Stephen Wolfram - Productivity Systems, Richard Feynman Stories, Computational Thinking, and More
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Stephen Wolfram (@stephen_wolfram) is the creator of Mathematica, Wolfram|Alpha, and the Wolfram Language; the author of A New Kind of Science; the originator of the Wolfram Physics Project; and the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research. Over the course of more than four decades, he has been a pioneer in the development and application of computational thinking, and has been responsible for many discoveries, inventions, and innovations in science, technology, and business.
Please enjoy!
00:00 Start
00:13 How Stephen collects information for his vast personal archives.
01:59 When a situation warrants building a matrix.
06:00 Science sometimes makes us look far back to move incrementally forward.
11:22 Befriending the computational.
16:46 How technology helps us navigate natural language.
26:57 How Stephen chose subjects for his book Idea Makers.
27:55 On spending time with Richard Feynman.
30:26 Thoughts on Srinivasa Ramanujan.
32:59 When Stephen started solving science problems with computers.
35:07 Heresies today, gospels tomorrow.
43:30 Ruminations on the ruliad.
58:24 What is time?
1:06:21 What constitutes consciousness?
1:10:23 Personal infrastructure and productivity.
1:18:04 Maintaining energy in the midst of a busy life.
1:24:49 Avoiding once-inevitable sickness after air travel.
1:27:11 Making time count - in sickness and in health.
1:28:11 Parting thoughts.
Resources: tim.blog/2022/11/24/stephen-w...
About Tim Ferriss:
Tim Ferriss is one of Fast Company’s “Most Innovative Business People” and an early-stage tech investor/advisor in Uber, Facebook, Twitter, Shopify, Duolingo, Alibaba, and 50+ other companies. He is also the author of five #1 New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers: The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, The 4-Hour Chef, Tools of Titans and Tribe of Mentors. The Observer and other media have named him “the Oprah of audio” due to the influence of his podcast, The Tim Ferriss Show, which has exceeded 800 million downloads and been selected for “Best of Apple Podcasts” three years running.
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His “Live CEOing” is a wealth of knowledge.
One of the best interviews I've heard with wolfram
Didn't expect the best of all the Stephen Wolfram interviews to happen on the Tim Ferriss Show. But here we are
Looking forward to going through this interview with Stephen. Thank you, Tim.
It's a small world in youtube recommendation land--Kurt you're at the nexus of all these deep thinkers--making you able to see across individual ego boundaries. Might be interesting to compare and contrast Wolfram's rule execution maintaining the fabric of spacetime, with Pais's Planck scale superforce composing the other forces... There might be some real insight to gain by exploring the possible overlap in the topology of those concepts... enabling cross pollination between different models of the universe
Hello
I think Wolfram's videologs will be where people go back and look at the work of Wolfram and Gorard and see there how they've unified quantum mechanics and general relativity; a massive achievement.
Its where I saw them do that.
Lol it's not unified by them, and it won't be for many years to come! Great video tho
@@Nine_Sea I'm interested in why you think that. Can you back up your statement with evidence? I've examined Wolfram's work in detail, reviewing a large number of his publicly available working sessions videos, and you'll see comments from me on some of them. I have a degree in mathematics from a top institution, and in examining Wolfram's work carefully, I see a large number of breakthrough concepts, and a synthesis of patterns from across physics woven into an extremely useful and convincing fabric, far beyond what I see in any other model. What I normally see in Wolfram's critics are that they simply haven't done their homework or reviewed his work in depth. Its really a shame that people are more willing to throw stones than they are to learn something so profound as what Wolfram's done. After learning about his work in depth, I have no problem defending it and believe it deserves defense.
The way it works, is that Wolfram has essentially created a data model, with sufficient degrees of freedom that he can recover both the equations of general relativity and an operable model of quantum computation within the same framework. There are layers of architecture which represent the state of spacetime at any given time, and layers which represent how it changes. There are really quite beautiful ways to describe why mass and energy are the same thing, and what is meant by the speed of light. You can map through to the construction of quantum mechanical observers, and you will find within branchial space an interpretation of decision branching that makes far more sense than the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. You can learn an immense amount about the structure and architecture of physical theories, if you just go and do the work to examine what Wolfram has done, carefully.
@@MarkDStrachan I work in complex systems, and have a degree in physics and all... I can keep saying, but the point of the matter is his unification work is not currently accepted by the physics community, including me who has done "homework" on foundtions of physics and unification theories. That said, rest is point of perspective and we can keep on debating, citing references and so on, but that won't solve anything. Afterall, there's no doubt Wolfram is a genius physicist.
This is a terrific interview! I have a degree in physics still I find Stephen Wolfram a person that is difficult to understand but this interview changed this. I read the writings of Stephen Wolfram afterwards on Steve Jobs and Richard Feynman which I find extremely!!!! interesting (you find them in Stephens book "idea makers" and also on his website). Also I discovered the "Science and technology Q&a for Kids on a weekly base, right now part 115 on 30th of December 2022 which give me some stimulus as a physics teacher. Thank you very much Tim!!!!!!
Thanks for this holiday gift, Tim. It is truly outstanding to hear the thinking of such a great physicist brought down to our level.
Thanks Tim. This was a really great interview with a fascinating person!
Really awesome conversation! Stephen is a very interesting person, no doubt.
Stephen litterally has a model or way of looking at relativity and quantum mechanics that makes them 2 very different aspects of basically the same thing, I'd say Stephen has finally made a TOR or GUT or the closest thing at the moment to it. Respect for the information and knowlege.
Really enjoyed this episode. Thanks a lot!
Tim got me into podcasts many years ago, so grateful for all the time I've spent with him. ❤️
Hello
Fantastic interview! 🤗 Great production (audio, editing, etc. is spot-on), *really* smart questions and just all around very informative. Thank you both 😃
He's right about what gives you the most energy, diet exercise & sleep are small potatoes compared to the energy burst you get from doing what excites you
Been waiting for this one. ❤
David Bohm was the first to suggest with a comprehensive theory/hypothesis that matter is whirlpools or eddies in the implicate order or fundamental structure. Secondly Stephen commented on this fact with respect to his age.Creativity and physically having this quality as a beginning of action is the healthiest thing for the physical body as long as you keep the body moving. Thirdly, creativity is a kind of force field path that is strong for some people. So strong that it guides one into creative puzzles that have new and unique skillful meanings.This is what is called a "gift". Creativity cannot be taught. It is either a reality or it is not.
Would love to know more detail re. Stephen's actual systems used to store, organise and recall all the data that Stephen collects like trip reports, meetings, emails, etc!?
Join one of the Q&A live-streams early and ask that question 😉 He might just answer it personally and live!
Branching mind perceiving the branching universe
Get dr. John Vervaeke on your show Tim. His work on the meaning crisis is more relevant now than ever!
55:00 is similar to what Michael Levin talks about- like a notion of potentiality
Personal productivity 1:12:06 Habitual 1:23:29 Keep list of things to do when tired 1:27:28 Driving list 1:27:50 (David Allen?) Wheat germ / choline preflight to remediate getting sick Energy fueled by passion crushes energy from diet/energy optimization
What's the logic behind the wheat germ hack?
Good
If you liked Tim's interview, you will also like our interview with Wolfram focused around college students.
I know free will isn't really a thing but is 45:00 related to the notion of free will.
Have you seen Susskind"s recent vision?
Didn't you know that Stephen has access to the Akashic Chronicles? 6:10
😅for sure!
@@harriehausenman8623 Does Tim Ferriss know that too?
Computation is a better way to measure time. Suppose it takes a certain length to get to a billion numbers of pi (with a certain algorithm). If one travels with sub-lightspeed back and forth one could obtain the answer relatively faster than the local observers. If matter is seen as a manifestation of some calculation than a black hole can be thought of as something where no calculation takes place Or does only provide random fluctuations where no information can be derived from. Hence crushing a clockwork into random parts makes time tick nowhere with no calculated result and therefore time seems standstill but actually is matter in rest....?
49:00 🤔 hmm... _Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, Go, throw yourself into the sea, and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them_
This is some wild shit
Eloquently put, sir!
Greetings from the Arilou Lalee'lay 👽
Yes Stephen told once he got the math writings feynman left behind, the nitty gritty math
Wolfram is brilliant but he has respected QM too much. He has imported the "instantaneous wavefunction collapse" idea straight from QM into his theory. Instead he needs to challenge it and build a model of wavefunction collapse using his own ideas.
I don’t hear Wolfram making predictions that can be tested.
Is he talking in English ?
Don’t have a kundalini awakening before you’re ready lol 👌
WHAT IS REAL?? are we living in a simulation?? Love this question :)
🌞 🫶🏼 🤸🏽♂️
Kind of kind of kind of ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Omg 😂 why are you learning romanian?
My thought exactly 😁
Mathematics is a language. But the beginning was not word. Language (mathematics) merely describes reality. It is not itself reality. This is obvious to any fool, but not to Wolfram. Stephen Wolfram's whole theory is just a category error. Explanatory power that reaches some proto-Godelian point of a failure of explanation, is aspirational. If you throw a ball into mud, you will see the outline if that ball in the mud. Reality is the ball, the mud is mathematics; figure and ground. The map, as they say, isn't the territory. I find it laughable Wolfram thinks starting from the attempt to explain phenomena is outdated. It is, in fact, the basis of all. Science. Also I detect the strong stink of a failure of attribution starting from Pythagoras by way of Hofstadter. What was it Carl Sagan said about Velikovsky? He said, Even if he turned out to be correct, he shouldn't get any credit for it because his methods were unsound. The map is not the territory, Wolfram, though the map is a useful tool.