The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast


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


Summary

Dr. Brian Green is a physicist and author of a number of books, including The Elegant Universe, Super Strings, Hidden Dimensions, and The Quest for the Ultimate Theory. In this episode, Dr. Green and I discuss the mysteries of quantum mechanics, special relativity, and string theory, as well as the relationship between consciousness and the perception of time, and entropy, and the expansion of the universe. We also discuss the potential testing of string theory and the emergence of consciousness in general, and how this ties into the concept of time and entropy. Let this be the first step towards the brighter future you deserve. Dr. Peterson has created a new series that could be a lifeline for those battling depression and anxiety. We know how isolating and overwhelming these conditions can be, and we wanted to take a moment to reach out to those listening who may be struggling. With decades of experience helping patients and a unique understanding of why you might be feeling this way. In his new series, Jordan B. Peterson offers a roadmap towards healing, showing that while the journey isn t easy, it s absolutely possible to find your way forward. If you're suffering, please know you are not alone. There's hope, and there's a path to feeling better. Go to Daily Wire Plus now and start watching Dr. B. Green's new series on Depression and Anxiety: A Path to Feeling Better. Today's episode is the first episode in the new series created by Dr. Jordan Peterson on Depression & Anxiousism. . Subscribe to Dailywire Plus to get immediate access to all the latest episodes of Daily Wire plus. and all the newest shows on Dailywireplus, wherever you get your most up to date news and information about what's going on in the world, your favorite shows and social meditations, your most authentic source of inspiration and tips on how to live your best day-to-day life, your daily dose of inspiration, inspiration and inspiration. Subscribe today! Subscribe for the latest updates on all things Dailywire plus and more! to stay up to catch up on what's happening around the web and social media and your most connected to the most important things in the most influential podcast on the world. Thank you for listening to your day to help spread the word about mental health and mental health, your truth, your voice matters! Get in touch with your best shot at a brighter future that matters most important to you!


Transcript

00:00:00.960 Hey everyone, real quick before you skip, I want to talk to you about something serious and important.
00:00:06.480 Dr. Jordan Peterson has created a new series that could be a lifeline for those battling depression and anxiety.
00:00:12.740 We know how isolating and overwhelming these conditions can be, and we wanted to take a moment to reach out to those listening who may be struggling.
00:00:20.100 With decades of experience helping patients, Dr. Peterson offers a unique understanding of why you might be feeling this way in his new series.
00:00:27.420 He provides a roadmap towards healing, showing that while the journey isn't easy, it's absolutely possible to find your way forward.
00:00:35.360 If you're suffering, please know you are not alone. There's hope, and there's a path to feeling better.
00:00:41.780 Go to Daily Wire Plus now and start watching Dr. Jordan B. Peterson on depression and anxiety.
00:00:47.460 Let this be the first step towards the brighter future you deserve.
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.
00:15:30.440 In today's chaotic world,
00:15:32.280 many of us are searching for a way to aim higher and find spiritual peace.
00:15:36.340 But here's the thing.
00:15:37.560 Prayer, the most common tool we have,
00:15:39.380 isn't just about saying whatever comes to mind.
00:15:41.760 It's a skill that needs to be developed.
00:15:44.120 That's where Hallow comes in.
00:15:45.820 As the number one prayer and meditation app,
00:15:47.860 Hallow is launching an exceptional new series called How to Pray.
00:15:51.780 Imagine learning how to use scripture as a launchpad for profound conversations with God,
00:15:56.700 how to properly enter into imaginative prayer,
00:15:59.540 and how to incorporate prayers reaching far back in church history.
00:16:03.520 This isn't your average guided meditation.
00:16:05.400 It's a comprehensive two-week journey into the heart of prayer,
00:16:09.260 led by some of the most respected spiritual leaders of our time.
00:16:12.900 From guests including Bishop Robert Barron,
00:16:15.180 Father Mike Schmitz,
00:16:16.140 and Jonathan Rumi,
00:16:17.420 known for his role as Jesus in the hit series The Chosen,
00:16:20.460 you'll discover prayer techniques that have stood the test of time,
00:16:23.640 while equipping yourself with the tools needed to face life's challenges with renewed strength.
00:16:28.380 Ready to revolutionize your prayer life?
00:16:30.340 You can check out the new series as well as an extensive catalog of guided prayers
00:16:34.520 when you download the Hallow app.
00:16:36.700 Just go to Hallow.com slash Jordan and download the Hallow app today
00:16:40.320 for an exclusive three-month trial.
00:16:42.560 That's Hallow.com slash Jordan.
00:16:44.920 Elevate your prayer life today.
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,
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.
00:47:28.000 Going online
00:47:30.100 without ExpressVPN
00:47:31.080 is like not paying attention
00:47:32.500 to the safety demonstration
00:47:33.560 on a flight.
00:47:34.680 Most of the time
00:47:35.360 you'll probably be fine
00:47:36.540 but what if one day
00:47:37.900 that weird yellow mask
00:47:39.120 drops down from overhead
00:47:40.140 and you have no idea
00:47:41.640 what to do?
00:47:42.440 In our hyper-connected world
00:47:43.760 your digital privacy
00:47:44.860 isn't just a luxury.
00:47:46.240 It's a fundamental right.
00:47:47.560 Every time you connect
00:47:48.340 to an unsecured network
00:47:49.520 in a cafe, hotel,
00:47:51.020 or airport
00:47:51.460 you're essentially broadcasting
00:47:53.000 your personal information
00:47:54.080 to anyone
00:47:54.800 with a technical know-how
00:47:55.960 to intercept it.
00:47:56.760 And let's be clear
00:47:57.600 it doesn't take
00:47:58.480 a genius hacker
00:47:59.140 to do this.
00:48:00.080 With some off-the-shelf hardware
00:48:01.440 even a tech-savvy teenager
00:48:03.040 could potentially access
00:48:04.180 your passwords,
00:48:05.220 bank logins,
00:48:06.020 and credit card details.
00:48:07.460 Now you might think
00:48:08.540 what's the big deal?
00:48:09.580 Who'd want my data anyway?
00:48:11.120 Well on the dark web
00:48:12.160 your personal information
00:48:13.400 could fetch up to $1,000.
00:48:15.520 That's right
00:48:16.220 there's a whole
00:48:16.900 underground economy
00:48:17.820 built on stolen identities.
00:48:19.800 Enter ExpressVPN.
00:48:21.560 It's like a digital fortress
00:48:22.700 creating an encrypted tunnel
00:48:24.200 between your device
00:48:25.220 and the internet.
00:48:25.820 Their encryption
00:48:26.720 is so robust
00:48:27.820 that it would take
00:48:28.460 a hacker
00:48:28.860 with a supercomputer
00:48:29.700 over a billion years
00:48:31.100 to crack it.
00:48:31.900 But don't let
00:48:32.460 its power fool you.
00:48:33.700 ExpressVPN
00:48:34.180 is incredibly user-friendly.
00:48:36.080 With just one click
00:48:36.960 you're protected
00:48:37.500 across all your devices.
00:48:39.080 Phones, laptops,
00:48:40.140 tablets, you name it.
00:48:41.260 That's why I use ExpressVPN
00:48:42.620 whenever I'm traveling
00:48:43.760 or working from a coffee shop.
00:48:45.380 It gives me peace of mind
00:48:46.440 knowing that my research,
00:48:47.780 communications,
00:48:48.580 and personal data
00:48:49.520 are shielded
00:48:50.220 from prying eyes.
00:48:51.380 Secure your online data
00:48:52.520 today by visiting
00:48:53.540 expressvpn.com
00:48:55.000 slash jordan.
00:48:56.100 That's
00:48:56.460 E-X-P-R-E-S-S
00:48:58.160 vpn.com
00:48:59.220 slash jordan
00:48:59.880 and you can get
00:49:00.520 an extra three months free.
00:49:02.520 Expressvpn.com
00:49:03.660 slash jordan.
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
00:59:13.300 ludicrous and so
00:59:15.200 however much we may
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
01:03:22.360 be tough but thanks to
01:03:23.600 Shopify running your
01:03:24.660 online storefront is
01:03:25.800 easier than ever
01:03:26.700 Shopify is the global
01:03:28.420 commerce platform that
01:03:29.420 helps you sell at every
01:03:30.440 stage of your business
01:03:31.300 from the launch your
01:03:32.400 online shop stage all
01:03:33.620 the way to the did we
01:03:34.400 just hit a million
01:03:35.180 orders stage Shopify is
01:03:37.000 here to help you grow
01:03:38.040 our marketing team uses
01:03:39.560 Shopify every day to
01:03:40.720 sell our merchandise
01:03:41.360 and we love how easy
01:03:42.740 it is to add more
01:03:43.480 items ship products and
01:03:45.040 track conversions with
01:03:46.660 Shopify customize your
01:03:47.880 online store to your
01:03:48.960 style with flexible
01:03:50.060 templates and powerful
01:03:51.100 tools alongside an
01:03:52.500 endless list of
01:03:53.380 integrations and
01:03:54.140 third-party apps like
01:03:55.200 on-demand printing
01:03:56.160 accounting and chat
01:03:57.240 bots Shopify helps you
01:03:58.820 turn browsers into
01:03:59.900 buyers with the
01:04:00.540 internet's best
01:04:01.240 converting checkout up
01:04:02.520 to 36 percent better
01:04:03.740 compared to other
01:04:04.460 leading e-commerce
01:04:05.260 platforms no matter
01:04:06.740 how big you want to
01:04:07.520 grow Shopify gives you
01:04:08.780 everything you need to
01:04:09.680 take control and take
01:04:10.840 your business to the
01:04:11.620 next level sign up for
01:04:13.320 a one dollar per month
01:04:14.220 trial period at
01:04:15.120 shopify.com slash jbp
01:04:17.300 all lowercase go to
01:04:19.120 shopify.com slash jbp
01:04:20.860 now to grow your
01:04:21.800 business no matter what
01:04:23.140 stage you're in that's
01:04:24.460 shopify.com slash jbp
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
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
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
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.