The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - 486. The Intersection of Science and Meaning ｜ Dr. Brian Greene

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00:00:57.420 Hello, everybody. I had the opportunity and privilege today to speak with Dr. Brian Green, who's a physicist and an author of a number of books.

00:01:16.260 The book we delved into most deeply today was The Elegant Universe, Super Strings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory.

00:01:25.620 That was originally published in 1999, but he's offering an updated version as of 2024.

00:01:31.900 And so we had a chance to delve into the mysteries of quantum mechanics, special relativity, and string theory.

00:01:39.000 And string theory is a branch of physics that was designed or emerged to deal with the contradictions that exist between general relativity and quantum mechanics.

00:01:50.360 And so what did we do in our discussion?

00:01:52.800 Well, we talked about quantum mechanics and what it means and signifies.

00:01:57.620 We talked about the theory of general relativity.

00:01:59.600 We talked about the nature of time and the nature of entropy, which are concepts that are quite tightly related.

00:02:08.860 We talked about the infamous double slit experiment, which is a mind twister to say the least.

00:02:17.980 We talked about the potential testing of string theory.

00:02:22.840 We talked about what it has to offer and what we we we we talked about consciousness and the perception of time and the relationship between the perception of time and entropy and the expansion of the universe.

00:02:38.560 And we talked about situating that more narrow pursuit of the truths of physics in a what in a more broadly humanistic approach to the world at large.

00:02:57.000 And so if you're interested in the mysteries of physics and the relationship between the various deep theories of physics to one another and trying to develop some understanding of cutting edge inquiry in that regard, particularly with in relationship to string theory, let's say, then this is the conversation for you.

00:03:19.160 And thanks to Dr.

00:03:20.700 Thanks to Dr. Brian Green for agreeing to put up with my questions and and for sharing his deep knowledge.

00:03:29.420 With me and my viewers.

00:03:31.940 So, Dr. Green, you've written a number of books.

00:03:35.120 I think I'll just list them.

00:03:36.440 And if I miss any, I don't think I will.

00:03:38.480 But if I do, let me know until the end of time.

00:03:42.260 That was 2020.

00:03:44.100 Light Falls.

00:03:46.560 2016.

00:03:47.520 The Hidden Reality.

00:03:49.160 2011.

00:03:50.780 Icarus at the Edge of Time.

00:03:53.860 2008.

00:03:54.520 The Fabric of the Cosmos.

00:03:56.240 2004.

00:03:57.640 And The Elegant Universe.

00:04:00.020 Super Strings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory.

00:04:03.240 That was published originally in 1999, but it's been updated for 2024.

00:04:08.060 And I guess that's part of the occasion for our discussion.

00:04:10.880 And so, you've been investigating and popularizing advanced physics for a very long time.

00:04:20.060 And I guess we'll have an opportunity to delve into that today.

00:04:23.620 So, I want to go through the Elegant Universe in some detail.

00:04:27.600 But if you don't mind, I'd like to take this opportunity to ask you some questions that I've been wanting to ask a theoretical physicist for a long time.

00:04:38.960 And that'll help me rectify some holes in my knowledge.

00:04:44.320 So, the first, I wanted to ask you about two things that are related to begin with.

00:04:51.360 One has to do with time and its relationship to entropy.

00:04:56.280 And I just want to see if I understand that relationship.

00:05:00.160 I have some specific reasons for that.

00:05:02.360 Because there are attempts in the neuroscience literature to tie emotional processing, both on the positive and negative side, to the concept of entropy.

00:05:13.600 And I did some work on that topic, especially with negative emotion, in my lab.

00:05:19.560 And I want to make sure that I actually understand the underlying concept.

00:05:22.940 So, and it should be of some interest to the people who are watching and listening.

00:05:27.400 So, the first question I have is whether or not it's reasonable to, is there a distinction between time and change?

00:05:39.220 I mean, my sense is that, and this ties us into the entropy discussion, I guess, to some degree.

00:05:44.060 I mean, my sense is that our perception of time, which is difficult to distinguishable from time itself as a phenomenon.

00:05:55.520 Our perception of time is something like our abstraction of average rates of change.

00:06:02.320 And it also seems to me that in a system where there's no change, like a closed system where there's no change, there's also no time.

00:06:12.600 And that time is something like the walk through the multiple states that a complex system can be in.

00:06:21.060 And that that's essentially associated with something with entropy.

00:06:26.400 Now, is there anything wrong?

00:06:27.500 I mean, it's very close.

00:06:29.140 Not really at all.

00:06:30.500 Okay.

00:06:30.700 I say that the real challenge, to give a precise answer to your question, which is a good one, the challenge is nobody has a real definition of what the word time actually means, what it is.

00:06:45.960 The best that we can do in physics is posit that there is some axis, there is some quality that we can measure change by invoking, much as you just described.

00:07:02.380 We say that time has elapsed because the system has changed.

00:07:05.960 But is that a real definition of time?

00:07:08.840 Not really.

00:07:10.360 It's a very pragmatic approach.

00:07:12.360 In our equations, we have a little variable called T.

00:07:16.360 It's introduced in basically all the dynamical equations of physics.

00:07:20.980 And yet we are still struggling to figure out, is it something we impose from the outside because it's a useful way of organizing experience to have a temporal order to things?

00:07:31.980 Is it fundamentally written into the laws of reality that there is this thing called time?

00:07:38.160 Might there be realms of reality where there is no time?

00:07:42.360 And yet there's still something there that we would call in existence.

00:07:47.060 So these are the big, tough questions that we've yet to fully been able to grapple with.

00:07:51.600 Well, I saw Richard Dawkins recently being interviewed by Pierce Morgan, and Pierce was struggling with the idea that there was no time before the Big Bang.

00:08:02.420 And that obviously violates our embodied intuitions, right?

00:08:08.020 Which are strongly tilted in the direction of presuming time as a constant.

00:08:13.980 But I would even say the framing of that question is an interesting one, because to talk about before the Big Bang is to assume that the notion of before is applicable in that extraordinarily different realm of existence.

00:08:31.060 In everyday life, of course, of course, the word before makes sense.

00:08:34.820 But when you get right back to the Big Bang, it could be that this conception of time emerges with that event.

00:08:42.760 And the very concept of before may be meaningless.

00:08:46.600 It's like, you know, Stephen Hawking had a great analogy here, which was if you're walking on planet Earth and you pass somebody, you ask them, which way is north?

00:08:55.100 They point you northward.

00:08:56.120 You keep on walking.

00:08:57.240 You ask somebody else, how do I go further north?

00:08:59.300 They point you further north as well.

00:09:01.160 When you get to the North Pole and you say to somebody there, how do I go further north than the North Pole?

00:09:06.880 They look at you quizzically because it doesn't make any sense.

00:09:10.520 You've reached the location on Earth where north begins.

00:09:14.280 The Big Bang could, in principle, be the location in reality where time begins and going further back in time, maybe as nonsensical as going further north than the North Pole.

00:09:24.940 This is exactly the difficulty of conceptualization that Pierce was struggling with.

00:09:29.920 And to me, it's a lot easier to understand that if you understand that there is no fundamental distinction between time and change.

00:09:40.340 And so if time, if the existence of time is predicated, let's say, on the existence not only of matter, but of matter that's changing,

00:09:50.000 and you have a state where there's either no matter or the matter that is there is not changing in any manner,

00:09:58.680 the whole notion of time vanishes because the phenomenon itself doesn't exist.

00:10:04.680 And, okay, so, all right, so then let me ask you about the idea of entropy a little bit.

00:10:11.260 So, it's very difficult for me to understand entropy except in relationship to something like a goal.

00:10:20.560 So, let me lay out how this might work psychologically.

00:10:28.480 Carl Friston has been working on this.

00:10:30.820 He's the world's most cited neuroscientist, and I interviewed him relatively recently.

00:10:35.400 He has a notion of positive emotion that's associated with entropy reduction.

00:10:42.040 And our work is run parallel with regards to the idea of anxiety as a signal of entropy.

00:10:50.120 So, imagine that you have a state of mind in mind that's a goal.

00:10:59.280 You just want to cross the street.

00:11:01.000 That's a good simple example.

00:11:04.040 Now, imagine that what you're doing is comparing the state that you're in now,

00:11:11.380 you're on one side of the street, to the state that you want to be in,

00:11:15.460 which is for your body to be on the other side of the street.

00:11:19.480 And then you calculate the transformations that are necessary,

00:11:24.760 the energy expenditure and the actions that are necessary to transpose the one condition

00:11:29.900 into the state of the other condition.

00:11:32.720 Then you could imagine there's path length between that, right?

00:11:36.240 Which would be the number of operations necessary to undertake the transformation.

00:11:41.440 Then you could imagine that you could assign to each of those transformations

00:11:45.400 something approximating an energy and materials expenditure cost.

00:11:50.800 And then you could determine whether the advantage of being across the street,

00:11:54.840 maybe it's closer to the grocery store, let's say,

00:11:57.160 whether the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

00:12:00.900 Okay, now, if you observe yourself successfully taking steps that shorten the path length

00:12:08.240 across the street, that produces positive emotion.

00:12:11.880 And that seems to be technically true.

00:12:13.820 And then if something gets in your way, or an obstacle emerges, or something unexpected happens,

00:12:20.720 then that increases the path length and costs you more energy and resources,

00:12:27.920 and that produces anxiety.

00:12:30.740 Now, the problem with that from an entropy perspective is it seems to make

00:12:35.900 what constitutes entropy dependent on the psychological nature of the target.

00:12:44.980 Like, I don't exactly know how to define one state as, say, more entropic,

00:12:52.060 and maybe it doesn't make sense, more entropic than another,

00:12:54.420 except in relationship to a perceived endpoint.

00:12:59.140 I mean, otherwise, I mean, I guess you associate entropy with a random walk

00:13:04.080 through all the different configurations that a body of material might take

00:13:08.320 at a certain temperature.

00:13:10.800 It's something like that.

00:13:11.920 And I would say analogous to that, but a little bit different.

00:13:17.360 So what we do is we look at the space of all possible configurations of a system,

00:13:24.100 whether it's a psychological system or whether it's air molecules in a box.

00:13:29.640 It doesn't really matter to us the way we humans interpret that system.

00:13:34.440 We simply look at the particles that make up the system,

00:13:37.600 and we divide up the space of all possible configurations into regions that,

00:13:44.560 from a macroscopic perspective, are largely indistinguishable, right?

00:13:49.560 The air in this room, it doesn't matter to me whether that oxygen molecules in that corner

00:13:53.720 or that corner, it would be indistinguishable.

00:13:56.300 But if all the air was in a little...

00:13:58.040 Because they're functionally equivalent.

00:13:59.560 But if all the air was in a little ball right over here and none was left for me to breathe,

00:14:04.900 then I would certainly know the difference between that configuration of the gas

00:14:09.080 and the one that I'm actually inhabiting at the moment.

00:14:12.020 So they would belong to different regions of this configuration space,

00:14:16.840 which I divide up into blobs that macroscopically are indistinguishable.

00:14:21.900 And we simply define the entropy in some sense to be the volume of that region.

00:14:28.220 So high entropy means there are a lot of states that more or less look the same,

00:14:32.740 like the gas in this room right now.

00:14:34.880 But if the gas was in a little ball, it would have lower entropy

00:14:37.840 because there are far fewer rearrangements of those constituents

00:14:40.940 that look the same as the ball of gas.

00:14:43.780 So it's a very straightforward mathematical exercise

00:14:48.320 to enumerate the entropy of a configuration

00:14:51.820 by figuring out which of the regions it belongs to.

00:14:55.160 But none of that involves the psychological states that you make reference to.

00:14:59.820 Now, there may be interesting analogies, interesting poetic resonances,

00:15:04.660 interesting rhyming between the things that one is interested in

00:15:08.340 from a psychological perspective and from a physics perspective.

00:15:11.760 But the beauty or the downfall, depending how you look at it,

00:15:14.980 of the way we define things in physics,

00:15:17.520 we kind of strip away the psychological.

00:15:19.720 We strip away the observer-dependent qualities.

00:15:22.800 We strip away the interpretive aspects

00:15:24.860 in order to just have a numerical value of entropy

00:15:27.900 that we can associate to a given configuration.

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00:16:47.280 Right.

00:16:47.940 Well, what you're trying to do when you control a situation psychologically

00:16:51.820 is to specify the,

00:16:54.780 I suppose it's something like specifying the entropy, right?

00:16:58.620 Because you're trying to calculate the number of states

00:17:00.940 that the situation that you're in now could conceivably occupy

00:17:05.060 if you undertook an appropriate,

00:17:08.120 what would you say, an appropriate course of action.

00:17:11.600 And as long as,

00:17:13.500 while you're specifying that course of action,

00:17:15.840 the system maintains its desired behavior,

00:17:18.840 then it's not, for example,

00:17:20.900 it's not anxiety provoking,

00:17:22.300 and you can presume that your course of action is functional.

00:17:24.920 And I say, if that proves to be a valuable definition

00:17:29.400 to acquire insight into perhaps human behavior

00:17:34.300 or the psychological reasons for crossing that street,

00:17:37.420 as you were describing before,

00:17:39.240 then that may be valuable within that environment.

00:17:43.600 The reason why we find entropy valuable as physicists

00:17:46.860 is we like to be able to figure out

00:17:49.720 the general way in which systems evolve over time.

00:17:53.380 And when the systems are very complicated,

00:17:56.340 again, be it gas in this room

00:17:57.960 or the molecules inside of our heads,

00:18:00.380 it's simply too complicated

00:18:01.880 for us to actually do the molecule-by-molecule calculation

00:18:05.920 of how the particles are going to move

00:18:08.200 from today until tomorrow.

00:18:10.300 Instead, we have learned

00:18:12.080 from the work of people like Boltzmann and Gibbs

00:18:15.300 and people of that nature a long time ago,

00:18:17.580 we've learned that if you take a step back

00:18:20.200 and view the system as a statistical ensemble,

00:18:24.120 as an average,

00:18:25.740 it's much easier to figure out on average

00:18:28.300 how the system will evolve over time.

00:18:30.680 Systems tend to go from low entropy to high entropy,

00:18:34.660 from order toward disorder.

00:18:36.860 And we can make that quite precise

00:18:38.400 in the mathematical articulation.

00:18:40.460 And that allows us to understand overall

00:18:44.700 how systems will change through time

00:18:47.380 without having to get into the detailed

00:18:49.520 microscopic calculations.

00:18:51.980 Okay, so there's some implications from that

00:18:54.400 as far as I can tell.

00:18:55.580 One is that time itself

00:18:57.580 is a macroscopic phenomena.

00:19:01.500 See, there's times when it seems to me,

00:19:10.300 and correct me if I'm wrong,

00:19:11.780 that you're moving something

00:19:14.180 like a psychological frame of reference

00:19:16.100 into the physical conceptualizations.

00:19:21.840 Because, for example,

00:19:24.800 you described a situation

00:19:26.780 where if there was a room full of air,

00:19:28.980 one of the potential configurations

00:19:31.900 is that all the air molecules

00:19:33.440 are clustered in one corner,

00:19:35.240 and at least it's denser there.

00:19:37.700 Now, it's going to be the case

00:19:39.620 that on average,

00:19:41.180 the vast majority of possible configurations

00:19:44.180 of air molecules in a room

00:19:47.240 are going to be characterized

00:19:50.280 by something approximating

00:19:51.700 random disbursement.

00:19:54.540 And so that fraction

00:19:55.980 of potential configurations

00:19:57.620 where there's,

00:19:59.600 what would you say,

00:20:01.340 there's differences in average density

00:20:04.080 are going to be rare.

00:20:05.940 But what you did say

00:20:09.740 that you used the term ordered,

00:20:12.680 and I guess I'm wondering

00:20:14.700 if there is a physical definition

00:20:18.080 for order.

00:20:19.060 because the configuration

00:20:23.080 where there's density differences

00:20:25.720 has a certain probability.

00:20:29.000 It's very low,

00:20:29.820 but it has a certain probability.

00:20:31.440 There isn't anything necessarily

00:20:33.240 that marks it out

00:20:34.260 as distinct from the rest

00:20:35.980 of the configurations,

00:20:37.220 except its comparative rarity.

00:20:40.200 But you can't define

00:20:41.600 any given configuration

00:20:42.800 as differentially rare

00:20:44.780 because every single configuration

00:20:47.020 is equally rare.

00:20:48.240 So how does the concept of order,

00:20:52.940 how do you clarify the concept of order

00:20:55.660 from the perspective of pure physics?

00:20:58.380 Yes.

00:20:58.880 And so you're absolutely right.

00:21:01.280 When you begin to delineate configurations

00:21:05.020 that you describe as ordered or disordered,

00:21:08.760 low entropy or high entropy,

00:21:09.980 it is by virtue of seeing the group

00:21:13.220 to which they belong

00:21:14.680 as opposed to analyzing them

00:21:16.900 as individuals on their own terms.

00:21:20.260 And when we invoke words

00:21:21.880 like order and disorder,

00:21:23.040 obviously those are human,

00:21:24.560 psychologically developed terms.

00:21:27.140 And where does it come from?

00:21:28.940 It comes from the following basic fact,

00:21:31.960 which is if you have a situation

00:21:34.340 that typically we humans

00:21:35.740 would call ordered,

00:21:37.460 for instance,

00:21:38.400 if you have books on a shelf

00:21:39.640 that are all alphabetical,

00:21:41.220 there are very few ways

00:21:44.120 that the books can meet that criterion.

00:21:46.860 In fact,

00:21:47.680 if you're talking about

00:21:48.740 making them alphabetical,

00:21:50.100 there's only one configuration

00:21:51.600 that will meet

00:21:52.340 that very stringent definition of order.

00:21:54.700 You could have other definitions of order

00:21:56.620 like all the blue ones are here

00:21:58.320 and all the red covers are here.

00:22:00.340 Then there's a few.

00:22:01.540 You can mix up the blues,

00:22:02.740 you can mix up the reds, 0.85

00:22:03.760 but you can't mix them together.

00:22:05.440 So again,

00:22:06.620 you have a definition of ordered.

00:22:08.340 Disordered is when you can have

00:22:10.840 any of those configurations at all.

00:22:13.920 So clearly,

00:22:15.340 an ordered configuration

00:22:16.460 is one that's harder to achieve.

00:22:18.960 It's more special.

00:22:20.500 It differs from

00:22:21.660 the random configuration

00:22:23.280 that would arise

00:22:25.360 in its own right

00:22:26.520 if you weren't imposing

00:22:27.680 any other restrictions.

00:22:29.960 And so that's why

00:22:30.660 we use those words.

00:22:32.140 But you're absolutely right.

00:22:33.660 Those words are of human origin

00:22:35.340 and they do require...

00:22:38.460 It's partly improbability

00:22:40.200 and rarity.

00:22:41.140 And then,

00:22:42.360 well, the emotional component

00:22:43.800 seems to come in

00:22:44.740 in that it's not only rare

00:22:47.600 and unlikely,

00:22:49.200 but it also has

00:22:50.260 some degree of

00:22:51.140 functional significance.

00:22:52.500 I mean,

00:22:52.860 the reason that you

00:22:54.040 alphabetize your books

00:22:55.720 is so that you can find them.

00:22:57.700 And so it's a rare configuration

00:22:59.400 that has functional utility.

00:23:01.240 And that's not a bad

00:23:03.480 definition of order,

00:23:04.400 but the problem with that

00:23:05.720 from a purely physical perspective

00:23:07.300 is its definition

00:23:08.180 that involves

00:23:08.920 some subjective element

00:23:10.900 of analysis.

00:23:12.560 So that's fine.

00:23:13.620 It does.

00:23:13.920 And this has bothered...

00:23:14.600 But I should say

00:23:15.160 this has bothered physicists

00:23:16.540 for a very long time

00:23:18.660 that when you invoke

00:23:20.360 the notion of entropy,

00:23:22.580 unlike most other laws

00:23:24.500 in physics,

00:23:25.360 like, you know,

00:23:26.220 Einstein's equations

00:23:27.180 of general relativity

00:23:28.140 or Newton's equations

00:23:29.340 for the motion of objects,

00:23:31.480 you can write down

00:23:32.260 the symbols.

00:23:32.800 Everybody knows

00:23:34.120 exactly what they mean

00:23:35.520 and you can simply

00:23:36.300 apply them

00:23:37.320 and start with

00:23:38.260 a given configuration

00:23:39.060 and figure out definitively

00:23:40.560 what it will look like later.

00:23:42.500 Entropy and thermodynamics

00:23:44.260 and statistical mechanics,

00:23:46.020 which is the area of physics

00:23:47.280 that we're talking about here,

00:23:49.200 is of a different character.

00:23:50.540 Because, for instance,

00:23:51.420 the second law

00:23:52.480 of thermodynamics

00:23:53.620 that speaks about

00:23:54.480 the increase of entropy,

00:23:56.340 going from order

00:23:57.160 to disorder,

00:23:58.000 you know,

00:23:58.440 your books are nice

00:23:59.280 and alphabetized,

00:24:00.240 but you pull them out,

00:24:01.120 you start to put them back

00:24:02.060 and you're going to lose

00:24:02.780 the alphabetical order

00:24:03.860 unless you're very careful

00:24:04.960 about putting the books

00:24:05.880 back in.

00:24:06.740 It's more likely

00:24:07.560 that you get to this

00:24:08.500 disordered state

00:24:09.380 where they're no longer

00:24:10.120 alphabetized in the future.

00:24:11.900 But that's not a law.

00:24:13.880 That's a statistical tendency.

00:24:16.660 It is absolutely possible

00:24:18.140 for systems to violate

00:24:19.600 the second law

00:24:20.880 of thermodynamics.

00:24:22.060 It's just highly improbable.

00:24:24.240 If I take a handful of sand

00:24:26.580 and I drop it on the beach,

00:24:28.920 most of the time

00:24:29.700 it's just going to splatter

00:24:30.900 and move those sand particles

00:24:32.560 all over the surface.

00:24:34.140 But on occasion,

00:24:34.920 is it possible

00:24:35.740 that I drop that handful

00:24:37.520 of sand and it lands

00:24:38.620 in a beautiful sandcastle?

00:24:40.960 Statistically unlikely,

00:24:42.480 probabilistically unlikely,

00:24:43.980 but could it happen?

00:24:45.380 Yes.

00:24:45.900 And if it did,

00:24:47.100 that would be going

00:24:47.920 from a disorder

00:24:48.920 to an ordered state,

00:24:50.180 violating the second law

00:24:51.280 of thermodynamics.

00:24:52.520 So that's why this law

00:24:53.980 is of a different character

00:24:55.380 than what we are used to

00:24:56.720 in physics.

00:24:57.640 Yeah, well,

00:24:58.040 that's what we've been

00:24:58.740 trying to wrestle with

00:24:59.640 to some degree

00:25:00.340 on the neuroscience.

00:25:01.720 And so, okay,

00:25:04.400 so let me ask you

00:25:05.140 another question.

00:25:07.800 It's probably obvious to you,

00:25:09.360 but I just also want to make sure

00:25:10.620 that I've got it right,

00:25:11.640 is that there is

00:25:14.160 a widespread consensus,

00:25:16.300 let's say,

00:25:17.800 that the universe is expanding.

00:25:21.820 And is there any difference

00:25:24.220 between that proclivity

00:25:25.680 for the universe to expand

00:25:27.900 and time itself

00:25:31.080 and also more specifically

00:25:32.560 the forward direction of time?

00:25:34.980 Like, is the expansion

00:25:36.680 of the universe

00:25:37.500 the macro equivalent

00:25:39.060 of the arrow of time

00:25:41.000 at the more micro

00:25:42.800 and subjective level?

00:25:44.600 Some people have thought so.

00:25:45.960 There was a time

00:25:46.640 even when Stephen Hawking

00:25:48.140 a while ago

00:25:48.880 made a claim

00:25:49.860 of a similar sounding sort.

00:25:51.820 Currently, we do not believe so.

00:25:54.380 We have theoretical models

00:25:56.860 in which the universe

00:25:57.700 can expand

00:25:58.920 and even then contract,

00:26:00.980 even though the direction

00:26:01.980 of time has not reversed

00:26:03.480 when the rate

00:26:04.940 or direction of expansion

00:26:06.500 has changed.

00:26:08.060 And so the idea

00:26:10.440 that the way in which

00:26:12.480 the universe expands

00:26:13.400 is intrinsically tied

00:26:15.120 to the arrow of time

00:26:16.540 is not one that

00:26:17.800 is currently at all

00:26:19.740 in favor.

00:26:21.180 In fact,

00:26:21.980 the issue of the arrow of time

00:26:24.440 is one of the big

00:26:26.420 perplexing questions

00:26:27.880 which we can only

00:26:28.900 at the moment

00:26:29.580 give the following answer to

00:26:32.420 when you're talking

00:26:33.180 cosmologically.

00:26:34.660 If entropy is meant

00:26:36.700 to increase

00:26:37.640 toward the future

00:26:38.700 than just running it backward,

00:26:41.040 you'd think that entropy

00:26:42.120 must have been lower

00:26:43.340 in the past.

00:26:44.760 And if you take that

00:26:46.120 directive

00:26:46.940 and you push it

00:26:48.180 to its limits,

00:26:49.280 it would suggest

00:26:50.020 that at the Big Bang,

00:26:51.620 entropy was in a really

00:26:53.000 low value,

00:26:54.480 really ordered state.

00:26:56.640 Now, that's confusing

00:26:58.200 because,

00:26:59.700 A, we don't really know

00:27:00.760 how the universe

00:27:01.320 came into existence,

00:27:03.140 but, B,

00:27:03.780 if it's so ordered,

00:27:04.820 you ask yourself,

00:27:05.980 how did it get so ordered?

00:27:07.620 I mean,

00:27:07.840 when the books on the shelf

00:27:08.880 are alphabetized,

00:27:10.060 we know how they got ordered.

00:27:11.360 Some intelligent being

00:27:12.420 came along,

00:27:13.480 you or me or my kid,

00:27:15.000 and put the books

00:27:16.260 in alphabetical order.

00:27:18.040 But if the moment

00:27:19.320 of creation

00:27:20.340 was so highly ordered,

00:27:22.020 the question is,

00:27:23.060 who did that

00:27:23.860 or what did that

00:27:24.780 or what's the origin

00:27:25.760 of this order?

00:27:26.680 And this is a vital question

00:27:27.980 because if the Big Bang

00:27:30.280 was not highly ordered,

00:27:32.000 if it was disordered,

00:27:33.260 if it had high entropy,

00:27:34.860 there'd be no opportunity

00:27:36.320 for ordered structures

00:27:37.640 like stars and planets

00:27:39.280 and life forms

00:27:40.300 to ever exist.

00:27:41.280 So we owe our existence

00:27:43.960 to the apparent fact

00:27:46.020 that the Big Bang

00:27:47.100 was highly ordered,

00:27:48.380 given the opportunity

00:27:49.640 for ordered structures

00:27:51.080 to then emerge

00:27:52.220 as the unfolding and change.

00:27:55.120 What's the relationship?

00:27:56.400 Okay, I have two questions

00:27:57.440 on that front then.

00:27:58.920 What's the relationship

00:27:59.980 between the ordered state

00:28:01.420 at the hypothetical Big Bang

00:28:03.220 and the emergence of order

00:28:04.700 on the cosmological

00:28:07.620 and galactic level

00:28:08.740 following the Big Bang?

00:28:09.840 I don't understand

00:28:10.660 that relationship.

00:28:11.640 And then,

00:28:12.120 so that's one question.

00:28:13.220 The other question is,

00:28:14.600 you know,

00:28:14.820 I read a brief history

00:28:17.400 of time a long time ago.

00:28:20.900 So I want to ask

00:28:22.840 a couple of questions

00:28:23.600 about that.

00:28:24.380 So when the universe

00:28:26.240 is contracting

00:28:27.080 within Hawking's model,

00:28:29.140 there is this proclivity,

00:28:30.840 as you just pointed out,

00:28:32.000 for everything to move

00:28:33.800 from a state of relative disorder

00:28:35.680 and dispersal

00:28:36.500 to a state of relative order.

00:28:37.900 And Hawking seemed

00:28:39.520 to imply in that book

00:28:40.580 that that meant

00:28:41.220 that the arrow of time

00:28:42.200 was running backwards.

00:28:43.980 But that puzzled me

00:28:45.860 in two ways.

00:28:47.060 And one would be

00:28:47.840 that there could still

00:28:49.240 be all sorts of random

00:28:50.440 perturbations in systems

00:28:51.980 that were collapsing.

00:28:53.140 And the other is

00:28:53.760 that it seems to me

00:28:55.080 that the notion

00:28:55.780 of quantum uncertainty

00:28:57.200 also disproves the idea

00:29:00.500 that the arrow of time

00:29:02.360 would run backwards

00:29:03.200 in some deterministic way

00:29:04.720 because there's no...

00:29:06.220 So, okay,

00:29:06.760 so that's the question

00:29:07.880 on the Hawking side.

00:29:09.460 Yep.

00:29:10.400 So let me answer those

00:29:11.360 in reverse order

00:29:12.520 because it's worthwhile

00:29:14.100 noting that Hawking himself

00:29:15.240 changed his mind

00:29:16.220 on this point

00:29:17.680 regarding the reversal

00:29:18.760 of the arrow of time

00:29:20.000 upon contraction.

00:29:21.160 So much of your concern

00:29:23.040 with that

00:29:23.620 is actually borne out

00:29:25.060 by our views as well.

00:29:27.140 So nobody really

00:29:28.460 takes seriously

00:29:29.180 this idea anymore

00:29:30.260 that the arrow of time

00:29:31.280 would reverse.

00:29:31.780 But the first question

00:29:33.420 of how do you get

00:29:34.620 the ordered structures

00:29:35.960 like stars and galaxies

00:29:37.460 from this Big Bang beginning

00:29:39.600 is a deep one.

00:29:41.760 And I believe that we have

00:29:42.780 some insight into that

00:29:44.260 which more or less

00:29:45.100 goes like this.

00:29:47.240 The Big Bang happens,

00:29:48.960 universe starts swelling rapidly,

00:29:51.640 and the energy

00:29:52.800 that drove that expansion

00:29:54.740 then disintegrates

00:29:55.960 into a bath of particles

00:29:57.700 that fills space.

00:29:59.760 Now, you might think

00:30:00.580 a bath of particles

00:30:01.580 filling space

00:30:02.260 that sounds disordered.

00:30:03.600 That sounds really

00:30:04.740 high entropy

00:30:06.160 like the gas in this room.

00:30:07.760 The particles are filled out

00:30:09.000 through the room.

00:30:10.280 Perhaps things would

00:30:11.580 just stay that way

00:30:12.680 and there would never be

00:30:13.600 clumps of particles.

00:30:15.840 And what changes is

00:30:17.040 when gravity matters

00:30:18.860 and it does

00:30:19.780 on cosmological scales.

00:30:21.180 It doesn't matter

00:30:21.880 in this room.

00:30:22.720 Gravity is irrelevant

00:30:23.540 to the air molecules

00:30:24.940 in this room.

00:30:26.100 But gravity does matter

00:30:27.480 if you have enough

00:30:28.400 particles filling space.

00:30:29.780 And that certainly happens

00:30:31.220 with the universe

00:30:31.880 as a whole.

00:30:33.260 And what that means is

00:30:34.420 gravity starts to pull.

00:30:36.660 Little inhomogeneities,

00:30:38.320 a little denser knot

00:30:39.580 of particles here,

00:30:40.640 a little less dense

00:30:41.460 over here.

00:30:42.300 The denser one

00:30:43.220 starts to pull in

00:30:44.060 more particles.

00:30:45.120 It gets denser still.

00:30:46.800 And because it's denser,

00:30:48.040 its gravitational pull

00:30:49.040 is yet stronger

00:30:49.900 and it pulls in

00:30:50.580 more particles.

00:30:51.820 And ultimately,

00:30:52.580 you get these locations

00:30:54.600 where particles begin

00:30:55.840 to implode in

00:30:56.960 on themselves,

00:30:58.080 getting hotter

00:30:59.000 and denser,

00:31:00.480 ultimately igniting

00:31:02.020 nuclear processes

00:31:03.140 and a star is born.

00:31:05.220 And the beautiful thing

00:31:06.360 about this,

00:31:07.020 and this is incredibly subtle,

00:31:08.540 but the beautiful thing is

00:31:09.720 this formation of the star

00:31:11.980 is indeed

00:31:12.900 a drop in entropy.

00:31:15.380 A star is more ordered

00:31:16.860 than the original configurations,

00:31:19.340 but in the formation

00:31:20.740 of the star,

00:31:22.200 the star gives off

00:31:23.080 heat and light

00:31:24.100 that emits entropy

00:31:26.080 to the wider environment.

00:31:28.240 I like to call this

00:31:29.260 the entropic two-step.

00:31:31.020 Entropy goes down

00:31:32.080 in the formation

00:31:32.740 of the star,

00:31:33.400 but it goes up

00:31:34.080 in the wider environment.

00:31:36.040 And overall,

00:31:37.020 the entropic balance works.

00:31:39.800 The overall entropy

00:31:40.900 goes up,

00:31:41.740 even though you get

00:31:42.460 a pocket of order

00:31:43.440 in the wake

00:31:44.180 of that entropic increase.

00:31:46.000 Okay, well,

00:31:46.420 human beings do that too.

00:31:48.740 Exactly.

00:31:49.320 That's what we do, right?

00:31:50.660 So, you know,

00:31:51.420 we eat food,

00:31:52.360 we take in these

00:31:53.500 orderly sources of energy,

00:31:55.040 we burn that fuel

00:31:56.840 to allow biological processes

00:31:59.480 to take place,

00:32:00.820 keeping our entropy low,

00:32:02.420 but in the process,

00:32:03.600 we go off heat,

00:32:04.760 we expel waste.

00:32:06.380 And if you take account

00:32:07.360 of that,

00:32:08.220 then the overall entropy

00:32:09.840 of us

00:32:10.560 and the environment

00:32:11.460 does go up,

00:32:12.580 but our entropy

00:32:13.800 is able to kind of

00:32:14.820 thumb its nose

00:32:15.500 at the second law

00:32:16.280 of thermodynamics,

00:32:17.180 at least while we're living,

00:32:18.920 and are able

00:32:19.380 to keep our entropy stable.

00:32:20.840 Attention men

00:32:23.000 who still believe

00:32:23.640 in the American dream.

00:32:24.840 In a world gone mad,

00:32:25.800 the Precision 5

00:32:26.540 from Jeremy's Razors

00:32:27.440 stands as a beacon

00:32:28.320 of sanity.

00:32:29.340 Five blades

00:32:29.880 of superior engineering

00:32:31.000 offer a shave

00:32:31.900 as unshakable

00:32:32.620 as your faith

00:32:33.320 that the nation's

00:32:33.920 best days still lie ahead.

00:32:35.580 Experience an exceptionally

00:32:36.560 smooth, remarkably

00:32:37.520 close shave

00:32:38.200 and a testament

00:32:38.860 to the fact

00:32:39.400 that merit still matters.

00:32:40.880 Stop giving your money

00:32:41.600 to woke corporations

00:32:42.480 that hate you.

00:32:43.420 Get Jeremy's Razors

00:32:44.240 Precision 5 instead.

00:32:45.660 Available now

00:32:46.180 at jeremysrazors.com,

00:32:47.620 walmart.com,

00:32:48.580 and Amazon Prime.

00:32:49.580 So, let me ask you

00:32:54.400 a question

00:32:54.880 about that

00:32:55.560 initial clumping.

00:32:58.600 It occurred to me,

00:33:01.540 I'm sure this isn't

00:33:02.520 an original idea,

00:33:04.220 that,

00:33:04.880 so if that initial state,

00:33:07.600 that initial state

00:33:08.860 immediately after

00:33:09.780 the Big Bang

00:33:10.420 can't be homogenous,

00:33:12.120 perfectly homogenous,

00:33:13.820 because quantum uncertainty

00:33:16.100 with regards

00:33:16.840 to the positioning

00:33:17.720 of the particles

00:33:18.920 would mean

00:33:19.540 that there would be

00:33:20.160 some lack

00:33:21.220 of homogeneity.

00:33:22.280 And the explanation

00:33:23.580 you gave

00:33:24.380 seems to imply

00:33:25.380 that even minor

00:33:26.880 deviations

00:33:27.660 in homogeneity

00:33:28.560 would start

00:33:29.160 a clumping process,

00:33:31.120 would begin

00:33:32.340 the clumping process,

00:33:33.240 and then once it starts,

00:33:34.660 it's going to,

00:33:35.360 it's going to capitalize

00:33:37.060 on itself.

00:33:37.900 And so,

00:33:38.760 is the lack

00:33:42.200 of homogeneity

00:33:43.160 after the Big Bang

00:33:44.240 a direct consequence

00:33:45.220 of quantum uncertainty

00:33:46.560 with regards to

00:33:47.440 the position

00:33:47.900 of the particles?

00:33:49.160 It is.

00:33:50.160 It is.

00:33:51.020 That's exactly right,

00:33:52.220 and it's even more

00:33:53.200 than just

00:33:53.920 an interesting idea.

00:33:56.240 What we've been able

00:33:57.560 to do,

00:33:58.080 and these are calculations

00:33:59.040 that go back

00:33:59.780 to the 1980s,

00:34:01.480 we've been able

00:34:02.200 to model

00:34:02.820 the early universe

00:34:04.020 mathematically,

00:34:05.160 using quantum physics,

00:34:06.180 using Einstein's

00:34:07.240 general relativity,

00:34:08.460 and we've been able

00:34:09.580 to calculate

00:34:10.580 how the uncertainty

00:34:12.980 in the positions

00:34:14.440 and the energies

00:34:15.460 and the speeds

00:34:16.260 of the particles

00:34:16.900 should affect

00:34:18.560 the environment.

00:34:20.060 And we've been able

00:34:20.840 to calculate

00:34:21.300 that it should cause

00:34:22.140 tiny inhomogeneities

00:34:23.700 as well

00:34:24.380 in the temperature

00:34:25.220 of the night sky,

00:34:26.220 in the temperature

00:34:26.780 of space,

00:34:27.780 which means that

00:34:28.680 if you could measure

00:34:29.660 the temperature

00:34:30.560 of the night sky

00:34:31.840 to adequate precision,

00:34:33.580 you should be able

00:34:34.380 to test the prediction.

00:34:35.560 And this is what

00:34:36.100 we have been able

00:34:36.840 to do with the

00:34:37.440 so-called cosmic

00:34:38.240 microwave background

00:34:39.220 radiation.

00:34:40.300 This is heat left over

00:34:41.440 from the Big Bang,

00:34:42.880 and starting in the 1990s

00:34:45.020 with ever greater precision,

00:34:46.800 we've used space telescopes

00:34:48.800 and other devices

00:34:50.400 to measure the temperature

00:34:51.640 of space.

00:34:52.780 And the agreement

00:34:54.000 between the theoretical

00:34:56.000 predictions

00:34:56.600 and the observations

00:34:58.380 is so incredibly accurate

00:35:00.960 that to see the error bars

00:35:02.920 in the measurements,

00:35:04.000 you have to magnify them

00:35:05.840 by like a factor

00:35:06.640 of 500

00:35:07.240 so that the naked eye

00:35:08.500 can even see them

00:35:09.180 on the graph.

00:35:10.140 That's how tightly

00:35:11.020 there is an agreement

00:35:11.980 between the mathematical

00:35:13.600 calculations

00:35:14.400 that we humans do,

00:35:15.940 these little biological systems

00:35:17.800 crawling around

00:35:18.720 this planet,

00:35:20.180 barely coming of age

00:35:21.260 in the Milky Way galaxy,

00:35:22.540 been able to calculate

00:35:23.580 conditions billions

00:35:24.980 of years ago

00:35:25.880 and compare them

00:35:26.880 to observations

00:35:27.580 and they agree

00:35:28.280 to spectacular precision.

00:35:30.160 This is one

00:35:30.660 of the great triumphs

00:35:31.860 of modern science.

00:35:33.920 I see.

00:35:34.380 So you could detect

00:35:35.400 lack of homogeneity

00:35:36.740 in the background temperature

00:35:38.660 and that was also indicative

00:35:39.980 of lack of homogeneity

00:35:42.620 in terms of dispersal

00:35:43.860 of particle density.

00:35:46.040 Exactly.

00:35:46.460 Oh, wow.

00:35:47.220 Okay, that's very cool.

00:35:48.600 All right.

00:35:48.960 So that's so interesting

00:35:50.320 because that implies as well

00:35:51.560 that or indicates

00:35:53.960 that quantum uncertainty

00:35:55.580 makes it impossible

00:35:56.520 for there to be

00:35:57.260 a homogenous distribution

00:35:58.340 of particles.

00:36:00.220 There's going to be

00:36:01.720 asymmetries emerge

00:36:03.180 and those asymmetries...

00:36:04.720 There have to be.

00:36:05.300 Right, and then

00:36:05.800 the asymmetries

00:36:06.660 expand up

00:36:09.140 until they manifest

00:36:10.260 themselves

00:36:10.740 at a cosmological level

00:36:12.280 with stars and galaxies

00:36:13.400 and those large filaments

00:36:15.560 that the galaxies

00:36:16.740 appear to congregate in

00:36:18.180 and, wow.

00:36:19.420 Okay, so that's how

00:36:20.220 that comes about.

00:36:20.940 We are the progeny.

00:36:22.480 We are the progeny

00:36:23.660 of quantum uncertainty

00:36:25.360 writ large

00:36:26.100 across the universe.

00:36:27.280 Right, right, right.

00:36:28.360 Okay, okay.

00:36:29.160 So, all right,

00:36:29.940 let me, if you don't mind,

00:36:31.080 I have one other

00:36:31.900 specific question

00:36:32.720 before I turn to

00:36:33.700 maybe the more

00:36:34.640 particular details

00:36:35.560 of your work,

00:36:37.980 especially with regards

00:36:38.820 to string theory.

00:36:40.060 So, you know,

00:36:40.700 I've been perplexed

00:36:41.980 like so many people

00:36:42.900 with the double slit experiment

00:36:44.840 and the fact that

00:36:46.640 if you...

00:36:47.900 I'll just review it

00:36:48.740 for people very briefly.

00:36:49.740 If you shine light

00:36:51.240 through a,

00:36:52.320 say, a cardboard sheet

00:36:55.640 that has slits in it

00:36:57.060 and you put a photographic plate

00:36:59.380 behind it,

00:37:00.100 you can produce

00:37:01.420 interference patterns

00:37:02.640 that are...

00:37:04.960 that you can capture

00:37:06.780 with the photographic emulsion.

00:37:09.960 And the hypothesis

00:37:11.700 is that

00:37:12.480 when the light beams

00:37:13.820 go through the slits,

00:37:15.260 they interfere

00:37:15.820 with one another

00:37:16.560 and so you get these

00:37:17.980 variegated zebra-like patterns

00:37:20.220 on the photographic emulsion.

00:37:21.640 But the peculiar thing

00:37:22.820 about that setup

00:37:25.620 is that if you

00:37:26.520 slow the transmission

00:37:29.380 of the light

00:37:29.960 through the slits

00:37:31.160 down to one photon

00:37:33.040 per unit of time

00:37:34.680 so that there's only

00:37:36.200 one photon being admitted,

00:37:37.520 you still get

00:37:38.020 the interference patterns.

00:37:39.960 Okay, so...

00:37:40.620 So, I had a thought

00:37:42.640 about that

00:37:43.140 and I want you to correct it

00:37:44.320 if it's wrong

00:37:45.980 or indicate if it's right.

00:37:48.100 So, my understanding

00:37:50.100 is that as...

00:37:51.820 that at the speed

00:37:52.720 of light

00:37:53.300 the universe

00:37:54.740 is flat

00:37:56.140 perpendicular

00:37:56.960 to the direction

00:37:58.040 of the travel

00:37:58.780 of the light beam

00:37:59.600 and that there is

00:38:01.020 no time.

00:38:02.440 And so,

00:38:02.860 is it not fair

00:38:03.800 to say that

00:38:04.500 from the perspective

00:38:05.460 of the photons,

00:38:07.180 like from our perspective

00:38:08.420 we're firing

00:38:09.060 one photon

00:38:09.680 at a time,

00:38:11.080 but from the perspective

00:38:11.980 of the light beam,

00:38:13.600 the light beams,

00:38:14.740 there's no difference

00:38:15.920 between the one photon

00:38:17.460 at a time state

00:38:18.940 and the shining

00:38:22.060 a light beam

00:38:22.840 that's composed

00:38:24.000 of an indefinite number

00:38:26.040 of photons

00:38:26.600 at the same time.

00:38:27.580 If there's no time

00:38:28.880 from the perspective

00:38:29.780 of the light beam,

00:38:31.600 then it's all the same

00:38:32.640 to the light

00:38:33.220 whether it's one photon

00:38:34.300 at a time

00:38:34.940 or a plethora of light.

00:38:38.420 Now, so I don't exactly

00:38:39.680 understand what that means

00:38:40.880 because I can't understand

00:38:42.800 the difference

00:38:43.320 between the time-free frame

00:38:44.920 of reference

00:38:46.460 that the light beam has

00:38:47.680 and our expansion of that,

00:38:51.220 but is there something wrong

00:38:54.220 in my reckoning

00:38:55.200 with regards to the idea

00:38:56.640 that time has collapsed

00:38:58.780 and so it's irrelevant

00:38:59.740 from the perspective

00:39:00.960 of the light?

00:39:02.140 Well, what I would say there

00:39:04.020 is that from a poetic sensibility,

00:39:08.080 if you apply Einstein's

00:39:09.680 special theory of relativity

00:39:10.840 to the frame of reference

00:39:12.340 of a photon,

00:39:13.120 then the things

00:39:14.820 that you say

00:39:15.660 are correct.

00:39:17.480 But I always caution

00:39:18.940 my students

00:39:19.720 against taking

00:39:20.640 that perspective

00:39:21.580 because what you're

00:39:23.700 ultimately doing

00:39:24.700 is you're infusing

00:39:25.780 the photon

00:39:26.380 with the very things

00:39:28.380 that we care about,

00:39:29.680 such as time

00:39:30.560 and space

00:39:31.340 and interference patterns,

00:39:32.780 but the photon

00:39:34.300 doesn't have

00:39:35.180 any capacity

00:39:36.560 to care about those things.

00:39:37.980 The photon doesn't have

00:39:39.140 any conscious experience.

00:39:40.500 What we want to do

00:39:42.020 is explain

00:39:42.560 our experiences

00:39:44.120 in our frame of reference

00:39:46.100 and in our frame of reference,

00:39:48.120 photon upon photon

00:39:49.480 upon photon

00:39:50.160 do have temporal separations.

00:39:52.500 So while it's kind of

00:39:54.200 mind-slapping

00:39:54.960 to imagine yourself

00:39:56.520 in the perspective

00:39:59.440 of a photon,

00:40:00.620 it's not a perspective

00:40:01.660 that any material object

00:40:03.040 can ever have.

00:40:04.040 The special thing

00:40:04.860 about a photon

00:40:05.480 is that it's massless

00:40:06.640 and only massless objects

00:40:08.240 can ever achieve

00:40:09.980 the speed of light.

00:40:11.600 And that's why

00:40:12.660 us and material objects

00:40:14.860 will never have

00:40:15.940 that perspective.

00:40:16.760 So if we want to explain

00:40:17.960 the things that we encounter,

00:40:20.120 the things that we experience,

00:40:21.520 we have to use

00:40:22.480 a frame of reference

00:40:23.540 that is not moving

00:40:24.480 at the speed of light

00:40:25.520 in the manner

00:40:25.960 that you described.

00:40:27.340 And so if it offers

00:40:28.660 some sort of poetic insight

00:40:31.040 to imagine

00:40:31.740 that there's no time

00:40:32.860 from the point of view

00:40:33.880 of a photon,

00:40:34.560 there's no space,

00:40:35.480 it's all been Lorentz-contracted

00:40:37.060 infinitely far,

00:40:38.100 these are actually

00:40:38.780 pushing Einstein's ideas

00:40:40.180 a little too far.

00:40:41.780 Poetically,

00:40:42.340 you can do it,

00:40:43.120 but Einstein's derivation

00:40:44.740 of time dilation

00:40:45.820 and Lorentz-contraction,

00:40:46.980 it all was from the perspective

00:40:48.160 of a massive body

00:40:49.340 that was not itself

00:40:50.520 traveling at light speed.

00:40:51.980 Right.

00:40:52.380 Well, I guess that

00:40:53.240 the reason I was thinking

00:40:54.840 along those lines

00:40:55.600 wasn't so much,

00:40:56.560 at least as far as

00:40:57.380 I was concerned,

00:40:58.500 for poetic reasons,

00:40:59.540 but to explain the fact

00:41:00.840 that the interference

00:41:02.280 actually still happens.

00:41:04.220 if the reality,

00:41:07.680 and not merely

00:41:08.440 subjective reality,

00:41:09.500 if the reality

00:41:10.140 that the photon

00:41:10.860 is operating in

00:41:12.320 lacks the temporal dimension

00:41:14.220 because it's contracted,

00:41:15.620 then of course

00:41:16.180 it's going to,

00:41:17.240 the interference,

00:41:18.300 the interference phenomenon

00:41:20.700 is still going

00:41:21.360 to make itself manifest.

00:41:22.660 And that seems to me,

00:41:24.320 maybe I'm misunderstanding you,

00:41:25.760 but that seems to me

00:41:26.540 to be more than

00:41:27.160 merely poetic.

00:41:28.420 It seems to me

00:41:29.240 to be an explanation

00:41:30.140 for why the interference

00:41:32.660 phenomena

00:41:33.280 still makes itself manifest.

00:41:35.180 It's all happening

00:41:35.900 at the same time

00:41:36.860 as far as the,

00:41:37.980 from the,

00:41:38.900 I don't mean

00:41:39.720 the subjective perspective

00:41:40.900 of the light beam

00:41:41.720 because as you pointed out,

00:41:42.940 that's preposterous

00:41:43.860 because it doesn't

00:41:45.280 have a perspective,

00:41:46.360 but it still is

00:41:47.740 interacting with its other,

00:41:50.460 with the other photons

00:41:51.900 in that setup

00:41:53.860 because the temporal dimension

00:41:55.460 is collapsed

00:41:56.200 and that seems to be

00:41:57.580 an explanation.

00:41:58.100 Go ahead.

00:41:59.860 But again,

00:42:00.400 it's pushing Einstein's

00:42:02.240 special relativity

00:42:02.840 to a place

00:42:03.640 that it doesn't

00:42:04.440 technically apply.

00:42:06.260 So when Einstein

00:42:07.460 derived all of the ideas

00:42:09.780 that you're implicitly

00:42:10.880 making use of,

00:42:12.200 that there's this thing

00:42:13.280 called time dilation,

00:42:14.440 which becomes infinitely big

00:42:16.120 at light speed,

00:42:17.100 or this thing called

00:42:17.940 Lorentz contraction

00:42:19.220 that becomes,

00:42:20.200 you know,

00:42:20.420 infinitely small

00:42:21.440 at light speed,

00:42:23.060 Einstein's derivation

00:42:24.360 only worked for speeds

00:42:25.580 that were less

00:42:26.300 than the speed of light,

00:42:27.500 not equal to the speed

00:42:29.100 of light.

00:42:29.460 So there's a technical glitch

00:42:30.760 in trying to actually

00:42:31.880 push that idea through.

00:42:34.380 And so what we have

00:42:35.400 been forced to do

00:42:37.040 is stick with the perspective

00:42:39.580 that we actually have

00:42:41.160 in the laboratory

00:42:41.860 and try to explain

00:42:43.540 what we see,

00:42:44.520 which is utterly bizarre

00:42:45.540 as you set it up,

00:42:46.700 that individual photons

00:42:48.360 that are encountering

00:42:50.020 this barrier

00:42:50.620 with the two openings

00:42:51.680 somehow still produce

00:42:53.420 this interference pattern

00:42:55.280 that is a wave-like phenomenon,

00:42:57.620 but what does it mean

00:42:58.460 to have a wave

00:42:59.060 when you've got

00:42:59.460 one particle, right?

00:43:00.620 That's the big puzzle.

00:43:02.500 And the solution

00:43:03.600 that we've come to

00:43:04.600 is that individual particles

00:43:06.160 do themselves

00:43:07.460 have a wave-like quality,

00:43:09.800 an unexpected one.

00:43:11.460 It's a quantum wave

00:43:12.820 that was introduced

00:43:14.520 by the great thinkers

00:43:15.700 in the early part

00:43:16.560 of the 20th century,

00:43:17.740 beginning with Einstein,

00:43:18.880 and then Niels Bohr

00:43:20.140 and Werner Heisenberg

00:43:21.080 and Erwin Schrödinger

00:43:22.080 and Max Born

00:43:22.900 and Paul Dirac

00:43:23.760 and all the people

00:43:24.460 who developed these ideas,

00:43:25.680 but the bottom line is

00:43:26.780 individual particles

00:43:28.520 have a spread-out

00:43:30.420 wave-like quality,

00:43:31.940 and that wave

00:43:32.540 is not an electromagnetic wave.

00:43:35.180 It's not a wave of light

00:43:36.420 if it's a photon, say.

00:43:38.160 Rather, it's a probability wave.

00:43:40.680 It's a wave

00:43:41.380 that no one had ever

00:43:43.020 anticipated arising

00:43:44.800 in our understanding

00:43:46.440 of the physical world.

00:43:47.760 The idea of being

00:43:48.640 the best you can ever do

00:43:50.020 is predict the likelihood

00:43:51.820 or the probability

00:43:52.760 of a particle being here

00:43:54.020 or here or there,

00:43:55.500 unlike what Newton

00:43:56.340 would have said.

00:43:57.500 Newton would have said,

00:43:58.380 just tell me

00:43:59.240 where the particle is

00:44:00.240 and how fast it's moving

00:44:01.220 right now,

00:44:02.100 and I'll use my math

00:44:03.480 to tell you exactly

00:44:04.580 where it will be later on.

00:44:06.620 And quantum physics

00:44:07.560 had to turn to Newton

00:44:08.680 and say,

00:44:09.360 you're asking

00:44:10.260 for an impossibility.

00:44:11.560 You can't tell

00:44:12.320 where a particle is

00:44:13.360 and how fast it's moving.

00:44:14.760 There's quantum uncertainty,

00:44:16.160 and the best you can do

00:44:17.120 because of that

00:44:17.900 is predict probabilities

00:44:19.520 of a particle

00:44:20.160 being one place or another.

00:44:21.780 Right, okay.

00:44:22.660 So let me delve

00:44:23.740 into that a little bit.

00:44:24.560 I know that's

00:44:25.720 like impossibly

00:44:26.720 incomprehensible

00:44:27.560 in a way,

00:44:29.260 but the wave

00:44:31.240 that you're describing

00:44:32.260 as a probability wave,

00:44:33.760 that's the possibility

00:44:36.300 that a given phenomena,

00:44:39.740 let's say speed

00:44:40.460 and location,

00:44:41.420 might make itself manifest,

00:44:42.860 but it's indeterminate.

00:44:45.160 There's some circumstances

00:44:46.480 under which

00:44:47.020 it's indeterminate.

00:44:47.880 And I don't exactly

00:44:50.080 understand the circumstances

00:44:51.520 under which

00:44:52.160 it's indeterminate.

00:44:53.600 In conventional

00:44:54.100 quantum mechanics,

00:44:55.360 it would be all situations.

00:44:57.600 Conventional quantum mechanics

00:44:58.900 would say,

00:45:00.140 you physicists

00:45:01.000 or you human beings,

00:45:02.280 you're asking

00:45:02.900 for too much.

00:45:04.600 Your intuition

00:45:05.380 based on everyday experience

00:45:06.880 has misled you

00:45:08.040 into thinking

00:45:08.620 that you can talk about

00:45:09.800 the position

00:45:10.620 and the speed of objects.

00:45:12.240 You can't.

00:45:13.200 You can talk about

00:45:14.100 one or the other,

00:45:15.340 or you can talk

00:45:16.020 approximately about each,

00:45:17.580 but you can't delineate

00:45:18.760 both simultaneously

00:45:20.000 with total precision.

00:45:21.320 It simply can't be done.

00:45:23.020 You've been misled

00:45:23.880 by common experience.

00:45:26.300 Macroscopic experience.

00:45:28.560 Macroscopic experience

00:45:29.480 is a completely misleading guide

00:45:31.640 to how the microscopic world works.

00:45:34.060 And, you know,

00:45:34.820 we really shouldn't be

00:45:35.640 too surprised by that.

00:45:37.440 Why should it be the case

00:45:38.660 that the things

00:45:39.100 that we experience

00:45:39.680 in everyday life

00:45:40.440 also govern

00:45:41.360 the incredibly small

00:45:42.580 or the incredibly big?

00:45:43.720 And it turns out

00:45:44.280 that they don't.

00:45:44.920 But I will say one thing

00:45:46.680 just on the side.

00:45:48.780 There are alternative ways

00:45:50.940 of talking about quantum physics

00:45:53.040 and articulating it mathematically

00:45:54.900 that have not achieved

00:45:56.980 the kind of widespread acceptance

00:45:59.640 as the version

00:46:00.540 that I'm relying upon

00:46:01.820 in our conversation here.

00:46:03.340 And in some of those

00:46:04.720 alternative versions,

00:46:05.900 which are perfectly good,

00:46:07.140 they make the same predictions,

00:46:08.640 you have a situation

00:46:11.060 where you can delineate

00:46:12.920 a particle's speed

00:46:14.220 and position.

00:46:15.400 They are determinate.

00:46:17.640 The indeterminacy

00:46:18.800 comes into the equations

00:46:20.060 in a different manner.

00:46:21.540 So this is an approach

00:46:22.700 that was developed

00:46:23.360 by David Bohm.

00:46:24.840 It was developed

00:46:25.360 by Louis de Broglie.

00:46:27.120 It got completely ignored

00:46:29.820 in the history

00:46:30.720 of quantum physics

00:46:31.780 for the most part.

00:46:32.760 There are some people

00:46:33.320 who think about it today.

00:46:34.280 But I only raise this to say,

00:46:36.400 even with a subject

00:46:37.360 like quantum physics,

00:46:38.280 which we can now use

00:46:39.360 to make predictions

00:46:40.160 that agree with experiments

00:46:41.360 to nine or ten decimal places,

00:46:44.060 that's how precise

00:46:45.040 these ideas are.

00:46:46.560 They're still

00:46:47.020 in interpretive quality.

00:46:48.600 They're still struggling

00:46:49.780 to make sense

00:46:50.840 of what it is

00:46:52.040 that it's really telling us

00:46:53.200 about reality.

00:46:53.960 And there are alternate versions

00:46:55.340 that are out there right now

00:46:57.440 that in principle

00:46:58.740 are each as good as the other

00:47:00.080 in the minds of

00:47:00.860 their different proponents.

00:47:02.660 Right, right.

00:47:03.100 So it's useful

00:47:03.740 to keep in mind

00:47:04.620 the fact that those interpretive,

00:47:06.440 that there's a variety

00:47:07.640 of opinions

00:47:08.240 with regards to

00:47:09.220 the plethora

00:47:10.680 of interpretive frameworks

00:47:11.740 that might be appropriate.

00:47:13.760 So...

00:47:14.060 Yeah, there is a dominant.

00:47:15.080 There is a dominant one.

00:47:16.280 I don't want to give

00:47:17.300 an incorrect view.

00:47:18.520 Most physicists

00:47:19.200 who you talk to

00:47:20.000 will speak in the manner

00:47:20.940 that we were a moment ago.

00:47:22.160 But I always feel

00:47:22.780 that it's worthwhile

00:47:23.560 pointing out

00:47:24.560 that that's not

00:47:25.600 the only way

00:47:26.560 that you can talk

00:47:27.180 about quantum physics.

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00:49:04.400 Do you...

00:49:09.280 This is a very

00:49:10.220 ill-formed question

00:49:11.860 and it sort of pushes me

00:49:14.960 to the edge

00:49:15.460 of my understanding.

00:49:17.820 I've spent a lot of time

00:49:19.240 studying mythology

00:49:20.740 and the ordering

00:49:23.880 effect of consciousness

00:49:25.740 is something

00:49:26.440 that's represented

00:49:27.380 in deep narratives

00:49:29.040 universally.

00:49:30.780 And the story

00:49:33.100 is something

00:49:33.860 like

00:49:34.360 an ordering agent

00:49:36.560 encountering

00:49:37.880 a field of possibility

00:49:39.120 and casting it

00:49:40.720 into

00:49:41.200 a determinate

00:49:42.600 and

00:49:43.240 somewhat fixed order.

00:49:46.800 So for example,

00:49:47.960 in the Genesis account,

00:49:50.480 the

00:49:50.760 waste

00:49:52.720 and chaos

00:49:53.540 that the spirit

00:49:54.640 of God

00:49:55.140 encounters

00:49:55.660 is the

00:49:56.320 tohu vabohu.

00:49:57.360 and it's

00:49:58.540 something like

00:50:00.360 a field of potential.

00:50:02.780 And I've been curious

00:50:03.760 about that,

00:50:04.760 about the relationship

00:50:06.040 between that

00:50:06.820 and these

00:50:07.300 ideas at a quantum level

00:50:09.580 that

00:50:09.920 the ground of reality

00:50:11.580 at the most

00:50:13.020 fundamental

00:50:13.680 material level

00:50:14.720 starts to become

00:50:16.120 something other than

00:50:17.200 the determinate

00:50:18.980 particles of dust

00:50:20.100 that we're familiar

00:50:20.880 with from our

00:50:21.680 day-to-day experience.

00:50:23.120 that it's

00:50:23.880 something like

00:50:24.580 a realm

00:50:25.120 of

00:50:25.380 realm

00:50:27.240 isn't precisely

00:50:28.000 the right word

00:50:28.740 but

00:50:29.040 I'll use it

00:50:30.580 because I don't

00:50:30.980 have a better one

00:50:31.740 a realm

00:50:32.560 of possibility

00:50:33.420 that can be

00:50:34.300 cast into

00:50:35.100 the actuality

00:50:36.620 of the present

00:50:37.280 and the past.

00:50:38.860 And so

00:50:39.200 I'm wondering

00:50:39.900 how you

00:50:40.440 understand

00:50:41.220 that

00:50:41.720 that wave

00:50:43.740 you know

00:50:44.420 you were careful

00:50:45.040 to distinguish it

00:50:45.980 from the

00:50:46.420 electromagnetic

00:50:46.980 wave form

00:50:48.220 and you're

00:50:49.080 talking about it

00:50:49.760 as if I

00:50:51.020 understand it

00:50:51.660 correctly

00:50:52.020 as a field

00:50:52.820 of possibility

00:50:54.240 a field

00:50:54.780 of

00:50:55.400 actualizable

00:50:57.200 possibility

00:50:57.920 that exists

00:50:59.260 in potential

00:51:00.280 whatever that

00:51:01.300 means

00:51:01.680 before it's

00:51:03.040 actualized

00:51:03.740 into an actual

00:51:04.460 event

00:51:04.840 and so

00:51:05.260 how do you

00:51:07.540 or do you

00:51:08.100 understand

00:51:08.580 that

00:51:09.100 field of

00:51:10.260 possibility

00:51:10.740 and what

00:51:11.240 existential

00:51:12.640 or phenomenological

00:51:13.680 significance

00:51:14.560 might that have

00:51:16.040 do you have

00:51:16.580 any sense

00:51:17.000 of what that

00:51:17.540 might mean

00:51:18.000 it's a deep

00:51:20.080 and very difficult

00:51:20.700 question

00:51:21.320 and let me

00:51:22.580 just give

00:51:23.760 you a little

00:51:24.380 bit of insight

00:51:25.000 as to why

00:51:26.100 it's so

00:51:26.760 difficult

00:51:27.300 that may not

00:51:28.080 be obvious

00:51:28.680 from what

00:51:29.080 we've discussed

00:51:29.680 so far

00:51:30.480 if we have

00:51:31.500 a single

00:51:31.960 particle

00:51:32.540 a photon

00:51:33.300 or electron

00:51:34.300 we can talk

00:51:35.500 about its

00:51:36.000 probability

00:51:36.540 wave

00:51:37.220 as existing

00:51:38.720 in ordinary

00:51:39.420 three dimensions

00:51:40.280 because after

00:51:41.300 all it's

00:51:41.700 telling us

00:51:42.120 the possible

00:51:43.340 the potential

00:51:44.240 locations

00:51:44.900 that that

00:51:45.400 particle

00:51:45.720 might occupy

00:51:46.560 and of course

00:51:47.160 those locations

00:51:48.160 exist in

00:51:48.900 three dimensions

00:51:49.620 but if you

00:51:50.780 have two

00:51:51.260 particles

00:51:51.820 that wave

00:51:53.400 doesn't now

00:51:54.420 exist in

00:51:55.160 three dimensions

00:51:55.880 it exists

00:51:57.000 in six

00:51:58.140 dimensions

00:51:58.780 because there

00:51:59.700 are three

00:52:00.020 locations where

00:52:00.860 the first

00:52:01.280 particle might

00:52:02.120 be and there

00:52:02.700 are three

00:52:03.360 coordinates I

00:52:04.240 should say

00:52:04.680 that would

00:52:05.100 delineate the

00:52:05.760 location of

00:52:06.380 the second

00:52:06.740 particle

00:52:06.980 so three

00:52:07.500 coordinates for

00:52:08.360 the first

00:52:08.760 three coordinates

00:52:09.420 for the second

00:52:10.040 if you have

00:52:10.800 three particles

00:52:11.640 that wave

00:52:12.220 lives in nine

00:52:12.940 dimensions

00:52:13.460 four particles

00:52:14.280 it lives in

00:52:14.760 twelve dimensions

00:52:15.760 you know if

00:52:17.340 you have a

00:52:17.760 trillion particles

00:52:18.980 that wave

00:52:19.980 lives in

00:52:20.660 three trillion

00:52:21.940 dimensions

00:52:22.300 how do you

00:52:23.500 think about

00:52:24.600 that wave

00:52:25.880 so that wave

00:52:27.820 as something

00:52:28.440 that for one

00:52:29.660 particle is

00:52:30.400 at least

00:52:30.980 it's tricky

00:52:31.660 but at least

00:52:32.240 you can envision

00:52:32.980 it as you

00:52:34.020 know some

00:52:34.740 gossamer

00:52:35.540 substance

00:52:36.280 that's filling

00:52:37.100 space and

00:52:37.920 where that

00:52:38.600 gossamer

00:52:39.380 substance is a

00:52:40.200 little bit you

00:52:40.860 know more

00:52:41.300 opaque high

00:52:42.360 probability

00:52:43.080 where it's

00:52:44.020 thin or low

00:52:44.940 you can think

00:52:45.840 about you

00:52:46.180 can cogitate

00:52:46.860 on that

00:52:47.480 i don't know

00:52:48.300 how to cogitate

00:52:49.100 on the version

00:52:50.280 that describes

00:52:51.160 many particles

00:52:52.320 because it's

00:52:53.060 beyond my

00:52:53.660 capacity

00:52:54.220 to envision

00:52:55.660 the arena

00:52:56.420 within which

00:52:57.280 that wave

00:52:58.040 exists

00:52:58.980 so it's a

00:52:59.900 tough tough

00:53:01.060 question

00:53:01.620 and and sort

00:53:02.460 of the way

00:53:02.880 it relates

00:53:03.620 at least the

00:53:04.080 way i try

00:53:04.540 to make it

00:53:04.940 relate to

00:53:05.400 the kinds

00:53:05.840 of topics

00:53:06.540 that you

00:53:06.980 were speaking

00:53:08.000 of be it

00:53:08.980 the bible

00:53:09.400 be it

00:53:09.780 mythology

00:53:10.340 i sort

00:53:11.740 of see

00:53:12.120 reality

00:53:12.760 as striated

00:53:14.060 stratified

00:53:15.020 into

00:53:15.420 different

00:53:16.400 layers

00:53:16.940 that all

00:53:17.600 relate to

00:53:18.200 each other

00:53:18.800 and you

00:53:19.440 need to

00:53:19.920 choose the

00:53:20.640 right language

00:53:21.480 the right

00:53:21.960 story if you

00:53:22.960 will to gain

00:53:23.760 insight into

00:53:24.540 whatever layer

00:53:25.440 you're interested

00:53:26.180 in and if

00:53:27.100 you're interested

00:53:27.520 in the rock

00:53:28.060 bottom reality

00:53:29.040 quantum physics

00:53:30.100 is where you

00:53:30.800 should absolutely

00:53:31.600 go if you're

00:53:32.640 interested in

00:53:33.200 the layer where

00:53:33.880 particles come

00:53:34.580 together into

00:53:35.440 molecules well

00:53:36.520 that's more

00:53:37.080 chemistry how

00:53:38.340 they come

00:53:38.700 together into

00:53:39.360 cells more

00:53:40.020 biology how

00:53:40.820 they come

00:53:41.200 together into

00:53:41.780 living systems

00:53:42.700 you know then

00:53:43.640 you get into

00:53:44.320 self-consciousness

00:53:45.780 neurology

00:53:46.860 psychology so

00:53:48.160 you see all

00:53:48.840 these nested

00:53:49.500 stories are

00:53:50.160 they reliant

00:53:51.080 upon quantum

00:53:51.820 physics in the

00:53:52.940 rock bottom

00:53:53.460 reality they

00:53:54.220 are but the

00:53:55.320 language that's

00:53:56.360 more useful at

00:53:57.660 the higher levels

00:53:58.440 of course is the

00:53:59.260 higher level

00:53:59.780 language that we

00:54:00.680 invoke and so

00:54:01.980 you know to

00:54:02.460 me mythology is

00:54:04.320 this wonderful

00:54:05.060 realm where

00:54:05.600 we human beings

00:54:06.400 have struggled

00:54:06.900 to find coherence

00:54:08.200 at the societal

00:54:09.560 level to try to

00:54:11.080 understand our

00:54:11.720 own mortality

00:54:12.580 ability to try

00:54:13.460 to understand

00:54:13.880 where we came

00:54:14.540 from and where

00:54:15.100 we're going not

00:54:15.920 from general

00:54:16.860 relativity but

00:54:17.760 from a more

00:54:18.220 human standpoint

00:54:19.420 and so that's

00:54:20.700 where I see

00:54:21.200 those stories

00:54:22.260 interfacing with

00:54:23.860 the cosmological

00:54:25.320 and quantum

00:54:25.820 mechanical story

00:54:26.860 okay so so

00:54:28.460 you you talked

00:54:29.320 about the

00:54:29.800 difficulty of

00:54:30.640 mapping that

00:54:31.520 three trillion

00:54:32.800 dimension space

00:54:33.960 let's say that

00:54:34.800 that emerges as

00:54:36.900 a consequence of

00:54:37.760 the interaction of

00:54:38.780 a plethora of

00:54:39.860 of particles

00:54:41.240 I mean it

00:54:42.720 it seems to

00:54:43.680 me that that's

00:54:45.300 actually and

00:54:46.760 this is a huge

00:54:47.400 leap and I'm not

00:54:48.440 claiming it's

00:54:49.000 correct but there's

00:54:50.100 something to it

00:54:51.020 because of course

00:54:52.120 I'll lay it out

00:54:55.120 first I mean we

00:54:56.320 we use imaginative

00:54:57.760 projection to

00:54:58.960 envision alternative

00:55:00.900 potential futures

00:55:02.200 right and we seem

00:55:03.180 to concentrate on

00:55:04.200 the ones that are

00:55:05.060 relatively statistically

00:55:07.500 likely like when

00:55:09.100 you're I've been

00:55:10.080 thinking a lot about

00:55:10.880 how consciousness

00:55:11.560 operates and you

00:55:12.780 know you can think

00:55:13.480 of us as

00:55:14.720 deterministic

00:55:16.640 creatures who are

00:55:17.540 driven by

00:55:18.240 mechanical algorithms

00:55:19.800 to move forward

00:55:22.240 robotically lockstep

00:55:24.000 as we're driven by

00:55:25.680 material causality

00:55:27.220 but you can also

00:55:29.200 think about us as

00:55:30.540 imaginative visionaries

00:55:33.620 who flesh out

00:55:35.320 realms of

00:55:36.180 possibility and

00:55:37.320 then implement

00:55:39.320 processes to bring

00:55:40.500 those about and I

00:55:41.520 think the latter

00:55:42.300 conceptualization is

00:55:45.140 much more accurate

00:55:46.160 with regards to the

00:55:47.200 contents of our

00:55:47.900 consciousness because

00:55:48.860 what consciousness

00:55:50.700 focuses on isn't

00:55:53.640 constants consciousness

00:55:55.640 focuses on

00:55:56.680 variability so for

00:55:58.260 example if something

00:55:59.200 unexpected happened in

00:56:01.020 your sensory field right

00:56:02.360 at the moment you

00:56:03.060 would orient towards

00:56:04.040 it and you do that

00:56:05.080 well for implicitly

00:56:06.820 but your consciousness

00:56:07.660 would focus on the

00:56:08.800 the uncertainty and

00:56:10.260 the variability and

00:56:11.660 so we seem to use

00:56:12.680 consciousness to shape

00:56:14.020 variability and so I

00:56:16.640 guess the first thing

00:56:17.460 I'm wondering is is

00:56:19.660 it reasonable to

00:56:20.580 suppose that the

00:56:21.500 purpose of the

00:56:22.140 imagination is to map

00:56:23.700 out that dimensional

00:56:25.480 multi-dimensional space

00:56:27.080 with regards to its

00:56:28.180 most likely

00:56:28.800 configurations and the

00:56:30.760 second question is

00:56:32.420 this is a more

00:56:34.100 oblique question is

00:56:35.180 that is it

00:56:36.880 reasonable to

00:56:37.940 assume that the

00:56:39.240 possibility that

00:56:40.520 consciousness appears

00:56:41.780 to be contending to

00:56:43.020 like the field of

00:56:44.160 possibility that opens

00:56:45.480 up to your imagination

00:56:46.420 let's say when you

00:56:47.460 wake up in the

00:56:48.060 morning and start to

00:56:49.440 apprehend the

00:56:50.180 possibilities of the

00:56:51.260 day is that a

00:56:53.000 manifestation of the

00:56:54.460 what it's is that a

00:56:57.240 manifestation of that

00:56:58.740 is it a higher level

00:57:00.900 manifestation of that

00:57:02.280 field of possibility

00:57:03.440 that characterizes the

00:57:04.980 the micro realm

00:57:07.060 you know you know

00:57:08.240 what I mean there's

00:57:08.860 possibility at the

00:57:10.020 quantum level does

00:57:11.000 that possibility make

00:57:13.420 itself manifest all the

00:57:14.700 way up to to the to

00:57:16.600 the level of macro

00:57:17.560 experience because we

00:57:19.100 seem to be dealing

00:57:20.000 with something like

00:57:20.720 possibility rather than

00:57:22.120 deterministic

00:57:23.480 algorithmic actuality and

00:57:25.240 so there definitely is a

00:57:26.840 a rhyming between the

00:57:29.160 two kinds of ideas for

00:57:31.820 sure but how is it that

00:57:34.160 quantum physics at that

00:57:35.720 rock bottom story bubbles

00:57:37.320 up and influences

00:57:39.180 conscious experience I

00:57:41.480 don't know and nobody

00:57:42.640 does it's too complex a

00:57:44.060 problem right now but

00:57:45.260 what I would say is

00:57:46.220 there are things about

00:57:47.820 consciousness that the

00:57:49.320 rock bottom story does

00:57:50.600 give insight into and

00:57:52.260 one of the big ones is

00:57:53.620 free will right I mean

00:57:54.980 there have been

00:57:56.560 arguments about free

00:57:57.680 will going on for

00:57:58.660 thousands of years and

00:58:00.500 to me it's quite clear

00:58:02.720 that when you recognize

00:58:04.600 if you believe that the

00:58:06.240 physical is all that

00:58:07.540 there is and I don't

00:58:08.380 know that that is the

00:58:09.280 case but let's just take

00:58:10.300 that as an assumption

00:58:11.200 for the moment that

00:58:12.180 there's no consciousness

00:58:13.020 field that's out there

00:58:14.360 in the world that we

00:58:15.180 somehow are tapping

00:58:15.960 into that there's no

00:58:17.100 greater power that's

00:58:18.200 somehow beyond the

00:58:19.120 laws of physics if all

00:58:20.620 we are are bags of

00:58:21.800 particles governed by

00:58:23.140 physical law and our

00:58:24.060 brains are nothing but

00:58:25.100 gloppy three pound

00:58:26.320 collections of

00:58:27.120 particles that are

00:58:28.280 organized sufficiently to

00:58:29.820 somehow yield the

00:58:30.960 information processing

00:58:32.020 that we call conscious

00:58:33.060 awareness if that's all

00:58:34.760 that it is and I think

00:58:35.660 that is all that it is

00:58:36.800 then there's no

00:58:37.780 opportunity for us to

00:58:39.120 have any freedom of the

00:58:40.520 will because our

00:58:42.540 particles are going to

00:58:43.700 do what they're going

00:58:44.480 to do governed by the

00:58:45.720 quantum laws and

00:58:46.680 there's no opportunity

00:58:47.560 for an I to

00:58:49.180 intercede in that

00:58:50.320 lawful if

00:58:51.320 probabilistic

00:58:52.200 projection so that's

00:58:54.560 just the way things

00:58:55.460 work and so the

00:58:57.160 view that we can

00:58:57.980 somehow cause our

00:58:59.420 particles perhaps to

00:59:00.540 hold still for a

00:59:01.740 moment wait wait for

00:59:03.380 Brian to make a

00:59:04.200 decision and once

00:59:05.560 Brian makes a

00:59:06.260 decision then carry on

00:59:07.620 with whatever motion

00:59:08.640 that you were going to

00:59:09.740 do by the laws of

00:59:10.660 physics that's

00:59:11.820 incoherent that's 0.94

00:59:13.300 ludicrous and so

00:59:15.200 however much we may 0.66

00:59:16.620 feel that we are the

00:59:17.760 ultimate authors of our

00:59:19.380 actions I don't see any

00:59:21.400 opportunity for that

00:59:22.580 because we can't

00:59:23.580 intercede in the lawful

00:59:24.760 progression of the

00:59:25.560 particles that govern

00:59:26.600 whether I move my arm

00:59:27.940 whether I say this or I

00:59:29.300 say that it's all just

00:59:30.740 the motion of particles

00:59:31.780 that are instantiated in

00:59:33.220 my biological form

00:59:34.440 do you feel that what

00:59:37.020 what's your opinion

00:59:37.920 about okay

00:59:39.380 you can make causally

00:59:43.220 determinate arguments

00:59:44.640 very far very high up the

00:59:47.700 resolution what

00:59:51.060 what spectrum

00:59:52.120 so the more

00:59:54.940 the more macro the

00:59:56.460 system the more

00:59:57.640 deterministic processes

00:59:58.900 seem to be at play but

01:00:00.160 when you push all the

01:00:01.760 way down to the micro

01:00:03.080 level

01:00:03.460 you have this

01:00:05.960 fundamental

01:00:06.840 indeterminacy and so

01:00:08.420 why would you

01:00:10.060 presume that

01:00:11.360 the deterministic

01:00:13.020 argument holds true

01:00:14.440 given that

01:00:15.980 at its most fundamental

01:00:17.720 basis there's

01:00:18.900 indeterminacy

01:00:20.180 you know isn't it the

01:00:21.720 case that if you wanted

01:00:22.680 to make an algorithmic

01:00:24.140 case that

01:00:24.760 you'd need

01:00:25.660 like predictable

01:00:27.260 algorithmic causality

01:00:29.000 all the way from the

01:00:30.160 most micro levels all the

01:00:31.640 way up

01:00:32.020 or are you making the

01:00:33.420 case that once you get

01:00:34.420 to the macro level the

01:00:35.580 determinacy takes over to

01:00:36.960 the point where there is

01:00:37.800 no possibility for such a

01:00:39.140 thing as free will

01:00:39.920 no I

01:00:41.440 think that the

01:00:42.580 indeterminacy

01:00:43.380 of quantum physics

01:00:45.060 turns out to be

01:00:46.740 irrelevant

01:00:47.820 to

01:00:48.620 the particular story

01:00:50.000 that I'm telling in the

01:00:50.940 following sense

01:00:51.860 so what I'm

01:00:53.560 I'm not saying that

01:00:54.640 we are determinate in the

01:00:55.860 sense that I can't

01:00:56.680 predict what you're going

01:00:57.800 to do next

01:00:58.580 because you are

01:00:59.740 ultimately a quantum

01:01:00.720 system let me look

01:01:01.720 right down at the level

01:01:03.340 of your particles

01:01:04.040 imagine I could zoom in

01:01:05.240 on you and see your

01:01:06.140 individual particles

01:01:07.160 the best I can do is

01:01:08.740 predict the likelihood

01:01:09.980 or the probability

01:01:10.820 that those particles

01:01:12.060 are going to evolve

01:01:13.080 from one configuration

01:01:14.080 to another through

01:01:15.340 time but that

01:01:16.800 probabilistic prediction

01:01:18.800 that uncertainty

01:01:20.440 that's not freedom

01:01:21.940 of your will

01:01:22.980 you aren't

01:01:24.240 controlling which

01:01:25.340 outcome happens

01:01:26.460 you aren't determining

01:01:27.860 which outcome is more

01:01:29.180 likely or less likely

01:01:30.700 you still are just

01:01:32.280 going along for this

01:01:33.420 probabilistic ride

01:01:34.880 and so whether physics

01:01:36.420 is probabilistic as

01:01:37.780 quantum mechanics says

01:01:39.020 or in the classical

01:01:40.540 determinant view that

01:01:41.840 Isaac Newton would

01:01:42.820 have said we know

01:01:43.380 it's the former not

01:01:44.460 the latter but even

01:01:45.960 in the former you

01:01:47.500 aren't controlling that

01:01:49.280 uncertainty and

01:01:50.260 therefore you aren't

01:01:51.120 controlling how things

01:01:52.720 are unfolding you

01:01:53.920 aren't controlling what

01:01:54.980 you do or what you

01:01:55.780 say at that fundamental

01:01:57.360 level so you are

01:01:59.280 nothing but this

01:02:00.400 collection of particles

01:02:01.380 still fully governed by

01:02:02.780 laws which I should

01:02:04.420 say the quantum laws

01:02:06.160 as mathematical equations

01:02:07.960 they are as

01:02:08.920 deterministic as the

01:02:10.700 classical laws but

01:02:11.540 what they determine

01:02:12.440 are likelihoods

01:02:13.920 probabilities and so

01:02:15.860 once those

01:02:16.580 probabilities are

01:02:17.700 determined by

01:02:18.820 mathematics you are

01:02:20.720 out of the equation

01:02:21.940 and that's the way in

01:02:23.120 which you don't have

01:02:24.320 the freedom of will

01:02:25.160 that you feel that

01:02:26.700 you do

01:02:27.280 okay yeah I

01:02:30.360 understand the

01:02:31.280 argument I guess

01:02:31.900 of course the

01:02:32.760 the classic what

01:02:35.100 would you say

01:02:35.540 rejoinder to that is

01:02:36.860 that you know we

01:02:38.060 structure and I

01:02:39.280 don't know how to

01:02:39.920 reconcile the two

01:02:40.820 you know I'm not

01:02:41.760 claiming that I do in

01:02:42.640 the least but you know

01:02:43.780 we structure our

01:02:44.740 societies on the

01:02:46.420 presumption of

01:02:47.220 something approximating

01:02:48.340 responsible free will

01:02:49.560 and in so far as we

01:02:50.900 do that we seem to be

01:02:51.980 able to hold people

01:02:52.840 responsible help them

01:02:54.440 govern their

01:02:55.020 behaviors integrate

01:02:56.420 them psychologically and

01:02:57.720 produce stable

01:02:58.440 communities and so

01:02:59.520 it's a very strange

01:03:00.980 situation that the

01:03:02.360 presumption of free will

01:03:03.600 seems to be a

01:03:05.080 pragmatic and

01:03:06.180 metaphysical necessity

01:03:07.500 but it's hard to

01:03:08.580 square with the kind

01:03:09.760 of modeling that

01:03:10.580 emerges well in your

01:03:12.300 argument either from a

01:03:13.480 more Newtonian

01:03:14.580 deterministic view of

01:03:15.760 physics or even from

01:03:16.640 the quantum view you

01:03:17.980 know it's a gap that's

01:03:18.940 I think I have an

01:03:19.540 answer

01:03:19.920 starting a business can

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01:04:26.540 I think I have an answer

01:04:30.420 to that but these are

01:04:32.040 difficult issues so I

01:04:33.860 don't by any means think

01:04:35.240 it's all settled but I

01:04:37.060 still think that in a

01:04:39.000 world of the sort that

01:04:40.380 I've described which I

01:04:41.120 think is our world I

01:04:42.340 think you still bear

01:04:43.540 responsibility for your

01:04:45.640 actions it's of a

01:04:46.640 slightly different nature

01:04:48.040 than the responsibility in

01:04:49.800 a world that does have

01:04:51.280 freedom of the will but if

01:04:53.160 you are the causal actor

01:04:54.760 that results in a

01:04:56.780 certain effect if you

01:04:58.500 are part of the causal

01:04:59.780 chain that results in

01:05:01.500 certain things happening

01:05:02.700 then you are responsible

01:05:04.240 for the things happen

01:05:05.340 because you are linking

01:05:06.480 the causal chain and the

01:05:08.140 closer your link is to

01:05:09.520 the outcome the more

01:05:10.960 responsibility you bear

01:05:12.920 right so what does that

01:05:13.720 mean for some

01:05:14.420 pragmatic view right

01:05:15.860 right I see exactly and

01:05:17.540 so so my view on

01:05:18.880 punishment from a

01:05:20.260 societal perspective is

01:05:21.980 it can't be from the

01:05:23.780 standpoint of retribution

01:05:25.200 that would seem to

01:05:26.360 require free will if

01:05:28.160 you're going to actually

01:05:28.960 take a punitive stance on

01:05:31.440 someone's behavior but

01:05:33.300 rather I think punishment

01:05:34.920 should be viewed as

01:05:36.100 shaping future behaviors

01:05:38.680 based upon current

01:05:40.020 actions I mean the

01:05:41.540 example that I like to

01:05:42.520 use to sort of take this

01:05:43.680 out of the emotional realm

01:05:44.860 of human beings imagine

01:05:46.440 you have a Roomba many of

01:05:47.760 us do that cleans your

01:05:49.060 floor right that Roomba

01:05:51.060 doesn't have free will

01:05:52.100 that's not controversial

01:05:53.360 and yet when that Roomba

01:05:55.240 bounces or bangs into

01:05:57.040 furniture it's intern if

01:05:58.680 it's a high-end version it

01:06:00.160 modifies its internal map

01:06:01.960 of the space in order that

01:06:03.460 subsequently it doesn't

01:06:04.680 bump into things it

01:06:05.900 doesn't do the wrong thing

01:06:07.320 in the future and so you

01:06:09.360 can update your program you

01:06:11.380 can update your behavior

01:06:12.860 based upon getting feedback

01:06:14.980 and so if punishment is

01:06:17.160 viewed as feedback in order

01:06:18.680 to shape future behavior then

01:06:20.560 yes we should punish people

01:06:21.960 that are responsible in the

01:06:23.780 manner that I just

01:06:24.580 described for things that we

01:06:26.020 view as transgressing the

01:06:27.540 rules that we collectively

01:06:29.140 have brought into existence

01:06:30.400 for society to be able to

01:06:31.880 function we're not

01:06:33.000 punishing them because we're

01:06:34.960 coming from a standpoint of

01:06:36.480 retribution we're coming

01:06:37.980 from a standpoint of

01:06:38.880 shaping future behavior

01:06:40.200 right right right so yeah so

01:06:41.720 that's a more behaviorist

01:06:42.880 conceptualization of the

01:06:44.380 utility of punishment the

01:06:45.660 necessity of punishment all

01:06:47.300 right well I think I'll leave

01:06:48.460 that I think what we'll do

01:06:49.540 now if if it's okay with

01:06:51.180 you is turn to string

01:06:54.320 theory and I mean I'm I'm

01:06:57.900 so ignorant about string

01:06:58.980 theory that it's kind of 0.95

01:07:00.020 miracle and I guess so I can

01:07:02.660 I'm going to start by asking

01:07:03.940 you some basic questions I

01:07:05.360 guess the first question you

01:07:07.000 know you touch upon this in in

01:07:09.040 the the second edition of your

01:07:11.120 1999 book which is the

01:07:14.280 elegant universe super strings

01:07:16.240 hidden dimensions in the quest

01:07:17.560 for ultimate theory you've

01:07:18.540 just updated that and you

01:07:21.920 open the book by explaining I

01:07:25.920 suppose the at least part of

01:07:27.540 the problem that string

01:07:28.520 theories hypothetically poised to

01:07:30.960 solve and at least to some

01:07:32.900 degree that's the lack of unity

01:07:35.660 between the theories of general

01:07:37.700 relativity and the theories of

01:07:39.300 the of the quantum of the

01:07:41.320 quantum physicists and so maybe

01:07:43.020 you could explain to us first what

01:07:45.800 it means that those theories

01:07:47.440 aren't unified like what that

01:07:49.740 means yeah what that means in the

01:07:51.700 scientific realm but also what it

01:07:53.260 means practically and then walk us

01:07:55.340 through how string theory what

01:07:58.140 string theory is and how it

01:07:59.680 constitutes a potential solution to

01:08:02.060 that to that conundrum yeah so the

01:08:06.620 two big discoveries of the 20th

01:08:09.240 century are Einstein's general

01:08:11.300 theory of relativity which

01:08:12.980 describes the force of gravity and

01:08:15.240 as we discussed before the force

01:08:16.700 of gravity matters when things are

01:08:18.200 big stars and galaxies in the whole

01:08:20.580 universe and in that domain

01:08:22.320 Einstein's ideas have been tested

01:08:24.320 and they do an incredible job of

01:08:26.260 explaining things that we see in the

01:08:27.880 heavens the other big development

01:08:29.780 which we've spent some time already

01:08:31.300 talking about is quantum physics

01:08:32.900 which describes the small things

01:08:35.200 molecules atoms subatomic

01:08:36.720 particles and in that domain quantum

01:08:39.300 physics has itself been tested to

01:08:41.340 incredible precision and it works

01:08:43.420 the crazy thing is in any situation

01:08:46.920 where you need to put quantum physics

01:08:48.780 and general relativity together when

01:08:50.800 you need to use the equations in

01:08:53.080 tandem you get nonsensical results

01:08:56.600 you get results like infinity is the

01:08:58.720 only answer that you ever get for any

01:09:00.380 question that you pose now you might

01:09:02.820 say well do you ever need to put them

01:09:05.160 together quantum mechanics is small

01:09:07.180 general relativity is big those seem

01:09:09.100 pretty separate but there are extreme

01:09:11.740 realms like the center of a black hole

01:09:13.900 where a lot of mass is encrushed to a

01:09:17.000 very small size big mass general

01:09:19.580 relativity small size quantum physics

01:09:21.400 or the big bang the entire observable

01:09:23.980 universe crushed to a very small size

01:09:26.920 a lot of mass energy small size again

01:09:30.100 you need general relativity and quantum

01:09:31.660 mechanics and so in those extreme

01:09:34.540 realms you find that the equations simply

01:09:37.760 fall apart the laws of general relativity

01:09:40.780 laws of quantum physics they do not

01:09:42.520 play to a well together they're

01:09:44.420 ferocious antagonists and that's the

01:09:47.080 problem that we've been trying to

01:09:48.220 and that produces these mathematical

01:09:50.200 absurdities that you've been

01:09:51.600 describing and interferes with our

01:09:53.420 understanding i guess there's the

01:09:55.480 aesthetic problem too which is that

01:09:57.720 we're possessed by the strong

01:09:59.560 intimation that all forms of

01:10:01.880 descriptive knowledge should unify at

01:10:03.960 least not exist in contradiction to one

01:10:05.680 another that seems well it seems to

01:10:08.040 violate i don't know our

01:10:09.720 understanding of what understanding

01:10:11.640 itself is and so that's okay okay and

01:10:14.820 so well so can you give us a maybe a

01:10:18.160 more tangible indication of what sort of

01:10:22.460 absurdities might emerge in the

01:10:24.900 conceptual realm when you're dealing

01:10:26.620 with something like the situation that

01:10:29.900 obtains in a black hole and you said

01:10:32.040 that the equations will produce

01:10:34.140 references to infinity continually which

01:10:36.440 seem to be non-helpful but that's

01:10:38.200 still pretty abstract for people who

01:10:39.720 aren't mathematically oriented is there

01:10:41.320 a way of simplifying that so that it's

01:10:43.100 more graspable yeah so for imagine

01:10:46.360 imagine you jump into a black hole

01:10:48.640 inadvisable but imagine you do it we

01:10:51.760 know that as you get closer and closer

01:10:53.960 to the center of the black hole things

01:10:55.860 will start to feel uncomfortable if you

01:10:57.820 jumped in feet first your feet are

01:10:59.940 going to be pulled more strongly than

01:11:01.620 your head so your body's going to stretch

01:11:04.000 it's going to spaghettify we call it

01:11:06.260 ultimately it's going to be pulled apart

01:11:07.700 into its constituents and those

01:11:10.100 constituents are then going to fall

01:11:11.600 toward the center and the deep question

01:11:13.500 is what finally happens when you

01:11:16.400 actually reach the center and if you ask

01:11:19.140 any physicists today for the answer

01:11:21.100 they would be forced to tell you if

01:11:22.900 they're honest we don't know we just

01:11:25.800 don't know what happens at the center of

01:11:28.360 the black hole some ideas are it's a

01:11:30.800 portal to another universe that's a wild

01:11:33.100 sci-fi sounding idea be wonderful it's

01:11:35.960 the case but we just don't know some

01:11:38.120 people think it's a location where time

01:11:40.140 comes to an end it's just where there's

01:11:42.540 no notion of time any further so these

01:11:45.180 are the things that we just don't know

01:11:47.460 how to answer so i have a question about

01:11:50.240 that too well my correct me if i'm wrong

01:11:54.580 about this but my understanding is that

01:11:56.800 as something falls into a black hole

01:11:59.420 and this is from the perspective of an

01:12:01.880 external observer as it falls it it it's

01:12:06.560 transforming more and more slowly and 0.98

01:12:09.140 that that transformation decreases in in

01:12:13.260 speed until it's really at a standstill and

01:12:16.420 so so that and so i'm wondering if that's

01:12:21.600 the case and that there's that time

01:12:25.120 dilation that's accompanied by descent

01:12:27.580 into a black hole i'm i'm trying to put

01:12:31.540 like vague imaginations here imaginings

01:12:34.260 together you have something that's very

01:12:36.720 very dense at the center of that and you

01:12:39.380 also have this time dilation process is

01:12:42.600 it and and you have the idea that at some

01:12:45.300 distant point in the future everything's

01:12:47.600 going to come back together in a big

01:12:49.240 crunch at least that's one of the

01:12:51.160 hypothesis like is there any difference

01:12:54.640 between the destination point when a

01:12:59.440 given body is falling into a given black

01:13:02.080 hole and the big crunch itself like is

01:13:05.640 that destination point the same

01:13:07.180 destination point and that would account

01:13:09.240 to some degree for the kind of infinite

01:13:11.220 density at at the center of the black

01:13:14.060 hole and it seems to make sense if if

01:13:16.500 time is dilating to that degree that's

01:13:21.260 the best it's a good question and

01:13:22.580 certainly you're right from the

01:13:24.060 standpoint of an outside observer

01:13:26.200 watching say you jump into a black

01:13:28.960 hole they will see you move slower and

01:13:31.120 slower as you reach the event horizon

01:13:33.720 the edge of the black hole and in fact

01:13:35.820 they will see you ultimately come to a

01:13:38.260 standstill right at the event horizon

01:13:40.280 itself but the amazing thing is from

01:13:42.240 your perspective you will fall right

01:13:45.060 through that event horizon you will go

01:13:46.520 right to the center and it will happen

01:13:48.060 in finite time it will not happen in

01:13:50.760 some long cosmological time it'll

01:13:52.720 happen in finite time and so it's not

01:13:55.180 as though the center of the black hole

01:13:56.380 is the big crunch if there is such a

01:13:58.460 thing for the universe but it is the

01:14:00.300 case that we believe that if we could

01:14:02.480 answer the question of what happens at

01:14:04.440 the center of a black hole we would

01:14:06.020 then be able to answer the question of

01:14:08.220 what happens at the big crunch or what

01:14:10.160 happens at the big bang because we face

01:14:12.660 exactly the same issue if you weren't so

01:14:15.120 interested in black holes but you're

01:14:16.660 interested in how the universe got

01:14:18.040 started again ask any physicist what

01:14:20.800 really happened at the moment of the

01:14:23.220 big bang time zero itself if the

01:14:25.740 physicist is straightforward honest

01:14:27.260 they'll say we don't know for exactly

01:14:29.660 the same reason that's a realm where the

01:14:32.060 density is so high that you need general

01:14:34.920 relativity where quantum physics is

01:14:36.760 vital because it's so small and the

01:14:38.420 equations break down and the equations

01:14:40.060 are the only tool that we have to gain

01:14:42.380 insight into realms that we can't

01:14:44.360 literally visit and that's the issue

01:14:46.480 that we're trying to fix okay so why

01:14:48.400 does it matter that we from your

01:14:51.700 perspective you would continue falling

01:14:54.940 at a finite time with regard to the

01:14:57.900 question of whether what's at the

01:14:59.480 bottom of the black hole is the

01:15:00.960 eventual aggregation of all matter I

01:15:04.520 because looking at it from the outside

01:15:08.400 as that falling entity grinds to a

01:15:11.700 halt there's an infinite duration of

01:15:15.260 time that's now involved in the

01:15:17.700 process and in that infinite duration

01:15:20.280 of time if the big crunch models are

01:15:22.480 correct that big crunch is eventually

01:15:24.700 going to occur so I don't understand

01:15:26.660 why they don't yeah why they don't

01:15:29.120 necessarily dovetail let's say or

01:15:31.600 converge so our our yeah so our goal is

01:15:35.300 to be able to explain the happenings in

01:15:37.780 the universe from any and all

01:15:39.900 perspectives the one thing that

01:15:42.480 Einstein taught us is that different

01:15:43.940 perspectives can tell very different

01:15:45.700 stories about the universe but our goal

01:15:47.700 is to be able to understand all those

01:15:49.340 stories you want to chronologize we want

01:15:51.160 to chronicle all the narratives if you

01:15:53.200 will that could be told about the

01:15:54.940 universe and so you're right from the

01:15:57.440 standpoint of the outside observer the

01:15:59.240 chronicle you're telling is correct okay

01:16:00.780 okay time yeah okay but we also want to

01:16:03.720 know the chronicle from the person that

01:16:05.300 could fall in as well yeah right right

01:16:07.420 right fair enough fair enough okay so

01:16:09.740 so let's go back to string theory so

01:16:11.640 you made the case that the the equations

01:16:17.460 that govern general relativity and quantum

01:16:20.280 mechanics don't dovetail well and that

01:16:22.880 poses certain interpretive problems and

01:16:25.400 you outlined what they might be and I

01:16:28.460 don't remember if we did try to nail that

01:16:30.840 down so that was more comprehensible if we

01:16:33.140 got out of the realm of mathematical

01:16:35.280 infinity to point out some of the like

01:16:37.780 maybe that's where we went into the

01:16:39.600 discussion of the black hole yes but

01:16:41.960 exactly okay so okay fine so let's let's

01:16:44.380 talk about you know how string theory in

01:16:48.420 principle reconciles that I'm also

01:16:50.140 curious you know there's a lot of

01:16:51.300 physicists who are very skeptical about

01:16:55.160 spring string theory as an enterprise and

01:16:57.840 so I guess I'm also wondering has the

01:17:01.140 have the proponents of this theory come up

01:17:05.920 with a explanation that adds additional

01:17:09.680 predictive validity to the combined use of

01:17:13.020 the theories of general relativity and of

01:17:15.440 quantum mechanics so what is string

01:17:17.600 theory and then why should we believe that

01:17:20.160 the suppositions of the string theorists have

01:17:22.280 any validity yeah so they're both good

01:17:24.680 questions start with the first one so the

01:17:27.360 basic conventional way of talking about

01:17:29.640 string theory the way I spoke about it even

01:17:31.500 in the elegant universe back in 1999 is a

01:17:35.180 slight shift in how we envision the

01:17:38.420 fundamental ingredients of matter the

01:17:41.580 old view that we've been talking about in

01:17:43.760 quantum mechanics are these little

01:17:45.000 particles they are described by

01:17:46.540 probability waves but the particle

01:17:48.220 itself is a little infinitesimal dot the

01:17:50.980 electron or the photon string theory says

01:17:53.880 that you need to update that picture think

01:17:57.100 now of the electron as a little tiny

01:17:59.540 vibrating filament a little tiny

01:18:01.640 vibrating string like filament think of

01:18:05.040 the photon as a little tiny vibrating

01:18:07.160 string like filament and the different

01:18:09.620 vibrations of the string just like the

01:18:12.380 string and a violin produces different

01:18:14.280 musical tones the different vibrational

01:18:16.760 patterns of these little strings don't

01:18:18.620 produce different music they produce the

01:18:20.860 different particles so a photon is a

01:18:22.960 string vibrating in one pattern electron a

01:18:25.060 string vibrating in a different pattern and so forth. That's the basic idea. Now, why do we

01:18:29.620 invoke that idea? And what does vibration mean? I mean, in that situation, what does vibration

01:18:35.880 mean and what's vibrating? And maybe those are nonsensical questions, like the color.

01:18:40.680 They're not nonsensical. They're tough questions. So what is the string made of? The best answer I

01:18:46.480 can give, it's made of string stuff. It's made of energy. If I could delineate something yet more

01:18:52.680 fine from which the string was built, our focus would be on that finer constituent. It may be,

01:18:58.880 if these ideas are correct, that this is the finest ingredient, period, end of story. We don't know

01:19:03.440 that, of course, but that is one way of thinking about the theory. And so the remarkable thing,

01:19:08.440 and this is not obvious and a little difficult to explain in words, but I will say that mathematically,

01:19:13.780 when you make the move from a point particle to a filament, the problems between general

01:19:19.480 relativity and quantum mechanics, they go away. All of a sudden, these two theories can play well

01:19:24.440 together. The infinities that we were talking about from the conventional formulation are quelled.

01:19:31.420 They're tamped down. You can make sensible calculations, at least in principle. And that's

01:19:37.620 why this idea took off in the 1980s. I see. So now is that, okay, so one of the problems that

01:19:44.940 non-physicists have, and I presume physicists as well, is that as we peer more and more deeply into

01:19:51.680 the micro realm, we get farther and farther away from our embodied axiomatic presuppositions,

01:19:58.680 right? I mean, we're accustomed to dealing with objects in the macro world that operate like

01:20:04.880 macro world objects. And then as we increase our resolution, the things we're looking at increasingly

01:20:11.400 don't act like that. And so they escape from our, really our axiomatic or a priori understanding,

01:20:18.000 which is very deeply embodied. And so you already have that problem at the level of the electron and

01:20:25.100 the photon. And it seems to me not improbable that that problem would be multiplied if you increase the

01:20:31.800 level of resolution past that. So is there any possibility whatsoever of the non-mathematically

01:20:39.220 inclined observer of even understanding what it means for there to be filaments or for there to

01:20:44.600 be vibrations? Or are those like second order castings of things that have to essentially be

01:20:50.860 mathematical? Well, they are ultimately mathematical. The imagery that we paint in words is a reasonable

01:20:58.620 approximation to what we believe the mathematics is telling us. So it's not far from a reasonable

01:21:07.320 poetic description of what's happening down there. But you're absolutely right. It's so far from

01:21:13.660 common experience. We're talking about distance scales that make the atomic seem large by comparison.

01:21:19.840 So we're way, way down at a distance scale of like 10 to the minus 33 centimeters. You know,

01:21:26.080 an atom is like, you know, 10 to the minus 10 centimeters or something. So we're talking 20 orders

01:21:30.860 of magnitude smaller than an atomic ingredient. So we're far, far from the familiar things that we

01:21:38.220 use to base our understanding of the world upon. But the question then you ask is, how do you test

01:21:43.340 this? And what practical use is it? Yeah, well, quantum mechanics is obviously insanely practically

01:21:49.920 useful. I mean, it's produced technologies that are world transforming. So.

01:21:54.980 But let me just point out on that, because that's a very vital realization. If you would have asked

01:21:59.380 the people who developed quantum mechanics like Niels Bohr and Schrodinger, if you ask them way back

01:22:05.500 in the 1920s, what's the practical utility of what you're working on, I'm pretty sure they would have 0.98

01:22:11.800 said, not much. We're just trying to understand. And so then it's 80 years later, we go from

01:22:18.140 understanding to harnessing. So I always find it dangerous to talk about practical utility of ideas

01:22:25.540 when they're being formulated, because it may be a century more before they're actually

01:22:29.160 put in practice. But you still need to ask the question, why should you believe any of this

01:22:33.720 stuff? Are there any experimental tests? Yes, yes. Well, the same was true of Maxwell when he

01:22:38.420 discovered electricity, right? Electromagnetism. Yeah. So. And I'm always in the elegant universe back

01:22:45.540 in 1999. And today I am forthright in saying there are no experimental observations. There are no

01:22:54.340 definitive predictions that we can test with today's technology. So we have not been able

01:23:00.080 to bridge the gap between the theory and the observation. They say, what the heck are you guys

01:23:04.740 doing? Why are you still thinking about something? And the answer is, we have made such stunning,

01:23:10.900 and I am saying this from the perspective of someone who's lived the life of mathematics,

01:23:16.700 you know, we've made stunning mathematical advances in this field that are beyond anything that most of

01:23:23.300 us would have thought remotely possible to have occurred by today. We've understood the equations.

01:23:28.860 We've been able to gain insight into the nature of black holes, not answering that fundamental

01:23:33.500 singularity question, but we understand the horizon of a black hole, the entropy of a black hole. We've made

01:23:39.440 progress in understanding the way in which this mathematics paints a vastly new picture of reality. Some of the

01:23:46.200 developments just in the last few years are absolutely mind-blowing. So if you are like me and many of my

01:23:51.980 colleagues willing to defer observation and experiment for now, not forever, but defer it now, develop the

01:23:59.780 mathematics in the hope that this risk that we are taking, that this math may not be relevant to the

01:24:06.460 world, but if it is, it will give us the deepest explanation of how the world came to be and how it came into

01:24:12.960 existence and the fundamental ingredients and how they behave. That makes the risk for some of us

01:24:18.380 worth taking. It's not a risk worth taking for everybody. This is where human nature comes into

01:24:24.320 science. Some scientists, God bless them, they're vital, need to have an ongoing dialogue with experiment

01:24:31.840 and observation for them to feel that what they're doing matters. Other scientists are willing to defer that

01:24:37.640 dialogue, develop the mathematics for however long it will take if you feel that the math is progressing

01:24:43.760 at a rate that's sufficiently gratifying and satisfying to make you feel that you're en route

01:24:49.180 toward truth. And that's the kind of person that works on string theory. There's no right or wrong here.

01:24:54.480 It's a matter of scientific taste.

01:24:56.780 So science, you can imagine, has two poles, and one would be hypothesis generation,

01:25:02.280 which is a relatively mysterious pole, and the other would be verification and testing. And it's

01:25:09.280 always the case that the hypothesis generation horizon exceeds the testing horizon, because

01:25:15.140 otherwise the hypothesis would be trivial. Now, and then the question would be, well,

01:25:20.620 to what degree are you temperamentally capable of, what would you say, appreciating that gap? And

01:25:26.640 there's going to be wide individual differences in that. They're probably related to something like

01:25:30.440 trait openness. But the notion that the hypothesis should exceed the data is, that's a truism in

01:25:37.180 some regard. Now, that does open up a very complex question, which is how do you, in the absence of

01:25:45.060 experimental verification, how do you determine which hypotheses aren't dead ends? And that seems to have

01:25:50.740 something to do with, it's something like pattern recognition. You know, I mean, one of the ways that we

01:25:57.160 determine that something is real is by quintangulating, I suppose, with our senses. And if we can detect

01:26:06.140 something in five dimensions, in the five sensory dimensions, then we assume that it's real, sometimes

01:26:11.420 after talking to other people who are doing the same thing. But the great pattern recognizers, who are

01:26:17.060 the hypothesis generators in science, seem to do something approximately the same in the absence of

01:26:22.660 experimental proof, right? They're using a vast variety of information sources to determine whether

01:26:28.720 their hypotheses are valid as opposed to, say, you know, delusional conspiracy theories or their

01:26:35.020 approximation. So, and you think the string theorists are, okay, so what is it? And I think we'll delve into

01:26:41.360 this more particularly on the Daily Wire side. I think maybe actually we'll turn to that because we are

01:26:45.960 coming to the end of our discussion. So, I think what I'm going to do on the Daily Wire side, for

01:26:51.760 everybody who's watching and listening, is to continue talking to Brian about the development of

01:26:55.720 his interest in the microcosmic realm and why, in particular, he was attracted to investigation of

01:27:04.280 string theory per se. There's lots of potential places that someone with an interest in physics might

01:27:10.280 go. And so, I'm always interested in the biographical element. So, I think we'll pursue that

01:27:15.200 on the Daily Wire side. And so, is there anything else that you can tell people that would flesh out

01:27:23.140 their understanding of string theory in relatively short order? I mean, I know that's a tall order, but

01:27:30.200 I'm still, we talked about these filaments and their vibrations. I mean, what's the nature of that

01:27:39.480 vibration? I mean, we know that light waves vary in their quality because of different frequency of

01:27:50.380 vibration, let's say. And so, that plays a fundamental role in the phenomenology of everyday

01:27:55.560 being. And so, it's obviously the case that difference in vibrations can be of crucial importance.

01:28:01.800 Like, is there an analogy between electromagnetic frequency in the case of photons and the vibrations

01:28:09.300 of the filaments? And then, how do you understand the nature of the filament? Because filament sounds

01:28:14.460 material. Like, it sounds like it's something that should be made of other things, you know, like an

01:28:19.360 ordinary object. Well, our everyday experience certainly teaches us that any extended object,

01:28:26.600 which is all objects we encounter in the real world, can be cut up into smaller things. And experience

01:28:33.260 has taught us that if you cut fine enough, you may find new ingredients that were not visible or available

01:28:39.500 or something that you would have recognized on the macroscopic scale. If you take that idea and you bring

01:28:45.720 it into the micro world, you would think that a string itself could be cut up into finer things, and maybe

01:28:50.860 you'll find ultimate constituents. But again, we don't know if that macroscopic notion applies in the

01:28:58.320 microscopic realms. You have to be very careful taking things that you're familiar with in the

01:29:02.840 macro world and just porting them into the micro world. So, again, it might be that we, and there have

01:29:09.940 been some studies that have suggested the possibility that strings may themselves be made up of smaller

01:29:15.600 ingredients, but there's also a whole literature that suggests that they may be the fundamental entity

01:29:21.580 in a certain domain of the theory, and there isn't something finer within them. But let me give one,

01:29:27.260 if you don't mind, because you were saying we're going to slightly wrapping up this part, I want to

01:29:31.140 leave one idea, which is one of the more spectacular ones. It'll just take me a moment to describe of

01:29:37.740 recent insight in string theory. Many of your viewers and listeners may be familiar with the idea of

01:29:43.880 quantum entanglement, which is the idea that two distant particles can have kind of an invisible quantum

01:29:50.120 link between them, where what you do in one particle instantaneously affects the other particle. The

01:29:56.360 particles are said to be quantum entangled, a mind-blowing idea that comes from the work of

01:30:01.040 Albert Einstein in 1935. Your viewers, listeners, may also be familiar with the notion of a wormhole,

01:30:07.200 a completely different idea, that in general relativity, you can have a tunnel through the

01:30:11.660 fabric of space linking one location and the other. Einstein developed that idea, too, in 1935,

01:30:18.900 just two months apart from quantum entanglement. For 90 years, nobody thought there was any

01:30:23.620 connection between these two ideas. String theory has recently revealed that it's very likely that

01:30:30.300 these two ideas are the same idea described in different languages, that when you have two

01:30:35.400 particles that are quantum entangled, in some sense there is a tunnel through the fabric of space,

01:30:40.300 a wormhole that is connecting them together. And if this idea holds up, it shows that a general

01:30:47.420 relativistic idea, a tunnel through the fabric of space, and a quantum idea, quantum entanglement

01:30:54.500 across space, are the same idea, which would suggest that general relativity and quantum mechanics

01:31:00.240 are deeply connected from the get-go. It's not so much that we need to find a way of bringing them

01:31:06.500 into union. They may already be in union, and what we need to do with string theory or whatever

01:31:12.680 approaches, understand that intrinsic relationship more fully. This is the new perspective that has

01:31:18.600 emerged in the last decade, and it's a thrilling one. All right, sir. Well, I think that's a good

01:31:24.320 place to end. That's a nice ending, and so I think we will, in fact, do that. And so for everybody who

01:31:30.020 is watching and listening, well, thank you for your time and attention. Thank you to the Daily Wire

01:31:34.360 people for making the public distribution of this podcast possible. Thank you very much, sir, for

01:31:41.680 spending the time today delineating out your ideas. That's much appreciated.

01:31:47.120 My pleasure. Thank you.

01:31:48.300 Yeah, yeah, my pleasure. And good luck on the second edition of your book. When did it come out?

01:31:55.460 I think last week.

01:31:56.740 Oh, yeah. And how's it doing?

01:31:58.100 Just came out. I have no idea. I've not been tracking it.

01:32:01.560 Okay, okay. Well, that'll be an exciting thing to encounter with any luck. And so,

01:32:07.440 yeah, well, thanks again for talking to us today. And then reminder for everybody who's watching and

01:32:14.180 listening, we're going to delve into the origin of Dr. Green's interests and how they developed

01:32:21.040 across time. It's very useful to talk to people who've been successful in their field of endeavor

01:32:26.220 to find how that pathway made itself manifest to them across the ups and downs of their life and

01:32:33.640 why they stuck with it and what made them successful. Everybody has to find out what

01:32:40.880 compels them and interests them in their life if they're going to adjust to the difficulties of

01:32:45.780 their existence successfully. And gaining some insight into that process is always useful. So

01:32:50.480 that's what we'll delve into on the Daily Wire side. So everybody can join us for that if they're

01:32:56.060 so inclined. All right, sir. Thank you very much. Much appreciate the discussion today.

01:33:01.380 Thank you.

The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - October 03, 2024

486. The Intersection of Science and Meaning ｜ Dr. Brian Greene

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