Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | August 2021

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  • Опубліковано 16 тра 2024
  • Patreon: / seanmcarroll
    Blog post with audio player, show notes, and transcript: www.preposterousuniverse.com/...
    Welcome to the August 2021 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by Patreon supporters (who are also the ones asking the questions). I take the large number of questions asked by Patreons, whittle them down to a more manageable size - based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good - and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy!
    Mindscape Podcast playlist: • Mindscape Podcast
    Sean Carroll channel: @Sean Carroll
    #podcast #ideas #science #philosophy #culture
  • Наука та технологія

КОМЕНТАРІ • 101

  • @youtubeuser9972
    @youtubeuser9972 2 роки тому +50

    I'm so happy that you share all of this with us people who are not fortunate enough to be able to afford to pay money for education. What an amazing world we live in where you can get things like this podcast/information for free. Really appreciate it

    • @daithiocinnsealach3173
      @daithiocinnsealach3173 2 роки тому +1

      Ultimately pointless

    • @Tampa_Roots
      @Tampa_Roots 2 роки тому +4

      @@daithiocinnsealach3173 yes but periodically profound Your car is ultimately going to end up in a scrap yard so why put gas in it or maintain it? Because it has use to you now in the present. Its emergent meaning.

    • @lukewormholes5388
      @lukewormholes5388 2 роки тому +1

      @@daithiocinnsealach3173 somebody just read their first sartre book

    • @trout3685
      @trout3685 Рік тому +1

      I just enjoy hearing how he answers questions so clearly. I enjoy the way he engages questions from people who are clearly confused and don't even know what they are talking about. I like when he talks about politics or every day things in life. He speaks so clearly and concisely. He never misses a beat and he does this all seemingly in one take which is amazing. I wish he was more involved with political discourse. He would also be a great person to have to discuss other complex issues in every day life.

    • @artificefount9930
      @artificefount9930 Рік тому

      ​@@daithiocinnsealach3173 😊aawaw22à😊wa àwWW3aw23àAÀaà AA L2/AA La£¢😊@A😊¢@😊Aa¢#😊¢😊¢¢##😊#/😊¢#¢😊😊#😊¢#№#😊№😊##😊№#😊¢¢😊¢¢😊aàs AA àa£😊😊 SS z😊z#😊#s#s

  • @StayPrimal
    @StayPrimal 2 роки тому +22

    When I hear that '' Hellowww everyone'', suddenly my day gets better.
    Thank you so much professor.
    PS Hope Ariel is fine !

  • @rohanjagdale97
    @rohanjagdale97 2 роки тому +6

    You are the best Sir because you're so open minded about science and very helpful to everyone about sharing knowledge . And this thing inspire me

    • @StayPrimal
      @StayPrimal 2 роки тому +2

      Yes, open minded, is what I like about him.

  • @AlexanderKoryagin
    @AlexanderKoryagin 2 роки тому +4

    Thank you so much for sharing these, Sean! Always a joy to listen!

  • @chrisofnottingham
    @chrisofnottingham 2 роки тому +11

    BTW I think the sail-car was actually being blown faster than the wind in the direction of the wind.

    • @alexanderstainton3199
      @alexanderstainton3199 2 роки тому

      I think that's what Sean was meaning when he said toward the wind, was toward the same direction of the wind based on how he was saying it. Although it was pretty ambiguous by the way he worded it.

  • @daemonhat
    @daemonhat 2 роки тому

    Thank you very much for answering my question, i enjoyed it.

  • @edwardlee2794
    @edwardlee2794 2 роки тому +3

    its good to hear starting with even the opening news. thanks and keep up the good work.
    from Hker worldwide

  • @jacobb6953
    @jacobb6953 2 роки тому +2

    I was surprised Sean didn’t have more to say on the existential anxiety question.
    I think quantum physics brings up a lot of existential questions and reveals the sometimes absurd nature of the universe with it’s rather arbitrary set of laws and forms.
    Also brings up a lot of questions about meaning and purpose, such as the ones Sean and Daniel Dennett discussed in a previous podcast.
    But even though I sometimes experience a great deal of existential dread when pondering the topics Sean discusses, I still love these podcasts and I’m going to keep listening lol.

    • @alexwilson8034
      @alexwilson8034 2 роки тому

      Yeah I had a hol’up moment on that question too haha

  • @richardbrucebaxter
    @richardbrucebaxter 2 роки тому

    48:30 - "why does the universe exist" is similar to the question why are the physical laws x rather than y
    58:24 - "how something of a totally different kind can arise from emergence" - one is empirical the other is non-empirical (can perfectly model a software AI without any assumption of subjective existence)
    1:55:00 - moral theories/beliefs can be wrong if they are logically incoherent

  • @jonwebb2417
    @jonwebb2417 2 роки тому

    What a great listen 💥

  • @onekutguy
    @onekutguy 2 роки тому +3

    So what would happen if an unstoppable force met an immovable object? My gut tells me they would simply pass through each other.

  • @BrianFedirko
    @BrianFedirko 2 роки тому +1

    haha.. "my 7 year old daughter was wondering... about black holes". I love that the topic now is comprehensive to young people, and that the interest can be there too. Quantum, Relativity can spark imagination in anyone with the right mental setting. I wish more adults could have talked this way when I was young. Gr8 talk Sean. You Rock!

  • @matthewrossmann7000
    @matthewrossmann7000 2 роки тому +1

    Thank you for advocating for vaccination.

  • @fs5775
    @fs5775 2 роки тому +3

    Is that really the question of a 7-year-old??? (standing on the "photon sphere of a black hole".... hmmm)

  • @2ndAmendmentX
    @2ndAmendmentX 2 роки тому +1

    Modern foiling sailboats sail far faster than the wind beating into the wind. Simple fluid dynamics.

  • @daydreamer05
    @daydreamer05 2 роки тому +2

    Let's go music is 👌.

  • @captainzappbrannagan
    @captainzappbrannagan 2 роки тому

    Could the quarks and gluons could be vibrating at the speed of light inside the proton and neutron, and the light speed trapped state is what allows protons not to decay?

    • @alvarorodriguez1592
      @alvarorodriguez1592 2 роки тому +1

      Amazing theory for someone with a very sexy learning disability.

    • @captainzappbrannagan
      @captainzappbrannagan 2 роки тому

      @@alvarorodriguez1592 Make fun of my intellect all you want but I will be a starship captain someday what's in your determined future. #velourforever

    • @alvarorodriguez1592
      @alvarorodriguez1592 2 роки тому +1

      @@captainzappbrannagan neutrality or death!!

  • @roberthvistendahl8635
    @roberthvistendahl8635 Місяць тому

    My mind is somethingly poised to write something emotional

  • @Ben-xl7ft
    @Ben-xl7ft 2 роки тому +1

    Are all singularities the same size regardless of the size of the black holes surrounding them?

    • @iruleandyoudont9
      @iruleandyoudont9 2 роки тому

      yeah they're points

    • @alexwareham8005
      @alexwareham8005 2 роки тому

      @@iruleandyoudont9 but how big is a point?

    • @iruleandyoudont9
      @iruleandyoudont9 2 роки тому +1

      @@alexwareham8005 a point is zero dimensional, it is infinitesimal. so strictly speaking it has no size

    • @alexwareham8005
      @alexwareham8005 2 роки тому

      @@iruleandyoudont9 damn

    • @ahad2k11
      @ahad2k11 2 роки тому

      If they are infinitesimally small and infinitely dense, then how do some black holes end up being larger or more massive than others?

  • @TheMemesofDestruction
    @TheMemesofDestruction Рік тому

    1:46:30 - Doesn't it?

  • @StarfireIgns
    @StarfireIgns 2 роки тому

    Would love to speak to you on the Indian Genes Podcast!!!..

  • @ForrestWest
    @ForrestWest 2 роки тому

    I'm pretty sure that propeller car was going with the wind not Against the Wind

  • @ForrestWest
    @ForrestWest 2 роки тому

    Thinking about Schroeder's cat I can't help but also think of Occam's razor. It says to me which is more likely? That the cat is both alive and dead right before you open the box, that two different universes are created at the moment the boxes open one with a live cat and one with a dead cat, or most simply the cat is alive or dead and we just don't know the answer till we open the box. The only thing that collapses is the mystery that we didn't know whether the cat was alive or dead because we couldn't see into the box. It seems way more simple to assume that one second or two seconds or a half a second or any fraction of a second before we opened the box the cat was definitely either alive or dead than to assume that something collapsed and happened only at the moment we open the box and not until that exact moment. Just because we don't know what's going on inside doesn't mean it both hasn't happened and has simultaneously since we never see that happen. What if someone was in a protected glass enclosure inside the box with the cat watching the cat? What would that person see just before you opened the box? It seems to me they would see the cat alive until the moment the gas was released and then would sit there with that knowledge until we open the box and saw the same thing. Can someone explain how I'm wrong? It seems the simplest answer makes the most sense and it's just a matter of it was one way or the other and we just didn't know.

  • @EdStrings
    @EdStrings 2 роки тому +2

    Cool

  • @robertglass5678
    @robertglass5678 2 роки тому

    When I heard your statement that the carbon emissions from an electric car are 1/3 that of gasoline, I immediately opened up a search engine and the top 10 or so results were pretty murky on this point. I teach HS Environmental Science and I teach my students that the current situation is probably slightly better for electric, but that it entirely depends on where you are plugging in your electric car (and how that electricity is made) and that we need to make more renewable electricity for it to actually do any good to get the electric car. Could you, or someone else, please show me where this "much better" calculation comes from? I'd like consider updating my prior.

    • @ERROR204.
      @ERROR204. 2 роки тому

      I think due to the higher efficiency of power plants than the average car it is still better for the environment to drive electric cars. Especially if the cars are autonomous because you can eliminate or at least severely mitigate traffic.

    • @robertglass5678
      @robertglass5678 2 роки тому +1

      @@ERROR204. Right, so electric cars are better if x, y and z happen. But he said that the current calculation is that they contribute 1/3 the carbon.

    • @devalapar7878
      @devalapar7878 2 роки тому

      But that shouldn't keep you from buying electric cars. Cars that run on gasoline will always harm the environment. In the case of electric cars, there is at least the potential to run entirely on renewable energy.

    • @devalapar7878
      @devalapar7878 2 роки тому

      ​@@lepidoptera9337 Most of the CO2 emissions come from transportation. It accounts for 30% of CO2 emissions. 60% of the 30% are medium-sized cars, buses and smaller ones.
      This is not surprising when 95% of the energy comes from carbon sources, mostly used for transportation, heating and heavy industry (with transportation and heating having the largest share).
      I don't know if his numbers on electric cars are true, but it's obvious that electric cars have the potential to be more CO2-friendly than regular cars. As he said, it depends where the electricity for the car comes from.

    • @devalapar7878
      @devalapar7878 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 All others are smaller than 30%. Transportation is the biggest contributor.
      That isn't a small piece! If you want to change something, you have to start with the biggest contributor, don't you?!?!?

  • @multiversal2023
    @multiversal2023 2 роки тому +1

    Do you think Sean understood the Architects speech in the end of the Matrix Reloaded

  • @HarryNicNicholas
    @HarryNicNicholas 2 роки тому

    2:11:00 long fingers, i play the guitar. but, this does highlight that "things would seem perfectly normal" if they were indeed different, like i always say about fine tuning, if god had made us blobs of jelly floating in space communicating telepathically, that would have been perfectly "normal" to us. god could make the universe anyway he wants and we wouldn't be any the wiser, so fine tuning is redundant as a requirement.

  • @williamramseyer9121
    @williamramseyer9121 2 роки тому +1

    Sean, thank you for all the teaching you do. My question--if we live in a simulation (I am not saying that we do), then what would the mind(s) and existence of the creator(s) be like? Thank you.

  • @Mezzomusicltd
    @Mezzomusicltd 6 місяців тому

    jeez what an impressive mind

  • @Schraupe
    @Schraupe 2 роки тому

    I'll chime in on the Church-Turing-Question:
    Some functions can be computed (e.g. the sum of two numbers), others can't (e.g. the function of how many cups of coffee I'll drink on the n'th day after my birth). We have an *intuitive* idea of what that means: A function is computable if we have a "precise procedure" that we can follow in order to obtain the function value for some input. This is not a precise definition, and it hinges on what exactly we mean by a "precise procedure", but ultimately we can put any claim that a procedure is sufficiently precise to the test: Follow the procedure and see if it leads to an unambiguous result (assuming unlimited time and resources).
    Turing made a more precise definition: A function is defined to be "computable" iff there is a Turing machine that computes it. There are other definitions, e.g. using a Lambda-calculus or primitive recursive functions in a theory of arithmetics. Turns out, all these *precise* definitions turn out to be equivalent: They all agree which functions are computable and which aren't.
    Now the Church-Turing-Hypothesis is the claim, that the precise definitions not only agree with each other, but all of them agree *with out intuitive notion* of computable. A function really is computable, by a person or a computer, if and only if it is computable in the formal/precise sense of Turing machines.

    • @Schraupe
      @Schraupe 2 роки тому +1

      Consequently, the CTH can't really be proven, because it basically claims that a formal, precise definition really does capture a vague, sort-of empirical idea, which naturally isn't precise or formal enough to prove anything about.

    • @Schraupe
      @Schraupe 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 I'm not entirely sure I get what you're saying - it seems to me that nature is pretty well described by exactly the kinds of functions CTH talks about...? You can't describe *everything* in nature using functions, but you also can't describe *everything* in nature using any other kind of tool. Where functions are appropriate, we use them, where they are inappropriate, physicists just use something else. Where do you think this nail-vision comes into play? Do you have an example?

    • @Schraupe
      @Schraupe 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 Parts of nature can be described by natural numbers, and where it can, we use computable functions. As I mentioned, where they are inappropriate, we use something else, for example continuous functions. In practice of course, when dealing with continuity you can use computable approximations by switching to floating point arithmetics, which yields perfectly "good enough" results.
      What's your point again, and what does cardinality have to do with it? Because the reals are uncountable? So what - I see no evidence that nature is continuous to the point where countable models of the reals (e.g. computable reals) aren't perfectly sufficient ;)

    • @Schraupe
      @Schraupe 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 I mean, you *do* know that the field of numerical analysis is a thing, right? :D

    • @Schraupe
      @Schraupe 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 I will repeat myself again: Where inappropriate, we use other tools. That's fine. I don't see what point you're trying to make by listing tools other than computable functions that physicists use...? What's the problem here? Where is this nail-vision you talk about?
      And could you please stop it with the condescending recommendations that I take courses on topics that I have degrees in and/or have tought at university levels? It does nothing to further your point, but makes you look like an ass in the process.

  • @drzecelectric4302
    @drzecelectric4302 2 роки тому

    Ooooh you get to work with the famous Murray Gel-Mann!

  • @ardentthrasher3508
    @ardentthrasher3508 4 дні тому

    Your thoughts on tha jabberonis didn't age well.

  • @HarryNicNicholas
    @HarryNicNicholas 2 роки тому

    49:00 i guess you might as well ask "why is there fruit?". which always makes me wonder, what things are there that don't exist? like a different kind of orange or a different type of apple? or to be clearer, what thoughts could aliens have, that we don't (ala contact).

  • @wizzelhoart
    @wizzelhoart 2 роки тому

    Those statistically very unlikely occurrences have to happen regularly in one of the infinite number of universes. Why not this one?

    • @veleronHL
      @veleronHL 2 роки тому +1

      because they are very unlikely?

  • @lukewormholes5388
    @lukewormholes5388 2 роки тому

    "there's an implicit idea in these thought experiments that thee is some wisdom that these people have that I would like to have access to" - yeah what's up with this? i see this all over the place with people from Einstein to the US "founding fathers" to the late greats in basically every other walk of life. also common is the notion that older/ancient beliefs or knowledge is somehow more correct or profound. what's happening here? is there an expert who studies this weird human quirk? that would be a great mindscape episode

  • @martinaakervik
    @martinaakervik 2 роки тому +1

    Do you really believe there is only one solution to a pandemic and that solution is extrem?

  • @HarryNicNicholas
    @HarryNicNicholas 2 роки тому

    surely fine tuning would mean god has to follow the laws of physics, they preceded him? and, aren't all the numbers, according to nature "1"? nature has no idea there is a connection numerically, surely? as far as nature is concerned "this is the only way it will work" and that's it.

  • @sarojinichelliah5500
    @sarojinichelliah5500 2 роки тому

    Please don’t overstretch the mind with such long fingers. I’m sorry to say it could only be a fun question . Why test Sean’s patience?

  • @WalkinBeauty278
    @WalkinBeauty278 2 роки тому

    Hey...climate change has me down...are there any theoretical physicists that go as far as.... mind creates...and a world concentrated on good things would in effect create good things...

  • @lukebieniek9069
    @lukebieniek9069 2 роки тому

    I’m sorry you’re sad. Did you know that real, true deep sadness was originated in the lab? Yeah!😃 It was developed by three gentleman who were tasked with formulating a new, slightly different coullaide for each of three hundred sixty five days of each year into infinity. This was provided that one or more of the concoctions, provided the three with an exceptional term of longevity, coupled with ingenuity, focus & all essential factors required for the endeavor to generate the necessary 🐬🤖🤒

  • @alexwilson8034
    @alexwilson8034 2 роки тому

    I have bought all your books, I think you’re uniquely talented. I’m going to be honest though Sean, the answer you gave about Wolfram was disappointing, I don’t think you answered the question seriously. Would you be willing to take another swing at it?

    • @fs5775
      @fs5775 2 роки тому

      Who the heck do you think you are, kiddo??

    • @Rattus-Norvegicus
      @Rattus-Norvegicus 2 роки тому

      @@fs5775 For some reason your reply has stricken a nerve so I'm going to attempt to answer your question. Simply put, he is a person who has a question he needs answered. Now, maybe he could have asked his question using more tact and been a tad less disrespectful but that doesn't give you the right to get offended and belittle him by referring to him as "kiddo". To use your words against you, "Who the heck do you think you are?"

  • @nowhereman8374
    @nowhereman8374 2 роки тому

    How can a neutron star have some of the most intense magnetic fields in the universe? It must be a misnomer that is there must be a lot of charged particles which are moving.

    • @nowhereman8374
      @nowhereman8374 2 роки тому

      @@lepidoptera9337 Thx, I have always wondered why. I wouldn't have imagined it to have measurable magnetic moment.

  • @flissanJ
    @flissanJ 2 роки тому +2

    Physics is the bible and you are the priest!

  • @DivinitySaid
    @DivinitySaid 2 роки тому

    Some people are so cognitively bankrupt they cannot afford to pay attention. 💊