Exploring Lightbulb Moments in Human History with Author Scott Williams

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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There were some really interesting parts and all the interesting

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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parts were the parts about sort of the ideas that people had and and those things

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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that changed, people's perspectives and after about a year of struggling with

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:00:14</time>
this , I realized where the story was, and I realized what I needed to write.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And the thing was, it had been there all along.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Welcome to Talk With History.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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I'm your host, Scott, here with my wife and historian, Jen.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Hello.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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On this podcast, we give you insights to our history inspired world travels,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:00:42</time>
YouTube channel journey, and examine history through deeper conversations

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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with the curious, the explorers, and the history lovers out there.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Now, today, we are joined by Scott Williams, the author of Lightbulb Moments

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:00:54</time>
in Human History from Cave to Coliseum.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Welcome, Scott.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Hey Scott, how are you doing?

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Now, before we get into chatting with Scott about his book, I want to

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:01:05</time>
remind our listeners that you can find Scott's book on Amazon in various But if

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:01:09</time>
you can't remember the exact title after you're done listening to today's episode,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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as we say in our past episodes, you can always find links to light bulb moments

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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over at our website, talkwithhistory.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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com.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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So just go to talkwithhistory.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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com, search for light bulb moments.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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That's talkwithhistory.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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com and search for light bulb moments and you'll be able to find

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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links directly to Scott's book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Fantastic.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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We try to share history as much as we can.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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now, as I mentioned earlier, we're joined today by Scott Williams,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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the author of Lightbulb Moments in Human History from Cave to Coliseum.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Now, Scott is a self described optimistic smartass, writer,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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humorist, and history nerd.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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His fascination with humanity's lightbulb moments began as a child

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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while watching the first moon landing.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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I appreciated your opening in the book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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He also has his own podcast that he hosts with his friend

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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CJ called What's My Age Again.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Now, thank you again for joining us tonight, Scott.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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I, I really do appreciate it.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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thank you for having me.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And just, just back on the moon landing, I don't know if you can see over the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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back of me, obviously the listeners can't see this, but I've got a, a signed

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Neil Armstrong photo up there, as so I'm Definitely a history in space nerd.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Yeah, no, I, I actually really appreciated the, the opening.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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I didn't get to read the whole book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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I poked around a little bit.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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But you sharing that kind of drew me right in to, to your perspective

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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and why you wrote this book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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So maybe we can jump right into that.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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So was that moon landing, was that really something that kind of sparked

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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the flame of your interest in history and these kind of large historical moments?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Oh, absolutely.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I mean if you're six years old I mean I used to get up obviously in Australia

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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the the the launches and landings were totally different times for what it was

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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for you guys and Often I'd get up in the morning at like in the morning with my

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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dad and we'd sit there watching launches.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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We actually saw the moon landing at school because we were actually at school

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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and they rolled out the TV set and we watched the moon landing at school.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And I mean, those kinds of things really stick with you.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I, I fully understood the import of it.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I knew it was a, a moment in history that was possibly, may never be, never

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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be surpassed the way we're going.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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But it's, it's it was incredible.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And certainly it sparked a love of those kind of big moments, big historical

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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moments and big breakthroughs that I follow through now, obviously.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Yeah.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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So, so for, I mean, that, that was obviously when you were younger, was

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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there something else and you as you went through school, I mean, I know you

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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joked in that opening okay, now I got to start training to be an astronaut, but I

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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mean, that's, that's a little different.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Track , it's more of a, , go fly and learn engineering and all that stuff.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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Then, then end up writing about history.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
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What kind of led you down the path of, eventually writing a book?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Look, I think it's just one of those things that

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I've been fascinated with history.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I only really wrote, started writing in my late fifties, so I wanted to write

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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but I could never work out an angle.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And finally the angle was the hardest thing for me.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And it turned out that the angle was there all along.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I just had to recognise that this, these big moments were the things

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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that fascinated me, and the things that made me realise that the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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world continues to get better.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I think, I hear a lot of people being very negative.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And I know that the world, there are lots of problems in the world at the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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moment, obviously we can see in Ukraine, and in the Middle East and everything.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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But, in the end, if you, if you sort of went to any other time in

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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history, things were still worse.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And think where we've continued to iteratively get better and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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better by building on all the developments of people before us.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And I think people have lost track of that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And I really wanted to to sort of bring that back for people to see

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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that, hey, things aren't that bad.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And I think my experience of things I've read over the years and my

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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fascinations with all these things just made me realize that this is

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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a lens to look at that through.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:05:32</time>
You're very optimistic and I appreciate that because I think that's

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:05:37</time>
where we have to be with history And I'm I'm very much I don't like that

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:05:40</time>
term history repeats itself because I'm like You're never gonna be in the

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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exact same place exact same time for history to actually repeat itself It

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:05:47</time>
can echo in some ways, but it will never actually repeat itself What would you

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:05:52</time>
define a lightbulb moment as like how big of a aha moment does it have to be?

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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What what is?

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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When you're writing a book like what did what do you

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:06:05</time>
constitute a lightbulb moment as?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:06:08</time>
Okay, they can be, they, they don't have to be massive,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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but they have to be things that are unprecedented and eventually lead

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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to something like the first caveman who chipped the first stone tool.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Hitting two rocks together is not a big deal.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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But that iteratively led to machines, to all sorts of things.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Just it took.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Millions of years, but the, so it doesn't have to be a big thing, but one of the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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reasons why it seemed for so long humans in our current form have been around

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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for hundreds of thousands of years, yet it's only in the last, probably

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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two or three hundred years that things have really started to change big time.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And that's because it took so long to get all the little building blocks in place.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I mean like, they had to, cavemen had to learn how to communicate with each other.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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They had to make tools, they had to do all these things that, that took a long time.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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These things didn't happen overnight.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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And once things started to, to build, once we started to get these

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little sort of sparks of ingenuity.

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Building one upon the other, then things start to speed up to the point where

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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we're now sort of, can't keep up with it.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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There's no one person could be Leonardo da Vinci now because there's just

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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no one could keep all the different strands of knowledge in their head.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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a Lightbulb moment is just something that sparks.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Some kind of paradigm shift.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Yeah,

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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remember in a grad school learning about what constitutes

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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a civilization, right?

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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When do anthropologists give the The term civilization to a group of people

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:07:50</time>
and it's when they can find proof that there have a bone that is healed So if

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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there was a broken bone and it has healed they prove civilization because there's

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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a group of people that can Set a bone.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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They're taking care of someone.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:08:06</time>
They're helping someone to mend So they're they're doing all of those things

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:08:09</time>
you said it's like the result of the lightbulb moments It's the result of

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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the communications result of learning about medicine it's the result of

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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learning and being together as a group that the bone heals and they can see

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
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that on a skeleton and that's when they can tell that that was a civilization.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:08:28</time>
So I can see what you're saying.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Yeah, it's like collective learning.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I mean, once we start to get a body of knowledge, we have to somehow pass it on.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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Now, for thousands and thousands of years, there was no writing.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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So the only way they could pass it on was by speech.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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But if someone got old and they died, they lost their information, and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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they were, like you were saying, when they can look after somebody who is

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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unwell, that means they're beginning to appreciate what they bring to the group

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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in knowledge, and that, that appreciation from knowledge then sort of, they then

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:03</time>
get a chance to pass that knowledge on.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:05</time>
It just, it just shows, like you say, it's civilization building.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:08</time>
Like you said, we're at this point now where AI, it's so fast.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:12</time>
No one person can do it.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:14</time>
It has to be like these collective, like now you can, maybe, maybe

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:18</time>
you can specialize in your one.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:19</time>
area, your one field of study and have something great happen

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:25</time>
and you put the face of it.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:26</time>
But if there's nobody who's going to be like a Thomas Edison today, like

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:31</time>
you just don't have the capacity to do it to people moving so fast as

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:09:35</time>
2000 Thomas Edison's living right now that are working really fast.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
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I totally agree.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:40</time>
And in fact, I see a problem with the fact that that one person can't

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:44</time>
monitor everything because I think a lot of the big ideas that I write

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:48</time>
about are things that are different strands of knowledge brought together

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:52</time>
by people who understood that this could be relevant to something else.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:09:57</time>
But if you've got people who are so focused in their field, they don't

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:01</time>
know about another field, they can't see the connection, they can't see the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:04</time>
relevance, you're not going to have.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:06</time>
Transcribed Some of those big lightbulb moments, unless there's someone who

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:11</time>
is like a polymath who can just look at everything and say, Hey, hold

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:17</time>
on, that that's pertinent to that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:19</time>
So it's, it's difficult.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:10:22</time>
Yes.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:10:23</time>
And you, you've taken your light bulb moments and you've categorized them.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:10:27</time>
You've put them into four groups.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:30</time>
yeah, that's.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:31</time>
That was I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's legit but I'm not a, I'm not

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:35</time>
a historian as such, and I'm not, it's not an intellectual book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:40</time>
I wanted to try and have something, a framework to hang it off, and I

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:44</time>
did characterize them into different groups, but that was more for anyone

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:50</time>
who was reading it who wanted to have something to, to sort of, just

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:10:53</time>
to look at and see what See how it, things related, but also my editor had

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:11:00</time>
said to me, you should do something a little bit more intellectual here.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:11:04</time>
So that wasn't a part of the original book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:11:06</time>
And I, I chafed at that a bit because it made it seem like I was more

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:11:10</time>
of a theorist than I really am.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:11:12</time>
So.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:11:12</time>
I appreciate it.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:13</time>
I appreciated that.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:15</time>
I mean, I, so I appreciated, again, that was kind of in the, in the early part

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:19</time>
of your book, you say, okay, here's the categories, but you do caveat listen,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:23</time>
I'm not a huge fan of these cats.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:25</time>
You poke, you poke fun at yourself right away.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:27</time>
And so I appreciate the humor, the humor right up front.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:31</time>
And I'm actually looking forward to digging deep, dig digging deeper into

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:34</time>
the, into the book, because I feel like your book is one of those ones

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:38</time>
that I could, someone could pick up at any given time and just flip to

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:43</time>
a chapter or flip to a certain spot.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:44</time>
They can either read it all the way through, or they could just say, Hey,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:47</time>
this is an interesting, this caught my.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:50</time>
Caught my eye on TV.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:51</time>
Oh, yeah, that's one of the chapters in this book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:53</time>
I mean, is that kind of how you intended this was to, to be easy

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:11:57</time>
to read, either front to back or pick it up whenever you, you could.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:07</time>
I tend to be one of those people who pick, pick things

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:09</time>
out of books and, and read what I can.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:11</time>
So, but I didn't, I wouldn't say I intended that to happen.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:15</time>
What I intended was to have, I mean, like we were talking before about an

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:19</time>
overarching view of like technology and things that I wanted to have an

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:23</time>
overarching view of history, which I mean there's, there's actually a kind

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:27</time>
of history called big history and it's basically just pulling back from all

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:31</time>
the minutiae and, and, and looking at trends and looking at things like that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:35</time>
I didn't want to get quite that far away, but I wanted to be able to pull back

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:39</time>
enough that you could see the patterns.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:42</time>
I know, I know that there's not.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:44</time>
History doesn't repeat itself.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:45</time>
I I agree totally with what you said there, but there are patterns that

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:49</time>
recur, that are dealt with in different ways by different civilizations.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:53</time>
And the, the, when you do that, when you pull back and do what I've, I've

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:12:56</time>
done, even for me, I didn't realize until I started to write what I was

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:13:02</time>
looking at here, where there was a lot of patterns and a lot of things that,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:13:06</time>
that echoed in even present day stuff.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:10</time>
And that's, and that's where I could see your, the categorization.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:14</time>
that you, we, we joke about earlier, that would probably help you from a writing

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:18</time>
perspective, at least for me, right?

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:19</time>
That's the way my brain works, is I gotta outline something, I gotta have some

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:22</time>
categories, and then, okay, I can pick and choose, okay, if, if it's a religion,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:27</time>
okay, this is when this religion came to the forefront, or that religion came to

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:30</time>
the forefront, or that concept came out.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:33</time>
With that, I mean, when you're researching a book like this, there's, there's

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:37</time>
no kind of One single source aside, if you just say the internet for all

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:40</time>
of history, if we interviewed someone who is, who is, writing on John Quincy

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:44</time>
Adams the other day, and he had a very specific source and one place he could

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:48</time>
go to for some personal journals.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:13:50</time>
But for you, what were you using for your, for your research for this book?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:13:54</time>
Oh, look, it was, it was, I say the internet, but

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:13:59</time>
I would also, I would look at the internet and then I'd go, okay, I

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:01</time>
would, I would pick something up.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:03</time>
I wanted to look for big ideas.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:05</time>
But I wanted odd angles on big ideas too.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:07</time>
I wanted, I wanted there to be stories involved.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:09</time>
So I would look to see if there were stories involved with something.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:12</time>
And I would, I would even look at Wikipedia.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:14</time>
And then I would, once I saw that, then I'd go, okay, deep dive

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:18</time>
on their sources then on other sources to see the veracity of it.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:22</time>
That's why I don't regard myself at any stretch, by any stretch of

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:25</time>
the imagination as a historian.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:27</time>
I am not a historian because I don't do the proper groundwork

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:31</time>
a historian would do.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:14:33</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:34</time>
I, I mean, I, I, and I would I would be loath to, people

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:39</time>
sometimes say, oh, you're a historian.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:40</time>
No, I'm not.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:42</time>
And that's not because I, I respect historians too much to

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:45</time>
equate myself with a historian.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:48</time>
But I also, I respect history and I don't write stuff that's not true or that isn't

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:54</time>
any that hasn't been reported as true.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:14:57</time>
If any history I've written is debated, I will then put a caveat

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:03</time>
on that and say, hey this is a great story, but it's debatable.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:08</time>
But I will go with the great story, if there's one there,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:11</time>
purely for entertainment's sake.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:12</time>
It's an entertainment book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:13</time>
It's not, it's not, it is informative, but it's meant to be entertaining.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:22</time>
, Jenn: see it as inspiring.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:24</time>
It's one of those inspiring books, right?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:27</time>
It's one of those If this person could do that, maybe I could do that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:30</time>
If that person was in this situation, I'd like to think I

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:33</time>
would do that in that situation.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:34</time>
I think that's what history, we want to hear these, these history makers that

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:40</time>
made these hard decisions and did things that we can look at and be like, wow, I,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:44</time>
I'm inspired to do something like that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:47</time>
Like Neil Armstrong.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:48</time>
Right?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:48</time>
I'm inspired to reach for the moon and then have a really

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:53</time>
great line once I hit the moon.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:57</time>
Yeah, yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:15:59</time>
Absolutely.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:00</time>
A glitch in the recording.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:16:02</time>
exactly.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:16:04</time>
So how long did it take you to write the book?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:11</time>
When I started, I started writing it as a history of education.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:14</time>
That was, that, it began as that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:16</time>
And I spent probably about a year putting together as a history of education.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:20</time>
And then I started to go There were some really interesting parts and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:23</time>
all the interesting parts were the parts about sort of the ideas that

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:27</time>
people had and and those things that changed, people's perspectives and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:35</time>
I'm a, I'm a teacher by, by trade.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:37</time>
I, I, and so that was why I thought education was good.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:40</time>
I was looking for an angle, education was the angle I was going for.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:43</time>
Then I realized that A, not many people would be super interested and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:47</time>
B, there was a better story there, or there was a better book there.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:51</time>
And so.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:52</time>
After about a year of struggling with this history of education, I

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:55</time>
realized where the story was, and I realized what I needed to write.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:16:59</time>
And the thing was, it had been there all along.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:03</time>
Ever since, like I say in the book, I don't know if you got that far, but my dad

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:08</time>
would read to me at night, and I wanted to be read non fiction books, so he'd

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:11</time>
read to me about ancient Egypt, he'd read to me about all these history things.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:15</time>
And it started all back then.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:18</time>
And then over the years I've just always touched base with, with

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:22</time>
history things, and even my my love of science fiction, to me science

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:28</time>
fiction is the history of the future.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:30</time>
The history I'll never get to see.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:33</time>
So I, I love science fiction because obviously I'll be dead, but that gives

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:37</time>
me a bit of an idea as to what history might be like, so it's, it, everything

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:17:41</time>
for me is about Historical moments.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:17:44</time>
SO what, what are some of your.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:17:46</time>
If I'm gonna tell a friend about this book, and, and even just the quick reading

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:17:51</time>
that I did of the first, 20 or 30 pages I, I actually really started getting into it.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:17:56</time>
And then my kids, yelled at me about something and I had to go warm

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:18:00</time>
up a hot dog or whatever it was.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:18:01</time>
But so what are some of your favorites that, as you were writing this or

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:18:06</time>
that kind of stood out to you the most in this, particular book?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:13</time>
Okay, some of the things that, I mean, not all of

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:16</time>
them are life changing moments.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:19</time>
One of the ones I really like is the beer, beer before bread hypothesis,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:23</time>
which is a hypothesis that humanity didn't band together in cities and,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:28</time>
and farm and everything to, to, to grow food and to make bread.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:35</time>
They, they needed to make beer.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:37</time>
And so one of the reasons that they they sort of develop farming was to create a a

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:43</time>
reliable source of grain for making beer.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:18:46</time>
Grain for making beer.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:47</time>
and that's, that's actually a, a bona fide theory.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:50</time>
That's not someone off the internet.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:52</time>
That's actually, there's a scientific paper that, that, that, it's only a

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:56</time>
theory, but it's still an interesting one.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:18:58</time>
And it certainly,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:18:59</time>
fun one, yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:00</time>
it's a fun one.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:00</time>
And when you see how important beer was to early civilizations,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:05</time>
the Mesopotamians loved beer.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:06</time>
Although the beer they drank wasn't exactly like what

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:09</time>
we would drink, apparently.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:10</time>
It was more like porridge and they had to drink it with a straw because of all

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:13</time>
the bits and pieces that were in it.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:19:14</time>
Oh my gosh.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:16</time>
the,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:19:16</time>
Hardy

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:17</time>
yeah, the Egyptians loved beer.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:19</time>
The Chinese love beer.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:21</time>
So it was a, it was one of those things that, it's universal.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:25</time>
And it's conceivable that, that, that beer before bread

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:29</time>
hypothesis was true, was true.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:31</time>
The fact that writing was pretty much invented by accountants.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:36</time>
So even though we see writing now as literary, literary sort

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:40</time>
of pursuits and all that kind of stuff, it was the accountants of

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:43</time>
Mesopotamia that that really started to sort of put things down on.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:50</time>
Not paper, obviously on clay, but they start to make marks in clay.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:53</time>
Those marks became more important, more complex and then a bit length,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:19:59</time>
a written language came out of that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:01</time>
That was interesting.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:03</time>
I mean, that, that makes sense.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:04</time>
That it, it's, it's useful for money.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:06</time>
Useful for money.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:07</time>
That's right.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:07</time>
Right.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:07</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:08</time>
Leave it, to leave it to the accountants and, the IRS types,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:10</time>
here, at least here in the States.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:12</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:12</time>
, that, to, to invent the system that would that would track all

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:20:15</time>
the taxes that, that I gotta

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:16</time>
Oh, yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:22</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:22</time>
I mean, what, and that's, that's definitely a lightbulb moment.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:26</time>
Some of them, there's a story in there about Sun Tzu, the,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:30</time>
the famous Chinese general.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:32</time>
And I wouldn't say it's a lightbulb moment other than the fact that he codified some

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:36</time>
of the, sort of the ideas to do with war.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:39</time>
But there was a story in the, in the book about how his emperor had challenged

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:44</time>
him to get a a group of, like female I think concubines to, to act like an army.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:52</time>
So he he divided them into two groups and he made one of the king's, of

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:20:56</time>
the emperor's concubines, the leader of each group, and then basically

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:02</time>
taught them some manoeuvres.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:04</time>
And when he brought the king out, or the emperor out to watch, they

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:08</time>
mucked it all up, they fell about laughing, and thought it was hilarious.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:13</time>
And so, he executed both of the concubines who were the leaders, and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:18</time>
then retrained the ones that were left, and they performed perfectly after that.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:23</time>
Absolutely.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:24</time>
It's motivation.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:25</time>
Yeah, that, that, that, that'll teach you to learn the art

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:29</time>
of war very, very quickly.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:31</time>
Oh, my goodness.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:32</time>
So yeah, there's loads of stuff like that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:34</time>
A lot of, a lot of the stories to do with mythology and ancient

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:39</time>
Egypt and Rome and Greece.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:42</time>
I mean, I, I won't give away, there's, there's a lot in there and obviously

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:46</time>
and this one could be a little bit controversial in the States, but there's

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:21:48</time>
some interesting stuff about Christianity too, but we might not go there right now.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:53</time>
Yeah I mean, there's lots of things.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:55</time>
I mean, and that's a great point.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:21:56</time>
And that's why I appreciated you setting the stage of hey, there are categories.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:00</time>
If you, the reader, wants to think of things in a certain category,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:04</time>
you're giving us the tools.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:05</time>
And then you say, hey, you don't have to use them because

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:07</time>
I don't even like using them.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:09</time>
But to your point, religion, politics, the idea of government

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:13</time>
and all that, that kind of stuff.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:22:15</time>
I mean, I'm sure a lot of those things are those, those light bulb moments.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:20</time>
And I think that it's important to know your, the history.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:23</time>
No matter if you like it or not, or if it sits well with you, you need

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:27</time>
to, you should know it because if you're going to have a conversation,

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:31</time>
a critical thinking conversation about something, then you need to know what's

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:34</time>
the other side and what's the evidence and let's have a conversation about it.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:38</time>
So I think that's good that you put that in there.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:22:40</time>
Don't shy away from that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:22:42</time>
Oh, absolutely.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:22:43</time>
And I think one thing we have done recently, and I, I suppose we're

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:22:50</time>
looking at the dumbing down of society the people don't tend to quick think

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:22:54</time>
critically, and they don't look at the past, they don't look at science

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:22:57</time>
and so many of these things that we really need to move forward.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:01</time>
And I mean, I've, I've hear my saying that I think the world keeps getting better.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:06</time>
But.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:07</time>
We're in a bit of a downturn now.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:09</time>
I'd say if, if, if I always say that it's like the stock market.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:13</time>
We're on a steady uptick, but there are corrections along the way.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:17</time>
And right now I think we're in a correction.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:19</time>
Is there anything when you were studying kind of these

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:21</time>
lightbulb moments, and I think you alluded to it, like even writing,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:25</time>
it depends on what's done with it.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:27</time>
Writing could have been positive, like the Bible, or it could have been negative

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:30</time>
Mein Kampf.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:31</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:33</time>
That's what you wrote in the book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:35</time>
I mean, was there other things like that, in, in your book for lightbulb

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:23:39</time>
moments that were could have, that were both, I guess, positive and negative?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:42</time>
Oh look, tools can be used for multiple, multiple things.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:45</time>
You can use a knife to, to sort of butter bread.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:48</time>
You can also stab someone with a knife.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:50</time>
There's lots of, there's lots of alternate uses for seemingly good things.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:23:56</time>
Free speech is a great thing, but free speech can be abused.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:01</time>
And I think I'm, no one's calling for the, for free speech to be curtailed, but.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:06</time>
You do wonder why people can get away with saying blatant untruths and, and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:13</time>
changing Like basically changing people's outlook on history based on untruths.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:19</time>
That, that to me is, is wrong and shouldn't be allowed.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:23</time>
But then how do you police that when free speech is so important?

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:24:31</time>
Now, I think I saw when I was poking around on Amazon,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:24:35</time>
that do you have another another, like a volume two coming out here

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:39</time>
I do, I do have volume two coming out.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:42</time>
There's, there we go.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:44</time>
There's volume one, volume two.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:24:46</time>
Oh, there you

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:24:46</time>
go.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:24:47</time>
There you go.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:24:47</time>
There was just so many that you found that you had another book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:51</time>
well, basically what I'm doing is I'm, I'm, I'm

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:54</time>
just moving through history.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:24:55</time>
The first book goes from the first humans up to the end of the Roman Empire.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:02</time>
And then I'm picking up from, yeah, from the middle ages up

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:06</time>
to the scientific revolution.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:07</time>
Right now I'm working on book three.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:09</time>
which is the Enlightenment.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:11</time>
In fact, it's that the working title at the moment is Revolution to

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:14</time>
Evolution, which is going to pick up on the the French Revolution, American

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:17</time>
Revolution, and then up to Darwin.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:21</time>
And then I'm going to keep on going basically.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:23</time>
But the idea is to, is to, to do it chronologically.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:27</time>
So you can iteratively, iteratively build.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:31</time>
And the fact that the first book.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:34</time>
Covers probably two million years of history.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:37</time>
The second book covers a thousand years.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:39</time>
The third book is going to cover 200 years maybe.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:43</time>
And, and that

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:44</time>
how fast things are growing.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:46</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:47</time>
So in fact, the original idea was to do three books.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:50</time>
It's probably going to end up being five.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:25:52</time>
Wow.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:25:53</time>
That's

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:53</time>
I'm, I'm, I'm sort of, making it, stretching

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:56</time>
it out to try to do whatever.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:25:58</time>
I'm basically, I'm struggling to fit it all in.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:02</time>
And in fact, I'm sure any, I'm sure anyone could look at the first book and go, why

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:07</time>
didn't you put this, this, this, or this?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:09</time>
And the further I go along.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:11</time>
The more there's going to be.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:12</time>
So I think if you've read in the introduction I'm putting in

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:17</time>
ones that I think are important.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:19</time>
They're not the only important lightbulb moments.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:21</time>
I think I can't possibly do it It's just a way of me sort of showing this

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:28</time>
iterative building and how how the world is getting better and how we

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:32</time>
need to appreciate that our lives are You know, immensely better than the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:39</time>
lives of people even 200 years ago.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:26:42</time>
So I think sometimes we just don't appreciate what we've got.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:26:52</time>
I like that

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:26:52</time>
gratitude.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:26:53</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:26:54</time>
And, and that's one thing.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:26:55</time>
And if you've been listening, if you have been listening to podcasts and you,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:26:58</time>
you would know that, that I tell people all the time, I'm not the history nerd,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:02</time>
but I've learned a lot doing all this stuff with Jen and learning about the

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:06</time>
lens that we look at things through.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:08</time>
And you even mentioned that in the very beginning, right?

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:11</time>
As long as, as you can.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:13</time>
Be curious and be open enough to know that you are looking at something

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:18</time>
through a lens and you can be willing enough to be open to that conversation.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:21</time>
You can be grateful and studying history and even knowing just a little bit

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:26</time>
about history, whether it's watching one of our videos or reading your book

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:30</time>
about those big light bulb moments that will give you that perspective

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:34</time>
and help you understand like, Hey, I really don't have it that bad.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:27:37</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:27:38</time>
And I like it's that Scott like this is your book.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:27:41</time>
So you're going to choose the light bulb moments, right?

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:27:44</time>
If someone else has other ones, and they can go write their book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:27:46</time>
No,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:27:50</time>
I saw something and went, Oh my God, why

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:27:52</time>
didn't I put that in the book?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:27:55</time>
Then I just, I just stopped being hard on myself and going, I did the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:27:57</time>
best I could, and there's loads of things I could have put in that I

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:01</time>
haven't put in, and I know that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:03</time>
But yeah, I'm, I'm really happy with how it's come out.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:06</time>
I'm happy with The feel.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:09</time>
I think the, the feedback I've got is, it meant I'm trying to make

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:12</time>
history appealing, interesting.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:15</time>
A bit funny 'cause there are funny parts in history.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:17</time>
I wanna, I want to tease those things out so people get to see the

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:22</time>
interesting, fun parts of history.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:23</time>
It isn't all just dates and things like that.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:27</time>
It's, it's a living thing that, that these people were alive.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:31</time>
I mean, they, they had lives like you and I, they.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:35</time>
were, they lived, they died, they had problems, and to see them as real people

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:41</time>
who were stupid and did dumb things and, but also did amazing things, it's

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:47</time>
and that people like say Churchill, who was incredible, but also had a really

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:52</time>
bad side to him, and I think you can acknowledge that You could acknowledge

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:28:57</time>
the greatness and still say, hey, this person wasn't, he was a bit of a

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:01</time>
racist and he was a bit of this and a bit of that, but he also was inspiring

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:05</time>
and did all these amazing things.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:07</time>
I have a real problem with people trying to revise history in a way which

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:12</time>
takes away the, that greatness factor and say George Washington's our own

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:17</time>
slaves, therefore he was a bad person.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:19</time>
And and not looking at The way things were at the time.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:23</time>
You can't judge people by today's standards.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:29:26</time>
That's not how history works.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:29:34</time>
not at all.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:29:34</time>
And I think we were just talking about that

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:36</time>
earlier.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:36</time>
I think that's the whole point, I was they just took down that

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:41</time>
they removed the Thomas Jefferson statue from the New York city hall.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:45</time>
It's been up there for a hundred and it's been in there for 187 years.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:48</time>
And I say, we're not doing our jobs as historians.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:52</time>
If that stuff is happening, because if people can, can dumb people down

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:29:56</time>
to one thing about them and it's a bad thing and then remove everything

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:02</time>
else that they've influenced and done and created and changed.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:07</time>
Then we're not doing job as historians to provide context.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:10</time>
And that is what historians do because nothing is happening today.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:16</time>
That is 200 years ago that we live off of today.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:21</time>
And so I, I totally agree with you.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:23</time>
I find it very, It's fascinating that people want to just take all the past

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:29</time>
and judge it today and then put it on a side and I really dislike the former

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:35</time>
President Obama had used this right and wrong side of history and I really

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:38</time>
dislike those terms because there is no right and wrong side of history.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:43</time>
It's all the accurate side of history.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:47</time>
It's all the truth side of history.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:48</time>
If you're looking for a right side, it's the side that's the truth.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:51</time>
That's the right side.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:53</time>
The wrong side is.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:54</time>
changing it or saying something different or, or making something else more

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:30:58</time>
important than what it is for an agenda.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:31:00</time>
That's the wrong side of history.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:31:02</time>
So I have a hard time with this, this trying to judge history and

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:31:08</time>
and, and clean it out from what.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:31:10</time>
People had to have done in the past because nobody was perfect.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:14</time>
No, it doesn't mean you can't look at history through different

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:17</time>
lenses and say like I, I use the example of my grandmother who was born in 1895.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:22</time>
She was born when Australia or before Australia even was a country, but she

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:27</time>
grew up during what was called the time of the white Australia policy where

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:30</time>
basically, no one who wasn't white and Anglo Saxon could come into the country.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:36</time>
She was a terrible racist.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:39</time>
But, she was a lovely person, but she was a terrible racist because of the era she

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:44</time>
grew up in, and everyone was racist then.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:46</time>
I mean, Australia wasn't that far away from South Africa, in many respects.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:51</time>
So, you gotta look at it in that respect.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:31:53</time>
And, she, she grew up through the World War I, Great Depression, World War II.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:00</time>
She ended up, she saw the moon landing.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:02</time>
I mean, society changed so much in that time.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:06</time>
And I'm sure some of her attitudes change, but there's a certain point

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:10</time>
where when you're a person of a certain age, there's only so far you can change.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:15</time>
And I think, I look at her, I remember the good person she was, but I acknowledge

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:21</time>
that There were problems, but I also know why those problems happened.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:25</time>
And I don't, I don't, I don't sort of say she's not my grandmother anymore because

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:28</time>
she said mean things about black people.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:30</time>
I mean, she did, she was awful.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:32</time>
I, I was actually quite shocked at some of the things she said, even as a child.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:37</time>
So that was, it was a wake up call.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:41</time>
There's no doubt about that, but she was also a good person in other respects,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:44</time>
but she came from a time when the default position was everyone was a racist.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:50</time>
. Scott: And that's why I always appreciate our conversations on talk

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:53</time>
with history because, I think our guests, have that perspective of,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:32:57</time>
of learning about history and being willing to say yes, that that wasn't.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:02</time>
By today's lens those actions back then weren't right.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:06</time>
However, people have gotten better and we have to understand where they

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:09</time>
came from And so again, that's what I appreciate about books like yours

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:13</time>
that bring some humor into this and make it a little bit more accessible

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:15</time>
for the non history nerds like myself.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:17</time>
And it, it's something that I, I can, I would mention to my friends at work

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:21</time>
and say, Hey, if, if you want a good, kind of coffee table, history book, or

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:26</time>
if you want to check out a history book, this one's super fun because it talks

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:29</time>
about all these, these larger concepts that most people will, be familiar with,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:34</time>
but maybe not the details behind them.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:36</time>
And then you interjecting your humor.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:39</time>
Throughout the book, is, is great.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:41</time>
So for for those listening, Scott, what's the best place that you would

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:45</time>
want them to come to you if you, they wanted to look for your, your current

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:49</time>
book or your book that's coming out?

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:51</time>
I think in the spring is what I saw.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:53</time>
Yeah, look, it's if you come to my website

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:59</time>
lightbulbmomentshistory.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:33:59</time>
com, it's got links to all the places you can get it, but you can, the other thing

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:03</time>
is I've just released a, an audio book of the first book that came out this month.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:08</time>
Okay.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:08</time>
So for, for listeners who don't like sitting down reading books,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:12</time>
but like to listen to things cause, Hey, I'm a podcast listener and

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:16</time>
I'm an audio book listener too.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:18</time>
Like I, most of my reading is done.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:20</time>
while walking or doing housework.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:22</time>
And I don't get time to sit down and read as much as I'd like.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:26</time>
So that's there.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:27</time>
It's there now.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:27</time>
It's it's available.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:29</time>
It's not quite there and audible for some reason yet, but everywhere else, Spotify,

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:32</time>
it's the audio books available out there.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:36</time>
I think it's quite accessible.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:38</time>
I'm not reading it.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:39</time>
So but I engaged a professional person to do that But as far as yeah everywhere else

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:46</time>
The books are the first books available everywhere Amazon and everywhere else.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:51</time>
The second book will be available everywhere as well but certainly my

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:34:55</time>
website's a good place to come and I can you can sign up for my mailing list.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:00</time>
awesome.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:00</time>
No, that's, that's great.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:01</time>
And, and we will we're, we're actually planning on putting

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:04</time>
together like a little kind of holiday gift guide, we're going to.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:08</time>
Put out maybe on our channel or something like that.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:10</time>
So we're absolutely going to include your, your book in that.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:12</time>
Cause I think it's a great one.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:13</time>
It's fun.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:14</time>
It's got, got a little bit of a different tone compared to some of the, some of

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:17</time>
the active academic book that Jen reads that I, I can't, I just can't pick up.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:21</time>
It's just not my thing.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:23</time>
It's okay.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:23</time>
I

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:35:23</time>
like the fun ones too.

<cite>Jenn:</cite>
<time>00:35:24</time>
I like, we learn in all

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:27</time>
different ways.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:28</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Scott Williams:</cite>
<time>00:35:28</time>
my book has lots of pictures too,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:30</time>
perfect for someone like me.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:31</time>
It's perfect for someone like me.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:38</time>
As Scott writes in his foreword quoting Sir Isaac Newton, if I have

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:42</time>
seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:47</time>
If you want a book that will inspire you by learning about the light bulb

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:51</time>
moments of history, I highly encourage you to check out Scott's book,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:54</time>
light bulb moments in human history.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:57</time>
yOu can find Scott's book.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:35:58</time>
book, Pretty Much Anywhere, and for those listening, thank you for

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:01</time>
listening to the Talk With History podcast, and please reach out to

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:03</time>
us at our website, TalkWithHistory.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:05</time>
com.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:07</time>
But more importantly, if you know someone else that might enjoy this

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:10</time>
podcast, especially if you think they'd be interested in this book,

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:13</time>
please share this episode with them.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:15</time>
We rely on you, our community, to grow, and we appreciate you all every day.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:19</time>
We'll talk to you next time.

<cite>Scott:</cite>
<time>00:36:20</time>
Thank you.

Exploring Lightbulb Moments in Human History with Author Scott Williams

The Story

Chapters