1 00:00:08,800 --> 00:00:13,320 Speaker 1: Science seems to work. We can argue about the philosophical 2 00:00:13,360 --> 00:00:16,360 Speaker 1: foundations of it, and whether a photon is a particle 3 00:00:16,560 --> 00:00:19,279 Speaker 1: or a wave. We can wonder whether the universe that 4 00:00:19,400 --> 00:00:22,880 Speaker 1: we perceive out there is real or is just an 5 00:00:22,880 --> 00:00:26,439 Speaker 1: elaborate hoax like in the matrix, and how we might 6 00:00:26,560 --> 00:00:30,120 Speaker 1: ever know the difference. But in the end, what is 7 00:00:30,200 --> 00:00:34,800 Speaker 1: beyond question is that science does work. We can build 8 00:00:34,840 --> 00:00:39,199 Speaker 1: airplanes that almost never crash. We can build incredible miniature 9 00:00:39,240 --> 00:00:43,159 Speaker 1: devices that rely on the quantum properties of electrons. We 10 00:00:43,320 --> 00:00:47,720 Speaker 1: can and have sent robots to crawl over the surface 11 00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:51,080 Speaker 1: of other planets and send us back pictures. All of 12 00:00:51,080 --> 00:00:54,960 Speaker 1: this stuff works because of science. Science lets us build 13 00:00:55,000 --> 00:00:59,040 Speaker 1: and test and refine little mathematical stories about how things work, 14 00:00:59,080 --> 00:01:03,240 Speaker 1: and then calm definitely use those mathematical principles in totally 15 00:01:03,280 --> 00:01:06,600 Speaker 1: different contexts. Ideas that we have in the shower, then 16 00:01:06,680 --> 00:01:10,839 Speaker 1: test in basement labs. They all work inside your iPhone 17 00:01:10,840 --> 00:01:14,720 Speaker 1: and on the space station. We can confidently use what 18 00:01:14,800 --> 00:01:19,000 Speaker 1: we have learned, even if we aren't exactly sure why 19 00:01:19,200 --> 00:01:40,120 Speaker 1: science works and whether the universe out there is actually real. Hi, 20 00:01:40,360 --> 00:01:43,520 Speaker 1: I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist and a professor at 21 00:01:43,560 --> 00:01:47,040 Speaker 1: UC Irvine, and I want to know what's real about 22 00:01:47,040 --> 00:01:50,480 Speaker 1: the universe. I don't want to just have ideas that work. 23 00:01:50,680 --> 00:01:53,920 Speaker 1: I want to know the truth about the universe. And 24 00:01:54,120 --> 00:01:58,040 Speaker 1: welcome the podcast Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, where 25 00:01:58,080 --> 00:02:01,560 Speaker 1: our goal is to do just that, to explore with 26 00:02:01,680 --> 00:02:05,240 Speaker 1: you what we do and don't know about the universe, 27 00:02:05,400 --> 00:02:08,840 Speaker 1: how microscopic little particles interact at the smallest levels, and 28 00:02:08,840 --> 00:02:12,119 Speaker 1: how all of their twoing and frowing and buzzing weaves 29 00:02:12,160 --> 00:02:15,519 Speaker 1: itself together into the world that we know with very 30 00:02:15,560 --> 00:02:18,240 Speaker 1: different rules, which is just a small part of the 31 00:02:18,320 --> 00:02:23,240 Speaker 1: larger context of stars and galaxies and superclusters slashing around 32 00:02:23,280 --> 00:02:25,720 Speaker 1: in a web of dark matter to make this glorious 33 00:02:25,760 --> 00:02:29,040 Speaker 1: and crazy universe. My co host and a friend, Jorge, 34 00:02:29,160 --> 00:02:32,000 Speaker 1: is on vacation this week, so I'm taking the opportunity 35 00:02:32,120 --> 00:02:35,160 Speaker 1: to take a bit of a digression into the philosophy 36 00:02:35,240 --> 00:02:39,200 Speaker 1: of science, together with an exciting guest. Now, what's amazing 37 00:02:39,240 --> 00:02:42,919 Speaker 1: to me about science is that we are capable at 38 00:02:42,960 --> 00:02:46,720 Speaker 1: all of understanding the universe that jumped up apes with 39 00:02:46,760 --> 00:02:49,839 Speaker 1: tiny little brains on a little rock in an irrelevant 40 00:02:49,880 --> 00:02:53,360 Speaker 1: galaxy can just by doing a few experiments and writing 41 00:02:53,360 --> 00:02:57,280 Speaker 1: down some math symbols build a mental model of how 42 00:02:57,320 --> 00:03:01,040 Speaker 1: the universe works, and a model that seems to work 43 00:03:01,120 --> 00:03:04,760 Speaker 1: pretty well. This model has revealed how stars form, and 44 00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:09,160 Speaker 1: how the universe expands, and how electrons funnel through weird metals, 45 00:03:09,200 --> 00:03:11,920 Speaker 1: and how the whole universe is filled with an invisible 46 00:03:12,000 --> 00:03:16,480 Speaker 1: Higgs field that gives matter to microscopic particles. It's incredible 47 00:03:16,520 --> 00:03:19,520 Speaker 1: what we have learned about the nature of the universe. 48 00:03:19,639 --> 00:03:22,120 Speaker 1: The very fact that you are hearing this podcast right 49 00:03:22,160 --> 00:03:26,040 Speaker 1: now relies deeply on our understanding of the basic rules 50 00:03:26,080 --> 00:03:29,600 Speaker 1: of the universe and our ability to manipulate and rely 51 00:03:29,840 --> 00:03:33,920 Speaker 1: on them. But why is that possible? Why does it 52 00:03:34,040 --> 00:03:36,960 Speaker 1: even work? Because what I said a moment ago was 53 00:03:37,040 --> 00:03:39,920 Speaker 1: a bit of a stretch of the truth. For all 54 00:03:39,960 --> 00:03:43,560 Speaker 1: of the successes of particle physics, we don't actually have 55 00:03:43,680 --> 00:03:47,000 Speaker 1: an understanding of the basic rules of the universe. We 56 00:03:47,040 --> 00:03:50,160 Speaker 1: don't know what the basic bits of the universe are 57 00:03:50,480 --> 00:03:54,120 Speaker 1: and what their rules are. Are they strings? Is it 58 00:03:54,160 --> 00:03:57,640 Speaker 1: a quantum foam? Is it something completely different than we 59 00:03:57,720 --> 00:04:01,320 Speaker 1: haven't yet or maybe could never even imagine or grapple with. 60 00:04:01,480 --> 00:04:03,800 Speaker 1: What we do have is a set of rules that 61 00:04:03,840 --> 00:04:06,680 Speaker 1: work for the experiments that we can do, but we're 62 00:04:06,720 --> 00:04:10,120 Speaker 1: pretty sure it's not the final answer, not that they're 63 00:04:10,120 --> 00:04:12,640 Speaker 1: wrong and it's all a hoax, but that it will 64 00:04:12,680 --> 00:04:17,000 Speaker 1: be eventually replaced by a deeper understanding. The way Newton's 65 00:04:17,080 --> 00:04:19,880 Speaker 1: physics worked for the experiments that could be done in 66 00:04:19,960 --> 00:04:24,320 Speaker 1: his day, but we're later replaced by Einstein's more general theory. 67 00:04:24,760 --> 00:04:27,320 Speaker 1: The way you can use F equals m A to 68 00:04:27,360 --> 00:04:30,200 Speaker 1: calculate how a ball flies through the air, and it 69 00:04:30,279 --> 00:04:33,800 Speaker 1: certainly works even if you don't understand the quantum frothing 70 00:04:33,920 --> 00:04:36,719 Speaker 1: happening inside of it. What we have in particle physics 71 00:04:36,800 --> 00:04:40,159 Speaker 1: is the same thing. We don't think it's fundamental. We 72 00:04:40,160 --> 00:04:43,080 Speaker 1: don't think it describes the basic bits of the universe. 73 00:04:43,240 --> 00:04:46,760 Speaker 1: We think it's effective, meaning that it works, but it 74 00:04:46,800 --> 00:04:51,680 Speaker 1: describes things that emerge from the fundamental pieces. But it 75 00:04:51,760 --> 00:04:54,680 Speaker 1: still works even though we don't know what the basic 76 00:04:54,720 --> 00:04:57,200 Speaker 1: pieces are and the rules that they obey. We have 77 00:04:57,360 --> 00:05:00,440 Speaker 1: found the non basic pieces and the rules that those 78 00:05:00,560 --> 00:05:04,719 Speaker 1: non basic pieces obey. For example, we have rules of 79 00:05:04,760 --> 00:05:08,520 Speaker 1: economics and they mostly work. But people and money are 80 00:05:08,560 --> 00:05:11,719 Speaker 1: not fundamental elements of the universe. You can have a 81 00:05:11,800 --> 00:05:14,799 Speaker 1: universe without people and money, and most of the history 82 00:05:14,800 --> 00:05:18,040 Speaker 1: of the universe didn't have people or money. But once 83 00:05:18,120 --> 00:05:21,320 Speaker 1: people and money emerge, you don't have to describe the 84 00:05:21,360 --> 00:05:25,599 Speaker 1: economy of a country using particle physics or string theory. 85 00:05:26,160 --> 00:05:30,040 Speaker 1: You can find basic mathematical laws that describe economics and 86 00:05:30,120 --> 00:05:33,240 Speaker 1: are pretty simple, just like F equals I may is 87 00:05:33,279 --> 00:05:37,600 Speaker 1: pretty simple, but it ignores all of the quantum details underneath. 88 00:05:38,080 --> 00:05:41,240 Speaker 1: So why does that work? Why is it possible? And 89 00:05:41,279 --> 00:05:44,960 Speaker 1: what does it mean about whether what we have learned 90 00:05:45,120 --> 00:05:49,560 Speaker 1: is true and fundamental to the universe, a real description 91 00:05:49,600 --> 00:05:51,640 Speaker 1: of what's out there, or if it's just a set 92 00:05:51,640 --> 00:05:55,200 Speaker 1: of mathematical stories that humans tell ourselves that happen to 93 00:05:55,279 --> 00:05:58,279 Speaker 1: work very well. So today on the podcast, we'll be 94 00:05:58,320 --> 00:06:07,279 Speaker 1: asking the question why does physics even work? Why is 95 00:06:07,279 --> 00:06:11,240 Speaker 1: it possible to tell mathematical stories about the universe out 96 00:06:11,240 --> 00:06:15,360 Speaker 1: there without knowing the deepest underlying truth. We know it's 97 00:06:15,400 --> 00:06:19,200 Speaker 1: possible to make chicken soup and iPhones without knowing quantum gravity, 98 00:06:19,360 --> 00:06:22,480 Speaker 1: but why can we Does that mean that the stories 99 00:06:22,560 --> 00:06:25,200 Speaker 1: we are telling, the physics ideas we have developed are 100 00:06:25,240 --> 00:06:29,000 Speaker 1: not real in some deep, true sense. Would alien scientists 101 00:06:29,040 --> 00:06:31,320 Speaker 1: come up with the same theories or have a different 102 00:06:31,480 --> 00:06:34,920 Speaker 1: concept of how to describe the universe. To help us 103 00:06:34,920 --> 00:06:37,520 Speaker 1: probe these questions, I've invited an expert in this area, 104 00:06:37,600 --> 00:06:41,279 Speaker 1: Professor Tim O'Connor. Tim is a professor of philosophy and 105 00:06:41,320 --> 00:06:45,160 Speaker 1: cognitive science at Indiana University, where he specializes in these 106 00:06:45,160 --> 00:06:49,600 Speaker 1: types of questions and especially the phenomenon of emergence cases 107 00:06:49,640 --> 00:06:52,200 Speaker 1: where it's possible to describe things at a higher level 108 00:06:52,560 --> 00:07:05,359 Speaker 1: without knowing the underlying pieces. So it's my pleasure to 109 00:07:05,600 --> 00:07:09,080 Speaker 1: introduce to the podcast Professor Tim O'Connor Tim. Thank you 110 00:07:09,160 --> 00:07:12,120 Speaker 1: very much for joining us today. Glad to be with you, Daniel. 111 00:07:12,280 --> 00:07:14,480 Speaker 1: As well as being an expert on philosophy of science 112 00:07:14,480 --> 00:07:16,640 Speaker 1: and emergence, I see that you also claimed the title 113 00:07:16,680 --> 00:07:20,480 Speaker 1: of Philo Pong World Grand Champion or the world's leading 114 00:07:20,560 --> 00:07:24,640 Speaker 1: table tennis player among properly credential philosophers. Tell us about 115 00:07:24,640 --> 00:07:26,680 Speaker 1: how you figure that out? How you determined that you 116 00:07:26,680 --> 00:07:34,480 Speaker 1: could claim that title. Oh, I declared the title, and 117 00:07:34,680 --> 00:07:38,280 Speaker 1: the interesting thing is that no philosophers have disputed that 118 00:07:38,360 --> 00:07:40,840 Speaker 1: I hold the title, and I think the reason is 119 00:07:40,960 --> 00:07:44,960 Speaker 1: that those who like to play serious table tennis figured 120 00:07:45,000 --> 00:07:46,880 Speaker 1: out that. Great. Then all I have to do is 121 00:07:46,920 --> 00:07:49,280 Speaker 1: beat you, and then I get to claim the title. 122 00:07:49,360 --> 00:07:52,560 Speaker 1: So I have defended the title on a few occasions. Um, 123 00:07:52,600 --> 00:07:55,400 Speaker 1: but I expect to be losing the title the next 124 00:07:55,440 --> 00:07:57,120 Speaker 1: time I go back to China. Well, I think it 125 00:07:57,160 --> 00:07:59,880 Speaker 1: made me says something about philosophy that you can just do, 126 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:02,120 Speaker 1: say yourself champion, and then you know, see, if it 127 00:08:02,160 --> 00:08:04,480 Speaker 1: stands up to scrutiny, that's it. It's kind of like 128 00:08:04,520 --> 00:08:07,680 Speaker 1: a homesteading thing. If no one disputes it, then at 129 00:08:07,720 --> 00:08:10,600 Speaker 1: a certain point that's I own it exactly. So, when 130 00:08:10,640 --> 00:08:14,040 Speaker 1: you're not winning ping pong matches, you're a philosopher of science, 131 00:08:14,120 --> 00:08:16,559 Speaker 1: tell us about that. What got you into philosophy of science? 132 00:08:16,600 --> 00:08:19,160 Speaker 1: What are the most important questions in your mind that 133 00:08:19,160 --> 00:08:23,000 Speaker 1: we should be asking about our universe? Great? Uh so, well, 134 00:08:23,120 --> 00:08:27,360 Speaker 1: I start out and still think of myself fundamentally as 135 00:08:27,400 --> 00:08:33,280 Speaker 1: a metaphysician, where metaphysics asks the really most general foundational 136 00:08:33,400 --> 00:08:40,199 Speaker 1: questions about reality, about fundamental categories like object, property, space, time. 137 00:08:40,360 --> 00:08:44,080 Speaker 1: Does the physics wholly determine what one should think about 138 00:08:44,080 --> 00:08:48,240 Speaker 1: space and time? It certainly constraints, um, what one should say, 139 00:08:48,320 --> 00:08:50,960 Speaker 1: and I'm more in the latter campic constraints, but doesn't 140 00:08:50,960 --> 00:08:53,720 Speaker 1: wholly determine how we think about it. But the relationship 141 00:08:53,800 --> 00:08:58,160 Speaker 1: of philosophy metaphysics to science is a challenging question in 142 00:08:58,240 --> 00:09:02,120 Speaker 1: its own right. And of course the two subjects originally 143 00:09:02,200 --> 00:09:05,280 Speaker 1: refused in the history of Western thought, going all the 144 00:09:05,280 --> 00:09:08,720 Speaker 1: way back to thinkers like Aristotle. But well on up 145 00:09:08,760 --> 00:09:12,080 Speaker 1: to the time of Newton. Um you had a one 146 00:09:12,160 --> 00:09:16,720 Speaker 1: job title natural philosopher, which was a description of science 147 00:09:16,800 --> 00:09:19,719 Speaker 1: as we think of it, as those philosophical questions that 148 00:09:19,880 --> 00:09:23,640 Speaker 1: concerned the natural world. And I think it's beginning with Newton, 149 00:09:23,880 --> 00:09:28,640 Speaker 1: who famously, when pressed for an account or an explanation 150 00:09:28,720 --> 00:09:33,199 Speaker 1: of how his theory of gravitational attraction action at a distance, 151 00:09:33,679 --> 00:09:36,280 Speaker 1: how we could conceive it seemed inconceivable, how we could 152 00:09:36,280 --> 00:09:38,600 Speaker 1: make sense of that, he famously said about you know, 153 00:09:38,640 --> 00:09:42,480 Speaker 1: about that, I feigned no hypotheses. And he's beginning to 154 00:09:42,520 --> 00:09:45,360 Speaker 1: show a certain sort of well, you know, you might 155 00:09:45,440 --> 00:09:48,400 Speaker 1: ask a certain kind of philosophical question, but as far 156 00:09:48,480 --> 00:09:53,160 Speaker 1: as doing science, which is what fundamentally Newton was up to, Uh, 157 00:09:53,200 --> 00:09:58,080 Speaker 1: the theory works beautifully, the mathematics works, it's predictively successful, 158 00:09:58,200 --> 00:10:00,400 Speaker 1: and so he was willing to go with that. So 159 00:10:00,440 --> 00:10:02,120 Speaker 1: I want to talk to you specifically in a bit 160 00:10:02,160 --> 00:10:05,479 Speaker 1: about emergence and how the world that surrounds us arises 161 00:10:05,480 --> 00:10:06,800 Speaker 1: and how we make sense of it. At first, I 162 00:10:06,800 --> 00:10:08,440 Speaker 1: want to start with a bigger picture of why we 163 00:10:08,480 --> 00:10:11,520 Speaker 1: ask these questions. As you say, we see that science works, 164 00:10:11,960 --> 00:10:13,880 Speaker 1: We know that it does. It's the reason that we're 165 00:10:13,880 --> 00:10:16,800 Speaker 1: talking right now. So if Newton doesn't care about questions 166 00:10:16,840 --> 00:10:19,240 Speaker 1: like why does it work? Or you know, is the 167 00:10:19,320 --> 00:10:21,839 Speaker 1: universe out there real or is it just a story 168 00:10:21,840 --> 00:10:24,240 Speaker 1: in our minds, why do we care about those questions? 169 00:10:24,240 --> 00:10:27,840 Speaker 1: Why are those questions important to figure out? Because ultimately, 170 00:10:27,840 --> 00:10:30,920 Speaker 1: I think we were driven to wanting to have a 171 00:10:30,920 --> 00:10:36,800 Speaker 1: consumption of reality on which it's explicable. Uh it makes sense. 172 00:10:36,840 --> 00:10:39,800 Speaker 1: I mean explicable, not in the sense necessarily if involving 173 00:10:39,880 --> 00:10:43,800 Speaker 1: purpose or anything like that, but just rationally explicable. And 174 00:10:43,960 --> 00:10:50,640 Speaker 1: so simply retreating to um an instrumentalist few syite of science, 175 00:10:50,880 --> 00:10:56,520 Speaker 1: UM saying it's science just delivers sophisticated instruments that enable 176 00:10:56,640 --> 00:11:01,880 Speaker 1: you to predict future observations and ultimate control future patterns 177 00:11:01,920 --> 00:11:06,040 Speaker 1: to degree through technology. That sort of conception leaves open 178 00:11:06,080 --> 00:11:08,240 Speaker 1: you know why, but why does it work? It can 179 00:11:08,320 --> 00:11:14,400 Speaker 1: seem like a cosmic coincidence um, that reality exhibits deep patterns. 180 00:11:14,440 --> 00:11:17,080 Speaker 1: If all you're willing to say is there are these 181 00:11:17,160 --> 00:11:21,439 Speaker 1: deep patterns and there's no rational intelligibility behind them. So 182 00:11:21,679 --> 00:11:25,080 Speaker 1: not everyone shares it, but it's the fundamental philosophical impetus 183 00:11:26,160 --> 00:11:30,320 Speaker 1: I guess to want to understand why things are as 184 00:11:30,400 --> 00:11:35,720 Speaker 1: they are. Um, And so depending on one's conception of science, 185 00:11:35,720 --> 00:11:38,400 Speaker 1: science may or may not even give you that right. 186 00:11:38,720 --> 00:11:43,240 Speaker 1: So so there are famous scientists too who insisted that 187 00:11:43,280 --> 00:11:46,640 Speaker 1: in a sense, science doesn't yield explanation. I mean, Richard 188 00:11:46,640 --> 00:11:50,800 Speaker 1: Feyneman did make noises along those lines. Famous twentieth century 189 00:11:50,800 --> 00:11:55,120 Speaker 1: physicists never been others. He said, uh yeah, he's got 190 00:11:55,160 --> 00:11:57,280 Speaker 1: a great quote somewhere. He says, you know, you want 191 00:11:57,320 --> 00:12:00,880 Speaker 1: to understand, you know, what reality is like, go ask 192 00:12:00,920 --> 00:12:05,559 Speaker 1: a philosopher dripping with this. You're saying, physics doesn't give 193 00:12:05,559 --> 00:12:10,000 Speaker 1: you that. Physics gives you these sophisticate instruments or devices 194 00:12:10,440 --> 00:12:14,640 Speaker 1: in the form of theories, powerful mathematics, mathematized theories that 195 00:12:14,840 --> 00:12:18,440 Speaker 1: are predictively successful, and that's it. But most scientists, in 196 00:12:18,440 --> 00:12:21,760 Speaker 1: my experience, they are you know, scientific realists. They think 197 00:12:21,800 --> 00:12:24,439 Speaker 1: that the things that we're probing are really out there. 198 00:12:24,440 --> 00:12:26,480 Speaker 1: I mean, the reason that I'm a particle physicist and 199 00:12:26,520 --> 00:12:29,760 Speaker 1: not a mathematician is that I want to know what's 200 00:12:29,760 --> 00:12:32,360 Speaker 1: really out there. I think of myself was revealing the truth. 201 00:12:32,400 --> 00:12:35,400 Speaker 1: And when I'm at cern if I ask people, hey, 202 00:12:35,400 --> 00:12:37,839 Speaker 1: do you think the Higgs boson that we discovered is real? 203 00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:40,319 Speaker 1: Or is it just something in our models that let's 204 00:12:40,480 --> 00:12:43,120 Speaker 1: accurately predict experiments, most of them would look at me 205 00:12:43,160 --> 00:12:45,400 Speaker 1: like I'm crazy, you know, like I had something bad 206 00:12:45,440 --> 00:12:48,800 Speaker 1: for lunch. It feels to me like they're doing philosophy 207 00:12:48,960 --> 00:12:52,080 Speaker 1: by rejecting the question, even though they don't imagine they're 208 00:12:52,120 --> 00:12:54,200 Speaker 1: doing philosophy. Why do you think that's sort of the 209 00:12:54,320 --> 00:12:58,440 Speaker 1: natural position of most physicists to imagine, you know, a 210 00:12:58,480 --> 00:13:02,120 Speaker 1: strong philosophical argument and um that everything we're out there 211 00:13:02,240 --> 00:13:04,720 Speaker 1: is actually real. Why do you think that most physicists 212 00:13:04,760 --> 00:13:08,600 Speaker 1: don't consider the whole spectrum of philosophical positions there? I 213 00:13:08,640 --> 00:13:13,559 Speaker 1: think because it's a sort of natural or default human inclination. 214 00:13:13,800 --> 00:13:16,440 Speaker 1: First of all, to be a metaphysical realist in the 215 00:13:16,800 --> 00:13:19,080 Speaker 1: in the minimal sense of there is a way the 216 00:13:19,080 --> 00:13:23,760 Speaker 1: world is subjectively speaking, and then to go beyond that, 217 00:13:23,880 --> 00:13:30,000 Speaker 1: to think if we have powerfully predictively accurate ways of 218 00:13:30,360 --> 00:13:36,440 Speaker 1: describing the patterns of our experiences. Then those must correspond 219 00:13:36,559 --> 00:13:39,880 Speaker 1: to something objective. If I'm being very vague here, but 220 00:13:40,400 --> 00:13:44,400 Speaker 1: something in reality is accounting for the fact that our 221 00:13:44,480 --> 00:13:49,160 Speaker 1: inductions are successful. It may not be a perfect isomorphic 222 00:13:49,320 --> 00:13:53,000 Speaker 1: overlap right between what we say, either in common sense 223 00:13:53,679 --> 00:13:57,720 Speaker 1: predictions or categorizations, or even in high level theory, but 224 00:13:58,040 --> 00:14:03,240 Speaker 1: there's some degree of congruents um there. We're tracking. I 225 00:14:03,280 --> 00:14:05,040 Speaker 1: guess with what I'm trying to say, we must be 226 00:14:05,120 --> 00:14:09,520 Speaker 1: tracking something real. And then when you think about fundamental physics, 227 00:14:09,559 --> 00:14:14,359 Speaker 1: because it's going so deep into the foundations, the inclination, 228 00:14:14,480 --> 00:14:17,880 Speaker 1: I guess it becomes natural to think we're getting closer 229 00:14:17,920 --> 00:14:21,960 Speaker 1: and closer to it isomorphism. The categories we're using are 230 00:14:22,080 --> 00:14:27,000 Speaker 1: are are tracking very directly these entities. But it feels 231 00:14:27,080 --> 00:14:31,440 Speaker 1: something more squishy than we usually find in physics. You know, physics, 232 00:14:31,480 --> 00:14:34,480 Speaker 1: we have math and calculations and these sorts of things. 233 00:14:34,680 --> 00:14:37,880 Speaker 1: Here we're talking about like a feeling that what we're 234 00:14:37,880 --> 00:14:40,960 Speaker 1: seeing out there is real, and you know, our ideas 235 00:14:40,960 --> 00:14:43,200 Speaker 1: about the universe must be real. It feels a little 236 00:14:43,200 --> 00:14:47,920 Speaker 1: bit more susceptible to you know, cultural bias or parochialism, 237 00:14:48,160 --> 00:14:50,600 Speaker 1: or thinking the way people have always thought. To me, 238 00:14:50,720 --> 00:14:52,680 Speaker 1: one way to make sense of this question, to make 239 00:14:52,680 --> 00:14:55,320 Speaker 1: it a bit more concrete, is imagine a scenario like 240 00:14:55,480 --> 00:14:59,360 Speaker 1: we meet alien physicists and we talk to them about 241 00:14:59,360 --> 00:15:02,120 Speaker 1: the universe. If what we're learning about the universe is 242 00:15:02,200 --> 00:15:04,440 Speaker 1: real in a sense that it's not just biased by 243 00:15:04,440 --> 00:15:07,200 Speaker 1: our human conception, then we can imagine maybe they have 244 00:15:07,280 --> 00:15:09,880 Speaker 1: discovered the same things. They also found the Higgs boson, 245 00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:12,400 Speaker 1: and they have group theory as a foundation of their 246 00:15:12,480 --> 00:15:15,240 Speaker 1: description of the fundamental particles. But if it's not, if 247 00:15:15,320 --> 00:15:19,160 Speaker 1: instead we have some human element to this understanding, or 248 00:15:19,160 --> 00:15:21,960 Speaker 1: that what's out there has no relationship, you know, to 249 00:15:22,040 --> 00:15:24,320 Speaker 1: the model that we've built other than that it works, 250 00:15:24,920 --> 00:15:28,560 Speaker 1: then maybe aliens would have completely separate ideas about physics. 251 00:15:29,120 --> 00:15:31,600 Speaker 1: You think that's a reasonable way to frame this question 252 00:15:31,640 --> 00:15:33,800 Speaker 1: of whether what we're probing is real, whether it could 253 00:15:33,880 --> 00:15:36,720 Speaker 1: also exist in the minds of other intelligent creatures. Sure, 254 00:15:37,520 --> 00:15:40,760 Speaker 1: I mean imagine first of all that at some stage 255 00:15:40,760 --> 00:15:44,480 Speaker 1: in physics, um clever theorist story able to come up 256 00:15:44,560 --> 00:15:50,440 Speaker 1: with two very different ways of categorizing phenomena, but they 257 00:15:50,480 --> 00:15:54,560 Speaker 1: were equally predictively successful. Then I think the natural conclusion 258 00:15:54,600 --> 00:15:57,560 Speaker 1: we would all draw, as it's underdetermined, at most one 259 00:15:57,600 --> 00:16:00,920 Speaker 1: of these, if they're incompatible frameworks. Uh, at most one 260 00:16:00,960 --> 00:16:05,600 Speaker 1: of these is true. Perhaps neither. Um we need more information. 261 00:16:05,880 --> 00:16:08,920 Speaker 1: But one of the great, of course achievements of physics 262 00:16:08,960 --> 00:16:13,960 Speaker 1: has been to increasingly try to break away from a 263 00:16:14,360 --> 00:16:18,280 Speaker 1: narrowly provincially human way of looking at things. That's very 264 00:16:18,320 --> 00:16:20,120 Speaker 1: difficult to do. And at some point I expect we'll 265 00:16:20,120 --> 00:16:22,960 Speaker 1: come back to this. I think there are limits to 266 00:16:23,560 --> 00:16:27,560 Speaker 1: how far one can go with that rationally, because at 267 00:16:27,600 --> 00:16:31,200 Speaker 1: the foundation of the evidence for scientific theories, right the 268 00:16:31,240 --> 00:16:35,640 Speaker 1: epistemology of science, are scientists in the activity of science. 269 00:16:35,760 --> 00:16:40,240 Speaker 1: And we can't end up endorsing frameworks in which we 270 00:16:40,320 --> 00:16:45,160 Speaker 1: cannot locate the rational inquirer in the community of inquirers 271 00:16:45,160 --> 00:16:48,840 Speaker 1: and there and the activity of inquiring. And I have questions. 272 00:16:48,920 --> 00:16:51,600 Speaker 1: It's very challenging. But you know, some of the more 273 00:16:51,640 --> 00:16:56,800 Speaker 1: speculative attempts to unify fundamental particle physics and you know, 274 00:16:56,920 --> 00:17:01,400 Speaker 1: large scale cosmology, I worry that they they're udding up against, um, 275 00:17:01,600 --> 00:17:06,240 Speaker 1: these kinds of limits that they're they're positing models that 276 00:17:06,320 --> 00:17:11,480 Speaker 1: we could imagine for some entirely disconnected reality. Right, they're 277 00:17:11,520 --> 00:17:15,240 Speaker 1: perfectly coherent models for describing something, But could they describe 278 00:17:15,240 --> 00:17:18,960 Speaker 1: our reality? Could we have reason to believe? Right? You know, 279 00:17:19,040 --> 00:17:21,680 Speaker 1: there there, we are right in that question. Could we 280 00:17:21,800 --> 00:17:25,520 Speaker 1: have reason to believe that we inhabit a world correctly 281 00:17:25,960 --> 00:17:28,800 Speaker 1: depicted by this model? There's a tricky question there at 282 00:17:28,840 --> 00:17:31,920 Speaker 1: the limit. It's certainly interesting to wonder about whether humans 283 00:17:31,960 --> 00:17:35,240 Speaker 1: can imagine what humans can't imagine, right? Can we think 284 00:17:35,240 --> 00:17:38,160 Speaker 1: our way out of our own box? It's it's certainly unknown. 285 00:17:38,200 --> 00:17:40,840 Speaker 1: I'm really curious about the point you made earlier about 286 00:17:40,920 --> 00:17:44,919 Speaker 1: whether there could be alternative and completely functional descriptions of 287 00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:48,359 Speaker 1: the universe that are conceptually different. Like if I describe 288 00:17:48,560 --> 00:17:50,760 Speaker 1: the universe with my theory of everything and it has 289 00:17:50,880 --> 00:17:53,080 Speaker 1: squiggles in it, and I say, look, my theory works, 290 00:17:53,119 --> 00:17:55,560 Speaker 1: squiggles must be real, and you know, you have your 291 00:17:55,600 --> 00:17:57,960 Speaker 1: theory and it has squaggles in it, and you're like, no, 292 00:17:58,040 --> 00:18:01,000 Speaker 1: squaggles are totally different from squiggles, and my predictions are 293 00:18:01,080 --> 00:18:02,960 Speaker 1: just as good as yours. Then you're saying, we're faced 294 00:18:03,000 --> 00:18:06,199 Speaker 1: with a question, are squaggles real? Are squiggles real? Is 295 00:18:06,240 --> 00:18:09,639 Speaker 1: anything actually real? Is that the basic idea. And doesn't 296 00:18:09,720 --> 00:18:14,000 Speaker 1: that sound very similar to the current situation about the 297 00:18:14,080 --> 00:18:17,359 Speaker 1: nature of fundamental particles and the questions about quantum mechanics. Right, 298 00:18:17,400 --> 00:18:20,280 Speaker 1: we have very very different conceptions of like what is 299 00:18:20,359 --> 00:18:24,440 Speaker 1: real at the smallest scale, relational quantum mechanics, boney and mechanics, 300 00:18:24,520 --> 00:18:27,880 Speaker 1: all apart from the you know, sort of orthodoxical Copenhagen interpretation, 301 00:18:28,119 --> 00:18:30,360 Speaker 1: aren't we sort of in that situation. None of those 302 00:18:30,400 --> 00:18:34,040 Speaker 1: theories give any real variation in their predictions, but they 303 00:18:34,080 --> 00:18:37,879 Speaker 1: have completely different stories about what's happening in the microscopic scale. 304 00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:40,560 Speaker 1: Does that mean that nothing is real or just that 305 00:18:40,600 --> 00:18:43,760 Speaker 1: we haven't found which one is real? I think the latter, 306 00:18:43,840 --> 00:18:46,159 Speaker 1: that we haven't found which one is real. And of 307 00:18:46,200 --> 00:18:49,320 Speaker 1: course you're the expert here, not me, But I like 308 00:18:49,400 --> 00:18:52,480 Speaker 1: to chat with the philosophers of physics and the occasional 309 00:18:52,560 --> 00:18:58,600 Speaker 1: particle there theoretical physicist about the conceptual challenges in in 310 00:18:58,760 --> 00:19:04,320 Speaker 1: quantum mechanics and in unifying quantum mechanics with space time theories, 311 00:19:04,560 --> 00:19:07,480 Speaker 1: and so as I'm told. For example, so you've got 312 00:19:07,520 --> 00:19:11,320 Speaker 1: this Bowman interpretation, one interesting feature of which is it's 313 00:19:11,359 --> 00:19:16,200 Speaker 1: a deterministic theory about the dynamics of the universe, unlike 314 00:19:16,320 --> 00:19:18,960 Speaker 1: at least a couple of the other leading theories. Whether 315 00:19:19,040 --> 00:19:22,400 Speaker 1: or not we call many universe theory a deterministic theory 316 00:19:22,480 --> 00:19:25,600 Speaker 1: is a somewhat subtle question, I think. But I'm told 317 00:19:25,920 --> 00:19:30,119 Speaker 1: that while these four frameworks all have the same predictive 318 00:19:30,240 --> 00:19:33,920 Speaker 1: consequences for the kinds of experiments we can do now 319 00:19:34,119 --> 00:19:38,240 Speaker 1: or have done, that, there are in principle Bowman mechanics 320 00:19:38,280 --> 00:19:43,040 Speaker 1: could have um different predictions, and so we could potentially, 321 00:19:43,640 --> 00:19:45,680 Speaker 1: I don't know how far off this might be, but 322 00:19:45,760 --> 00:19:50,080 Speaker 1: we could potentially have evidence that bore differentially between bow 323 00:19:50,080 --> 00:19:53,320 Speaker 1: Mean mechanics and at least some of the alternatives. So 324 00:19:53,400 --> 00:19:56,199 Speaker 1: that suggests, yeah, we don't know. So then we're just 325 00:19:56,480 --> 00:19:59,320 Speaker 1: right currently, you know. But we're still interested in the question. 326 00:19:59,400 --> 00:20:01,680 Speaker 1: It may not upen in our lifetime. So the question 327 00:20:01,760 --> 00:20:05,760 Speaker 1: is should we be completely agnostic? And here the different 328 00:20:05,800 --> 00:20:10,480 Speaker 1: theories have different kinds of theoretical virtues and vices. Insofars, 329 00:20:10,560 --> 00:20:16,159 Speaker 1: one is willing to say purely general characteristics of theories 330 00:20:16,359 --> 00:20:21,520 Speaker 1: in terms of simplicity of ontology and things like that, 331 00:20:21,880 --> 00:20:25,400 Speaker 1: or whether it makes you requires you to make certain 332 00:20:25,560 --> 00:20:30,200 Speaker 1: very outlandish seeming hypotheses, whether you give that any kind 333 00:20:30,240 --> 00:20:34,199 Speaker 1: of evidential weight at all might determine whether or not 334 00:20:34,240 --> 00:20:37,360 Speaker 1: you think we have reason to lean in one direction 335 00:20:37,440 --> 00:20:40,200 Speaker 1: or the other, even if we don't have conclusive evidence. Well, 336 00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:42,800 Speaker 1: I hope that experimentalists are clever enough to come up 337 00:20:42,840 --> 00:20:45,480 Speaker 1: with ways to test these various hypotheses and tell us 338 00:20:45,640 --> 00:20:48,680 Speaker 1: what's actually happening at the smallest scale one day. So 339 00:20:48,720 --> 00:20:51,320 Speaker 1: I have a lot more questions for you, especially about emergence. 340 00:20:51,440 --> 00:21:06,560 Speaker 1: But first let's take a quick break. All right, we're 341 00:21:06,560 --> 00:21:09,879 Speaker 1: back and we're talking to Professor Tim O'Connor, philosopher of 342 00:21:09,920 --> 00:21:14,119 Speaker 1: science and follow upon, Grand Champion of the World, who's 343 00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:17,520 Speaker 1: answering my naive questions about philosophy of science and whether 344 00:21:17,560 --> 00:21:20,960 Speaker 1: we can understand what's out there and whether it's real. 345 00:21:21,280 --> 00:21:23,119 Speaker 1: I first came to read your work because I was 346 00:21:23,240 --> 00:21:26,919 Speaker 1: very interested in the question of emergence cases where we 347 00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:30,000 Speaker 1: can describe things we see in the world using rules 348 00:21:30,000 --> 00:21:32,960 Speaker 1: that are very different from the rules of the underlying bits. 349 00:21:32,960 --> 00:21:34,399 Speaker 1: It's like if you have a set of rules for 350 00:21:34,440 --> 00:21:36,720 Speaker 1: how legos work, but once you put the legos together 351 00:21:36,720 --> 00:21:39,879 Speaker 1: into complicated objects, you're better off describing their behavior in 352 00:21:39,960 --> 00:21:42,040 Speaker 1: a new set of rules, like in a game of 353 00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:45,199 Speaker 1: life where simple objects with simple rules come together and 354 00:21:45,359 --> 00:21:49,360 Speaker 1: very complex behavior emerges. How would you define this concept 355 00:21:49,440 --> 00:21:52,640 Speaker 1: of emergence and why in your views? Emergence and important 356 00:21:52,680 --> 00:21:56,719 Speaker 1: question in philosophy of science. Yeah, so it's always been 357 00:21:56,720 --> 00:22:00,000 Speaker 1: a controversial idea, and it emerged in the nineteenth century 358 00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:04,240 Speaker 1: people began thinking, uh, in emergence terms of it's it's 359 00:22:04,280 --> 00:22:07,879 Speaker 1: a question about the relationship of science at different levels 360 00:22:07,920 --> 00:22:11,959 Speaker 1: of grain. So, how does physics relate to chemistry, chemistry 361 00:22:12,000 --> 00:22:16,520 Speaker 1: to molecular biology, biology to organismic biology, and and so, 362 00:22:16,640 --> 00:22:20,720 Speaker 1: and then our biology to human psychology neuroscience and the 363 00:22:20,760 --> 00:22:25,160 Speaker 1: brain to human psychology. And the emergent test is a 364 00:22:25,200 --> 00:22:30,280 Speaker 1: person who, in very general terms thinks that organization of 365 00:22:30,359 --> 00:22:36,680 Speaker 1: certain kinds gives rise to new features, new new patterns 366 00:22:36,720 --> 00:22:40,679 Speaker 1: that have a certain degree of autonomy with respect to 367 00:22:40,720 --> 00:22:44,359 Speaker 1: the lower level underlying dynamics. It's a new form of 368 00:22:44,480 --> 00:22:48,200 Speaker 1: dynamics of patterns that the kinds of concepts you need 369 00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:50,720 Speaker 1: to describe what's going on are different than the kind 370 00:22:50,720 --> 00:22:53,360 Speaker 1: of concepts you need to do the lower level science. 371 00:22:53,680 --> 00:22:57,959 Speaker 1: And uh. Left at that um that there is emergencies 372 00:22:58,320 --> 00:23:01,800 Speaker 1: entirely uncontroversial. There is such a thing as chemistry, and 373 00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:05,879 Speaker 1: chemistry can be understood to a degree, at least at 374 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:09,639 Speaker 1: an elementary level apart from quantum mechanics, and certainly biology 375 00:23:09,680 --> 00:23:14,160 Speaker 1: can be understood without knowing anything about quantum physics and psychology, 376 00:23:14,200 --> 00:23:18,520 Speaker 1: you know, you one can even do psychology of various kinds, 377 00:23:18,640 --> 00:23:22,119 Speaker 1: of social psychology, of normal psychology, and so on without 378 00:23:22,200 --> 00:23:25,520 Speaker 1: knowing anything about physics or chemistry. So there are patterns 379 00:23:25,720 --> 00:23:28,360 Speaker 1: in the world that have to do with organized systems 380 00:23:28,359 --> 00:23:31,080 Speaker 1: of a certain kind, robust patterns, patterns where you can 381 00:23:31,119 --> 00:23:33,920 Speaker 1: predict phenomena. I mean, think about the fact that if 382 00:23:33,960 --> 00:23:37,160 Speaker 1: I were to go agree to fly out to California 383 00:23:37,280 --> 00:23:40,159 Speaker 1: to meet up with you, and three days later I 384 00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:44,600 Speaker 1: show up at your office door, and you quite confidently 385 00:23:44,720 --> 00:23:48,080 Speaker 1: believe that that's going to happen, And that involves the 386 00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:52,040 Speaker 1: movement of a hunk of matter that's coalesced in a 387 00:23:52,240 --> 00:23:57,280 Speaker 1: fairly organized way, transporting itself across a great deal of distance. 388 00:23:57,320 --> 00:24:01,680 Speaker 1: And could you predict that in terms of physics, Well, 389 00:24:01,760 --> 00:24:06,160 Speaker 1: certainly not, given your and given our computational limits. Right, 390 00:24:06,240 --> 00:24:08,840 Speaker 1: But you know, psychology works beautifully well, right, I mean, 391 00:24:08,960 --> 00:24:12,080 Speaker 1: we can predict human behavior to a certain degree just 392 00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:18,520 Speaker 1: by attributing to people beliefs, desires, intentions, uh, and so on, 393 00:24:18,840 --> 00:24:21,880 Speaker 1: and you can be completely ignorant. People were doing this 394 00:24:22,240 --> 00:24:26,080 Speaker 1: a thousand years ago, knowing nothing about the physical, underlying 395 00:24:26,080 --> 00:24:29,080 Speaker 1: physical structure of the world. So there's a sense in 396 00:24:29,119 --> 00:24:33,920 Speaker 1: which it's it's obviously true that there are emergent phenomena. 397 00:24:34,160 --> 00:24:38,560 Speaker 1: So weak emergence is the uncontroversial kind. Weak emergence says 398 00:24:38,680 --> 00:24:43,480 Speaker 1: there are organized phenomena that have their own characteristic forms 399 00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:47,440 Speaker 1: of activity, their own characteristic features, and the kind of 400 00:24:47,520 --> 00:24:51,160 Speaker 1: dynamics for how how this activity unfolds. But the weak 401 00:24:51,200 --> 00:24:56,280 Speaker 1: emergentis says all of that is fixed, in some sense 402 00:24:56,760 --> 00:25:02,439 Speaker 1: determined by the underlying most fundamental dynamics in our world, 403 00:25:02,640 --> 00:25:05,840 Speaker 1: the fundamental physical dynamics, whatever that turns out to be, 404 00:25:06,600 --> 00:25:11,359 Speaker 1: you know that lies at the root of everything. Fix 405 00:25:11,480 --> 00:25:15,320 Speaker 1: that across space and time, all the fundamental physics, right, 406 00:25:15,359 --> 00:25:19,879 Speaker 1: and you've thereby fixed all higher level phenomena in their patterns. So, 407 00:25:19,960 --> 00:25:21,720 Speaker 1: for example, like we're playing a game of ping pong, 408 00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:23,600 Speaker 1: or saying that we can describe the motion of the 409 00:25:23,600 --> 00:25:27,080 Speaker 1: ping pong ball using fairly simple rules, but fundamentally, even 410 00:25:27,080 --> 00:25:29,840 Speaker 1: though we can't calculate it today, those basic rules of 411 00:25:29,880 --> 00:25:32,240 Speaker 1: the ping pong ball come from the basic rules of 412 00:25:32,240 --> 00:25:34,720 Speaker 1: its constituents. That the twoing and throwing of all the 413 00:25:34,760 --> 00:25:37,520 Speaker 1: particles inside the ping pong ball adds up somehow to 414 00:25:37,760 --> 00:25:41,320 Speaker 1: F equals M A that is determined by the basic elements. 415 00:25:41,320 --> 00:25:44,080 Speaker 1: Is that is that the idea? Yes, And it's just 416 00:25:44,240 --> 00:25:47,320 Speaker 1: you know, computational limits on our part that we can't 417 00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:52,560 Speaker 1: discern it all right, So laplace the nineteenth century physicist mathematician, 418 00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:58,520 Speaker 1: you know, famously imagined a kind of disembodied intelligence who 419 00:25:58,560 --> 00:26:04,000 Speaker 1: had with subjects eurocomputational limits, right, could track all the 420 00:26:04,119 --> 00:26:08,720 Speaker 1: fundamental entities constituting space and time and their trajectories, and 421 00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:13,320 Speaker 1: discern the patterns the fundamental dynamics that drive those things 422 00:26:13,440 --> 00:26:17,119 Speaker 1: their interactions. And then the thought is you could, so 423 00:26:17,320 --> 00:26:20,480 Speaker 1: to speak, step back, uh and see the forest for 424 00:26:20,600 --> 00:26:23,600 Speaker 1: the trees, and could also notice then that there are 425 00:26:23,760 --> 00:26:28,480 Speaker 1: these structured uh features of of you know, more larger 426 00:26:28,680 --> 00:26:32,000 Speaker 1: regions of space and time and their interactions, and and 427 00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:35,840 Speaker 1: discern they have dynamics, and could in a very lorious 428 00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:38,880 Speaker 1: way for us at any rate, show that these high 429 00:26:38,960 --> 00:26:42,600 Speaker 1: level patterns don't disturb you might say, or add to 430 00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:45,960 Speaker 1: what's going on at the fundamental level, they're just a 431 00:26:46,040 --> 00:26:49,680 Speaker 1: structured consequence of it. It's a surprising fact why we 432 00:26:49,720 --> 00:26:52,920 Speaker 1: could imagine a boring flat world where there's just fundamental 433 00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:57,360 Speaker 1: physics but there was no interesting structured phenomena um, while 434 00:26:57,440 --> 00:26:59,600 Speaker 1: our world is not like that. And so that gives 435 00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:02,200 Speaker 1: rise to an interesting question even for the weak emergence. 436 00:27:02,200 --> 00:27:05,440 Speaker 1: So why is our world such that there are not 437 00:27:05,720 --> 00:27:10,800 Speaker 1: just fundamental physical patterns that fix everything, but also these 438 00:27:11,200 --> 00:27:15,640 Speaker 1: higher levels structured phenomena. It seems conceivable that that there 439 00:27:15,680 --> 00:27:19,359 Speaker 1: could be alternative physics where that just never happens. So 440 00:27:19,480 --> 00:27:21,399 Speaker 1: to me, that's a that's a really fascinating question. I 441 00:27:21,440 --> 00:27:23,680 Speaker 1: can't let you go past that without exploring it more deeply. 442 00:27:23,800 --> 00:27:26,119 Speaker 1: To me, that's one of the deepest questions. Like in 443 00:27:26,200 --> 00:27:28,639 Speaker 1: the weak emergent case, where everything is determined by the 444 00:27:28,680 --> 00:27:33,040 Speaker 1: most fundamental principles, why is it then possible to find 445 00:27:33,119 --> 00:27:36,000 Speaker 1: this structure? Why is it possible to find fairly simple 446 00:27:36,119 --> 00:27:39,919 Speaker 1: mathematical laws with hugely reduced degrees of freedom? Right when 447 00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:41,919 Speaker 1: you talk about the ping pong ball and moving across 448 00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:43,720 Speaker 1: the table, you don't have to talk about all the 449 00:27:43,840 --> 00:27:46,119 Speaker 1: particles that are inside of it, as you say, there 450 00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:49,960 Speaker 1: are these simpler descriptions of structure that emerges. Is it 451 00:27:50,119 --> 00:27:53,680 Speaker 1: necessary that structure emerges? Why isn't it just the fundamental 452 00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:56,440 Speaker 1: bits and then basically chaos above that? You know, Why 453 00:27:56,480 --> 00:27:58,920 Speaker 1: isn't everything like a hurricane out of rain drops and 454 00:27:59,040 --> 00:28:02,960 Speaker 1: possible to predict no larger structure? Why does it these 455 00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:05,880 Speaker 1: simple explanations emerge. Do we understand that? To the best 456 00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:09,560 Speaker 1: of my knowledge? And no, since I've never encountered anyone 457 00:28:10,119 --> 00:28:14,160 Speaker 1: the many thinkers, scientists and philosophers who talk about emergence 458 00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:18,399 Speaker 1: who directly address that question and give kind of a full, 459 00:28:18,760 --> 00:28:22,360 Speaker 1: plausible sounding answers to it. And I'm almost thinking it's 460 00:28:22,440 --> 00:28:28,320 Speaker 1: a question for a mathematician or a physicist, you know, 461 00:28:28,440 --> 00:28:30,800 Speaker 1: kind of where's dual hats? As a mathematician, I mean, 462 00:28:31,119 --> 00:28:34,120 Speaker 1: so you you invoked the game of life. So John Conway, 463 00:28:34,560 --> 00:28:40,440 Speaker 1: famous mathematician, Uh, he described this the cellular automata, which 464 00:28:40,720 --> 00:28:43,360 Speaker 1: sounds complicated, but it's actually quite simple, right. It's like 465 00:28:43,480 --> 00:28:47,720 Speaker 1: it's almost like describing a reality, a two dimensional reality 466 00:28:48,120 --> 00:28:51,440 Speaker 1: that has very very simple property, so simple, much simpler 467 00:28:51,520 --> 00:28:55,080 Speaker 1: than fundamental physics. But what's really interesting about it is 468 00:28:55,520 --> 00:28:58,680 Speaker 1: he shows that depending on the initial conditions you said, 469 00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:01,960 Speaker 1: and then you just watch how grid changes over time. 470 00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:06,640 Speaker 1: Moment to moment, patterns emerge, Structured patterns emerge that don't 471 00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:10,720 Speaker 1: alter the basic rules of life are unchanged, and yet 472 00:29:10,760 --> 00:29:13,200 Speaker 1: there are these interesting patterns that can be understood in 473 00:29:13,240 --> 00:29:16,520 Speaker 1: their own terms. That way of framing at this very 474 00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:20,240 Speaker 1: elementary mathematical he should he shows it that it happens 475 00:29:20,320 --> 00:29:23,920 Speaker 1: in certain life worlds. You get these interesting patterns, and 476 00:29:24,000 --> 00:29:27,440 Speaker 1: then the question is whether it's almost sounds like the 477 00:29:27,640 --> 00:29:33,200 Speaker 1: territory of a mathematical proof of certain fundamental dynamics subject 478 00:29:33,280 --> 00:29:38,640 Speaker 1: to certain constraints that can be given a clear mathematical description, 479 00:29:39,320 --> 00:29:45,360 Speaker 1: necessarily will yield over um, given enough times, patterns of 480 00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:49,160 Speaker 1: structured interactions. At least, That's why I'm tempted to say 481 00:29:49,240 --> 00:29:51,880 Speaker 1: it's it's it's almost it's that kind of question. It's 482 00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:54,760 Speaker 1: fascinating to me. And you know, maybe, like the weakest 483 00:29:54,920 --> 00:29:57,680 Speaker 1: argument I could make to say that structure has to 484 00:29:57,760 --> 00:30:00,320 Speaker 1: emerge is that, well, maybe it doesn't a is, but 485 00:30:00,560 --> 00:30:03,200 Speaker 1: we exist in the universe where it has, because otherwise 486 00:30:03,640 --> 00:30:06,720 Speaker 1: we couldn't. I mean, we are structure right my mind, 487 00:30:06,880 --> 00:30:09,320 Speaker 1: my concept of myself, this conversation all of this is 488 00:30:09,360 --> 00:30:12,080 Speaker 1: emerging structure. I'm not a fundamental bit in the universe. 489 00:30:12,520 --> 00:30:16,040 Speaker 1: Neither you neither as humanity, maybe not you know consciousness, 490 00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:18,720 Speaker 1: So perhaps you know there are many universes out there, 491 00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:21,760 Speaker 1: and only in ones where structure does emerge at larger 492 00:30:21,840 --> 00:30:25,720 Speaker 1: scales can you have consciousness and podcasts and philosophy at 493 00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:28,200 Speaker 1: those scales. That seems to be sort of a very 494 00:30:28,240 --> 00:30:30,920 Speaker 1: weak argument. In physics, we have another concept, which is 495 00:30:31,160 --> 00:30:34,520 Speaker 1: normalization theory, which lets us say the theory we have 496 00:30:34,600 --> 00:30:37,320 Speaker 1: about particle physics right now is an effective theory. We 497 00:30:37,440 --> 00:30:40,360 Speaker 1: know that we know that electrons and quirks are probably 498 00:30:40,400 --> 00:30:42,880 Speaker 1: not the answer to the deepest question in the universe. 499 00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,920 Speaker 1: But we can abstract away all the really high energy stuff, 500 00:30:45,960 --> 00:30:48,240 Speaker 1: the stuff we can't probe today, the smaller bits in 501 00:30:48,400 --> 00:30:51,600 Speaker 1: terms of a few parameters, and Robert Wilson theory about 502 00:30:51,640 --> 00:30:54,600 Speaker 1: renewalization and all of this stuff and the decoupling theorem 503 00:30:54,720 --> 00:30:57,000 Speaker 1: lets us do this. But we don't really understand to 504 00:30:57,080 --> 00:31:00,600 Speaker 1: my knowledge why that is. It seems to it's sort 505 00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:02,640 Speaker 1: of like science and a larger scale. It seems to work. 506 00:31:02,800 --> 00:31:05,520 Speaker 1: We have these abilities to do this, but there's no 507 00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:07,400 Speaker 1: theory as far as I can tell, that tells us 508 00:31:07,640 --> 00:31:09,959 Speaker 1: why that happens. I mean, it's in another way, if 509 00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:12,720 Speaker 1: I gave you a fundamental description of the universe, could 510 00:31:12,800 --> 00:31:15,640 Speaker 1: you predict whether or not emergence comes out of it, 511 00:31:15,720 --> 00:31:18,520 Speaker 1: whether or not things emerge, or would you have to 512 00:31:18,640 --> 00:31:20,920 Speaker 1: run the simulation and observe it. To me, that's a 513 00:31:20,960 --> 00:31:25,120 Speaker 1: really interesting question. You know, why this stuff emerges at all? Yes, 514 00:31:25,600 --> 00:31:28,840 Speaker 1: And then of course there's the question of a different 515 00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:33,920 Speaker 1: kind of emergence. So strong emergence, which is non trivial, 516 00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:39,080 Speaker 1: it's not trivially manifest, is a notion of when under 517 00:31:39,160 --> 00:31:44,400 Speaker 1: certain structured conditions, properties of holes arise and they have 518 00:31:44,600 --> 00:31:49,360 Speaker 1: an influence on how things behave. And these properties do 519 00:31:50,800 --> 00:31:52,959 Speaker 1: uh add at the end of the day, and they 520 00:31:53,040 --> 00:31:56,120 Speaker 1: add to the fundamental dynamics of the world. They have 521 00:31:56,280 --> 00:31:59,320 Speaker 1: a kind of downward influence, and it goes all the 522 00:31:59,400 --> 00:32:03,400 Speaker 1: way down right. So it's as if it's a new force, 523 00:32:03,560 --> 00:32:06,000 Speaker 1: like property or something. I mean, how exactly we might 524 00:32:06,160 --> 00:32:12,200 Speaker 1: theorize such an irreducible property, irreducible but causing the effective property. 525 00:32:12,400 --> 00:32:14,080 Speaker 1: Perhaps there's more than one way we could do it. 526 00:32:14,200 --> 00:32:15,880 Speaker 1: But you know, just as a kind of rough and 527 00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:18,080 Speaker 1: ready initials start. You know, think of it as like 528 00:32:18,160 --> 00:32:22,760 Speaker 1: a new kind of structured force property or something that 529 00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:25,440 Speaker 1: adds to But this is sort of a shocking idea 530 00:32:25,520 --> 00:32:28,080 Speaker 1: to me, because as a particle physicist, I imagine a 531 00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:30,880 Speaker 1: reductionism works. If I want to understand big stuff, I 532 00:32:30,960 --> 00:32:32,479 Speaker 1: go to the small stuff, and I eventually I can 533 00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:35,440 Speaker 1: build up from there if I have infinite computing power, etcetera. 534 00:32:35,560 --> 00:32:38,000 Speaker 1: And you're suggesting that's not necessarily the case, that maybe 535 00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:40,440 Speaker 1: there are rules that exist at the higher level, of 536 00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:42,960 Speaker 1: the level of ping pong balls and ice cream, that 537 00:32:43,120 --> 00:32:46,240 Speaker 1: don't come out of the smallest bits, but somehow exists 538 00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:48,880 Speaker 1: only at that level. Is that right? Yeah? And and 539 00:32:49,040 --> 00:32:50,560 Speaker 1: so then I want to say, you know, it's an 540 00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:52,960 Speaker 1: empirical question. It ought to be thought of as a 541 00:32:53,200 --> 00:32:57,520 Speaker 1: straightforwardly empirical question whether there are emergent properties of that kind, 542 00:32:57,680 --> 00:33:02,560 Speaker 1: emergent properties and patterns and activity of of that stronger variety. 543 00:33:02,920 --> 00:33:07,200 Speaker 1: And for that I don't think fundamental physics is the 544 00:33:07,320 --> 00:33:11,320 Speaker 1: domain you go to, or certainly not by itself. I mean, 545 00:33:11,640 --> 00:33:16,840 Speaker 1: if we were Laplasians, pure disembodied infinite intelligence, well we 546 00:33:16,920 --> 00:33:19,080 Speaker 1: could we could do do it and say, well do 547 00:33:19,200 --> 00:33:22,320 Speaker 1: it do I is there any region of space time 548 00:33:22,920 --> 00:33:28,520 Speaker 1: we're running only with the fundamental dynamics breaks down right 549 00:33:28,640 --> 00:33:33,480 Speaker 1: in certain interestingly structured local regions, right, But we're not 550 00:33:34,120 --> 00:33:38,520 Speaker 1: such an intelligence and so and it's inconceivable at present 551 00:33:38,640 --> 00:33:43,040 Speaker 1: and probably forever, that we could directly monitor in real 552 00:33:43,200 --> 00:33:48,400 Speaker 1: time trillions upon trillions of variables corresponding to all the 553 00:33:48,520 --> 00:33:52,040 Speaker 1: particles both in and immediately within the light cone over 554 00:33:52,120 --> 00:33:54,760 Speaker 1: an interval of time, you know, some some sort of 555 00:33:54,880 --> 00:33:58,600 Speaker 1: organized phenomena and calculate, you know what, how we expect 556 00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:01,440 Speaker 1: all those interactions to go and see whether the particle 557 00:34:01,480 --> 00:34:04,680 Speaker 1: physics is sufficient for capturing what's going on in say 558 00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:08,080 Speaker 1: a human brain, to pick a likely target of a 559 00:34:08,280 --> 00:34:12,200 Speaker 1: strong emergences hypothesis. Right, And so that's a very attractive 560 00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:15,200 Speaker 1: question obviously. You know, we look at the human brain 561 00:34:15,320 --> 00:34:17,640 Speaker 1: and it's a lump of stuff. There are other lumps 562 00:34:17,719 --> 00:34:19,840 Speaker 1: of stuff that don't seem to be conscious. You know, 563 00:34:19,960 --> 00:34:22,480 Speaker 1: my desk, my chair are also lumps of stuff to 564 00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:25,160 Speaker 1: have actually the same you know, number of protons and 565 00:34:25,200 --> 00:34:28,120 Speaker 1: neutrons and electrons as my brain does. Why is it 566 00:34:28,239 --> 00:34:31,480 Speaker 1: that my brain exhibits this crazy behavior that rocks and 567 00:34:31,719 --> 00:34:34,840 Speaker 1: chairs and tables don't. So are you suggesting that, for example, 568 00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:40,239 Speaker 1: consciousness might not just emerge from the interactions of those 569 00:34:40,360 --> 00:34:42,800 Speaker 1: pieces inside the brain, but could come out at some 570 00:34:42,920 --> 00:34:46,360 Speaker 1: sort of higher level. Yeah, and so here's where I 571 00:34:46,440 --> 00:34:49,839 Speaker 1: would say, contentiously, we're kind of in the realm of philosophy. 572 00:34:50,040 --> 00:34:53,080 Speaker 1: But when you reflect on the nature of conscious experience, 573 00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:59,040 Speaker 1: we seem directly acquainted with qualities. Qualities of our own 574 00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:05,200 Speaker 1: experience says that cannot plausibly, perhaps even conceivably be mapped 575 00:35:05,239 --> 00:35:09,880 Speaker 1: onto structured properties of the relevant regions of our brain. 576 00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:13,319 Speaker 1: So you know, famous kind of example, if you if 577 00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:15,719 Speaker 1: you go into the philosophy literature talking about this, you 578 00:35:16,400 --> 00:35:21,160 Speaker 1: encounter the story of this neuroscientist Mary, and Mary is 579 00:35:21,440 --> 00:35:24,160 Speaker 1: we imagine a hundred years from now the science of 580 00:35:24,400 --> 00:35:29,400 Speaker 1: the neuroscience of color vision is complete, and uh so 581 00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:36,400 Speaker 1: Mary is a credential neuroscientist of color vision. So what 582 00:35:36,560 --> 00:35:39,920 Speaker 1: that means is you put somebody on an under the 583 00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:45,440 Speaker 1: relevant scanning device and Mary gets some kind of interpreted 584 00:35:45,640 --> 00:35:49,480 Speaker 1: feed out from from her computer telling her what's going 585 00:35:49,560 --> 00:35:53,440 Speaker 1: on structurally, and she can predict what kind of color 586 00:35:53,560 --> 00:35:56,360 Speaker 1: experience the person is having just on the basis of 587 00:35:56,440 --> 00:35:58,920 Speaker 1: that But now here's the wrinkle you add to the story. 588 00:35:59,080 --> 00:36:03,640 Speaker 1: Mary herself is ever had color experience because Mary Mary's 589 00:36:03,719 --> 00:36:07,480 Speaker 1: parents were crazy psychologist who thought it was an interesting 590 00:36:07,600 --> 00:36:10,040 Speaker 1: experiment to raise her to be both a scientist of 591 00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:12,400 Speaker 1: color vision, but to never have So she only has 592 00:36:12,520 --> 00:36:16,520 Speaker 1: monochrome shades of gray, right everything. And she's locked in 593 00:36:16,600 --> 00:36:19,160 Speaker 1: a room and she she does there's nothing that has 594 00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:22,960 Speaker 1: color beyond shades of gray and white and black. She's 595 00:36:23,000 --> 00:36:27,279 Speaker 1: never cut herself, She's happily has never cut herself. She 596 00:36:27,400 --> 00:36:29,800 Speaker 1: never thought to do that. But one day, you know, 597 00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:32,480 Speaker 1: she escapes from her room and she looks out on 598 00:36:32,560 --> 00:36:35,040 Speaker 1: a bright sunny day and sees a red rose. And 599 00:36:35,840 --> 00:36:40,239 Speaker 1: she knows that when human beings look at roses right, 600 00:36:40,440 --> 00:36:44,080 Speaker 1: that they have what she calls red color experience. But 601 00:36:44,280 --> 00:36:46,759 Speaker 1: for her, it's a purely theoretical quality. What is that 602 00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:51,479 Speaker 1: the way red looks to a normally sighted human under bright, 603 00:36:51,719 --> 00:36:54,800 Speaker 1: sunny conditions. So now she has the experience, and she 604 00:36:54,920 --> 00:36:58,399 Speaker 1: says to herself, so that is what a red rose 605 00:36:58,840 --> 00:37:02,640 Speaker 1: looks like. That is she's not learning something about the 606 00:37:02,840 --> 00:37:05,200 Speaker 1: color of the rose. That's that has to do with 607 00:37:05,280 --> 00:37:10,000 Speaker 1: the surface of the rose. Right, kind of certain reflectance property. 608 00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:12,840 Speaker 1: That's not what she exclaims. She's actually talking about her 609 00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:16,480 Speaker 1: own experience of a red rose. She's saying, that's what 610 00:37:16,640 --> 00:37:20,919 Speaker 1: an experience of redness is like for a human being, 611 00:37:21,160 --> 00:37:23,080 Speaker 1: you know. And we think about that thought experiment, and 612 00:37:23,160 --> 00:37:26,080 Speaker 1: we think it makes perfect sense, and we say, right, 613 00:37:26,600 --> 00:37:30,840 Speaker 1: somebody who who's never experienced the color red, you can't commune. 614 00:37:30,880 --> 00:37:34,799 Speaker 1: It's kind of ineffable. There's just this simple quality, right, 615 00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:38,200 Speaker 1: of a certain kind of deep red color, let's say, 616 00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:41,120 Speaker 1: as opposed to a blue and green. Right, These are 617 00:37:41,280 --> 00:37:44,360 Speaker 1: just they're just different. They're distinct qualities, but the relatively 618 00:37:44,440 --> 00:37:47,400 Speaker 1: simple qualities of our experiences right now. That the physics 619 00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:50,280 Speaker 1: of it, of course, is that photons hate your eyeballs 620 00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:53,759 Speaker 1: at different energies, different wavelengths, and they'll stimulate, you know, 621 00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:57,200 Speaker 1: different paths at different signals of the optic nerve. But 622 00:37:57,280 --> 00:37:59,920 Speaker 1: of course there's no color in those signals. Right. The 623 00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:02,479 Speaker 1: color you're saying is experienced by the brain. It gets 624 00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:05,239 Speaker 1: the signal and it gives you the experience of red 625 00:38:05,360 --> 00:38:08,880 Speaker 1: or the experience of blue. You're saying, that internal experience. 626 00:38:09,120 --> 00:38:11,320 Speaker 1: We don't know how to describe it, or quantify it 627 00:38:11,480 --> 00:38:13,919 Speaker 1: or make it objective, but but it's real, and it's 628 00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:16,839 Speaker 1: something over and about. Mary seems to learn something new 629 00:38:17,000 --> 00:38:19,680 Speaker 1: about color experience, even though she knew every what you 630 00:38:19,760 --> 00:38:22,440 Speaker 1: were just describing in shorthand. Harry knows all that stuff. 631 00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:25,799 Speaker 1: She she knows the neuroscience of color experience. She knows 632 00:38:25,840 --> 00:38:28,160 Speaker 1: what goes on in the visual cortex. Right, what kind 633 00:38:28,200 --> 00:38:31,040 Speaker 1: of patterns of firings of neurons are going on when 634 00:38:31,120 --> 00:38:34,239 Speaker 1: someone has an experience like that? Right, But those seem 635 00:38:34,320 --> 00:38:39,160 Speaker 1: to be all the causal preconditions, the underpinnings of color experience, 636 00:38:39,239 --> 00:38:42,480 Speaker 1: but not the experience itself, the subjective of the simple 637 00:38:42,560 --> 00:38:47,359 Speaker 1: subjective quality. So the suggestion is right, there are these 638 00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:53,560 Speaker 1: subjective qualities, qualities of conscious minds, experiential qualities, but are 639 00:38:53,640 --> 00:38:57,759 Speaker 1: something over and above the physical structures and states and 640 00:38:57,880 --> 00:39:01,480 Speaker 1: processes that undoubtedly our nest necessary to have to undergo 641 00:39:01,600 --> 00:39:06,000 Speaker 1: those experiences. There's something additional. They seem strongly emergent, because 642 00:39:06,040 --> 00:39:08,560 Speaker 1: now we're not just talking about a pattern of activity. 643 00:39:08,719 --> 00:39:12,000 Speaker 1: We're talking about a new fundamental quality that can't be 644 00:39:12,480 --> 00:39:17,000 Speaker 1: described in terms of any of these sorts of processes, 645 00:39:17,040 --> 00:39:20,279 Speaker 1: even at the neuroscientific level of description, which would seem 646 00:39:20,320 --> 00:39:23,200 Speaker 1: to be the relevant level of description here, right, that's 647 00:39:23,400 --> 00:39:28,040 Speaker 1: if it is a wholly physically constituted phenomena, then neuroscience 648 00:39:28,120 --> 00:39:30,840 Speaker 1: should be the science that tells you what it is. 649 00:39:31,200 --> 00:39:35,120 Speaker 1: It's that neural structure and patterns. So you describe this 650 00:39:35,200 --> 00:39:38,200 Speaker 1: as an empirical question, what is the empirical test you 651 00:39:38,280 --> 00:39:41,920 Speaker 1: could do to figure out whether consciousness or you know, 652 00:39:42,040 --> 00:39:47,160 Speaker 1: even physics of baseballs is strongly emergent or weakly emergent, 653 00:39:47,280 --> 00:39:50,239 Speaker 1: whether it is something new at these larger scales, or 654 00:39:50,239 --> 00:39:52,759 Speaker 1: whether this is determined by the little bits that they're 655 00:39:52,760 --> 00:39:55,560 Speaker 1: made out of. Right, Well, it would seem like we 656 00:39:55,640 --> 00:39:59,320 Speaker 1: would need a much you know, neuroscience is still in 657 00:39:59,440 --> 00:40:02,680 Speaker 1: its RelA to infancy. If you talk to neuroscientists, that's 658 00:40:02,719 --> 00:40:05,440 Speaker 1: what they say about the state of the science. They 659 00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:09,200 Speaker 1: know a lot about local interactions and so on, neurons 660 00:40:09,280 --> 00:40:12,920 Speaker 1: and synapses and all that, but large scale patterns um 661 00:40:13,600 --> 00:40:16,120 Speaker 1: is something that they're just beginning to get a bit 662 00:40:16,160 --> 00:40:19,360 Speaker 1: of a handle on. There's a ton that they don't understand. 663 00:40:19,560 --> 00:40:22,000 Speaker 1: But it would seem like if we could envision a 664 00:40:22,640 --> 00:40:29,000 Speaker 1: much more developed systematic neuroscientific theory of neural dynamics of 665 00:40:29,160 --> 00:40:34,319 Speaker 1: brains as complicated as our brains, and you could show 666 00:40:34,560 --> 00:40:40,359 Speaker 1: that you could completely predict the unfolding of the relevant processes, 667 00:40:40,440 --> 00:40:43,520 Speaker 1: say in the visual cortex, when someone's having color experience, 668 00:40:43,840 --> 00:40:49,319 Speaker 1: without recurse to some hypothesized further quality that presumably would 669 00:40:49,360 --> 00:40:52,160 Speaker 1: be doing something. That is, if the look of a 670 00:40:52,239 --> 00:40:55,320 Speaker 1: red rose really is a quality over and above some 671 00:40:55,520 --> 00:41:02,279 Speaker 1: kind of structured neural quality, then that quality is part 672 00:41:02,480 --> 00:41:06,440 Speaker 1: of what leads me to talk about it. Right, So 673 00:41:06,640 --> 00:41:10,480 Speaker 1: that means that in principle, a neuroscientist who's paying attention 674 00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:13,279 Speaker 1: in real time what's going on in your brain when 675 00:41:13,320 --> 00:41:15,799 Speaker 1: all this is happening, you're having experience and you're talking 676 00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:19,960 Speaker 1: about it, if the theory was sufficiently well developed and testable, 677 00:41:20,680 --> 00:41:25,160 Speaker 1: could see whether somehow there was an incompleteness, you know, 678 00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:27,759 Speaker 1: if the if the neuroscientists just just doing it in 679 00:41:27,920 --> 00:41:30,960 Speaker 1: terms of neurons and neural assemblies and so forth, and 680 00:41:31,120 --> 00:41:34,200 Speaker 1: they can perfectly predict the dynamics going on in the 681 00:41:34,239 --> 00:41:39,000 Speaker 1: relevant portion of your brain without recourse to some further hypothesized, holistic, 682 00:41:39,560 --> 00:41:43,200 Speaker 1: strongly immersion property. But in fact, suppose suppose that's just wrong. 683 00:41:43,360 --> 00:41:46,560 Speaker 1: It's an illusion, but it's somehow hardwired into us that 684 00:41:46,680 --> 00:41:49,919 Speaker 1: we have this illusion. If there's something further that's left 685 00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:53,520 Speaker 1: out of a physical description that's a conceivable, you might 686 00:41:53,560 --> 00:41:57,200 Speaker 1: say it's a psychological hypothesis. Right, one could go looking 687 00:41:57,320 --> 00:42:00,759 Speaker 1: for there's something about the way our our psychology structured 688 00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:02,640 Speaker 1: such that you know, you know, we know there are 689 00:42:02,719 --> 00:42:06,719 Speaker 1: visual illusions built into our visual system, the Mueller lie, 690 00:42:07,800 --> 00:42:10,799 Speaker 1: the you know, the two lines with arrows. I won't 691 00:42:10,920 --> 00:42:13,720 Speaker 1: go into a description right there, there's well known visual 692 00:42:13,840 --> 00:42:16,880 Speaker 1: illusions that have to do with certain limits to our 693 00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:21,600 Speaker 1: visual system. Right, we're led to say untrue things about 694 00:42:21,640 --> 00:42:24,319 Speaker 1: what we're experiencing. Maybe maybe there's something like this that's 695 00:42:24,360 --> 00:42:29,680 Speaker 1: even deeper. Right, we're inclined to attribute qualities to experiences 696 00:42:29,760 --> 00:42:32,919 Speaker 1: that aren't actually there, right, and so if they're not there, 697 00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:36,000 Speaker 1: then boom, the problem goes away. Okay, great, So so 698 00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:38,440 Speaker 1: you know a scientists, you know, who's kind of reductionist 699 00:42:38,560 --> 00:42:43,360 Speaker 1: minded should be tempted by this illusionist perspective unconscious experience. 700 00:42:43,480 --> 00:42:47,120 Speaker 1: We're having experiences, it's just they're not what they seem 701 00:42:47,239 --> 00:42:49,520 Speaker 1: to us to be. And to me, that connects really 702 00:42:49,560 --> 00:42:52,480 Speaker 1: deeply with this larger question of what's out there? And 703 00:42:52,680 --> 00:42:55,160 Speaker 1: do we know that what we are experiencing, the theories 704 00:42:55,200 --> 00:42:58,320 Speaker 1: we're building from those experiences really reflect what's real in 705 00:42:58,400 --> 00:43:00,759 Speaker 1: the universe, or whether it's just us to sort of 706 00:43:00,880 --> 00:43:03,560 Speaker 1: game we're putting together in our minds, um And so 707 00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:05,439 Speaker 1: I want to ask you more about that, but first 708 00:43:05,520 --> 00:43:20,879 Speaker 1: let's take another quick break. Okay, we're back and we're 709 00:43:20,920 --> 00:43:24,440 Speaker 1: talking with Professor Tim O'Connor, who's telling us about how 710 00:43:24,560 --> 00:43:26,800 Speaker 1: things emerge in the world and how we can explore 711 00:43:26,880 --> 00:43:29,359 Speaker 1: them and most importantly, what that tells us about what's 712 00:43:29,400 --> 00:43:31,920 Speaker 1: real out there in the universe. And to me, this 713 00:43:32,120 --> 00:43:34,960 Speaker 1: question of emergence is very closely connected to the question 714 00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:38,080 Speaker 1: of scientific realism, because even if you believe that the 715 00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:40,919 Speaker 1: universe is real and there are basic bits and rules 716 00:43:40,920 --> 00:43:43,560 Speaker 1: about those basic bits, if you take the weak emergence, 717 00:43:43,680 --> 00:43:46,040 Speaker 1: we haven't learned what those basic bits are. We've only 718 00:43:46,200 --> 00:43:49,640 Speaker 1: learned the emergent bits. So in the question of scientific 719 00:43:49,719 --> 00:43:51,800 Speaker 1: realism of what's out there in the universe, how do 720 00:43:51,920 --> 00:43:55,840 Speaker 1: we know that what has emerged is real or whether 721 00:43:55,920 --> 00:43:58,839 Speaker 1: it's just sort of like our description of it. Even 722 00:43:58,880 --> 00:44:00,840 Speaker 1: if there is a real un verse out there, and 723 00:44:01,239 --> 00:44:03,600 Speaker 1: if we drill down with the biggest particle collider or 724 00:44:03,600 --> 00:44:06,319 Speaker 1: anybody could ever build. We might find something deep and true. 725 00:44:06,440 --> 00:44:08,279 Speaker 1: How do we know that what's emerged on top of 726 00:44:08,400 --> 00:44:11,879 Speaker 1: that is real? Is it possible that the way things 727 00:44:11,920 --> 00:44:14,960 Speaker 1: emerged to us might be different than the way things 728 00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:18,680 Speaker 1: emerge to another intelligent race that is a different set 729 00:44:18,719 --> 00:44:22,320 Speaker 1: of senses, For perhaps it perceives the universe through different 730 00:44:22,360 --> 00:44:25,840 Speaker 1: fundamental physics properties. How do we know the emergent pieces themselves? 731 00:44:26,239 --> 00:44:29,960 Speaker 1: We can you know, say, are actually out there? Good? Um? Right, 732 00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:34,040 Speaker 1: so it seems, you know, in the abstract, it seems 733 00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:41,320 Speaker 1: conceivable that there be different but equally effective course scrained ways. 734 00:44:41,440 --> 00:44:43,520 Speaker 1: You might say of chunking up you know, things that 735 00:44:43,640 --> 00:44:46,680 Speaker 1: the level of middle sized objects and observers, But just 736 00:44:46,880 --> 00:44:51,080 Speaker 1: the categories are different. Um, so you know, we find 737 00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:53,759 Speaker 1: it natural to group things. Let me acknowledge right at 738 00:44:53,760 --> 00:44:58,120 Speaker 1: the outside, or I think we all should acknowledge our senses, right, 739 00:44:58,160 --> 00:45:02,040 Speaker 1: Our categories are closely tied to our perceptual senses, and 740 00:45:02,120 --> 00:45:06,080 Speaker 1: our senses are geared to be good at we know 741 00:45:06,400 --> 00:45:10,080 Speaker 1: detecting features that are useful to us, or at least 742 00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:12,640 Speaker 1: we have reason right to believe they would have evolved. 743 00:45:12,920 --> 00:45:15,759 Speaker 1: And so you know, this could kind of add scientific 744 00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:18,960 Speaker 1: reason to be a little bit worried about this question. 745 00:45:19,200 --> 00:45:23,160 Speaker 1: It say, certain things get foreground in our experience because 746 00:45:23,320 --> 00:45:26,480 Speaker 1: they they're really important to us. You know, colors are 747 00:45:27,040 --> 00:45:31,960 Speaker 1: signals to us of you know, food sources and properties 748 00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:34,080 Speaker 1: for example, and probably a lot of other things I 749 00:45:34,160 --> 00:45:36,399 Speaker 1: don't even know about. But maybe to a different kind 750 00:45:36,520 --> 00:45:39,880 Speaker 1: of a non carbon based kind of inquirer who doesn't 751 00:45:39,920 --> 00:45:43,600 Speaker 1: need organic food sources, maybe color might not be the 752 00:45:43,719 --> 00:45:46,800 Speaker 1: same same sale sort of property, but other properties that 753 00:45:47,080 --> 00:45:50,680 Speaker 1: do have relevance to its survival and its ability to 754 00:45:50,920 --> 00:45:53,840 Speaker 1: navigate its environment would be foreground. And for us, we 755 00:45:53,920 --> 00:45:56,000 Speaker 1: don't kind of see, we don't. We don't tend to 756 00:45:56,040 --> 00:45:58,520 Speaker 1: pick out those patterns, and so it leads yeah, and 757 00:45:58,600 --> 00:46:01,400 Speaker 1: then you know, you generalize the picture. And then so 758 00:46:02,160 --> 00:46:05,640 Speaker 1: then the two different types of enquirers, the organic ones 759 00:46:05,719 --> 00:46:08,920 Speaker 1: like us and the non organic silicon based ones that 760 00:46:09,040 --> 00:46:12,800 Speaker 1: we could imagine their whole way of representing middle sized 761 00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:17,080 Speaker 1: environmental features and patterns somehow different, but they get along 762 00:46:17,120 --> 00:46:19,680 Speaker 1: well in their environment that they're able to do science. 763 00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:23,040 Speaker 1: And so suppose we're at roughly the same level of 764 00:46:23,239 --> 00:46:28,280 Speaker 1: scientific advancement, and so we have rather similar fundamental physics, 765 00:46:28,440 --> 00:46:31,320 Speaker 1: but we're different. Maybe that's what you're asking, you know, 766 00:46:31,480 --> 00:46:34,760 Speaker 1: at the at the level of kind of more emergent levels. 767 00:46:34,880 --> 00:46:36,839 Speaker 1: But there's also there's a question here a scale, because 768 00:46:36,880 --> 00:46:39,000 Speaker 1: when we talk about emergence, I think you're probably thinking 769 00:46:39,040 --> 00:46:41,280 Speaker 1: about me and you and ice cream, ping pong balls. 770 00:46:41,400 --> 00:46:45,120 Speaker 1: But for the particle physicists, I'm even talking about electrons. 771 00:46:45,200 --> 00:46:48,200 Speaker 1: I'm talking about corks, which we think are probably emerging 772 00:46:48,280 --> 00:46:51,760 Speaker 1: from something you know, mind bogglingly even deeper in the universe. 773 00:46:51,800 --> 00:46:55,080 Speaker 1: So basically everything we've ever learned is emerging. We have 774 00:46:55,239 --> 00:46:57,640 Speaker 1: no knowledge of the fundamental and we don't even know 775 00:46:57,680 --> 00:46:59,960 Speaker 1: if there is something fundamental. Maybe there isn't Maybe it's 776 00:46:59,960 --> 00:47:03,399 Speaker 1: a infinite tower of effective theories all the way down. 777 00:47:03,480 --> 00:47:05,560 Speaker 1: There is no deep truth. How do we know that 778 00:47:05,640 --> 00:47:09,200 Speaker 1: our tower will line up with alien towers or if 779 00:47:09,280 --> 00:47:11,560 Speaker 1: they have another way of looking at what you call 780 00:47:11,719 --> 00:47:14,879 Speaker 1: coarse grained theories of the universe where to me, course, 781 00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:16,759 Speaker 1: grain could be as small as an electron or as 782 00:47:16,840 --> 00:47:20,160 Speaker 1: large as a planet. Yeah, I don't know if this 783 00:47:20,480 --> 00:47:23,880 Speaker 1: fully Uh, it certainly doesn't fully address your question, but 784 00:47:23,960 --> 00:47:27,360 Speaker 1: I would want to throw out the following constraint unless 785 00:47:27,560 --> 00:47:33,480 Speaker 1: we become complete systematic skeptics about human knowledge and say, 786 00:47:33,640 --> 00:47:36,200 Speaker 1: you know, I don't even know whether or not I'm dreaming, 787 00:47:36,520 --> 00:47:39,200 Speaker 1: or even more radically, you know Descartes way back in 788 00:47:39,239 --> 00:47:42,920 Speaker 1: the seventeenth century, perhaps perhaps I'm just a disembodied mind 789 00:47:43,320 --> 00:47:46,120 Speaker 1: and I have a false beliefs about my own past. 790 00:47:46,200 --> 00:47:48,520 Speaker 1: In fact, there is no physical world. I wasn't born, 791 00:47:49,120 --> 00:47:51,680 Speaker 1: none of this, and there's just some evil genius spent 792 00:47:51,840 --> 00:47:55,640 Speaker 1: on deceiving me who's pumping my mind with a flow 793 00:47:55,800 --> 00:48:00,080 Speaker 1: of stream of experience that I naturally interpret as my 794 00:48:00,280 --> 00:48:04,600 Speaker 1: in interacting with my physical environment. But none of it's there, right, 795 00:48:04,920 --> 00:48:07,879 Speaker 1: or you know the matrix films, you know, our kind 796 00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:10,560 Speaker 1: of updated version of this, you know the way things 797 00:48:10,640 --> 00:48:14,160 Speaker 1: really are, that what really lies behind our experiences is 798 00:48:14,239 --> 00:48:18,040 Speaker 1: something very different from what we naively take it to be. Well, 799 00:48:18,280 --> 00:48:22,200 Speaker 1: you can't do science under those ground rules, right. Science 800 00:48:22,239 --> 00:48:26,719 Speaker 1: has to presuppose, for example, that we didn't pop into 801 00:48:26,840 --> 00:48:30,040 Speaker 1: existence just thirty seconds ago with a bunch of you know, 802 00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:34,600 Speaker 1: built in false memories about having had past experience. Science 803 00:48:34,640 --> 00:48:40,279 Speaker 1: has to presuppose that there's some kind of regularity to 804 00:48:40,400 --> 00:48:44,040 Speaker 1: the way the world unfolds. And if you say, well, no, 805 00:48:44,280 --> 00:48:49,000 Speaker 1: science can show that there's regularity by doing experiments and 806 00:48:49,680 --> 00:48:54,200 Speaker 1: you know, corroborating results. That presupposes that what you're hearing 807 00:48:54,400 --> 00:48:57,720 Speaker 1: when you're being informed by another scientist about their results 808 00:48:58,239 --> 00:49:02,680 Speaker 1: itself reflects the um outputs of another scientist. But why 809 00:49:02,719 --> 00:49:05,880 Speaker 1: are you trusting your senses? Right? That's a really big assumption. 810 00:49:06,000 --> 00:49:10,080 Speaker 1: That your senses are even effectively registering anything outside you 811 00:49:10,480 --> 00:49:14,279 Speaker 1: is a big assumption. Well, you can't scientifically verify that, right, 812 00:49:14,280 --> 00:49:16,680 Speaker 1: because you'd have to somehow get outside of your senses. 813 00:49:16,760 --> 00:49:19,200 Speaker 1: You can't do that. You can't get outside of your 814 00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:21,799 Speaker 1: rational thinking. So the point is, even what we think 815 00:49:21,840 --> 00:49:25,800 Speaker 1: of as a paradigm of rational inquiry, science has to 816 00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:29,880 Speaker 1: make certain foundational assumptions about the rough and ready, at 817 00:49:29,960 --> 00:49:34,399 Speaker 1: least reliability of our basic cognitive equipment, and the rough 818 00:49:34,480 --> 00:49:38,320 Speaker 1: and ready predictability or patterned nous of the world that 819 00:49:38,400 --> 00:49:41,200 Speaker 1: we're seeking to describe. It doesn't have to assume a 820 00:49:41,320 --> 00:49:43,520 Speaker 1: lot more than that, but it doesn't have to assume 821 00:49:43,560 --> 00:49:48,600 Speaker 1: at least those things. And it has to assume if 822 00:49:49,160 --> 00:49:52,720 Speaker 1: science is going to deliver a rational set of beliefs 823 00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:56,719 Speaker 1: of us, that we exist, that we persist, that we 824 00:49:56,880 --> 00:49:59,880 Speaker 1: really are interacting with one another. Well, but once you 825 00:50:00,040 --> 00:50:02,480 Speaker 1: once you do that, when now we've got I exist, 826 00:50:02,760 --> 00:50:06,600 Speaker 1: you exist if we're fellow scientists, I'm part of this community, 827 00:50:06,840 --> 00:50:11,320 Speaker 1: just this distributed community. I have to assume, since I 828 00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:14,279 Speaker 1: can't do all the science myself, no scientists can do that, 829 00:50:14,560 --> 00:50:18,440 Speaker 1: that there is this rational community that's effectively managing to 830 00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:23,000 Speaker 1: communicate results and theories and descriptions and how they corroborate 831 00:50:23,160 --> 00:50:26,520 Speaker 1: with theories. A lot is getting baked in my point. 832 00:50:26,600 --> 00:50:28,600 Speaker 1: I guess that is what I'm getting at here has 833 00:50:28,680 --> 00:50:31,640 Speaker 1: to be baked in for Steve and ask an interesting 834 00:50:31,760 --> 00:50:36,560 Speaker 1: question about have our theories delivered the rational goods? Now? 835 00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:42,359 Speaker 1: Making those assumptions doesn't require that. Chemistry or biology as 836 00:50:42,440 --> 00:50:46,879 Speaker 1: we know it is very closely tracks the truth at 837 00:50:46,920 --> 00:50:50,239 Speaker 1: that level of description. So I'm not suggesting we get 838 00:50:50,280 --> 00:50:53,480 Speaker 1: our emergent phenomena. But there there are constraints. You can 839 00:50:53,520 --> 00:50:55,600 Speaker 1: either be a total skeptic or you have to say 840 00:50:55,760 --> 00:51:00,600 Speaker 1: there are enquirers that have certain capacity of these and 841 00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:04,600 Speaker 1: uh certain reasonable assumptions that they make. I'm not sure 842 00:51:04,680 --> 00:51:06,600 Speaker 1: how far that gets us, but it gets us a 843 00:51:06,719 --> 00:51:09,840 Speaker 1: certain ways. I think you're making the point that we 844 00:51:09,920 --> 00:51:13,880 Speaker 1: can take our skepticism and paranoia too far in throwing 845 00:51:13,920 --> 00:51:16,800 Speaker 1: out everything and saying we can know nothing, um. And 846 00:51:16,920 --> 00:51:18,960 Speaker 1: it's certainly the case that, you know, we would like 847 00:51:19,040 --> 00:51:21,719 Speaker 1: to know something that's true about the universe. But I 848 00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:26,440 Speaker 1: think the motivation for examining these fundamental in the foundations 849 00:51:26,480 --> 00:51:28,720 Speaker 1: of our knowledge and how we know things is because 850 00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:31,400 Speaker 1: we wonder if we've make it made a mistake, if 851 00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:34,680 Speaker 1: we've made some arbitrary choices where we could have perhaps 852 00:51:34,800 --> 00:51:38,120 Speaker 1: if Plato had a different mood, you know, founded intellectual 853 00:51:38,160 --> 00:51:40,560 Speaker 1: thought in another direction, and everything would have been built 854 00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:42,759 Speaker 1: up and conceived up in a completely different way. And 855 00:51:42,920 --> 00:51:46,320 Speaker 1: to me, that's what's exciting about potentially meeting alien physicists, 856 00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:50,480 Speaker 1: or even digging back into ancient human knowledge and seeing 857 00:51:50,560 --> 00:51:54,600 Speaker 1: how independent communities the Mayans, the Egyptians of Chinese thought 858 00:51:54,640 --> 00:51:57,400 Speaker 1: about their the universe and their relationship to it, you know, 859 00:51:57,520 --> 00:52:00,080 Speaker 1: separately from from each other. Because it seems to me 860 00:52:00,200 --> 00:52:02,359 Speaker 1: like it's possible, and it's fascinating to me that it's 861 00:52:02,360 --> 00:52:05,520 Speaker 1: possible that the way we've built our ideas of physics 862 00:52:05,680 --> 00:52:09,560 Speaker 1: and the universe could have some arbitrary nous to it, right, 863 00:52:09,600 --> 00:52:12,080 Speaker 1: that there could be another way to have done this. 864 00:52:12,280 --> 00:52:13,920 Speaker 1: So to me, it's exciting to probe those and to 865 00:52:14,000 --> 00:52:16,200 Speaker 1: do the impossible thing that we suggested earlier, which is 866 00:52:16,239 --> 00:52:20,120 Speaker 1: to imagine what humans haven't yet or maybe cannot yet imagine. 867 00:52:20,320 --> 00:52:22,200 Speaker 1: So let me ask you the last question, what do 868 00:52:22,239 --> 00:52:25,400 Speaker 1: you think are the prospects for making progress? I mean, 869 00:52:25,480 --> 00:52:28,360 Speaker 1: we've been talking about whether the universe out there is 870 00:52:28,440 --> 00:52:32,560 Speaker 1: real or just imagined since the matrix, since um, you know, 871 00:52:32,640 --> 00:52:36,040 Speaker 1: the card, since Plato in fact, so it's been thousands 872 00:52:36,080 --> 00:52:38,480 Speaker 1: of years we've been thinking about these questions. Is it 873 00:52:38,560 --> 00:52:40,680 Speaker 1: a question we'll be thinking about forever or are we 874 00:52:40,800 --> 00:52:43,120 Speaker 1: likely to see breakthroughs where one day we say, oh, 875 00:52:43,200 --> 00:52:46,680 Speaker 1: look we settled that question. Plato was right or Plato 876 00:52:46,880 --> 00:52:48,960 Speaker 1: was wrong, and then we can move on to other questions. 877 00:52:49,040 --> 00:52:51,040 Speaker 1: What do you think, Well, we won't settle it in 878 00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:56,960 Speaker 1: the sense that, um, there's never the basis for a 879 00:52:58,200 --> 00:53:04,000 Speaker 1: somewhat reasonable worry or skepticism that we haven't mailed it down. 880 00:53:04,440 --> 00:53:09,680 Speaker 1: There's always because we're a scientific human inquiry generally, and 881 00:53:09,800 --> 00:53:13,760 Speaker 1: science as a special rigorous case of human inquiry is fallible. 882 00:53:13,920 --> 00:53:17,640 Speaker 1: There's no reason to believe they're perfect. So that's if 883 00:53:17,760 --> 00:53:21,600 Speaker 1: if we lower our sites and uh, get away from 884 00:53:21,680 --> 00:53:26,279 Speaker 1: having a perfect congruence, a perfect mapping of reality. Maybe 885 00:53:26,360 --> 00:53:29,840 Speaker 1: we'll never get that, but we have a closer and 886 00:53:29,960 --> 00:53:34,280 Speaker 1: closer mapping than that. That's good enough. Well, it certainly 887 00:53:34,480 --> 00:53:37,800 Speaker 1: is helping us, you know, develop new technologies and I 888 00:53:38,000 --> 00:53:41,040 Speaker 1: hope revealing something that's true about what's out there in 889 00:53:41,120 --> 00:53:43,600 Speaker 1: the universe. To me, I love these moments of insight 890 00:53:43,760 --> 00:53:46,680 Speaker 1: and discovery where we feel like not just that we've 891 00:53:46,840 --> 00:53:49,680 Speaker 1: developed some new tool that describes the universe, but we're 892 00:53:49,680 --> 00:53:53,520 Speaker 1: actually revealing its internal it's underlying mechanism. You know that 893 00:53:53,640 --> 00:53:56,200 Speaker 1: the ex boson, for example, is actually out there and 894 00:53:56,400 --> 00:53:58,279 Speaker 1: is doing and frowing and doing. It's a bit to 895 00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:00,480 Speaker 1: create mass for all the other particle and not just 896 00:54:00,960 --> 00:54:03,520 Speaker 1: a mathematical description that we have in our heads, because 897 00:54:03,560 --> 00:54:07,279 Speaker 1: otherwise my entire life's work is uh, it's just much 898 00:54:07,360 --> 00:54:10,279 Speaker 1: more theoretical than I ever imagined. But thanks very much 899 00:54:10,280 --> 00:54:12,239 Speaker 1: for joining us on the podcast today and for thinking 900 00:54:12,280 --> 00:54:15,040 Speaker 1: about these crazy questions and allowing me to talk about 901 00:54:15,040 --> 00:54:18,040 Speaker 1: aliens and philosophy at the same time. I really appreciate 902 00:54:18,120 --> 00:54:20,759 Speaker 1: you coming on the podcast. All right, Thanks Daniel, thanks 903 00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:31,040 Speaker 1: for having me, Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel 904 00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:33,560 Speaker 1: and Jorge explained. The Universe is a production of I 905 00:54:33,840 --> 00:54:37,239 Speaker 1: heart Radio. For more podcast for my heart Radio, visit 906 00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:40,759 Speaker 1: the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you 907 00:54:40,880 --> 00:54:42,360 Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.