Merlin Sheldrake

The sets then are naturally amazing, as is the dialogue.

as is the quirky folk-tinted music which heralds the first movie score from Cosmo Sheldrake, who happens to be the brother of Merlin Sheldrake, the pioneering mycologist, both of whom are the sons of Rupert Sheldrake, the noted parapsychologist who developed the concept of morphic resonance.

A talented family.

Anyway, perhaps my expectations were not sky high here.

I'm ready.

These, [laughs] so this was another one of my favorite parts of the book that I had actually specially highlighted, and it says this, hmm: "The biologist Merlin Sheldrake [laughs] says that mushrooms thrive on the mess that humans make.

Oyster mushrooms, like the ones in our breakfast, usually grow on decaying wood, but can also grow on a diet of used diapers, haha.

Researchers have even trained oyster mushrooms to digest one of the most disposed items in the world, cigarette butts, whose toxins sometimes can take a decade to decompose.

That's crazy.

The book I'm reading by Merlin Sheldrake, Entangled Fungi, he says if you were to get all of the mycelial network, you know, the little strands of roots or fungal roots, if you were to get them all in the world and spread them out in a single line, it could go to like the end of the galaxy or something like that.

And that's only in the first 10 centimeters of soil on our planet.

That's amazing.

Yeah.

Well, with a name like Merlin Sheldrake, you kind of have to be a sort of mushroom specialist, right? He is a mushroom specialist, yeah.

There wasn't really many other opportunities in life for him.

A mycologist is the official title.

Okay, so there's a quote from a British biologist.

His name is Merlin Sheldrake, and he's talking about... life and that everything is connected.

He's arguing that the observable universe is not one single thing, that everything, nothing is in isolation, basically.

So I'm doing an absolute terrible job.

It becomes that ripple effect that you were talking about.

Yes.

Merlin Sheldrake.

No person exists in complete isolation.

And that sounds like an obvious and trivial thing to say, but it suddenly struck me when I was reading a book.

I was reading Merlin Sheldrake's book about mushrooms.

Yeah, wonderful book.

And he was talking about these dogs.

Yeah.

[laughs]

And Merlin Sheldrake loses his job.

Be nice though, wouldn't it? It's like what is it that, um, what is it Aquinas said? He, he had that experience of God and, and where God says, you know, "Thomas, you have written of me well." You know, I like to think that when I'm sort of reintegrated into the paternal consciousness, that the, the bean plant will come over and say, you know, "Alex, you wrote about me well," in, in the same kind of way.

So question number one, one book that you've read recently that you would recommend.

God, I don't have much time to read books, but Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake.

It's all about mushrooms and the, the microfilial networks that expand within trees, and it's fascinating stuff.

Nice.

What is your very top tip for communicating effectively about science?

I think something that Merlin Sheldrake said recently when I saw him talk was to answer the question is to kill the question.

And I think the question that we're trying to answer when we're talking about science is often the most interesting part.

So I think take people on the journey with...

and also from the scientists how we can extract some facts that really make the artists sing.

My name is Merlin Sheldrake and I'm a biologist and a writer.

I study fungi and fungi are a kingdom of life which is as broad a category as animals or plants but they aren't animals and they aren't plants and they do things their own way Some fungi have evolved an ability to grow inside insect bodies and control their behaviour in a way that suits the fungus.

One of these fungi is called Ophiocordyceps unilateralis.

I think he said yes anyway, of course.

It was an immediate yes from him and from all the contributors, from Cecilia Vicuña, Kerry Neidharty, Merlin Sheldrake.

Seamus Bowers, who live on every single one of them was just an immediate yes.

And they've all just written beautiful responses to what they feel the book represents.