Edward Witten - Why the ‘Unreasonable Effectiveness’ of Mathematics
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- Опубликовано: 1 окт 2024
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What is it about mathematics that it can describe so accurately the world around us? From quantum physics, the very smallest features and forces of the foundations of matter and energy, to cosmology, the very largest structures and forces of the beginning and evolution of the universe, mathematics is the language of description. Why does the physical world follow so faithfully equations of abstract symbols and variables?
Edward Witten is a theoretical physicist and professor of mathematical physics at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Witten is a researcher in string theory, quantum gravity, supersymmetric quantum field theories, and other areas of mathematical physics.
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Pure brilliance. Imagine winning Math's highest honor while being a physicist.
and becoming a prominent physicist while being an historian. this man is a fucking beast!
Imagine winning a Fields Medal without proving theorems... Ridiculous.
@@thepowerman8952 You should really take a look at Witten's work yourself. Why all the salt?
That was a side quest
@@iaexo No salt, I just think it's ridiculous. I have nothing against Witten, why would I? By all accounts he is a modest, self-effacing guy. Makes a change from most extremely intelligent people.
Notice how Witten avoids saying anything metaphysical, no matter how much the questioner tries to tempt him.
Ichiro Akuma very well observed
Everything he says implies a metaphysic posture, you can't get away without it. I'd love to hear him talk explicitly about it, though...
It's the only way to be...
@insane hermit because he's not a pseud and he understood that mathematics is the only good metaphysics.
Lotta people under this comment need to open a book on philosophy 🤦♀️
And what?? He said “it’s as if the universe was made by a mathematician”. How is that not metaphysics?
Ed Witten is regarded as one of the most influential intellects of Theoretical Physics/Mathematics by his colleagues and peers in the scientific community. And he's probably one of the nicest, most humble individuals you'll ever meet.
Witten is speech affectation and verbosity: no lab results, no experimentation, no verification, no way to test hypotheses... Witten is not a physics theorist but a physics ideologue. For decades he has lived off the budget and NO NEW REAL THEORY.
He's the William Buckley of physics: verbosity without any real content or direction.
he is not humble
@@gcangur1 He is, you're just so intelectually lower than him that you envy him and thus accuse him of lack of humbleness. Lol what a miserable bipedal "thing"🤣
I emailed Witten with a question and was surprised that he answered me almost immediately, zero ego or arrogance.
What was the question and did his answer make any sense?
@@Za7a7aZ I asked him why did the chicken cross the road
@@xyzmediaandentertainment8313 it saw the truth
This interview is telling. The answer was probably mega-suggestive. Ed looks like one of the best answerers from this interview.
his a super human, probably from a higher civilized universe than ours.
Don't forget Korzybski's statement: "The map is not the territory". Descriptions of reality are not necessarily properties of it.
Some mathematicians seem to believe otherwise. Even as far back as Pythagoras they have believed that "mathematical truths" are real, in the real world, and independent of mind.
Mental maps of reality (mathematical or otherwise) seem to me to be extremely simplified mappings or sketches. The mind-independent reality is far more (many trillions of times more) and very different.
But it is uncanny how reality bends toward the the math (Road to Reality?)
@@viveviveka2651Are you not, in fact, expressing the same thought, rephrased more elaborately?
@@AMindnamedAdam Forgive me, but you do not know that with certainty, and the hypothesis really deserves to be treated as such.
@@callmedeno reality does NOT bend toward math. It is the opposite.
Bro imagine sitting across from Ed mf Witten
Sounds like a WWE entry announcement
I would imagine Ed Witten to have quite a captivating ethereal dance style at deep house or tance events.
Rich JMB same as Jeff Goldblum I imagine. How cool would it be if he talked like him?
@@kuruman1 Lol. Yes Ed is one of the select guests I expect Jeff invites to his private night club in the basement of his mansion. They can Trance out for hours to progressive house and slowly evolving chords, Jeff is very into his arm movements and uses them extensively as part of his repertoire
my favourite youtube comment ever congratulations
@@richjmb5522what the fuck have I just read😂
Eric Weinstein on Joe Rogan brought me here
Witten is widely regarded as THE scientist among other theoreticians and mathematicians. Listening to him is an education as well as entertaining.
I want to watch Him making a Fried Egg...🤔
I find in listening to Witten, I'm transported into another 'headspace' altogether, simply by the way he speaks; a hypnotic, almost celestial pitch and tenor. it's remarkable really. I can grasp very little of the concepts of which he speaks, but he does seem to effortlessly force you to start to think differently, when walking away from 10 minutes of conversation like this. I would liken it, in a way, as he does, to listening to a beautiful classic piece by Bach, or Chopin.
I’d say it’s more like listening to somebody TALK about Bach, albeit somebody who understands Bach likely better than you do. Any presentation of technical ideas in language for lay people is necessarily extremely limited. You’d learn a lot more about physics by studying some basic calculus than listening to popular talks or experts taking in easily accessible language. As you can tell I’m actually kinda sceptical about these professional ‘mind blowers’. Not that Witten is one btw, he isn’t. But any expert taking in this sort of way is indirectly participating in the same sort of thing.
yeah i'm starting to love this guy! incredible
Ed's voice doesn't fit with his face. Something got mixed up during assembly.
Very nice comment. Thanks for the contribution
He's got it maybe backwards: perhaps a mathematician is the universe!? What if the basis of the universe is divisive and additive ie, simple processes that undergo emergent phenomena that evolves self-organisingly to more and more interesting maths. That would put consciousness as a higher order self-organising system able to observe lower order universe mathematical structures and think: a mathematician designed this. Yet, if the whole thing has a simple mathematical underpinning, every evolution would fabricate more and more higher order structures until the structures themselves became to rigid for self-organising systems to continue.
The quality of Ed’s communication (signal to noise ratio) tends towards infinity, very few filling words or sounds. Raw genius.
almost robotic. looked like he was glitching.
Originally a history major and linguist minor: the guy knows effective language for communication.
Tends towards infinity as what? What's the dynamic variable here?
I didn't know Bill Shatner was raw genius; the more you learn...
JLongTom Time, he’s not at zero noise level yet, he’s getting better ;)
Ed Witten is brilliant and his insight never ceases to amaze me. A very worthwhile video.
Mathematics: "im the most unreasonable thing on the universe"
My Wife: "Hold my beer..."
😂
Hope you have out on the running shoes. Good luck!
Great humour, never heard that joke before, except on every fucking sitcom ever.
Fucking loser.
Glob Two Says the one listening to abstract philosophical discourse. Does your comment have a purpose? Mine does. (Hint: It’s pedagogical)
@@BlackIndigenousPosse name me one sitcom where you heard that joke please.. Mister. We will be waiting for you.
Incredible to have Witten on. Hope to see more. Thank you for this.
OMG Ed Witten on this show! Thanks a lot!
Just by listening to him you know how much knowledge he has. Truly incredible
Ed Witten is currently one of the giants of physics. Pure genius.
As much as I love theoretical physics and mathematics; before today, I honestly never heard of Prof. Edward Witten. I used to think that Sean Carroll would always remind me of how I little I know about theoretical physics, but after hearing this guy, I don't even think I know the meaning of "theory."
I don't mean it as an insult, but he sounds unhuman at times and more like a talking textbook or encyclopedia. His behavior, tone, and sharp focus is how I would imagine Isaac Newton explaining his laws of mechanics, optics, calculus, and analytic geometry.
he says pure maths which we think has no application to real world can infact be used for explaining phenomenon in our natural world also we could able to create new math by finding structures in our natural world like newton did when he found calculus
I think this is just a bi-product of trying to articulate concepts which layman people are unlikely to understand. It takes a lot of energy to form what occurs on your mind into words in a clear fashion, never mind then having to dumb it down for people.
Eric Weinstein has an interesting albeit different view on this guy. Check out JRE.
Fine and precise statements by Witten, although the interviewer is not very smart. It is really a pleasure to find something scientifically reasonable on RUclips, in contrast to fools like Unzicker, Hossenfelder etc.
I like Sabine Hossenfelder's take: We think that the universe is governed by mathematically simple equations but that could be because we're only able to understand or are otherwise biased towards simplicity. We're also only able to perform experiments to a particular degree of specificity, so sometimes our equations can be a little off but on a human scale we don't notice and can't test for those discrepancies (like Newton's gravitational equations).
If I have a helium balloon and let go of the string I can be certain it will travel up, the path that the balloon will take as it rises is ridiculously complex. Even though on one level the math to describe "up" is extremely simple, once you get into the details that simplicity dissolves. I tend to think that nature isn't actually simple at all, but we've just found little pockets of simplicity based on our human frame of reference.
Yep, seems like we only just started in the grand scheme of what we call nature. I beleive that rightfully understand the relation between maths and what we call physical reality will take us to the next level.
Making the extremely complex into something simple and digestible...she may not be proving the point she thinks she's making.
She is not a big fan of untestable theories like Witten's though.
@@wyqtor She's thinks math is overrated. And I agree with her.
@@peterdamen2161 I don't think that is true. However, she has stated that seeking for mathematical beauty is non-sense.
Joe rogan sent me
Narrow-minded egoic self-praise and lacking substance to match the video title or description.
Basically: Isn't it amazing how some/many people fixate on one way to explain the universe? Marvel at the convincing power of our advertising campaign.
It's like if an English professor explains why he thinks English has proven itself as the best language that ever was an ever will be.
Tell me, how would you mathematically describe the driving of the flow of time through your basic brain function's basic will to breathe? Of course you can't, because math comes with a package deal of excluding such realms. How do you quantify emotion and its impact on manifesting reality? How do you calculate the portions of impact if several people entertain the same thought?
Math keeps people locked in a perception of the universe limited by it. It's a self-affirming delusion.
This is so cringily basic: Of course math describes the universe so well if you mistake your math-filtered perception of the universe for the universe itself.
Tripping on sobriety is a thing. (It's just another drug-induced state.)
Go rip a bong and be quiet.
Even Robert Dijkgraaf, the former head of Princeton said od Edward Witten that when they would talk mathematics Robert would feel a dwarf and had difficulty in keeping up with the brilliance of Edwards mind!
One of the smartest walking the face of the planet.
I hear this type of comment about Witten often (Terence Tao is often included alongside him), but I think it's just a meme. What exactly distinguishes him from a thousand other utterly brilliant people?
@@JLongTom well, he said 'one of the' smartest.
@@JLongTom his work. what else would it be.
@@JLongTom … his papers
@@JLongTom Read about his contributions before asking such a nonsensical question. You have Google at your fingertips
Ed Witten. Pure brain. No additives.
Ed Witten explained M theory (which unifies all consistent versions of superstring theory) to a room full of the world's best physicists. Apparently the lecture was too difficult for most of them.
No, that lecture was relatively easy compared to others of his, it was just shocking.
@@annaclarafenyo8185 How so?
@@sclogse1 of course it was shocking, the theory is not complete
That’s not something to be proud of …
Or maybe they didn't want to waste their time with a theory making no useful predictions whatsoever.
Why DiMeglio CLEARLY tops Newton AND Einstein:
The game is over. F=ma AND E=mc2 BOTH apply to AND describe WHAT IS THE SUN. The SPEED OF LIGHT (c) is a POINT. Gravity/acceleration involves BALANCED inertia/INERTIAL RESISTANCE, AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. ACCORDINGLY, GRAVITATIONAL force/energy IS proportional to (or BALANCED with/as) inertia/INERTIAL RESISTANCE; AS ELECTROMAGNETISM ENERGY IS GRAVITY. "Mass"/ENERGY involves BALANCED inertia/INERTIAL RESISTANCE consistent with/as what is BALANCED ELECTROMAGNETIC/GRAVITATIONAL FORCE/ENERGY, AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. ACCORDINGLY, a given PLANET (INCLUDING WHAT IS THE EARTH) sweeps out equal areas in equal times; AND this is THEN CLEARLY consistent WITH/AS F=ma, E=mc2, AND what is perpetual motion; AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. Gravity/acceleration involves BALANCED inertia/INERTIAL RESISTANCE, AS GRAVITY IS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY. (THEREFORE, the rotation of the Moon MATCHES it's revolution.) SO, ALL of SPACE is NECESSARILY ELECTROMAGNETIC/GRAVITATIONAL (IN BALANCE); AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. GREAT !!! Indeed, a PHOTON may be placed at the center of THE SUN (as a POINT, of course); as the reduction of SPACE is offset by (or BALANCED with) the SPEED OF LIGHT; AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. Energy has/involves GRAVITY, AND ENERGY has/involves inertia/INERTIAL RESISTANCE. Gravity IS ELECTROMAGNETISM/energy. ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY.
It is proven.
ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. This is proven by BOTH F=ma AND E=mc2. This NECESSARILY represents, INVOLVES, and describes what is possible/potential AND actual IN BALANCE. Consider THE MAN who is standing on the FULLY VISIBLE EARTH/ground in what is NECESSARILY the BALANCED, ELECTROMAGNETIC/GRAVITATIONAL, MIDDLE DISTANCE in/of SPACE. The ability to thought to DESCRIBE OR RECONFIGURE sensory experience is ULTIMATELY dependent upon the extent to which thought is SIMILAR to sensory experience. THINK invisible/VISIBLE SPACE in balance. GREAT. Game over. (Thoughts are invisible.) There is your complete and perfect correspondence. Philosophy and physics TOGETHER in victory !!! Balance and completeness go hand in hand. It ALL makes perfect sense. DONE. E=mc2 is DIRECTLY AND FUNDAMENTALLY DERIVED FROM F=ma. ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. GAME OVER.
VERY IMPORTANTLY, outer "space" involves full inertia; AND it is FULLY INVISIBLE AND black.
The ULTIMATE unification of physics/physical experience combines, BALANCES, and includes opposites. Indeed, the INTEGRATED EXTENSIVENESS of thought (AND description) is improved in the truly superior mind. That is top down thinking. The PROOF is absolutely CLEAR. I have surpassed Newton and Einstein. FACT. IT ALL MAKES PERFECT SENSE.
Dream experience is/involves true/real QUANTUM GRAVITY. Dreams balance being AND EXPERIENCE. THE EYE IS THE BODY. In the dream, BODILY/VISUAL experience is invisible AND VISIBLE IN BALANCE; AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY.
ACCORDINGLY, we are in the BALANCED MIDDLE DISTANCE in/of SPACE that is BETWEEN what is THE SUN and what is the SPEED OF LIGHT (c, a POINT). SO, "mass"/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY. ALL of SPACE is NECESSARILY ELECTROMAGNETIC/GRAVITATIONAL (IN BALANCE), AS ELECTROMAGNETISM/ENERGY IS GRAVITY.
By Frank DiMeglio
I love fighting with these guys, they will never agree on anything ,Not even with Themselves ,I talking about Quantum mechanics
Quantum Anything ,String theory. Hahaha it's all mythical to one ho does not believe in raw evidence
"It is uncanny how powerful mathematics is in understanding physics." Could have stopped right there.
He could but we would have missed the biggest point of it all , part of it may be proven to be wrong by a better discovery ,our grasp of reality is not very solid and it can change in a dime as recent history shows
@@rovidius2006 Could we be on the verge of a major breakthrough in the understanding of the universe?-- the use of math in everything, simulations, computer games, artificial intelligence, realistic simulations -- all seems to be pointing at what the universe is made of -- relativity, quantum theory was 100 years ago -- we are due for a major breakthrough -- "It's uncanny how powerful mathematics is in understanding" our world.
@@williamwolfe8708 While math is a powerful tool for understanding and projecting processes in the observable universe it is limited in its scope ,it explains how it works but not how it came into being .While it is a big deal to most people many top scientists reveal of how little we know of the universe around us and how powerless we are if forces of nature would not be so friendly to us .
@@rovidius2006 Yes, we are all on a rock flying through space at, what, 490,000 miles/hr give or take, with nobody at the helm. We are truly lost in space -- total mystery. In the midst of our ignorance is the weird thing that every time we seek to clarify the truth about the little we do seem to know, it comes out in mathematical terms -- uncanny.
@@williamwolfe8708 Someone may be at the helm as we cant even see it nor the helmsman ,this is a well organized apparatus .Trajectory is well protected and its been so for life to get where it is now ,for reasons higher than our understandings .
This is what locking yourself does to your body. Impressive, but unbalanced. Extremely unbalanced. Is like watching Time Machine by HG Wells, sort of almost a mutant. Feel bad for him and the idolatry in the comments.
Eric Weinstein is actually afraid of this guy's intelligence.
Higher mathematics is about relationships, not numbers. Physics is also about relationships.
Newton thought his own theory of gravity was nonsense. He used it because he couldn't do any better.
I wonder how many lockers he was stuffed in in high school. Poor guy’s emotional centers have been fried from studying so much.
His statement “the universe was created by a mathematician“; this is a strong case of the availability heuristic. He is a mathematician who understands and can manipulate maths,
Cain would’ve said, “the universe is a gardon; it was created by a Gardener.“
I've heard that quantum gravity is a dead end that Witten has been defending without showing any progress for decades
It’s hard to explain but when he speaks, you can almost hear that his words are being plucked from a space of unfathomable depth.
Ma boys wicked smaat. -Good Will Hunting
You know the world is made up of sheep who only applaud without understanding anything, and people who act. I think there are too many clapping sheep in the comments.
“It’s like the universe was created by a mathematician.” Yup, that’s right. Religion (supernatural) and science together is, ultimately, the theory of everything. Many scientists theorize we “live” in a simulation. If so, who’s the “programmer”.
I am.. but don't tell anybody...
What’s his mmr in league?
"It's as if the universe has been created by a mathematician". Right Edward. Right.
Is that sarcasm?
@@swavekbu4959 definately
I’d love to see Ed on JRE or Lex’s Podcast
Follow his Twitter mobile.twitter.com/witten271
as long as Joe stay's away from 'the simulation' - those shows were just too painful to watch
Oh wow, Ed on JRE would be next level
This Witten video made my day.
He is witty
I love the unencumbered clarity of thought and commitment to curiosity and truth that isn't embodied by most scientists today. Far too many are engaged with the religious truth of their science as their god-head rather than remaining curious and open to whatever science presents to them as truth via objective observation.
I do think you'r not actually describing scientists, but "geeks" or non-educateds who are "into science". That said, I think learning about the nature of the scientific method has its subtle nuances that are not easily understood, so its somewhat understandable, though not deemed desirable. What is a scientific fact, versus what people hear "is fact", and what are personal beliefs (alternative facts/truths), are nuances not often discussed with enough care and attention in, say, comment sections or twitter. The problem itself takes more than 160 characters...
Reading Graham Farmelo's _The Universe Speaks in Numbers_ tells how one stupendous math-physics intersection after another was happening from, around EW. Mind-boggling.
It's great to see an intellectual and intelligent human being, wearing a suit, elegantly describing the hard truth and mathematical reality of a theory. This is how scientists used to talk if you Google some interview in the 1990s.
Thanks a lot for this interview.
Big thumbs up from me,
And Subscribed ....
How come I so rarely see Ed on any of these shows, podcasts, etc?
I greatly love Witten's work in Knot Theory and its application to String, but let's keep this in perspective, that nothing besides "beautiful theories" have come out of them. I wish he has spent the talent on Quantum Gravity and Cosmology and such. Unfortunately his works contributed, and still does, to dragging a big crowd of young and very talented theoretical physicists in the direction of "lala land" of Strings and SUSE and such.
String theory is a quantum gravity theory, you don't know what you're talking about. There is not a good quantum gravity theory apart from string theory.
@@holliswilliams8426 quantum gravity is likely a dead end. It’s going to take a major paradigm leap in understanding to find a different idea that works.
Most likely the smartest man on the earth right now, and I will be going to learn under him soon... I cannot wait :)
Did you ever end up studying under Witten?
How's that going? I met him in ~ 1983 when I was choosing a grad school and visited Princeton. I certainly had no idea what a giant he was, and was to become.
Usually such geniuses tend to be very bad teachers. They cannot explain concepts at a low enough level for their audience to understand.
@@wyqtor considering the absolute perfection of that interview, I tend to believe he gives the best teaching experience available
Ed Whitten is a pure pleasure to listen to. What a great mind. 👍 His last comment was great 🙂
I've watched a lot of these videos over the years. I appreciate that the host often asks profound questions. Prof. Witten is brilliant and I enjoy his simple and elegant answers.
Can we split a zero in half???
SOMETHING CAN
Imagine 🤔 harnessing a sun ☀️
And the power of a black hole 🕳️
Witten,the greatest living,most celebrated and cited Mathematical Physicist in the world!
Sceptical Scientist
Now Freeman has gone😷
Gary Shepherd
I know but even Dyson,Hawking and Penrose,called Ed special
@@rationalsceptic7634 Feynman and Dirac are also great.
Fanboy 375
Of course..but they are dead... Witten has won more Awards...only Physicist ever to win a Fields Medal...which is astonishing!
Hawking and Penrose call him unique in the World!
Fanboy 375
Living?
witten, for those who dont know, is the most terryfing dude ever,close to impossible to follow even thou my hobby is physics
He is one of the greatest applied mathematicians of our time, which happens to get a lot of inspiration from physics...
But how much of what he works on is about actual physics is still debated
@@samanthaqiu3416 applied mathematician??? how many pure mathematician even understand this Field's Medal winner's works?
@@fahimullah8490 so what if they don't? Elaborate your argument
@@samanthaqiu3416 dude. even if they down understand his works doesn't mean anything. but he knows math no less than a pure mathematician! that's my point! have u seen his publications? have u seen with whom he has been working with? do u even understand what a pure mathematician is? u seem to talk like ed witten works with some petty algorithms
@@fahimullah8490 "he knows math NO LESS than a pure mathematician"
Ok, so we identified the problem. You are partaking in the cultural delusion that an applied mathematician is expected to "know less" math than a "pure" one.
The problem is that you have been misled by poor wording: by "pure" mathematics, mathematicians actually meant "abstract" as in "pursued by its own value", while applied math is developed as technology to solve specific problems that exists outside the domain of mathematics. But how much mathematics a mathematician understands is inherently independent from how he chooses to use it
Fun fact...the physics/math super genius Dr Witten actually started out in college as a history major!
Super into history and math. Guess me and him have something in common.
Finally something I share with him!
I want to hear more about what this guy thinks.
Many of his lectures at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton are on you tube. Just search RUclips with his name and you can spend months watching his lectures
@@Cooldrums777 well, that´s too hard for me, I was rather refering to his philosophical believes.
You'd probably be disappointed, he strongly avoids thinking in such directions..
@@whataboutthis10 he has given many interviews and talks that are on u tube .
He is a nice guy a family man
He doesn't answer philosophical questions.
The Voldemort of Physics.
'The universe was created by a mathematician' is the closest Witten comes to a divine design, how else can 'complexity' be tamed to produce Maldacena's QC function.
His theories are wrong.
These are the parasites who've destroyed theoretical physics.
what do you know fool lol
Mathematics is brilliant when used by brilliant people. Hawking was not brilliant.
It depends on the field. They were all following innovation. Yes I have heard his indiscretions. Fact is he is still regarded highly. The mistake was not being themselves and branching out from previous discussions and discoveries. String theory was tragic but even with the help of Edward was wasted. Currently all these guys wasted their life on incomplete theories. Fundamentally, the scale issue and how all calculations change depending on size. These guys focused on Einstein and atoms, molecules, and..string. instead of the fundamentally missing equations to do the said conversions.
For somone physically bound to a chair for his entire life his brain had still to function astoundingly well.
This Ed guy sounds smart, he should consider doing physics as a job.
he dropped his notes.
hahahahaaaaaaaaaa
This guy is so great! 👌👌👌
Look how self deprecating this incredibly rare genius is. Contrast with Jordan Peterson.
Definition two very different men.
By that measure, Newton must have been a lesser genius, since he was arrogant and couldn't stop reminding everyone how brilliant his theories were
Jordan Peterson is a complete clown. The stupid man's smart person. You are comparing a mountain and a molehill.
@@samanthaqiu3416
By what measure? I didn't intend or imply that genius and humility are proportional
I prefer to listen to JP. Crystal clear delivery compared to Witten and JP's insights might actually help me in day to day life, some of them are based on tried and tested scientific theories. Did Witten make any testable predictions using M-Theory?
Too quote Monty Python - My brain hurts
"Why the 'unreasonable effectiveness' of mathematics"
Same answer as the "Why the 'unreasonable effectiveness' of language". It's literally just a form of describing reality by creating words that match with objects and concepts and just saying what you see. It's designed by man for the purpose of thinking and communicate what we sense and experience.
"Ooo why are counting numbers so efficient at counting objects, how weird!" 😂
Math = Ratios. Universal Laws = Ratios. Ergo the logic of ratios can describe existential ratios. ie: math isn't unreasonably effectve, it's obviously effective, because it's deterministically obvious.
Great to see Edward Witten here, always interesting to hear him speak.
Isn’t this the guy who wasted decades of the best minds’ efforts toward a theory that has not been proven to have any connection to the real universe
You are mistaken.
Witten is so interesting to listen to how the way he formulates what he says. He nails it down saying "it's as if the universe was created by a mathematician". Certainly after studying Quantum Mechanics I got that feeling of the maths taking you along for the ride rather than the physical motivating the maths.
Witten is spot on with the remark: "universe created by a Mathematician". The sovereign creator is the greatest Mathematician! There would be no universe without mathematics, because it is the foundation of physics.
Needing a Creator is such a Human Thing to think...🙄
@@superfuss1984 Can you explain the origin of the universe without a first causal agent? I cannot. And why not put a name on that agent, if it is a person with a greater purpose for humans?
@@The_Revealer_7 If you need a Explanation, good for you. I am happy with Things just happening. Seeing the Size of the Current Universe, i guess i am closer to the Truth. Never forget: Man created God, not the other Way around. 🤷
At 15:13 Witten mentions the equations. Usually if I type into a search engine what I think someone said, simply guessing at the spelling, I find what I'm looking for. Not this time. Can anyone tell me what that word is? It sounds to me like "insolon" but nothing comes up when I type it into my preferred search engine, which is DDG.
At 4:45, Ed Witten says: “instanton equations”; necessary to understand “4-model”(?) field theories.
@@andrefletcher7970 Thanks for the info
"It is as if the universe is created by a mathematician"- it is. Since you study of the small slice of reality called the physical universe with the help of mathematical models, i.e. your study is method-driven, it is only natural that what you get reflects your method. This is the paradox of objectivity: you create a model based on a particular method and then ignore differences between your model and the real thing and even have the audacity to state that your model encompasses the entirety of reality and is independent of you. It is not. Your model is the physical universe. Your method is mathematics. So yes, the model is method-driven and was created by a mathematician.
I would argue that transcendental numbers and fractals are unreasonable, and the mathematical treatment of them is merely a crude workaround.
he's a legit genius. I didn't understand any of this. I'm a total chimp compared to this guy.
He's so practical. He says "interesting" so many times. I wonder how he might see interest as being metaphysical or if he sees it as practical application or if there is something more.
1:04 "It's as if the universe had been created by a mathematician" Lol
I always had a feeling that Enstein's theory is also not fully inclusive of total geometry. In similar way Newton theory works on earth not in space. But to lesser degree. If there would be only Xa,Ya,Za, time dimensions we would not be able to change our destiny. Novak Djokovic would not have a choice but to become 24 times slams winner. Our world is not deterministic. And as such at point of time when Novak consciously made decision to become tenis player and not soccer player or skier the world has started shifting to parallel Xb,Yb,Zb,time.....X24slams, Y24slams, Z24slams,time. And such logic surely must apply on NEwton, Enstein, Dirac, . . . Subparticle theories
For those interested in the development of theoretical physics in recent decades, this is a timeline video ranking the most cited theoretical papers in high energy physics: ruclips.net/video/yDrudWnAlyc/видео.html. One of the most cited papers is Witten's important paper on holography.
It is not Newton who invented Calculus. It is Sangamagrama Madhavan who lived 300 years before Newton. This later reached Europe. Newton simply used this principle of infinitesimal calculus to develop his equations. Fundamentals of Infinitesimal calculus is elaborated in Madhavan's book Venuarohanam and of his deciple Jyeshthadeva named Yuktibhashyam.
Witten, Maldacena and Nima have appeared on this show. You are only missing Nati Seiberg for the whole IAS super quartet.
Orbifold Yeah. Nima with his formulation of the Amplitudhedron is astounding work.
Take a look at the Mathematical Universe Hypothesis.. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_universe_hypothesis
Robert was out of his depth there
He simply misunderstood the term "unreasonableness"
Wigner was saying - Math is the key to the universe, but there's no reason why it should be
What I love is he has pretty much the entire history of scientific discovery down pat in his head with the names of the discoverers and how they built understanding off of each other and cites the WAY they thought their way to each idea-including the blind alleys and how they arrived their ideas and then weaves all of it together into a coherent, seamless stream eleucidating sidebars as needed, without getting lost in any one tangent. You get a wonderful sense of the human dynamic, not just the dry facts rules and conclusions derived
please ask him to write a popular book about it.. may seem like time waste for him, but breakthroughs have happened doing something mundane
Lee Smolin's "Trouble with Physics". Peter Woit's "Not Even Wrong". Read these books and know the state of theoretical physics in a wider context. You dunces.
Isn't mathematics quantitative logic
And
The laws of physics follow quantitative logic
Plus they have a good lawyer 🙃🖖
"Why does the simple equation work so simply, provide such a nice answer? Why wasn't it, instead of, say, the simple cube-square result, some sort of long decimal?"
The Fine Structure Constant is an example of a weird, almost-but-not-quite-simple, long decimal result. It's right, it intuitively looks right, yet it counterintuitively isn't the simple, nice value it should be.
I'm an English prof irl, and sometimes I get annoyed that I make so little $$ compared to the STEM guys. Then I listen to STEM guys talk.
Yeah. They're probably earning it. 🧠
"Why is math uncanny?"....... Because 20 th century scientist gave up the idea of God. How long will it take to understand that the math is the PROF of that there is a mind behind the universe?! "Unreasonable" means we do not understand how it is that what we call the most objective -we should have ourself invented -as some claim. Ramanujan is the splendid example of that mat is NOT invented but discovered....revealed!
Rather than saying "as if universe created by a mathematician" I would say "mathematicians are the keenest observers and explainers of the universe".
X-Files
Humans vs. Alien Vampires
The counting corpses can create stark, sterile space stations floating in emptiness and futuristic bombers.
But unlike earthling human beings and creators of joy...the counting corpses that rule US can't create harmony (real intelligence) because vampires (greed) are ignorant (dead).
Vampires (greed) who suck the joy out of life have joined the zombies who eat the futures of their children.
Zombie Apocalypse is here and happening now.
Question. Why are the evangelical counting corpses using the bible as a springboard to perform somersaults to do the exact opposite of "treat others like they want to be treated"?
Answer. This is sick. Because this simple concept is too far out there to grasp for vampires and zombies.
Mathematics is a construct, physics is a phenomenon. Physics doesn't care about mathematics, but mathematics NEEDS physics to justify itself.
Mathematical models are not physics.
Einstein's Theory Is A Field Theory.
Empty space with a zero gravity field has zero time.
Something other worldly about Prof. Witten. A bit like Dr Spock of Star Trek. And he's married? - To a mathematical physicist!
2:07 _"So it's just a geometrical fact about three space dimensions that you've got an inverse square law."_ What a delightfully naïve assertion! Sure, once you assume the preordained existence of the fantastically complex - and, in nature, _never_ exact collection of behaviors we humans call "3-space," sure, all sorts of "mathematically provable" physics falls out. How could it not? Your space is nothing more than an infinitely extrapolated - and thus, I note, also an energetically impossible - extension of the very physics you are trying to describe.
All 3-space is and ever was is an approximate limit of special relativity. Even worse, it is a limit observed only at low speeds using lots of lumpy, only sort-of point-like stuff provided by nature. All of that perfect-smoothness, 1700s-ish continuum thinking came before quantum theory smacked us in the face with the impossibility of ever creating a point-like limit of anything.
Why not - and this is still naïve - start the Poincaré symmetries? Those, at least, describe the approximate behaviors of all those lumpy bits over a much broader range of scales and energies.
I understand it is comforting to focus on the behaviors for which our narrowly designed brains operate best. But I also think it is important to ask whether that is a good approach to defining the fundamentals of any mathematics used to describe real physics.
It's past time for folks to start devising maths that more accurately reflect the patterns found in reality we see around us, instead of following what the grid and place cells in our mammal brains tell us "must" be fundamental.
Not convinced there's any amazing connection between math and physics. Applied math isn't developed in a vacuum. And not all pure math has physical applications. The math that is useful in physics was designed by us to be so. Put another way: if "math" as we know it weren't useful in physics, we wouldn't use it for physics. We'd use some other paradigm of rules. And it would be just as unamazing that it works. We use rules that work. Is anyone amazed that physics follows rules? Why?
This video was underwhelming. Would love another video/series with this brilliant man.
If only Mr Witten (and a large team) would be allowed to work on UAPs. The criminal pentagon / USAF will never allow it, and I don't know if Mr Witten is interested in UAPs, but it could have resulted is great progress for us all.