1 00:00:08,520 --> 00:00:10,920 Speaker 1: Hey, Daniel, how can you tell the difference between a 2 00:00:11,039 --> 00:00:13,960 Speaker 1: physicist and a crack pot? Is this one of those 3 00:00:14,040 --> 00:00:16,759 Speaker 1: Internet memes like can you tell which picture is a 4 00:00:16,800 --> 00:00:19,920 Speaker 1: homeless man and which one is a physics professor? Well, 5 00:00:19,960 --> 00:00:22,759 Speaker 1: you usually can, but I guess. I mean, you know, 6 00:00:22,800 --> 00:00:25,319 Speaker 1: if someone has a crazy new idea, how do you 7 00:00:25,360 --> 00:00:29,840 Speaker 1: know whether to take them seriously or just ignore them? Well? 8 00:00:29,880 --> 00:00:32,760 Speaker 1: The truth is mostly you can't tell. I mean, some 9 00:00:32,960 --> 00:00:36,120 Speaker 1: crazy ideas about the universe turn out to be true, 10 00:00:36,240 --> 00:00:39,120 Speaker 1: like look at quantum mechanics. Wow. So does that mean 11 00:00:39,159 --> 00:00:41,960 Speaker 1: that you read every theory that people send you over 12 00:00:42,240 --> 00:00:44,400 Speaker 1: the internet. I try to, but you know, there are 13 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:47,240 Speaker 1: just too many. There's so many people out there with 14 00:00:47,360 --> 00:00:51,280 Speaker 1: fun and silly and crazy ideas, so honestly, most people 15 00:00:51,320 --> 00:00:54,280 Speaker 1: in physics just ignore them. Oh man, does that mean 16 00:00:54,280 --> 00:00:58,440 Speaker 1: that the theory of everything could be right now buried 17 00:00:58,680 --> 00:01:02,760 Speaker 1: in a spam folder? What a tragedy selected for the 18 00:01:02,840 --> 00:01:18,840 Speaker 1: junk mail pile by some Ai. Hi am poor Hammy 19 00:01:18,880 --> 00:01:22,360 Speaker 1: cartoonists and the creator of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. 20 00:01:22,480 --> 00:01:25,399 Speaker 1: I'm a particle physicist. I'm always on the hunt for 21 00:01:25,440 --> 00:01:27,440 Speaker 1: the theory of everything. But I don't expect it to 22 00:01:27,480 --> 00:01:30,039 Speaker 1: show up in my inbox? Is that how you usually 23 00:01:30,080 --> 00:01:35,120 Speaker 1: get your research ideas through Emailsdam? That's right. I just 24 00:01:35,200 --> 00:01:37,600 Speaker 1: like looking there the slush pile. So like maybe somebody 25 00:01:37,680 --> 00:01:41,440 Speaker 1: emailed me exactly the idea I need right now. Oh man, 26 00:01:41,640 --> 00:01:46,840 Speaker 1: it's called tenure sit around and wait for emails for it. No, 27 00:01:46,959 --> 00:01:50,120 Speaker 1: but I do get messages some from our listeners suggesting 28 00:01:50,240 --> 00:01:53,840 Speaker 1: new ideas and even like grand theories that could describe 29 00:01:53,880 --> 00:01:56,640 Speaker 1: some of the open puzzles in physics. Wow, that's awesome. 30 00:01:56,680 --> 00:01:59,320 Speaker 1: It's awesome that people are listening and getting you know, 31 00:01:59,360 --> 00:02:02,800 Speaker 1: stimulated intellectually, and and they come up with their own 32 00:02:02,840 --> 00:02:05,160 Speaker 1: ideas about how the universe might work. Yeah, and it's 33 00:02:05,160 --> 00:02:07,040 Speaker 1: not just our listeners, and it's not just me. I 34 00:02:07,040 --> 00:02:10,400 Speaker 1: think basically everybody who's a physicist gets a few random 35 00:02:10,440 --> 00:02:13,519 Speaker 1: suggestions for theories of everything in their inbox every week. 36 00:02:14,520 --> 00:02:17,880 Speaker 1: Do you think maybe that's sort of a basic human curiosity? 37 00:02:17,919 --> 00:02:19,280 Speaker 1: You know, we're all trying to figure out how to 38 00:02:19,320 --> 00:02:21,080 Speaker 1: all work. We all are, and as we say on 39 00:02:21,160 --> 00:02:24,280 Speaker 1: this podcast all the time, wondering belongs to everybody, and 40 00:02:24,320 --> 00:02:27,239 Speaker 1: these questions about the universe are ones that everybody wants 41 00:02:27,240 --> 00:02:29,480 Speaker 1: to know. The answer to and frankly, I love that 42 00:02:29,520 --> 00:02:32,320 Speaker 1: people are thinking about this and that they're imagining that 43 00:02:32,360 --> 00:02:35,280 Speaker 1: maybe they could come up with the idea they could 44 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:38,800 Speaker 1: have that moment of insight, which explains deep questions about 45 00:02:38,840 --> 00:02:41,520 Speaker 1: the universe. Well, speaking of everybody, Welcome to our podcast 46 00:02:41,639 --> 00:02:44,560 Speaker 1: Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, a production of I 47 00:02:44,720 --> 00:02:47,680 Speaker 1: Heart Radio in which we examine all those big questions 48 00:02:47,680 --> 00:02:49,680 Speaker 1: about the universe and take you to the forefront of 49 00:02:49,680 --> 00:02:51,920 Speaker 1: what science knows and what it doesn't know, and what 50 00:02:52,000 --> 00:02:54,920 Speaker 1: it's hoping you will email it to it because you know, 51 00:02:55,040 --> 00:02:57,720 Speaker 1: I guess it turns out that science doesn't know everything. 52 00:02:57,960 --> 00:03:00,360 Speaker 1: There's a lot we don't know. We know a timey amount. 53 00:03:00,360 --> 00:03:03,959 Speaker 1: We've only recently learned how little we know about the universe. 54 00:03:04,320 --> 00:03:06,280 Speaker 1: And so while it might feel like a lot of 55 00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:08,919 Speaker 1: the stuff around you is understood, the fraction of the 56 00:03:09,000 --> 00:03:12,679 Speaker 1: universe that we know is very small and big, crazy 57 00:03:12,760 --> 00:03:15,880 Speaker 1: new ideas awaits. So it's sort of like the universe 58 00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:18,320 Speaker 1: is still up for grabs. You know, anyone out there 59 00:03:18,400 --> 00:03:21,600 Speaker 1: could potentially come up with the theory of everything, because 60 00:03:21,680 --> 00:03:23,440 Speaker 1: we are pretty far away from it right now. We're 61 00:03:23,520 --> 00:03:25,800 Speaker 1: very far away from it. In fact, if you delivered 62 00:03:25,840 --> 00:03:29,040 Speaker 1: it to me today in complete form, I probably wouldn't understand. 63 00:03:29,040 --> 00:03:32,000 Speaker 1: It would take like days, weeks, months to digest it. 64 00:03:32,000 --> 00:03:35,480 Speaker 1: It might require whole new branches of mathematics, which I'm 65 00:03:35,640 --> 00:03:38,040 Speaker 1: totally not familiar with and nobody has even thought of. 66 00:03:38,600 --> 00:03:42,560 Speaker 1: So even if aliens arrived and emailed me, or you know, 67 00:03:42,640 --> 00:03:45,680 Speaker 1: delivered in golden engravings the theory of everything, it would 68 00:03:45,720 --> 00:03:48,400 Speaker 1: take a while to understand it. I might immediately dismiss it. 69 00:03:48,640 --> 00:03:50,760 Speaker 1: You mean, are you saying my handwriting is that bad? 70 00:03:51,760 --> 00:03:55,680 Speaker 1: Are you an alien? Are you admitting that? Finally? I 71 00:03:55,720 --> 00:03:58,480 Speaker 1: am a doctor technically, so I think we're required to 72 00:03:58,520 --> 00:04:02,200 Speaker 1: have bad handwriting. Crypto I'm writing. But the point is 73 00:04:02,320 --> 00:04:05,160 Speaker 1: that the truth about the universe might be something which 74 00:04:05,400 --> 00:04:08,920 Speaker 1: is strange and weird and sounds wrong on the surface, 75 00:04:09,200 --> 00:04:12,200 Speaker 1: which makes us think about the universe in a different way. 76 00:04:12,720 --> 00:04:15,520 Speaker 1: And that's the difficulty. But that's also the beauty of science, 77 00:04:15,560 --> 00:04:17,760 Speaker 1: is that we follow the data, we follow the clues, 78 00:04:18,000 --> 00:04:20,760 Speaker 1: and eventually we get to the right answer. It's amazing 79 00:04:20,800 --> 00:04:22,680 Speaker 1: that the process works. Yeah, And so to be on 80 00:04:22,680 --> 00:04:26,160 Speaker 1: the program will be tackling something, a new theory, a 81 00:04:26,160 --> 00:04:28,919 Speaker 1: new clue about the universe, that just that it is 82 00:04:28,920 --> 00:04:31,599 Speaker 1: super recent, it's hot off the process. It just came out, 83 00:04:31,960 --> 00:04:34,599 Speaker 1: and physicists are still sort of scratching their heads and 84 00:04:34,760 --> 00:04:36,960 Speaker 1: trying to think about whether or not this is something 85 00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:40,560 Speaker 1: that's actually true and describes the universe, or maybe it's 86 00:04:40,560 --> 00:04:43,120 Speaker 1: something that's totally wrong. That's right. It sort of came 87 00:04:43,160 --> 00:04:46,360 Speaker 1: out of left field, and it's a bold claim from 88 00:04:46,360 --> 00:04:50,320 Speaker 1: a man famous for bold claims, and you know, dropped 89 00:04:50,360 --> 00:04:53,320 Speaker 1: like a nine d pages of stuff on the physics community, 90 00:04:53,720 --> 00:04:56,440 Speaker 1: and it's fascinating that people are taking it seriously. He's 91 00:04:56,440 --> 00:04:58,960 Speaker 1: not a physics professor, but he's attracted the attention of 92 00:04:59,000 --> 00:05:01,080 Speaker 1: a lot of top physics Since it be on the program, 93 00:05:01,080 --> 00:05:08,640 Speaker 1: we'll be asking the question, did Steven Wolfram come up 94 00:05:08,680 --> 00:05:11,400 Speaker 1: with the theory of everything? Well, he definitely came up 95 00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:15,040 Speaker 1: with a theory. The question is what the theory of him? 96 00:05:15,200 --> 00:05:17,880 Speaker 1: Does it describe our universe or and the universe or 97 00:05:18,000 --> 00:05:21,040 Speaker 1: does it even work at all? And some listeners actually 98 00:05:21,080 --> 00:05:24,039 Speaker 1: wrote in asking us to break this down for them. Hey, 99 00:05:24,120 --> 00:05:26,880 Speaker 1: Daniel and Jorge, this is Cure from Chicago, and I 100 00:05:27,040 --> 00:05:30,120 Speaker 1: recently read about Stephen wolf from his physics project where 101 00:05:30,120 --> 00:05:33,120 Speaker 1: he's trying to come up with a fundamental theory of 102 00:05:33,160 --> 00:05:35,080 Speaker 1: physics that I know a lot of people have been 103 00:05:35,200 --> 00:05:37,839 Speaker 1: searching for for a long time, and it sounded really 104 00:05:37,880 --> 00:05:40,279 Speaker 1: interesting to me, but it was also a little bit 105 00:05:40,279 --> 00:05:42,440 Speaker 1: over my head. And you guys are really great at 106 00:05:42,440 --> 00:05:44,640 Speaker 1: explaining these kinds of things, So I was wondering if 107 00:05:44,680 --> 00:05:46,920 Speaker 1: you could maybe tell me a little bit about how 108 00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:50,120 Speaker 1: his theory works, how it's different from other theories that 109 00:05:50,120 --> 00:05:52,839 Speaker 1: are out there, and if you feel like it actually 110 00:05:52,839 --> 00:05:55,920 Speaker 1: has the potential to truly answer one of the great 111 00:05:56,000 --> 00:05:58,080 Speaker 1: mysteries of physics. Thank you, guys, and keep up a 112 00:05:58,120 --> 00:06:00,839 Speaker 1: great job. Thanks to everybody who wrote in with those questions. Well, 113 00:06:00,880 --> 00:06:03,200 Speaker 1: let's talk about Stephen Wolfram, because you know, I know 114 00:06:03,279 --> 00:06:05,680 Speaker 1: the name from my college days when I used a 115 00:06:05,760 --> 00:06:08,960 Speaker 1: program called Mathematica. But tell me what you know about 116 00:06:09,240 --> 00:06:12,240 Speaker 1: this person, Stephen Wolfram. Yes, so Wolfirm is sort of 117 00:06:12,279 --> 00:06:16,320 Speaker 1: a Polly math. He's a really smart guy. He graduated 118 00:06:16,400 --> 00:06:19,680 Speaker 1: got his PhD at a really young age. He studied 119 00:06:19,760 --> 00:06:24,240 Speaker 1: particle physics, He worked with Richard Feynman. Really he's a physicist. 120 00:06:24,279 --> 00:06:27,159 Speaker 1: He's a physicist for sure. Yeah, he was a professor 121 00:06:27,200 --> 00:06:30,240 Speaker 1: at cal Tech. Oh, he was a professor professor. Yeah, oh, 122 00:06:30,320 --> 00:06:32,000 Speaker 1: I see he made a time like maybe like he 123 00:06:32,040 --> 00:06:34,400 Speaker 1: wasn't a professor. No, I mean, the guy was really smart. 124 00:06:34,440 --> 00:06:37,039 Speaker 1: He definitely has the chops. He's the youngest recipient of 125 00:06:37,040 --> 00:06:40,600 Speaker 1: the MacArthur Genius Award. He got it at age twenty one, 126 00:06:40,920 --> 00:06:42,600 Speaker 1: so it was pretty clear from a young age that 127 00:06:42,720 --> 00:06:45,840 Speaker 1: this guy had a brain on him. And he's known 128 00:06:45,880 --> 00:06:49,919 Speaker 1: for writing Mathematica, which is a software that engineers and 129 00:06:49,960 --> 00:06:54,839 Speaker 1: mathematicians used to simulate things right and crunch equations and numbers. Yeah, 130 00:06:54,880 --> 00:06:57,800 Speaker 1: Mathematica is a beautiful piece of software. It does a 131 00:06:57,800 --> 00:07:00,640 Speaker 1: lot of the really gorgeous physics animations you probably see 132 00:07:00,680 --> 00:07:03,560 Speaker 1: on Twitter and elsewhere, but it's also really good for 133 00:07:03,600 --> 00:07:06,800 Speaker 1: doing symbolic mathematics. Like there's lots of ways to get 134 00:07:06,839 --> 00:07:10,560 Speaker 1: computers to do numerical calculations add these two numbers, but 135 00:07:10,600 --> 00:07:12,680 Speaker 1: it's much harder to tell a computer like take this 136 00:07:12,720 --> 00:07:16,840 Speaker 1: equation and simplify it. And Mathematica is really powerful that 137 00:07:16,960 --> 00:07:18,880 Speaker 1: doing that kind of stuff, and so it's really the 138 00:07:18,960 --> 00:07:22,440 Speaker 1: premier way to do math on the computer. Yeah, it's 139 00:07:22,440 --> 00:07:25,120 Speaker 1: pretty amazing, Yeah, because it can do symbolic math, which 140 00:07:25,200 --> 00:07:28,360 Speaker 1: is not just number crunching, but like manipulating you know, 141 00:07:28,480 --> 00:07:32,240 Speaker 1: the concepts and symbols and functions. That's right. And though 142 00:07:32,320 --> 00:07:36,000 Speaker 1: he's gone off into founding a company and becoming super 143 00:07:36,120 --> 00:07:39,400 Speaker 1: rich and writing this software, he's always had an interest 144 00:07:39,520 --> 00:07:42,800 Speaker 1: in theory and in physics because this is where he started. 145 00:07:43,000 --> 00:07:45,520 Speaker 1: That's where his hardway. Yeah, that's where all of our 146 00:07:45,560 --> 00:07:48,560 Speaker 1: hearts are. That's not where his money was pocketbook was. 147 00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:51,680 Speaker 1: But so he always had a sort of a passion 148 00:07:51,720 --> 00:07:53,920 Speaker 1: for and A and the chops in the background for 149 00:07:53,960 --> 00:07:57,000 Speaker 1: it to think about particle physics and things like the 150 00:07:57,000 --> 00:07:59,720 Speaker 1: theory of everything. Yeah, exactly. And there are a lot 151 00:07:59,800 --> 00:08:02,920 Speaker 1: of as people who started out in physics and ended up, 152 00:08:02,960 --> 00:08:05,040 Speaker 1: you know, becoming super rich or started out with like 153 00:08:05,120 --> 00:08:08,200 Speaker 1: deep mathematics and went to Wall Street and became hedge 154 00:08:08,200 --> 00:08:12,280 Speaker 1: fund gazillionaires. You know. So these people do penetrate sort 155 00:08:12,320 --> 00:08:14,360 Speaker 1: of the water culture. They don't know, we just stay 156 00:08:14,400 --> 00:08:17,040 Speaker 1: in the white halls of academia. But you know, they're 157 00:08:17,040 --> 00:08:19,920 Speaker 1: always wondering, I think, you know, could I crack that 158 00:08:20,040 --> 00:08:23,280 Speaker 1: problem or you know, could I still contribute? And I 159 00:08:23,280 --> 00:08:26,960 Speaker 1: guess maybe you're saying he's unusual because he sort of 160 00:08:27,080 --> 00:08:30,600 Speaker 1: came up with this new theory of everything, not from 161 00:08:30,640 --> 00:08:33,160 Speaker 1: an office in a university I guess that's what's kind 162 00:08:33,160 --> 00:08:35,440 Speaker 1: of unusual, or at a research center. It's like he 163 00:08:35,480 --> 00:08:37,840 Speaker 1: sort of did it on his own in his house. Yeah, 164 00:08:37,840 --> 00:08:39,400 Speaker 1: he did it on his own, I mean, in his 165 00:08:39,480 --> 00:08:42,160 Speaker 1: company with a couple of other folks. But he's not 166 00:08:42,400 --> 00:08:46,320 Speaker 1: part of a mainstream research group, right, Like I see, 167 00:08:46,320 --> 00:08:48,600 Speaker 1: he has a team, he's a small team. He attracted 168 00:08:48,640 --> 00:08:51,480 Speaker 1: some young students want at Cambridge and other places to 169 00:08:51,520 --> 00:08:53,440 Speaker 1: work with him. Is it getting more legit by the 170 00:08:53,480 --> 00:08:55,320 Speaker 1: second thing? I have to say. I feel like we 171 00:08:55,360 --> 00:08:58,080 Speaker 1: started the episode talking about like a crack plot, but 172 00:08:58,400 --> 00:09:01,200 Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, mag I've see the difference between this 173 00:09:01,240 --> 00:09:05,520 Speaker 1: guy and Dannyl. Well he's a lot richer. That's difference 174 00:09:05,600 --> 00:09:08,120 Speaker 1: number one. But no, this is not like you know, 175 00:09:08,200 --> 00:09:10,440 Speaker 1: sheets of paper you found under the homeless guy at 176 00:09:10,440 --> 00:09:13,120 Speaker 1: the bus station. Right. This is a guy who everybody 177 00:09:13,200 --> 00:09:16,920 Speaker 1: respects as intelligent. But that doesn't mean necessarily that he's 178 00:09:16,920 --> 00:09:18,800 Speaker 1: always on the forefront of knowledge. I mean, the guy 179 00:09:18,880 --> 00:09:21,400 Speaker 1: is busy doing a lot of other things. It's difficult 180 00:09:21,600 --> 00:09:23,760 Speaker 1: to stay on the forefront of knowledge and to keep 181 00:09:23,840 --> 00:09:27,000 Speaker 1: up with academia and to understand the current ideas and 182 00:09:27,040 --> 00:09:30,000 Speaker 1: if you're not part of the community of academia, it's 183 00:09:30,040 --> 00:09:32,720 Speaker 1: difficult to contribute. You know, some people think of science 184 00:09:32,800 --> 00:09:35,319 Speaker 1: is like a single minded pursuit of truth. That's true, 185 00:09:35,360 --> 00:09:38,200 Speaker 1: but it's also it's people, which means it's people having 186 00:09:38,200 --> 00:09:43,000 Speaker 1: a conversation and it's cocktail parties, it's hanging out on Twitter. Yeah, 187 00:09:43,040 --> 00:09:45,559 Speaker 1: but it's it's also it's a big conversation and people 188 00:09:45,559 --> 00:09:47,559 Speaker 1: are talking about stuff. And if you're talking about things 189 00:09:47,640 --> 00:09:50,960 Speaker 1: nobody else is interested in or talking about, then even 190 00:09:51,040 --> 00:09:53,080 Speaker 1: if you're right, it's going to be hard to attract 191 00:09:53,080 --> 00:09:55,280 Speaker 1: their attention. So you have to speak the language and 192 00:09:55,320 --> 00:09:57,360 Speaker 1: you have to know how to talk to people in 193 00:09:57,480 --> 00:10:00,199 Speaker 1: order to get scientists to pay attention. So you can 194 00:10:00,240 --> 00:10:02,480 Speaker 1: be totally right and understand the universe, but if nobody 195 00:10:02,480 --> 00:10:04,480 Speaker 1: will hear you or talk to you or understand what 196 00:10:04,520 --> 00:10:07,120 Speaker 1: you're saying, you can't really have any impact. So there's 197 00:10:07,120 --> 00:10:09,839 Speaker 1: this human side of science that I think is underappreciating. 198 00:10:09,880 --> 00:10:12,480 Speaker 1: It strikes me as a not a good thing though, 199 00:10:12,520 --> 00:10:13,640 Speaker 1: you know what you know what I mean, Like, I 200 00:10:13,679 --> 00:10:16,600 Speaker 1: feel like it strikes me as like, you know, people 201 00:10:16,640 --> 00:10:18,760 Speaker 1: at a cocktrol party not wanting to listen to somebody 202 00:10:18,760 --> 00:10:20,920 Speaker 1: else just because they're not in their little group. Yeah, 203 00:10:20,960 --> 00:10:23,440 Speaker 1: it would be better if we had more people, so 204 00:10:23,480 --> 00:10:26,560 Speaker 1: we had more diverse ideas, we had more funding for science, 205 00:10:26,800 --> 00:10:29,960 Speaker 1: if it was more accessible and more open. Absolutely, it 206 00:10:30,040 --> 00:10:33,360 Speaker 1: also be better if humans were like objective and in 207 00:10:33,440 --> 00:10:36,400 Speaker 1: ways to measure these things, you know, objectively. But we 208 00:10:36,480 --> 00:10:39,880 Speaker 1: can't write human science is done by humans for humans, 209 00:10:40,320 --> 00:10:43,439 Speaker 1: at least until the aliens come. You had to press 210 00:10:43,440 --> 00:10:46,880 Speaker 1: the alien burn Thenner, Well, well, maybe Stephen Wolf from 211 00:10:46,880 --> 00:10:49,840 Speaker 1: is an alien. That seems very likely. This guy seems 212 00:10:49,840 --> 00:10:51,920 Speaker 1: too good to be true. Oh my gosh, maybe maybe 213 00:10:51,960 --> 00:10:54,280 Speaker 1: this is the aliens coming to give us the ideas. Right, 214 00:10:54,280 --> 00:10:59,480 Speaker 1: you're saying, Stephen Wolf from down. He just went from 215 00:10:59,520 --> 00:11:04,320 Speaker 1: crack to respectable physicists, to alien to maybe the next 216 00:11:04,440 --> 00:11:07,440 Speaker 1: the second coming. Where will this end up? Danny? But 217 00:11:07,559 --> 00:11:10,640 Speaker 1: this is unusual. It's very weird to have somebody outside 218 00:11:10,640 --> 00:11:13,280 Speaker 1: of academia, even somebody who used to be a professor, 219 00:11:13,640 --> 00:11:16,880 Speaker 1: come back and try to contribute. Often these ideas are 220 00:11:16,880 --> 00:11:19,680 Speaker 1: not given any attention, so it's unusual to happen, and 221 00:11:19,679 --> 00:11:22,000 Speaker 1: it's unusual that it has gotten so much attention. Interesting. 222 00:11:22,040 --> 00:11:23,840 Speaker 1: So okay, so he's sort of been working on this, 223 00:11:23,920 --> 00:11:25,760 Speaker 1: apparently with the team for a while, and he came 224 00:11:25,840 --> 00:11:29,520 Speaker 1: up with a theory of everything, and he's sort of 225 00:11:29,960 --> 00:11:32,640 Speaker 1: so popped into the cocktail party of physicists and dropped 226 00:11:32,800 --> 00:11:36,360 Speaker 1: a huge pile of paper saying I got it. Yeah. 227 00:11:36,440 --> 00:11:38,240 Speaker 1: And there was a little bit of a hint that 228 00:11:38,280 --> 00:11:40,560 Speaker 1: this move was going to happen, because about twenty years 229 00:11:40,600 --> 00:11:44,760 Speaker 1: ago almost he wrote a mammoth tome called A New 230 00:11:44,880 --> 00:11:47,839 Speaker 1: Kind of Science, in which he unveiled the way he 231 00:11:48,000 --> 00:11:51,800 Speaker 1: thinks about science. And you can tell from even just 232 00:11:51,920 --> 00:11:54,600 Speaker 1: the title of the book A New kind of Science, 233 00:11:54,920 --> 00:11:58,160 Speaker 1: that he thinks very highly of himself and his own work. 234 00:11:58,400 --> 00:12:01,760 Speaker 1: And it's important. How would you have called it, Daniel, 235 00:12:01,800 --> 00:12:04,800 Speaker 1: a possible new kind of science, a suggestion for a 236 00:12:04,840 --> 00:12:06,719 Speaker 1: new kind of science? Well, you know, I I'm a 237 00:12:06,760 --> 00:12:09,640 Speaker 1: strong believer in humility. Um. I value that a lot 238 00:12:10,200 --> 00:12:13,040 Speaker 1: um And I think that's that's sort of the conclusion 239 00:12:13,080 --> 00:12:15,240 Speaker 1: you leave for other people to draw. You know that 240 00:12:15,240 --> 00:12:18,520 Speaker 1: that you've invented a new kind of science. And a 241 00:12:18,559 --> 00:12:21,360 Speaker 1: lot of criticisms of that book is that there's a 242 00:12:21,360 --> 00:12:23,559 Speaker 1: lot in there. It's like twelve hundred pages, but a 243 00:12:23,640 --> 00:12:25,679 Speaker 1: lot of it is not actually that new he's not 244 00:12:26,000 --> 00:12:29,280 Speaker 1: always either familiar with the existing work in the field 245 00:12:29,280 --> 00:12:31,520 Speaker 1: and sort of reproduced it and claimed it as his own. 246 00:12:32,040 --> 00:12:34,960 Speaker 1: And some of the stuff is actually wrong. So there's 247 00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:37,439 Speaker 1: a danger to working all on your own in your 248 00:12:37,480 --> 00:12:40,440 Speaker 1: own ivory tower and then delivering a twelve page tome 249 00:12:41,040 --> 00:12:42,920 Speaker 1: is that you know, you can make mistakes early on, 250 00:12:43,320 --> 00:12:46,640 Speaker 1: and you could have benefited from some notes notes. Yeah, 251 00:12:46,800 --> 00:12:49,400 Speaker 1: and so he made sort of a splash last week. 252 00:12:49,520 --> 00:12:51,720 Speaker 1: And so physicists, you were telling me, are still sort 253 00:12:51,760 --> 00:12:54,640 Speaker 1: of going over his theory. But there's been sort of 254 00:12:54,679 --> 00:12:57,959 Speaker 1: a big initial reaction. People on the internet have reacted 255 00:12:58,000 --> 00:12:59,800 Speaker 1: to this. Yeah, and so he's sort of a famous 256 00:13:00,400 --> 00:13:03,480 Speaker 1: and people give him attention. And so he captured the 257 00:13:03,480 --> 00:13:06,199 Speaker 1: world's attention, especially the attention of physicist when he announced 258 00:13:06,240 --> 00:13:08,800 Speaker 1: back on April thirteen that he had a model for 259 00:13:08,920 --> 00:13:12,640 Speaker 1: everything in the universe, space, matter and whatever and whatever 260 00:13:12,720 --> 00:13:18,920 Speaker 1: and whatever his technical term. And he put out a 261 00:13:18,960 --> 00:13:21,679 Speaker 1: really long blog post and a video and then submitted 262 00:13:21,720 --> 00:13:25,040 Speaker 1: a couple of sort of academic style papers to journals 263 00:13:25,240 --> 00:13:28,440 Speaker 1: full review. But in the meantime, physicists have been trying 264 00:13:28,480 --> 00:13:29,920 Speaker 1: to digest it. And you know, I'm part of this 265 00:13:29,960 --> 00:13:32,120 Speaker 1: community and everybody's been talking about it. If you read it, 266 00:13:32,160 --> 00:13:33,880 Speaker 1: what do you think? And there's sort of, you know, 267 00:13:33,960 --> 00:13:36,400 Speaker 1: the strong reactions to it. Yeah. So you collected a 268 00:13:36,400 --> 00:13:39,880 Speaker 1: couple of reactions from Twitter about physicists or well known 269 00:13:39,880 --> 00:13:43,719 Speaker 1: physicists who have sort of commented on this potential discovery. Yeah. 270 00:13:43,760 --> 00:13:47,600 Speaker 1: And so, for example, Sabine Haustin Felder, she's a physics theorist, 271 00:13:47,600 --> 00:13:49,800 Speaker 1: and she's also famous for being sort of an alt 272 00:13:49,920 --> 00:13:52,800 Speaker 1: theory consultant. She's the one that runs that program where 273 00:13:52,840 --> 00:13:54,960 Speaker 1: you can email her your theory and you'll get like 274 00:13:55,040 --> 00:13:57,760 Speaker 1: half an hour with an actual particle physicist to give 275 00:13:57,800 --> 00:14:01,840 Speaker 1: you opinions on it. I don't think so, because she 276 00:14:01,840 --> 00:14:04,880 Speaker 1: says I looked at it and I don't think it's interesting. Wow, 277 00:14:05,000 --> 00:14:07,440 Speaker 1: I spent five minutes with it. I think she dug 278 00:14:07,480 --> 00:14:10,000 Speaker 1: into it. Then there are other folks like Sean Carroll's 279 00:14:10,160 --> 00:14:13,880 Speaker 1: famous science popularizer, and you know he's also a theorist 280 00:14:14,000 --> 00:14:16,400 Speaker 1: working at the forefront of knowledge. Yeah, so you have 281 00:14:16,480 --> 00:14:18,840 Speaker 1: here that Sean said, I'm in favor of taking swings 282 00:14:18,840 --> 00:14:22,160 Speaker 1: that fundamental physics with wildly non standard ideas and seeing 283 00:14:22,160 --> 00:14:25,240 Speaker 1: what happens. Most such efforts will inevitably fail. But the 284 00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:28,360 Speaker 1: payoff is huge if you hit the target. Yeah. All right, 285 00:14:28,480 --> 00:14:32,800 Speaker 1: Well it sounds like people are not embracing this right away, 286 00:14:32,920 --> 00:14:36,360 Speaker 1: but keeping an open mind. Yeah, I think people are 287 00:14:36,440 --> 00:14:38,680 Speaker 1: sort of hopeful, like, wow, that would be awesome if 288 00:14:38,720 --> 00:14:41,920 Speaker 1: you came up with a grand new theory. At first glance, 289 00:14:42,080 --> 00:14:45,360 Speaker 1: it doesn't seem like maybe it really accomplishes everything that 290 00:14:45,440 --> 00:14:49,000 Speaker 1: Stephen Wolform claims, Like his claims are really broad and 291 00:14:49,160 --> 00:14:52,080 Speaker 1: very grand, and I'm not sure he really delivers. But 292 00:14:52,120 --> 00:14:53,760 Speaker 1: it's going to take the community a little bit of 293 00:14:53,800 --> 00:14:57,200 Speaker 1: time to read these papers carefully and to digest them properly. 294 00:14:57,360 --> 00:15:00,840 Speaker 1: All right, well, let's get into what this idea that 295 00:15:00,960 --> 00:15:04,640 Speaker 1: Stephen Wolfram just dropped in the physics community and talk 296 00:15:04,680 --> 00:15:07,280 Speaker 1: about how that describes the universe. But first let's take 297 00:15:07,320 --> 00:15:25,880 Speaker 1: a quick break. All right, Daniel, Stephen Wolfram, famous millionaire philanthropist, mathematica, 298 00:15:26,400 --> 00:15:29,880 Speaker 1: code writing genius, just dropped on the phitnist community a 299 00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:33,280 Speaker 1: theory of everything. And so let's first talk about what 300 00:15:33,480 --> 00:15:36,440 Speaker 1: this theory is because I'm super curious, and then we'll 301 00:15:36,440 --> 00:15:39,640 Speaker 1: talk about whether it actually describes the universe. We limit, So, 302 00:15:39,800 --> 00:15:42,240 Speaker 1: what's the basic idea Daniel here? So The basic idea 303 00:15:42,360 --> 00:15:44,720 Speaker 1: is one that I like. It says, let's look at 304 00:15:44,760 --> 00:15:48,640 Speaker 1: this really complex, vast universe with all these different kinds 305 00:15:48,680 --> 00:15:51,120 Speaker 1: of things in it at different scales, you know, from 306 00:15:51,320 --> 00:15:54,840 Speaker 1: little particles up to galaxy superclusters, and let's try to 307 00:15:54,880 --> 00:15:58,280 Speaker 1: explain all that using a simple set of rules. You know, 308 00:15:58,320 --> 00:16:01,080 Speaker 1: that's the sort of basic principle behind in particle physics. Right. 309 00:16:01,320 --> 00:16:03,960 Speaker 1: You could just describe the universe as like it is, 310 00:16:04,080 --> 00:16:07,200 Speaker 1: this is what it is, but we're seeking a reductionist answer. 311 00:16:07,240 --> 00:16:09,720 Speaker 1: We want to pull it apart and explain everything in 312 00:16:09,840 --> 00:16:13,720 Speaker 1: terms of something underneath that drives it. Right, And you know, 313 00:16:13,760 --> 00:16:15,600 Speaker 1: we've had success with stuff like that, Like you look 314 00:16:15,640 --> 00:16:18,120 Speaker 1: at the periodic table and you discover that all the 315 00:16:18,160 --> 00:16:20,880 Speaker 1: patterns in the periodic table come out of very simple 316 00:16:20,960 --> 00:16:24,800 Speaker 1: rules for how electrons fill their orbitals. So complex emergent 317 00:16:24,840 --> 00:16:28,040 Speaker 1: phenomena can come from a simple set of rules. That's 318 00:16:28,080 --> 00:16:30,960 Speaker 1: the motivation, right, right, I mean, isn't that sort of 319 00:16:31,000 --> 00:16:33,360 Speaker 1: how we've built all of our signs theories. I mean 320 00:16:34,040 --> 00:16:37,400 Speaker 1: it's all based on like simple particle interactions that then 321 00:16:37,680 --> 00:16:40,600 Speaker 1: you know, accumulate, and then that's how the universe exists. 322 00:16:40,680 --> 00:16:44,120 Speaker 1: That's right, And Stephen Wolf from Likes the particular kind 323 00:16:44,160 --> 00:16:49,040 Speaker 1: of this theory. They're called cellular automata, and the idea 324 00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:51,320 Speaker 1: is just take a couple of basic objects and a 325 00:16:51,360 --> 00:16:54,320 Speaker 1: couple of basic rules for how they can interact, and 326 00:16:54,480 --> 00:16:58,440 Speaker 1: from that you can get really complex behavior. Yeah. Like, 327 00:16:58,480 --> 00:17:01,120 Speaker 1: there's a guy who recently passed away named John Conway 328 00:17:01,480 --> 00:17:04,280 Speaker 1: who devised this thing called the Game of Life, who 329 00:17:04,280 --> 00:17:06,520 Speaker 1: showed that you can devise a really simple game based 330 00:17:06,520 --> 00:17:08,480 Speaker 1: on just like black and white squares and a few 331 00:17:08,480 --> 00:17:12,600 Speaker 1: simple rules, and really complex patterns emerge, patterns that look 332 00:17:12,640 --> 00:17:15,320 Speaker 1: a little bit like how life looks. Okay, so I'm 333 00:17:15,359 --> 00:17:18,439 Speaker 1: guessing that cellular automats that this concept that is not 334 00:17:18,520 --> 00:17:21,760 Speaker 1: related to cells, like human cells, like biological cells. It's 335 00:17:21,800 --> 00:17:24,320 Speaker 1: more like a mathematical term. Yeah, it's like a little 336 00:17:24,359 --> 00:17:26,160 Speaker 1: basic object. And you can also think of them as 337 00:17:26,200 --> 00:17:29,240 Speaker 1: like nodes and so, you know, like a little dot. 338 00:17:29,560 --> 00:17:31,800 Speaker 1: And the idea is just like, have a little very 339 00:17:31,840 --> 00:17:34,439 Speaker 1: simple thing and write down simple rules for what it 340 00:17:34,480 --> 00:17:37,520 Speaker 1: can do, and then study the behavior as you go 341 00:17:37,720 --> 00:17:40,240 Speaker 1: to a zillion of these things, or you take them 342 00:17:40,240 --> 00:17:43,640 Speaker 1: azillion steps forward, and you discover that you can get 343 00:17:43,680 --> 00:17:47,159 Speaker 1: from very simple things emerge complex behaviors. That's what the 344 00:17:47,440 --> 00:17:50,159 Speaker 1: game is, life is all about. I see. So is 345 00:17:50,200 --> 00:17:53,320 Speaker 1: the idea that he started approaching it from the bottom 346 00:17:53,400 --> 00:17:55,720 Speaker 1: up instead of the top down? You know, like you 347 00:17:55,760 --> 00:17:58,199 Speaker 1: know physicists, like what you do is you take regular 348 00:17:58,240 --> 00:18:00,080 Speaker 1: big stuff and you break it apart and you so 349 00:18:00,200 --> 00:18:01,880 Speaker 1: to see what it's made out of. Is he saying 350 00:18:01,920 --> 00:18:04,720 Speaker 1: that maybe a better way to approach the theory of 351 00:18:04,760 --> 00:18:08,119 Speaker 1: everything is to start like, let's let's let's see if 352 00:18:08,119 --> 00:18:10,520 Speaker 1: we can guess what the smallest thing does, and then 353 00:18:10,600 --> 00:18:12,600 Speaker 1: let's build it up to see if it works absolutely 354 00:18:12,840 --> 00:18:15,439 Speaker 1: And in that sense, it's very similar in motivation to 355 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:19,119 Speaker 1: string theory. String theory says, maybe the whole universe is 356 00:18:19,119 --> 00:18:21,639 Speaker 1: a bunch of titsal vibrating strings, and here are the 357 00:18:21,720 --> 00:18:24,639 Speaker 1: rules for how those strings interact. Can we then build 358 00:18:24,720 --> 00:18:26,879 Speaker 1: up the universe that we know in the physics that 359 00:18:26,920 --> 00:18:30,800 Speaker 1: we've discovered from those simple rules. Very similar motivation, very 360 00:18:30,800 --> 00:18:33,520 Speaker 1: similar approach. But it's not the same as string theory. 361 00:18:33,800 --> 00:18:36,959 Speaker 1: It's not. Okay, So how is it different? How does that? 362 00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:40,840 Speaker 1: How does this theory describe the universe? Like, what's what's 363 00:18:40,880 --> 00:18:42,840 Speaker 1: he actually doing here? So what he's actually doing, is 364 00:18:42,880 --> 00:18:46,480 Speaker 1: he says, let's begin with a couple of nodes. So 365 00:18:46,520 --> 00:18:48,159 Speaker 1: he makes his graph where he says, I have a 366 00:18:48,160 --> 00:18:50,520 Speaker 1: couple of nodes and I connect them with lines of 367 00:18:50,560 --> 00:18:54,520 Speaker 1: what of space, of matter, of energy? Just mathematically pure. Right, 368 00:18:54,640 --> 00:18:57,159 Speaker 1: so far we're just mathematically appeared. Just like draw a 369 00:18:57,200 --> 00:18:59,720 Speaker 1: dot in your mind and another dot and put a 370 00:18:59,760 --> 00:19:02,879 Speaker 1: line in doctor the man start start with like a 371 00:19:02,920 --> 00:19:06,680 Speaker 1: total abstraction. Just in the beginning. What is the thought? 372 00:19:08,359 --> 00:19:11,520 Speaker 1: In the beginning, there was nothing, And Stephen wolf from 373 00:19:11,640 --> 00:19:15,920 Speaker 1: created a dot, he said, and he just went from 374 00:19:15,960 --> 00:19:19,240 Speaker 1: alien to God, let there be created from the second 375 00:19:19,280 --> 00:19:23,240 Speaker 1: Coming to the actual Father himself. Well, he's sort of imagined. 376 00:19:23,280 --> 00:19:24,960 Speaker 1: That's the point, you know, not to be God, but 377 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:28,679 Speaker 1: to imagine from what is the universe originated? What is 378 00:19:28,680 --> 00:19:30,520 Speaker 1: the basic element of it? You know, if you wanted 379 00:19:30,560 --> 00:19:33,439 Speaker 1: to build the universe, what is the essential source code? 380 00:19:33,920 --> 00:19:36,119 Speaker 1: And he would like if the essential source code of 381 00:19:36,160 --> 00:19:38,280 Speaker 1: the universe was just two or three lines that you 382 00:19:38,400 --> 00:19:41,280 Speaker 1: just run a zillion times. So he's saying, let's build 383 00:19:41,320 --> 00:19:43,960 Speaker 1: up the universe from scratch, and let's start with this 384 00:19:44,240 --> 00:19:46,960 Speaker 1: a little bit of math and code and see what happens, 385 00:19:47,040 --> 00:19:49,040 Speaker 1: and see if it ends up. If you pile it 386 00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:51,600 Speaker 1: on if it ends up into you know, funny and 387 00:19:51,720 --> 00:19:56,320 Speaker 1: interesting podcast about exactly. And he's hoping that if you 388 00:19:56,359 --> 00:19:59,040 Speaker 1: start from very simple rules and you build up a structure, 389 00:19:59,200 --> 00:20:03,040 Speaker 1: then you could then recognize in that structure familiar rules 390 00:20:03,040 --> 00:20:05,680 Speaker 1: of physics the things in our universe, because that would 391 00:20:05,720 --> 00:20:09,119 Speaker 1: tell you that maybe those are then the simple rules 392 00:20:09,200 --> 00:20:12,040 Speaker 1: of our universe. So he starts with, you know, a 393 00:20:12,080 --> 00:20:14,959 Speaker 1: couple of dots and a line, and he says, all right, 394 00:20:15,000 --> 00:20:16,840 Speaker 1: just pick a random graph, it doesn't really matter. Make 395 00:20:16,840 --> 00:20:19,359 Speaker 1: four dots and draw some lines between them. He just 396 00:20:19,520 --> 00:20:21,960 Speaker 1: know how it begins, and then make up with some 397 00:20:22,080 --> 00:20:25,280 Speaker 1: rules like say, well, if two things are connected to 398 00:20:25,359 --> 00:20:27,600 Speaker 1: the same thing, then you know, you can add a 399 00:20:27,600 --> 00:20:29,439 Speaker 1: line between them, or you can add a new node, 400 00:20:29,600 --> 00:20:31,360 Speaker 1: or you can add a thing whatever. Just make up 401 00:20:31,480 --> 00:20:34,520 Speaker 1: some simple rule rule. It's kind of like a simple 402 00:20:34,560 --> 00:20:38,439 Speaker 1: game like go or Othello or checkers. Yes, exactly. You 403 00:20:38,440 --> 00:20:40,800 Speaker 1: need a basic starting point and then you need an 404 00:20:40,880 --> 00:20:43,120 Speaker 1: update rule that says how you can change the graph, 405 00:20:43,160 --> 00:20:45,760 Speaker 1: how you can grow it. And so that's the whole 406 00:20:45,800 --> 00:20:48,919 Speaker 1: idea is, you know, maybe the universe starts from a 407 00:20:48,960 --> 00:20:51,560 Speaker 1: structure like that, And then he takes it And what 408 00:20:51,640 --> 00:20:54,359 Speaker 1: he did with his team was make of some of 409 00:20:54,359 --> 00:20:58,119 Speaker 1: these simple graphs and develop them, you know, a million times, 410 00:20:58,119 --> 00:21:01,560 Speaker 1: a billion times with his very powerful mathematical language, and 411 00:21:01,640 --> 00:21:04,080 Speaker 1: visualize them. And then he looked at them and he asked, 412 00:21:04,400 --> 00:21:08,280 Speaker 1: do I recognize in here things from physics? I see? 413 00:21:08,320 --> 00:21:11,120 Speaker 1: So he started. He took a whiteboard with this team 414 00:21:11,119 --> 00:21:15,240 Speaker 1: there in his compound and drew four dots, therew lines 415 00:21:15,280 --> 00:21:17,760 Speaker 1: between them, and then did he did he guess what 416 00:21:17,880 --> 00:21:19,520 Speaker 1: these rules might be or did he have you know, 417 00:21:19,640 --> 00:21:21,879 Speaker 1: powerful computers say all right, try to come up with 418 00:21:21,920 --> 00:21:24,479 Speaker 1: a Brasilian rules and see if any of them come 419 00:21:24,560 --> 00:21:27,040 Speaker 1: up to the universe. Yeah, he just guessed a few rules. 420 00:21:27,160 --> 00:21:29,480 Speaker 1: And the kicker is he didn't find a rule. It 421 00:21:29,560 --> 00:21:32,720 Speaker 1: works like he has a few examples, and in those 422 00:21:32,760 --> 00:21:35,320 Speaker 1: examples he shows, oh, there's some things in here that 423 00:21:35,359 --> 00:21:38,359 Speaker 1: look like physics, and that's what motivates him to think, oh, 424 00:21:38,560 --> 00:21:40,400 Speaker 1: maybe I'm on the right track and we can dig 425 00:21:40,400 --> 00:21:42,280 Speaker 1: into it a little bit more. But he hasn't actually 426 00:21:42,320 --> 00:21:45,840 Speaker 1: found a rule that describes our universe. He's more like saying, 427 00:21:45,960 --> 00:21:49,800 Speaker 1: maybe this approach will work. Oh, I see, So he 428 00:21:49,840 --> 00:21:52,600 Speaker 1: hasn't he doesn't actually have a theory yet of the universe. 429 00:21:52,640 --> 00:21:56,520 Speaker 1: He just has what he thinks might be a way 430 00:21:56,560 --> 00:21:58,840 Speaker 1: to get to the theory of everything. Yeah, it's sort 431 00:21:58,840 --> 00:22:01,399 Speaker 1: of like a recipe for a theory, and his theory 432 00:22:01,480 --> 00:22:04,120 Speaker 1: is also a recipe for building a universe, So sort 433 00:22:04,119 --> 00:22:06,119 Speaker 1: of a recipe for a theory for a recipe for 434 00:22:06,160 --> 00:22:10,879 Speaker 1: the universe. To a cook as well, he's a chef 435 00:22:11,040 --> 00:22:14,480 Speaker 1: in addition to being God. He's cooking up universes. Man, 436 00:22:15,640 --> 00:22:19,480 Speaker 1: I see has a recipe for a theory that might 437 00:22:19,680 --> 00:22:21,720 Speaker 1: result in the universe. That's right, And you know, it's 438 00:22:21,720 --> 00:22:23,879 Speaker 1: more than just like, hey, maybe this will work. He 439 00:22:24,000 --> 00:22:26,199 Speaker 1: sees some cool stuff in these things that he built up. 440 00:22:26,200 --> 00:22:28,960 Speaker 1: You know, for example, you take these graphs and you 441 00:22:29,040 --> 00:22:31,320 Speaker 1: have a few rules and you let them run and 442 00:22:31,359 --> 00:22:33,320 Speaker 1: they build up interesting things, Like some of them build 443 00:22:33,400 --> 00:22:36,199 Speaker 1: up what looked like three D space, you know, like 444 00:22:36,240 --> 00:22:39,920 Speaker 1: a mesh, a mesh, you know, a nicely organized mesh 445 00:22:40,160 --> 00:22:43,280 Speaker 1: that you could say, hey, maybe spaces quantized. And we've 446 00:22:43,320 --> 00:22:47,159 Speaker 1: talked about how maybe space is just an emergent phenomena 447 00:22:47,560 --> 00:22:50,160 Speaker 1: and it's you know a bunch of dots connected together. Yeah, 448 00:22:50,320 --> 00:22:53,320 Speaker 1: we have an episode about quantum foam. Yeah, quantum foam 449 00:22:53,400 --> 00:22:56,760 Speaker 1: and and you know, the pixelated universe. And so that's 450 00:22:56,800 --> 00:22:59,200 Speaker 1: sort of the leap to physics. He's saying, I'm coming 451 00:22:59,280 --> 00:23:03,359 Speaker 1: up with this math, thematical construct, and then without building 452 00:23:03,359 --> 00:23:06,680 Speaker 1: it in, without saying please build space, just letting it run. 453 00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:11,160 Speaker 1: He sees that from it emerge things he recognizes, like 454 00:23:11,359 --> 00:23:14,440 Speaker 1: a structure you could identify with space. How can you, boy, 455 00:23:14,640 --> 00:23:17,680 Speaker 1: how can you get three dimensions three dimensional space out 456 00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:20,520 Speaker 1: of some dots? I guess that's my question. Yeah, And 457 00:23:20,640 --> 00:23:23,120 Speaker 1: actually his space is not three dimensions, which is one 458 00:23:23,119 --> 00:23:26,119 Speaker 1: of the problems. He makes a space which is two 459 00:23:26,119 --> 00:23:30,359 Speaker 1: point seven dimensions, which is pretty weird. Actually that's pretty 460 00:23:30,400 --> 00:23:34,400 Speaker 1: cool if you think about it. Fractional dimensions. Fractional dimensions 461 00:23:34,400 --> 00:23:36,560 Speaker 1: are cool, but I mean a little inconvenient, Like where 462 00:23:36,600 --> 00:23:38,240 Speaker 1: you're gonna put your stuff. You know, you have three 463 00:23:38,320 --> 00:23:40,800 Speaker 1: D stuff, it doesn't fit in two point seven D space. 464 00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:46,320 Speaker 1: Well that you Jesus describe my closet and everybody's closet. 465 00:23:46,359 --> 00:23:48,120 Speaker 1: Feel like my closet is made out of two points. 466 00:23:48,320 --> 00:23:50,360 Speaker 1: I know. I'm like, if you're gonna do fractional dimensions 467 00:23:50,359 --> 00:23:51,760 Speaker 1: to three and a half, at least you know, give 468 00:23:51,840 --> 00:23:54,680 Speaker 1: us some extra, don't just you know, lose point three dimensions. 469 00:23:54,720 --> 00:23:56,760 Speaker 1: These days everybody needs more room of us need a 470 00:23:56,760 --> 00:23:58,680 Speaker 1: little extra space. You know, that would have been nice, 471 00:23:58,720 --> 00:24:00,320 Speaker 1: That would be a good selling point for the theory. 472 00:24:00,400 --> 00:24:03,600 Speaker 1: So he he runs this idea and he you know, 473 00:24:03,720 --> 00:24:07,280 Speaker 1: grows it, sort of lets it grow itself, right, that's 474 00:24:07,320 --> 00:24:09,720 Speaker 1: kind of the idea. And you're saying, he's gets some 475 00:24:09,800 --> 00:24:13,680 Speaker 1: things that maybe look like what might be space and 476 00:24:13,880 --> 00:24:16,560 Speaker 1: also other things, right, and so he identifies, you know, 477 00:24:16,600 --> 00:24:20,680 Speaker 1: this mesh with a higher dimensionality space, and I encourage 478 00:24:20,720 --> 00:24:22,600 Speaker 1: you to look at his blog post. It's some really 479 00:24:22,680 --> 00:24:25,880 Speaker 1: nice visualizations there. You can understand how he goes from 480 00:24:25,920 --> 00:24:29,159 Speaker 1: like a mesh of points to imagining the dimensionality of 481 00:24:29,200 --> 00:24:32,840 Speaker 1: that points. Essentially, he's thinking about like the density of 482 00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:35,879 Speaker 1: points as you move away from a central point, Like 483 00:24:36,160 --> 00:24:39,560 Speaker 1: in three dimensions, the density of points, you know, drops 484 00:24:39,560 --> 00:24:42,000 Speaker 1: in a certain way, and two dimensions, the density points 485 00:24:42,040 --> 00:24:45,680 Speaker 1: drops in another way. So just by measuring like how 486 00:24:45,720 --> 00:24:47,880 Speaker 1: many points there are as you take five or six 487 00:24:47,920 --> 00:24:51,240 Speaker 1: steps away, then you can sort of measure the dimensionality 488 00:24:51,280 --> 00:24:53,720 Speaker 1: of the space. But it's a leap, you know, Like 489 00:24:54,080 --> 00:24:57,919 Speaker 1: this is a mathematical construct. It has some relationship to 490 00:24:58,600 --> 00:25:00,920 Speaker 1: some things we see in the universe. Does that mean 491 00:25:00,960 --> 00:25:03,920 Speaker 1: it is how the universe works? Like that's a kind 492 00:25:03,920 --> 00:25:06,560 Speaker 1: of a deep philosophical question, right. I guess my question 493 00:25:06,800 --> 00:25:10,399 Speaker 1: maybe at this point is how does it differ from 494 00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:12,280 Speaker 1: some of the other theories that we've talked about, like 495 00:25:12,359 --> 00:25:15,680 Speaker 1: quantum foam And is he coming at it totally from 496 00:25:15,680 --> 00:25:17,600 Speaker 1: the left field or is he start of saying, maybe 497 00:25:17,640 --> 00:25:20,199 Speaker 1: these ideas have some validity to them, but I have 498 00:25:20,280 --> 00:25:22,320 Speaker 1: my own spin on it. Yeah, And that's one of 499 00:25:22,320 --> 00:25:24,480 Speaker 1: the problems with his work is that he doesn't really 500 00:25:24,560 --> 00:25:27,800 Speaker 1: put it into the context of existing ideas. And as 501 00:25:27,800 --> 00:25:31,640 Speaker 1: you say, people have been thinking about quantized space as 502 00:25:31,640 --> 00:25:34,159 Speaker 1: a building block of the universe and trying to go 503 00:25:34,280 --> 00:25:38,240 Speaker 1: from there to recovering Einstein's equations, for example, and that's 504 00:25:38,280 --> 00:25:40,639 Speaker 1: tricky people who been working on for ten twenty years 505 00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:44,359 Speaker 1: and they haven't quite gotten there yet. Whereas he's starting 506 00:25:44,400 --> 00:25:47,200 Speaker 1: from a slightly different point. He's not saying, let's start 507 00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:50,000 Speaker 1: from building blocks of space. He's like, let's just start 508 00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:52,760 Speaker 1: from these nodes from which we get space and then 509 00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:56,239 Speaker 1: from which we also get time and general relativity and 510 00:25:56,480 --> 00:25:59,200 Speaker 1: quantum mechanics and all this stuff. He's going a level 511 00:25:59,240 --> 00:26:01,720 Speaker 1: deeper just of my mind. He's claiming to have gone 512 00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:04,480 Speaker 1: even further than everybody else has gone. You know, he's 513 00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:07,320 Speaker 1: starting deeper and he's claiming to have gone further. So 514 00:26:07,320 --> 00:26:09,720 Speaker 1: you understand why there's a little bit of skepticism that 515 00:26:09,760 --> 00:26:12,600 Speaker 1: he could have accomplished all of this by himself with 516 00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:15,760 Speaker 1: a couple other people while also running a big company. Right, Well, 517 00:26:15,800 --> 00:26:21,320 Speaker 1: if he's an alien chef second coming, it's totally possible. Um. 518 00:26:21,359 --> 00:26:23,240 Speaker 1: But yeah, he just made me realize, Like it's like 519 00:26:23,280 --> 00:26:25,080 Speaker 1: he's trying to go from the thoughts in a white 520 00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:29,040 Speaker 1: board to time itself and pays itself the time itself. Yeah, 521 00:26:29,200 --> 00:26:31,679 Speaker 1: and a lot of this stuff is interpretation. Right. You 522 00:26:31,760 --> 00:26:34,360 Speaker 1: look at this structure in the graph that comes out, 523 00:26:34,440 --> 00:26:36,879 Speaker 1: and you say, oh, that looks to me like time. 524 00:26:37,440 --> 00:26:39,240 Speaker 1: All right, it looks to you like time, But maybe 525 00:26:39,240 --> 00:26:41,600 Speaker 1: you were looking for time. You know. Would you have 526 00:26:42,080 --> 00:26:44,040 Speaker 1: deduced this just from looking at it? Would you have 527 00:26:44,040 --> 00:26:47,760 Speaker 1: found Einstein's equations on your own without Einstein? Or you 528 00:26:47,840 --> 00:26:50,399 Speaker 1: just sort of like looking at a room full of 529 00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:53,800 Speaker 1: typing monkeys and saying, hey, look at this one's typing Shakespeare. Therefore, 530 00:26:54,160 --> 00:26:58,240 Speaker 1: typing monkeys is the way to write great literature. Right, Well, 531 00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:00,119 Speaker 1: that strikes me as a little bit of what you 532 00:27:00,160 --> 00:27:02,439 Speaker 1: guys do in a way, right, like theories, just like 533 00:27:02,520 --> 00:27:05,520 Speaker 1: you know, not to equate physicists theories with monkeys, but 534 00:27:05,680 --> 00:27:07,720 Speaker 1: you know, you guys started throwing out theories and and 535 00:27:07,720 --> 00:27:10,360 Speaker 1: and then the experimentalis have to see which ones work. Yeah, 536 00:27:10,359 --> 00:27:12,760 Speaker 1: experimentalists have to see which one's work. That's the critical 537 00:27:12,760 --> 00:27:15,680 Speaker 1: test here. You know, there's a lot of these different 538 00:27:15,680 --> 00:27:19,560 Speaker 1: spaces and the fact that some of them can reproduce 539 00:27:19,600 --> 00:27:22,199 Speaker 1: theories we already have and they have been tested, doesn't 540 00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:25,879 Speaker 1: necessarily mean that this is the fundamental structure of the universe. Right, 541 00:27:26,040 --> 00:27:28,520 Speaker 1: There's lots of ways to reproduce physics theories. I could 542 00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:31,639 Speaker 1: just have monkeys type and occasionally they would reproduce physics theories. 543 00:27:31,880 --> 00:27:33,919 Speaker 1: Doesn't mean that the universe is a bunch of monkeys. 544 00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:37,680 Speaker 1: And remember, Daniel, keep an open mind, and maybe it is. Yeah, yeah, 545 00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:42,320 Speaker 1: maybe it's a monkey. Maybe it is right, it's monkeys 546 00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:45,960 Speaker 1: all the way down. All right, let's get into whether 547 00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:49,639 Speaker 1: people think this theory actually works or whether it's so 548 00:27:49,800 --> 00:27:52,879 Speaker 1: out there that nobody is taking it seriously. But first 549 00:27:52,960 --> 00:28:07,159 Speaker 1: let's take a quick break, all right, Daniel talk to 550 00:28:07,240 --> 00:28:10,640 Speaker 1: me about two point seven dimensional space. That is still 551 00:28:11,000 --> 00:28:13,440 Speaker 1: blowing my mind. How can you have to like frac 552 00:28:13,520 --> 00:28:15,639 Speaker 1: tionnel dimensions? Is it that like one of them is 553 00:28:15,640 --> 00:28:18,000 Speaker 1: not quite a dimension. Well, he doesn't really have any 554 00:28:18,000 --> 00:28:21,679 Speaker 1: spatial dimensions at all, right, it's just points and lines. 555 00:28:21,760 --> 00:28:24,440 Speaker 1: He just connects the points with lines, and he tries 556 00:28:24,480 --> 00:28:27,080 Speaker 1: to make an analogy two dimensions. He says, if you 557 00:28:27,160 --> 00:28:30,000 Speaker 1: take a point and I walk four points away, right, 558 00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:32,840 Speaker 1: I walk four points win in every direction, then I 559 00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:36,240 Speaker 1: can count sort of how many points are in that object. 560 00:28:36,440 --> 00:28:38,880 Speaker 1: You can take paths away from that point in every direction. 561 00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:43,040 Speaker 1: You can ask how many points are within four steps away, 562 00:28:43,880 --> 00:28:45,920 Speaker 1: and how many points are within ten steps away and 563 00:28:46,000 --> 00:28:50,320 Speaker 1: fifteen steps away. And that grows differently if you're in 564 00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:53,840 Speaker 1: three dimensional space or two dimensional space or four dimensional space. 565 00:28:53,960 --> 00:28:57,120 Speaker 1: So he's taking that as a measure of dimension, right, 566 00:28:57,120 --> 00:28:59,720 Speaker 1: it doesn't have any dimensions built in. You could take 567 00:28:59,760 --> 00:29:02,240 Speaker 1: his whole hypergraphs and just lay them flat on a 568 00:29:02,240 --> 00:29:04,240 Speaker 1: piece of paper, or you could spread them out in 569 00:29:04,280 --> 00:29:06,880 Speaker 1: three D. It's totally arbitrary. There's no place to hang 570 00:29:06,960 --> 00:29:11,760 Speaker 1: these things, right. They don't have locations, They just have relationships. 571 00:29:11,800 --> 00:29:15,560 Speaker 1: But he's contending that from these relationships there is a structure, 572 00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:18,680 Speaker 1: and that structure is very similar to dimensionality, to the 573 00:29:19,080 --> 00:29:24,720 Speaker 1: relationship that things have in actual space physically, yes, yes, exactly. 574 00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:28,880 Speaker 1: So you know, volume grows with our cubed for a spear, 575 00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:32,800 Speaker 1: area grows like are squared for a circle. Right in 576 00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,880 Speaker 1: four dimensions, things grow with a different dependence. And so 577 00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:38,400 Speaker 1: he just asks, as I take steps away from a 578 00:29:38,440 --> 00:29:41,400 Speaker 1: single point, what's the density of points? And that's my 579 00:29:41,560 --> 00:29:45,280 Speaker 1: measure of the dimensionality of my space. And he doesn't 580 00:29:45,320 --> 00:29:47,480 Speaker 1: get a number of two or three. He gets this 581 00:29:47,600 --> 00:29:50,200 Speaker 1: weird two point seven, and so you're like, what what 582 00:29:50,240 --> 00:29:52,440 Speaker 1: does that even mean? You get three, so that you 583 00:29:52,520 --> 00:29:58,800 Speaker 1: know that's not you know, physics is like hand grenades 584 00:29:58,840 --> 00:30:01,640 Speaker 1: and horseshoes as long as you get close. Well, you 585 00:30:01,640 --> 00:30:04,520 Speaker 1: make an interesting point, which is that you know, if 586 00:30:05,040 --> 00:30:08,680 Speaker 1: just because something does something the way that you see 587 00:30:08,720 --> 00:30:11,640 Speaker 1: it doesn't mean that it's how things are kind of like, 588 00:30:11,680 --> 00:30:14,760 Speaker 1: you know, just because you can build an artificial intelligence, 589 00:30:14,760 --> 00:30:18,640 Speaker 1: for example, or like a function that spits out or 590 00:30:18,920 --> 00:30:21,960 Speaker 1: happens to simulate how a ball gets tossed up in 591 00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:25,320 Speaker 1: the air, doesn't mean that that's how the universe works, 592 00:30:25,320 --> 00:30:29,360 Speaker 1: that the balls float through the air according to an Ai. Yeah, 593 00:30:29,400 --> 00:30:31,959 Speaker 1: and I think there's two different issues here. One is 594 00:30:32,000 --> 00:30:34,720 Speaker 1: exactly what you just said. You know, you can't just 595 00:30:35,160 --> 00:30:38,360 Speaker 1: identify similar behavior and say that's the truth. But that's 596 00:30:38,360 --> 00:30:41,520 Speaker 1: actually a really hard philosophical problem. Like, if you have 597 00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:45,520 Speaker 1: a theory of strings that completely describes the universe, does 598 00:30:45,560 --> 00:30:48,280 Speaker 1: that mean that strings are real? I mean, and somebody 599 00:30:48,320 --> 00:30:50,720 Speaker 1: asked us this question over Twitter just yesterday. They said, 600 00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:54,280 Speaker 1: what if I had an alternative theory of bananas and 601 00:30:54,360 --> 00:30:57,480 Speaker 1: it also described the universe and you could never tell 602 00:30:57,520 --> 00:31:00,280 Speaker 1: the difference between strings and bananas, would that mean that 603 00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:03,200 Speaker 1: bananas are also a valid theory of the universe? And 604 00:31:03,240 --> 00:31:05,640 Speaker 1: which would be true? Oh? I see, if you have 605 00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:08,920 Speaker 1: two theories that both describe the universe, how do you 606 00:31:08,920 --> 00:31:11,000 Speaker 1: tell which one's true or the right one? Yeah? And 607 00:31:11,000 --> 00:31:13,360 Speaker 1: if you can't tell the difference, if they're like both 608 00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:16,959 Speaker 1: make exactly the same predictions, but they have very different 609 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:20,640 Speaker 1: descriptions of what's really happening, then which one is what's 610 00:31:20,680 --> 00:31:23,560 Speaker 1: really happening? Well, the answer is, we can't tell. And 611 00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:26,440 Speaker 1: so it depends on what you think true means. You know, 612 00:31:27,120 --> 00:31:30,760 Speaker 1: is there some untestable actual truths in the external universe 613 00:31:30,840 --> 00:31:33,040 Speaker 1: or is it really just about describing what we see? 614 00:31:33,240 --> 00:31:36,640 Speaker 1: So that's sort of a deep, unanswerable philosophy question. But 615 00:31:36,680 --> 00:31:39,479 Speaker 1: there's a there's a more practical angle to it, which is, 616 00:31:40,080 --> 00:31:43,200 Speaker 1: can you do more than just describe what we already see? 617 00:31:43,440 --> 00:31:47,400 Speaker 1: Can you predict something we haven't yet seen? Right, It's 618 00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:49,840 Speaker 1: very easy to look in a sea of garbage and 619 00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:52,520 Speaker 1: pick out something sparkling. It's like, look, I produced one 620 00:31:52,560 --> 00:31:56,520 Speaker 1: diamond or something like, my theory, my simulation, my code 621 00:31:56,960 --> 00:31:59,440 Speaker 1: predicts how this ball will what this ball will do 622 00:31:59,480 --> 00:32:01,200 Speaker 1: if I toss it up in the air. But that's 623 00:32:01,200 --> 00:32:03,360 Speaker 1: sort of not interesting to physicists. Yeah, like we have 624 00:32:03,400 --> 00:32:06,240 Speaker 1: all these everything that he's derived we already have. We 625 00:32:06,320 --> 00:32:11,360 Speaker 1: have Einstein's equations, we have special relativity, we have quantum mechanics. Right, 626 00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:13,920 Speaker 1: the question is has he revealed any new insights and 627 00:32:14,000 --> 00:32:17,080 Speaker 1: he made any predictions? If his theory is really true, 628 00:32:17,400 --> 00:32:19,880 Speaker 1: it should predict something you should say on the universe 629 00:32:19,920 --> 00:32:23,600 Speaker 1: also works in this other way that you hadn't yet realized, 630 00:32:24,040 --> 00:32:25,520 Speaker 1: and then we can go out and verify that and 631 00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:28,400 Speaker 1: be like, oh, well then maybe your theory is true. Right. 632 00:32:28,800 --> 00:32:31,560 Speaker 1: It's not just enough to say to describe the universe, 633 00:32:31,600 --> 00:32:34,680 Speaker 1: because my hundred typing monkeys will eventually do that also, 634 00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:38,720 Speaker 1: but they will generate nonsense predictions. So tell me anything 635 00:32:38,720 --> 00:32:40,440 Speaker 1: about the universe I don't already know. You just have 636 00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:43,520 Speaker 1: to give those monkeys more bananas. I mean that that 637 00:32:43,520 --> 00:32:46,200 Speaker 1: would make it all. But it sort of sounds like 638 00:32:46,240 --> 00:32:50,360 Speaker 1: maybe what he's doing that's new and interesting is he's 639 00:32:50,360 --> 00:32:53,760 Speaker 1: actually sort of making that connection between a really simple 640 00:32:53,800 --> 00:32:57,000 Speaker 1: set of things to the complex things you know, Like, 641 00:32:57,560 --> 00:32:59,680 Speaker 1: you know, string theory has been around for a long time, 642 00:32:59,720 --> 00:33:02,680 Speaker 1: but nobody has tried to build up the universe using strings, 643 00:33:02,680 --> 00:33:05,600 Speaker 1: have they, And but it sounds like maybe he's sort 644 00:33:05,640 --> 00:33:09,080 Speaker 1: of done that and is seeing things that are promising. Well, 645 00:33:09,160 --> 00:33:11,240 Speaker 1: that's one problem with string theory is that you can 646 00:33:11,240 --> 00:33:14,479 Speaker 1: take strings and build up universes, but you get like 647 00:33:14,760 --> 00:33:18,440 Speaker 1: ten to the five different kinds of universes, and ours 648 00:33:18,600 --> 00:33:22,160 Speaker 1: is one of them, but it doesn't necessarily predict ours, right, 649 00:33:22,200 --> 00:33:24,680 Speaker 1: So then you ask, well, if the universe is just strings, 650 00:33:24,720 --> 00:33:26,960 Speaker 1: how can we end up in this universe? And he 651 00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:30,440 Speaker 1: has basically the same problem, right, He has a lot 652 00:33:30,440 --> 00:33:33,720 Speaker 1: of potential possible rules for building up the universe using 653 00:33:33,800 --> 00:33:36,800 Speaker 1: his hypercrafts. Some of them lead to universes sort of 654 00:33:36,880 --> 00:33:40,080 Speaker 1: like ours, so you know, wrong number dimensions, etcetera. But 655 00:33:40,160 --> 00:33:42,680 Speaker 1: some of them don't, and so you know, sort of 656 00:33:42,680 --> 00:33:45,400 Speaker 1: in this vast sea of outcomes. It would be much 657 00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:48,360 Speaker 1: more compelling if he had a basic set of rules 658 00:33:48,400 --> 00:33:51,160 Speaker 1: that necessarily led to our universe that there was nothing 659 00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:53,560 Speaker 1: else that could predict, like it had to only be 660 00:33:53,640 --> 00:33:56,320 Speaker 1: this way. That would be much more compelling. That would 661 00:33:56,360 --> 00:33:59,960 Speaker 1: be better maybe, but maybe not even true or possible, 662 00:34:00,120 --> 00:34:02,640 Speaker 1: Like maybe the universe is just a random set of rules. 663 00:34:02,800 --> 00:34:05,240 Speaker 1: Oh man, that what are we even doing? Right? If 664 00:34:05,240 --> 00:34:10,719 Speaker 1: the universe is not understandable? But I know, I hope 665 00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:15,200 Speaker 1: it is. Yet I don't give up. I don't give up. 666 00:34:15,560 --> 00:34:19,000 Speaker 1: I'm still hoping. Um, And so it's totally valid to 667 00:34:19,440 --> 00:34:22,120 Speaker 1: look for a new way to build things up from scratch. 668 00:34:22,520 --> 00:34:25,160 Speaker 1: And maybe he's right, and it would be deep insights 669 00:34:25,239 --> 00:34:28,120 Speaker 1: if he was, But you know, it hasn't really shown 670 00:34:28,120 --> 00:34:31,080 Speaker 1: in new insights yet, hasn't really shown us anything new 671 00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:33,560 Speaker 1: that can come from it. And there's also a lot 672 00:34:33,600 --> 00:34:36,120 Speaker 1: of questions about the sort of the connections he's made 673 00:34:36,200 --> 00:34:39,280 Speaker 1: between what his theory can do and what we've already discovered. 674 00:34:39,400 --> 00:34:41,680 Speaker 1: I see well, maybe it's stepped me through some examples 675 00:34:41,680 --> 00:34:43,759 Speaker 1: of what you mean here, because you know you're telling 676 00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:48,760 Speaker 1: me earlier that in some ways his model, his theory 677 00:34:48,800 --> 00:34:51,719 Speaker 1: of the universe sort of predicts clsality and things like 678 00:34:51,760 --> 00:34:55,560 Speaker 1: special relativity and particles. Is that not sort of interesting 679 00:34:55,719 --> 00:34:58,520 Speaker 1: or it's interesting and it's a good idea, but it's 680 00:34:58,520 --> 00:35:00,600 Speaker 1: not clear that it predicts it, or if he's just 681 00:35:00,600 --> 00:35:04,520 Speaker 1: sort of like identifying something in his structures which looks 682 00:35:04,560 --> 00:35:07,440 Speaker 1: a little bit like it, and it's sort of wishful connections. Right, 683 00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:09,960 Speaker 1: there's a lot of leaps here where he's like, oh, 684 00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:12,319 Speaker 1: look at this sort of structure that dot dot, here's 685 00:35:12,320 --> 00:35:15,320 Speaker 1: Einstein's equation, And you're like, well, a whole lot of second. 686 00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:18,280 Speaker 1: You know, I can write down Einstein's equation on a chalkboard. 687 00:35:18,320 --> 00:35:21,120 Speaker 1: Doesn't mean that it's a necessary consequence of what I've 688 00:35:21,160 --> 00:35:24,960 Speaker 1: just done. But there are some cool connections, for example, causality. 689 00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:29,440 Speaker 1: He takes his little hypergraphs and his little rules for 690 00:35:29,560 --> 00:35:32,759 Speaker 1: updating them, and his picture those rules for updating them. 691 00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:35,960 Speaker 1: That's time. Every time you change your hypergraph by following 692 00:35:35,960 --> 00:35:38,960 Speaker 1: these rules, that's like a step forward in time. And 693 00:35:39,200 --> 00:35:42,680 Speaker 1: he shows that for some simple examples. It doesn't really 694 00:35:42,719 --> 00:35:45,919 Speaker 1: matter which order you apply these rules in, Like maybe 695 00:35:45,920 --> 00:35:47,680 Speaker 1: you apply them first to this node and then to 696 00:35:47,800 --> 00:35:50,440 Speaker 1: that note, and the other time you do another direction. 697 00:35:50,880 --> 00:35:53,719 Speaker 1: Sometimes you end up in the same place no matter what. 698 00:35:54,400 --> 00:35:57,080 Speaker 1: Start from the same initial conditions. Do things in a 699 00:35:57,080 --> 00:36:00,839 Speaker 1: different order end up in the same place. And so him, 700 00:36:00,880 --> 00:36:04,440 Speaker 1: that's causality that says, look, this first place has to 701 00:36:04,520 --> 00:36:08,840 Speaker 1: come before this other place, because in these graphs you 702 00:36:08,880 --> 00:36:11,080 Speaker 1: always start with one and end up at the other. 703 00:36:11,400 --> 00:36:14,920 Speaker 1: So that's where causality coming from. He sees behavior in 704 00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:18,960 Speaker 1: this graph, you know, he sees shades of what might 705 00:36:19,200 --> 00:36:21,279 Speaker 1: if maybe you look into it, or if you sort 706 00:36:21,320 --> 00:36:23,960 Speaker 1: of maybe keep going with this, you might sort of 707 00:36:24,080 --> 00:36:29,200 Speaker 1: rediscover or or create causality and special relativity and particles. Yeah, 708 00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,120 Speaker 1: exactly the way. You know. I sometimes listen to my 709 00:36:32,360 --> 00:36:35,760 Speaker 1: children's random thoughts and say, like, oh, wow, look, you 710 00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:38,319 Speaker 1: you're a genius. You just had some great idea. You 711 00:36:38,320 --> 00:36:42,279 Speaker 1: know you can recognize in random babbling. Uh, you know, 712 00:36:42,440 --> 00:36:45,319 Speaker 1: great ideas if you're hopeful, right, And so there's a 713 00:36:45,360 --> 00:36:47,600 Speaker 1: little bit of that, like, well, yeah, you could have 714 00:36:47,640 --> 00:36:51,560 Speaker 1: said that, but are you just imposing on very complex 715 00:36:51,560 --> 00:36:55,000 Speaker 1: structures the things you wanted to see. So that's one example. 716 00:36:55,239 --> 00:36:57,839 Speaker 1: Another is he tries to describe particles and he says, Okay, 717 00:36:57,880 --> 00:37:02,279 Speaker 1: in this case, if space is this mesh of points, right, 718 00:37:02,280 --> 00:37:04,719 Speaker 1: then what is matter? How do you get matter in 719 00:37:04,760 --> 00:37:08,000 Speaker 1: this measure points? And so what he does is he says, well, 720 00:37:08,040 --> 00:37:13,560 Speaker 1: maybe matter. Maybe particles are these special connections between these points, 721 00:37:13,600 --> 00:37:16,759 Speaker 1: these arrangements between these points. Like every time you have 722 00:37:17,120 --> 00:37:19,960 Speaker 1: three nodes with these particular connections between them, you call 723 00:37:20,040 --> 00:37:23,040 Speaker 1: that a particle. And he's tried to show that sometimes 724 00:37:23,040 --> 00:37:27,120 Speaker 1: these particles are stable configurations, like if they exist, they 725 00:37:27,160 --> 00:37:31,120 Speaker 1: will continue to exist, and they will move across the graph. 726 00:37:31,360 --> 00:37:36,000 Speaker 1: So they're like patterns in these connections. The relationship between 727 00:37:36,080 --> 00:37:38,440 Speaker 1: nodes sort of moves in the way that maybe a 728 00:37:38,480 --> 00:37:42,319 Speaker 1: particle would move through space. Yeah, exactly, recognize the relationship 729 00:37:42,520 --> 00:37:46,160 Speaker 1: and see that relationship sort of translate itself across the graph. 730 00:37:46,400 --> 00:37:48,960 Speaker 1: That would be what a particle would be. I'm getting 731 00:37:48,960 --> 00:37:50,920 Speaker 1: the picture of, you know, having the matrix. At the end, 732 00:37:50,960 --> 00:37:54,880 Speaker 1: Neo sees the code behind the universe. I wonder if 733 00:37:54,880 --> 00:37:56,200 Speaker 1: this is how he was feeling. He's like, oh, I 734 00:37:56,239 --> 00:37:58,040 Speaker 1: can see the whole universe. It's just a whole bunch 735 00:37:58,080 --> 00:38:01,480 Speaker 1: of notes. I am Kiana reeves again if it worked, 736 00:38:01,640 --> 00:38:03,799 Speaker 1: he hasn't actually made that work. He hasn't seen that 737 00:38:03,880 --> 00:38:05,839 Speaker 1: happen on his graphs. He's just sort of like, hey, 738 00:38:05,920 --> 00:38:08,680 Speaker 1: that would be cool. And he's mentioned that, you know, 739 00:38:08,840 --> 00:38:10,279 Speaker 1: they're going to follow up on that in a couple 740 00:38:10,320 --> 00:38:12,520 Speaker 1: of weeks and hope to figure that out. And I'm like, yeah, 741 00:38:12,520 --> 00:38:14,439 Speaker 1: I'd like to figure out particle physics in a couple 742 00:38:14,440 --> 00:38:16,319 Speaker 1: of weeks too. Yeah, why didn't he just wait a 743 00:38:16,320 --> 00:38:19,319 Speaker 1: couple of weeks before publishing this? Yeah, there's a lot 744 00:38:19,320 --> 00:38:21,680 Speaker 1: of that. There's like, Okay, well you have some cool ideas, 745 00:38:22,000 --> 00:38:24,640 Speaker 1: you have some notions here, you haven't really quite figured 746 00:38:24,719 --> 00:38:26,880 Speaker 1: it out, so why now we Maybe a question is 747 00:38:27,360 --> 00:38:31,040 Speaker 1: he's seen all these things time, causality, particles in his 748 00:38:31,560 --> 00:38:33,640 Speaker 1: you know, mesh of nodes. So is this you know, 749 00:38:33,760 --> 00:38:36,160 Speaker 1: the mesh, from one simple set of rules, or is 750 00:38:36,160 --> 00:38:38,359 Speaker 1: he like tweaking the rules every time and like, if 751 00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:40,120 Speaker 1: I tweak it this way, you get castality, If I 752 00:38:40,120 --> 00:38:42,680 Speaker 1: tweaked them this way, you get space. He identifies all 753 00:38:42,719 --> 00:38:45,919 Speaker 1: these things from one simple set of rules, but he's 754 00:38:45,920 --> 00:38:48,239 Speaker 1: tried a few different rules, and he's tried this rule 755 00:38:48,239 --> 00:38:50,520 Speaker 1: and that rule and the other rule. And he notices 756 00:38:50,800 --> 00:38:53,120 Speaker 1: similar behaviors in a lot of these meshes, which is 757 00:38:53,160 --> 00:38:56,520 Speaker 1: cool and makes it more compelling. But again, he hasn't 758 00:38:56,560 --> 00:38:59,839 Speaker 1: found the rule that he thinks is convincing and so one, 759 00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:03,279 Speaker 1: and he'd like is for everybody to participate. He has 760 00:39:03,320 --> 00:39:06,280 Speaker 1: a website where you can go and build a graph 761 00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:09,320 Speaker 1: and enter a rule and see what universe it builds. 762 00:39:09,360 --> 00:39:13,120 Speaker 1: And he wants to sort of like crowdsource, the crowdsourcing 763 00:39:13,360 --> 00:39:16,480 Speaker 1: making universes exactly. We are all God, it sounds like 764 00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:20,279 Speaker 1: a smart god. He's like, God's like, I'm tired, I'm 765 00:39:20,520 --> 00:39:22,920 Speaker 1: I'm out of ideas. I'll just get one of my 766 00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:25,239 Speaker 1: creations to help me create more creations. Right, I'm just 767 00:39:25,239 --> 00:39:26,680 Speaker 1: going to leave the recipe on the counter here, and 768 00:39:26,680 --> 00:39:29,000 Speaker 1: I want you to actually make the cookies. All right. Well, 769 00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:31,839 Speaker 1: it sounds sort of like, you know, he's he's sort 770 00:39:31,880 --> 00:39:34,560 Speaker 1: of a bit of an outsider, and he's sort of 771 00:39:34,640 --> 00:39:38,000 Speaker 1: maybe taking a huge leap forward without bringing the rest 772 00:39:38,040 --> 00:39:41,759 Speaker 1: of the community along. And there's some skepticism, and but 773 00:39:41,880 --> 00:39:43,919 Speaker 1: it sort of sounds like his idea is not too 774 00:39:43,960 --> 00:39:46,960 Speaker 1: far off from what people are thinking or we're looking 775 00:39:47,000 --> 00:39:49,480 Speaker 1: for it sounds like maybe he's just sort of skipped 776 00:39:49,480 --> 00:39:52,719 Speaker 1: a few steps, you know, in the procedures of physics. Yeah, 777 00:39:52,719 --> 00:39:55,640 Speaker 1: he skipped a few steps in the procedures, which is okay. 778 00:39:55,760 --> 00:39:58,080 Speaker 1: I mean, if you deliver a five page treatise on 779 00:39:58,120 --> 00:40:00,640 Speaker 1: the universe, it's a lot to swallow. But hey, if 780 00:40:00,680 --> 00:40:04,560 Speaker 1: it's true, thank you, thank you. But he's also skipped 781 00:40:04,560 --> 00:40:06,920 Speaker 1: a few steps in his treatise, Like you read it 782 00:40:06,960 --> 00:40:08,759 Speaker 1: and you're like, well, well, how do you get from 783 00:40:08,800 --> 00:40:11,359 Speaker 1: here to there exactly? You know, And in this case, 784 00:40:11,440 --> 00:40:14,279 Speaker 1: he knows all the results in advance, and so he's 785 00:40:14,280 --> 00:40:17,520 Speaker 1: sort of like dot dot dot general relativity. You know, 786 00:40:17,560 --> 00:40:20,120 Speaker 1: you have to really show that it's the only consequence, 787 00:40:20,160 --> 00:40:22,319 Speaker 1: and I don't think he's really compellingly done that. The 788 00:40:22,360 --> 00:40:24,960 Speaker 1: way to do that, really compelling lee would be to 789 00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:27,560 Speaker 1: come up with a new theory. They're like, okay, and 790 00:40:27,840 --> 00:40:31,480 Speaker 1: here's dark matter or here's the dark energy, or this 791 00:40:31,520 --> 00:40:34,080 Speaker 1: explains that, you know, what happened before the Big Bang 792 00:40:34,200 --> 00:40:36,239 Speaker 1: or something, and then we could probe that and see 793 00:40:36,239 --> 00:40:39,120 Speaker 1: that it's true, and wow, okay, maybe then the universe 794 00:40:39,320 --> 00:40:42,000 Speaker 1: is just four lines of mathematic Well, it sounds like 795 00:40:42,080 --> 00:40:44,719 Speaker 1: maybe he is not quite there yet, but he's saying, Look, 796 00:40:44,719 --> 00:40:46,480 Speaker 1: it's promising. You can start to see space, you can 797 00:40:46,520 --> 00:40:49,759 Speaker 1: sort of see time totally, and sounds like maybe the 798 00:40:49,840 --> 00:40:52,560 Speaker 1: real answer is to be determined. In a couple of weeks, 799 00:40:52,640 --> 00:40:56,879 Speaker 1: will out, Daniel, everything. Everyone will be stuck at home, 800 00:40:56,920 --> 00:40:59,960 Speaker 1: but we'll know how everything works. Yeah, and he had 801 00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:02,840 Speaker 1: made a prediction or two. You know, he thinks that 802 00:41:02,960 --> 00:41:06,160 Speaker 1: the size of these hypergraphs is something like ten to 803 00:41:06,200 --> 00:41:10,759 Speaker 1: the minus ninety three meters, mean the size of the 804 00:41:10,960 --> 00:41:14,360 Speaker 1: little bananasm makeup the unit. Yeah, the distance between these 805 00:41:14,400 --> 00:41:17,040 Speaker 1: points in the node. Right, the minimum distance, the basic 806 00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:19,880 Speaker 1: unit of distance in his universe is ten to the 807 00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:23,600 Speaker 1: minus ninety three ms, which is like almost impossibly small 808 00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:27,000 Speaker 1: and hard to think about because remember, the smallest distance 809 00:41:27,080 --> 00:41:30,960 Speaker 1: we've ever seen is like tend to the minus twenty meters, 810 00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:34,120 Speaker 1: which is already like you know, tiny, tiny, tiny fraction 811 00:41:34,160 --> 00:41:37,239 Speaker 1: of a proton. And other people think the universe like 812 00:41:37,480 --> 00:41:39,920 Speaker 1: the quantum loop theory, people think the universe is like 813 00:41:40,239 --> 00:41:42,880 Speaker 1: ten of the minus thirty five meters is like the 814 00:41:42,920 --> 00:41:45,719 Speaker 1: size of a space pixel. So this guy's like sixty 815 00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:49,759 Speaker 1: orders of magnitude smaller, and so that's a that's a 816 00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:53,440 Speaker 1: prediction that's almost impossible to test, but so so as 817 00:41:53,520 --> 00:41:55,919 Speaker 1: drink theory kind of yeah, so strength theory. Strength theory, 818 00:41:55,920 --> 00:41:58,120 Speaker 1: we think operates on the plunk scale. So it's only 819 00:41:58,239 --> 00:42:01,319 Speaker 1: fifteen orders of magnitude away, you know, instead of being 820 00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:04,839 Speaker 1: sixty or seventy orders in magnet. It's uh, it might 821 00:42:04,880 --> 00:42:08,680 Speaker 1: be difficult to prove this. Ever, you're saying yes, yes, 822 00:42:08,719 --> 00:42:11,320 Speaker 1: And you know, he imagines that there might be particles 823 00:42:11,600 --> 00:42:13,839 Speaker 1: down at that little scale, and maybe those particles are 824 00:42:13,880 --> 00:42:16,960 Speaker 1: even dark matter, right, so saying earlier he should make predictions, 825 00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:19,000 Speaker 1: All right, Well he has made this one, but it's 826 00:42:19,040 --> 00:42:21,319 Speaker 1: sort of out of reaching. This is not something we're 827 00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:23,040 Speaker 1: going to test in a couple of weeks. But at 828 00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:25,040 Speaker 1: the same time, it could be that the real nature 829 00:42:25,040 --> 00:42:27,399 Speaker 1: of the universe will never be able to grow. Man, 830 00:42:27,440 --> 00:42:29,720 Speaker 1: you're really hoping for that, aren't you. It's just like Daniel, 831 00:42:29,760 --> 00:42:36,600 Speaker 1: you're wasting your life. No, it's true. It's true that 832 00:42:37,880 --> 00:42:42,120 Speaker 1: it's true that the universe might not be understandable to humanity. 833 00:42:42,160 --> 00:42:45,080 Speaker 1: It's true the universe might not be understandable, but for 834 00:42:45,120 --> 00:42:48,360 Speaker 1: some weird reasons. So far, we've been making pretty good progress, 835 00:42:48,400 --> 00:42:51,120 Speaker 1: which suggests that this method of science and our way 836 00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:54,440 Speaker 1: of thinking is somehow aligned with the way the universe works, 837 00:42:54,560 --> 00:42:57,440 Speaker 1: or can be aligned, and so yeah, we'd like to 838 00:42:57,520 --> 00:43:01,759 Speaker 1: keep doing it. We're all wishful thinkers. Not everybody thinks 839 00:43:01,760 --> 00:43:05,040 Speaker 1: that we're wasting our time. All right, Well, that's pretty interesting. 840 00:43:05,040 --> 00:43:07,799 Speaker 1: I guess we'll find out in the future whether he's 841 00:43:07,920 --> 00:43:10,440 Speaker 1: right or not. And in the meantime, I guess you 842 00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:12,719 Speaker 1: can go online and read more about it and even 843 00:43:12,760 --> 00:43:14,920 Speaker 1: make up your own universe. That's right. And you know, 844 00:43:14,920 --> 00:43:16,960 Speaker 1: he's down a bit of an unusual pr campaign with 845 00:43:17,000 --> 00:43:19,880 Speaker 1: his blog post and his videos and his announcements, but 846 00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:25,680 Speaker 1: he's physics. Yeah, but he's also submitted some papers to 847 00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:28,560 Speaker 1: journals and so they're being vetted by other physicists taking 848 00:43:28,560 --> 00:43:31,680 Speaker 1: them seriously, you know, peer review, and so that takes 849 00:43:31,719 --> 00:43:34,239 Speaker 1: a little while. And so you know, stay tuned. He 850 00:43:34,320 --> 00:43:36,360 Speaker 1: learned his lesson from two thousand two where he just 851 00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:39,000 Speaker 1: brought a book. Well, no, he's also writing a nine 852 00:43:39,320 --> 00:43:41,640 Speaker 1: page book which we have very soon I see, but 853 00:43:41,719 --> 00:43:44,960 Speaker 1: he he learned to post it on Twitter, So stay tuned. 854 00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:47,080 Speaker 1: You know, the top minds in the fields are thinking 855 00:43:47,080 --> 00:43:49,680 Speaker 1: about this, and they will critique it and criticize it 856 00:43:49,719 --> 00:43:52,359 Speaker 1: and find what's good and what remains to be worked on. 857 00:43:52,680 --> 00:43:55,000 Speaker 1: But you're right, it could be the theory of everything. 858 00:43:55,040 --> 00:43:57,200 Speaker 1: We just don't know yet and we might never know, 859 00:43:57,360 --> 00:43:59,040 Speaker 1: or it might come from somebody and not him, but 860 00:43:59,160 --> 00:44:02,160 Speaker 1: somebody who's maybe listening to this podcast. That's right. So 861 00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:05,200 Speaker 1: if you're working on your theory of everything, take heart. 862 00:44:05,239 --> 00:44:08,960 Speaker 1: You know, Stephen Wolfram might not be right. All right, Well, 863 00:44:09,080 --> 00:44:11,400 Speaker 1: we hope you enjoyed that. Thanks so much for listening. 864 00:44:11,600 --> 00:44:21,799 Speaker 1: See you next time. Thanks for listening, and remember that 865 00:44:21,920 --> 00:44:24,840 Speaker 1: Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production I 866 00:44:25,080 --> 00:44:28,520 Speaker 1: Heart Radio. For more podcast for my Heart Radio, visit 867 00:44:28,520 --> 00:44:32,040 Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you 868 00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:39,480 Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows. Yeah,