Where this was said
The Janitor's Closet: All Possible Modes of Being
At 1:09:08 · chapter starts 1:08:20
Bostrom introduces one of the episode's most striking images: imagine a vast cathedral representing all possible modes of consciousness and experience. Across all of human history — every culture, every personality type, every art form and ideology — humanity has been sitting in the janitor's closet. We have barely begun to explore what minds can experience or what life can mean. Just as chimpanzees are structurally incapable of understanding humor, romantic love, or science, we are almost certainly blind to whole categories of meaning and value that are simply inaccessible to a coconut-sized biological brain. Rogan adds a compelling data point: researchers who taught primates sign language were puzzled to discover that the animals never asked questions — they could communicate, understand fairness, even express preferences, but curiosity-driven inquiry seemed absent. What is the human equivalent of the question we are constitutionally incapable of asking?
All of human diversity — every personality, every culture, every art form — is just a tiny corner of what minds could eventually experience. Think of a vast cathedral: we have spent all of history sitting in the janitor's closet.
Bostrom argues all human diversity across history represents only a tiny corner of the possible space of minds and modes of experience — like sitting in the janitor's closet of a vast cathedral.
Rogan notes researchers were puzzled to find that primates taught sign language never ask questions — they can communicate and understand fairness but lack curiosity-driven inquiry.
