs more than it is like this idea of exploring
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what it means to necessarily be quote-unquote humans. And I
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think that's the reason that we don't have these type
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of questions, because, you know, when you have a replicant
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type character, what they tend to be is for us
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some sort of mirror. And we don't that's not the
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type of of storytelling or structure or thematic element, really,
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that George Lucas is going for in his stories in
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the first place.
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Well, what's also interesting is, you know, you touch on
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the whole mimicking human behavior thing, which is what we're
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going through with the LLM slash AI sort of stuff
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right now, as we're recording this, I'm sure that in
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20 years, so it was like, Oh, those were fools.
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I didn't know what they were talking about. Whatever. Okay.
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I'll be dead by then probably.
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But anyway, um, uh, like I'm looking at it through a, um,
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another lens as well, because what you're, you're talking about
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touches on Brian Daly when he did the star Wars
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radio dramas, which we should talk about at some point
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here on the show. Um, Bernard Barron's as Obi-Wan talks
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with Luke at one point and like 3PO says something
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like walks out of the room with R2. And I
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don't remember the exact circumstance, but he says words to
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the effect of humans don't always think of the after
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effect of instilling their machines with personality. Like he, like
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to speak to your point, Obi-Wan's never rude to a droid.
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But Obi-Wan also doesn't befriend a droid on the level
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that Anakin and Luke do. There's something different going on
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that happens there. And Brian Daly himself picked up on
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that all the way back when he wrote the Star
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Wars radio drama. And I think, though, that it's interesting
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because you also mentioned L3.
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So my question.
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To you would be, is there room for Star Wars
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to explore what they did with the, I think it
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was Tales of the Bounty Hunters, where, now, this is
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the thing.
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So I'm going to call him Zuckus, although.
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I know they later changed his name to 4LOM, even
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though when I was growing up, 4LOM was the insect-looking dude,
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and Zuckus was the droid, and then they flipped it.
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for whatever reason, I know the reasons, blah, blah, blah.
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But in that, the droid of that duo achieved a
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sort of sentience and a connection to the Force. Now,
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going back to a Dragon Con that you and I attended,
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where I sat on a panel about droid sentience, inspired
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by the L3 stuff and everything like that. Do you
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think that there is room with the way the conversation
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is going now for Star Wars to explore that idea
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of a droid achieving some sort of force connection? Would
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that even be possible in the Star Wars galaxy?
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Yeah, I think in the end, you know, um, the
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force as understood by George Lucas and, you know, now
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with the Dave Filoni in charge, I don't see this
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ever happening. And because there, I agree just for the record,
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because there is something about the idea of, um, The
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embodied existence of a flesh and blood being and its
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connection to the force and that yet– that there is–
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and I think this is something that's never really truly
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been explored. But as– that the midichlorians are the things
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that live within the cells of beings that exist in
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what we would consider flesh and blood, right? And not
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in the– animate material that makes up a droid in
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that sense you know the forces and everything in the
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sense that in the rocks and the trees and all
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that kind of stuff but I think that it seems
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as though the midichlorians themselves seem to reside and this
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is just my guess only in quote-unquote flesh and blood beings.
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Well, I mean, if they're symbiotic, if they're symbiotes, what
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could they live in in metal or rock? That would
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change the entire... If you're able to tell midichlorians through
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a blood test, that is exactly right. This is why
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I said early on, while you were talking, I was like, yeah,
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for the record, I agree. Because it's an energy field
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created by all living things. And I think that that's
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the thing that sometimes gets... missed is they're not living.
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Even if it becomes intellectually indistinguishable between myself and a
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robot in Star Wars, it's not alive.
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It can't be alive.
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Something that's alive has to eat and grow and change.
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Like it's all a thing where, um, if you remember
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the Ron Howard movie backdraft, they talk about fire as
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a living thing because it moves, it grows, it consumes
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and it changes. And it's like that, that's some sort
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of definition of life. Um, and I think that, uh, you.
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Know, a, a droid.
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Is also limited because it's, let me just to sort
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of like close it out because I'm sort of, this
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is occurring to me as we talk about this. Right now,
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you can't go a couple of months with some new
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model of LLM being released.
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It can do this now. It can do that now.
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How would you go.
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About updating a robot to become more than it is now? Like,
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is there a Situation like we know that Threepio is
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00:21:07.029 --> 00:21:10.509
built by Anakin and he's essentially the same parts.
369
00:21:11.349 --> 00:21:12.730
It's not a ship of Theseus thing.
370
00:21:12.789 --> 00:21:15.549
He's essentially the same parts at his core, at least
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by the time he gets to Luke decades later. How
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do you craft a growing and learning situation for that
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mechanical being? Like, let's say we even say that it's
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a replicant thing. Like it has to learn and grow,
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doesn't it? And is there a cap?
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00:21:34.920 --> 00:21:38.740
Therefore, on what R2 and 3PO and other droids are
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even capable of.
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I think there is. Now, I think that the most
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00:21:43.119 --> 00:21:48.630
interesting aspect of this is that we also get the
380
00:21:48.710 --> 00:21:53.390
understanding in Star Wars that most droids are wiped frequently.
381
00:21:55.029 --> 00:21:57.490
And so the droids that we have seen that have
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00:21:57.569 --> 00:22:00.849
more personality are those droids who are not, right? And
383
00:22:00.910 --> 00:22:06.039
it does create this sense of a personality. and it
384
00:22:06.140 --> 00:22:09.619
feels more real and organic in that sense, right? And
385
00:22:09.640 --> 00:22:11.700
a part of that also has to do with the
386
00:22:11.759 --> 00:22:15.390
way in which their owner treats them too, right? And
387
00:22:15.430 --> 00:22:19.490
it's almost as if they can mimic the way in
388
00:22:19.549 --> 00:22:22.890
which their owner treats them, and that creates that symbiotic relationship.
389
00:22:23.410 --> 00:22:27.380
But I think what you're asking is 100% correct. There
390
00:22:27.519 --> 00:22:32.690
is always going to be a limit to how far
391
00:22:33.569 --> 00:22:38.369
a binary being can go because they can only think binarily.
392
00:22:38.890 --> 00:22:43.410
And therefore, one of the hallmarks of being human, just
393
00:22:43.430 --> 00:22:45.759
to speak in that way, is the idea to think
394
00:22:45.819 --> 00:22:48.359
outside the box, to think about all of these other things,
395
00:22:48.410 --> 00:22:52.599
to imagine, to all of that. And so even when
396
00:22:52.619 --> 00:22:56.039
I think of L3, to me, it seems like her
397
00:22:56.579 --> 00:23:02.170
thought process of sentience comes from her Possibly having read
398
00:23:02.569 --> 00:23:06.759
works by beings and have and and then imposing that
399
00:23:06.880 --> 00:23:10.319
thought process on her and her own existence in the
400
00:23:10.480 --> 00:23:15.680
existence of like, you know, other droids. Right. And so, yeah,
401
00:23:15.759 --> 00:23:19.259
I mean, look, I think in the end, to answer
402
00:23:19.299 --> 00:23:23.259
your question, yes, there is an absolute limit to what
403
00:23:23.680 --> 00:23:27.299
a binary code can do.
404
00:23:27.660 --> 00:23:29.740
Although I will say that the one wrinkle.
405
00:23:30.319 --> 00:23:34.009
With what we agree on there is that Lucas himself
406
00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:40.670
said that if you track the journey of the robots
407
00:23:40.930 --> 00:23:45.509
of R2 and 3PO, their journey is toward a more
408
00:23:45.609 --> 00:23:50.470
human state than Anakin, who has a reverse journey toward
409
00:23:50.529 --> 00:23:53.849
becoming Darth Vader. But then what I would layer on
410
00:23:53.910 --> 00:23:59.759
top of that is that, How different are 3PO and
411
00:23:59.880 --> 00:24:04.660
R2 between when we see them in the original trilogy
412
00:24:04.680 --> 00:24:06.940
and the prequel trilogy? Because we even know for a
413
00:24:07.339 --> 00:24:12.329
fact that 3PO' s mind gets wiped after episode three. But
414
00:24:12.369 --> 00:24:17.569
when we encounter him, he's still essentially 3PO. So that
415
00:24:17.630 --> 00:24:18.910
speaks to the idea of a limit.
416
00:24:19.390 --> 00:24:20.589
He is who he is.
417
00:24:23.359 --> 00:24:27.759
What nuance do we see for how he changes through time?
418
00:24:28.400 --> 00:24:31.299
That might even be an interesting one to delve into
419
00:24:31.380 --> 00:24:32.880
in a 3PO focused episode.
420
00:24:32.920 --> 00:24:35.789
And I mean, the biggest one is that, that really
421
00:24:36.190 --> 00:24:40.269
changes and grows is R2, right? You know, he has
422
00:24:40.349 --> 00:24:43.230
the most personality and in some ways as a droid,
423
00:24:43.589 --> 00:24:46.269
it feels the one that is most human. I mean,
424
00:24:46.289 --> 00:24:49.250
he's the one that's worried for himself. He's the one
425
00:24:49.289 --> 00:24:53.279
that's worried for, you know, his master that he would
426
00:24:53.319 --> 00:24:57.599
consider a friend, you know? Um, so yeah, I mean,
427
00:24:57.779 --> 00:25:00.180
and part of that again is because his mind is
428
00:25:00.220 --> 00:25:01.160
not wiped. Right.
429
00:25:01.339 --> 00:25:03.960
So, well, I would still, I would still say that
430
00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:07.140
he's not as human as chopper who is capable of murder.
431
00:25:07.869 --> 00:25:11.069
And that to me is definitely a very, very clear
432
00:25:11.130 --> 00:25:13.509
indication of humanity when you're capable of great evil.
433
00:25:13.529 --> 00:25:14.109
This is true.
434
00:25:14.509 --> 00:25:17.470
And, uh, you know, I mean, let's be honest, chopper
435
00:25:17.910 --> 00:25:20.799
living forever close to my heart. But you know what
436
00:25:20.819 --> 00:25:23.380
else lives close to my heart, Matt, is all of
437
00:25:23.400 --> 00:25:26.319
the ways that I can reach you online. That transition
438
00:25:26.339 --> 00:25:27.960
made absolutely no sense whatsoever.
439
00:25:28.039 --> 00:25:30.180
But here we are. So where can people find you
440
00:25:30.599 --> 00:25:31.259
out there in the wild?
441
00:25:31.299 --> 00:25:33.440
Well, my friends, it's not a binary decision. You can
442
00:25:33.480 --> 00:25:36.109
find me all over social media under the name MattRushing02.
443
00:25:36.289 --> 00:25:37.910
Of course, here on the network, you'll find me on
444
00:25:37.930 --> 00:25:39.710
a show called Owl Post, as I talked about every
445
00:25:39.750 --> 00:25:41.829
single chapter of the Harry Potter series one chapter at
446
00:25:41.849 --> 00:25:44.329
a time over on the TFM network. We've got a
447
00:25:44.329 --> 00:25:46.730
lot of shows in the 602 Club talking about all
448
00:25:46.750 --> 00:25:49.150
the franchises that we love. And then a lot of
449
00:25:49.190 --> 00:25:51.710
great Star Trek talk with my good friend Chris Jones
450
00:25:51.809 --> 00:25:54.470
over there. So I hope you'll enjoy all of those shows.
451
00:25:55.130 --> 00:25:57.190
But John, you know, when people aren't trying to figure
452
00:25:57.230 --> 00:25:59.690
out what you're saying because you sound just a little
453
00:25:59.710 --> 00:26:01.849
bit too much like Chopper, where can people find you?
454
00:26:02.069 --> 00:26:04.750
Well, gosh, I sound like a drunk Chopper, honestly. And
455
00:26:04.769 --> 00:26:06.069
you can find me out there on the wilds of
456
00:26:06.089 --> 00:26:11.119
the internet. It's Kessel Junkie, K-E-S-S-E-L-J-U-N-K-I-E. And every so often
457
00:26:11.220 --> 00:26:14.000
I write on KesselJunkie.com. And then you can find me
458
00:26:14.059 --> 00:26:18.279
here on the network, co-hosting a show with two lovely gentlemen,
459
00:26:18.740 --> 00:26:21.960
Darren Moser and Tristan Riddell called House Lights, where we
460
00:26:21.980 --> 00:26:24.200
look at the work of directors. And every so often,
461
00:26:24.660 --> 00:26:26.900
We cover a director that I have to whine months
462
00:26:27.029 --> 00:26:30.329
and months to cover. As we record this, we're covering
463
00:26:30.349 --> 00:26:32.390
the works of John Carpenter, who's one of the greatest
464
00:26:33.309 --> 00:26:37.789
maestro directors of my lifetime. And I will not be
465
00:26:37.809 --> 00:26:40.809
taking any questions after that. But Matt, I have to
466
00:26:40.849 --> 00:26:43.220
go and I have to watch some more movies because
467
00:26:43.259 --> 00:26:46.000
it's spooky season as we record this by Mr.
468
00:26:46.039 --> 00:26:51.720
John Carpenter. So I think it's time to close these negotiations. John, negotiations. Negotiations.
469
00:27:04.230 --> 00:27:05.250
Join the revolution.
470
00:27:05.930 --> 00:27:07.150
Join the nerd party.
