Building A Theory Of Everything | Stephen Wolfram | Escaped Sapiens #70

The Escaped Sapiens Podcast

This is a conversation with Stephen Wolfram about his proposed theory of everything. Stephen is a British-American computer scientist, mathematician, physicist, and CEO of Wolfram Research. He also created Mathematica, and Wolfram|Alpha & Wolfram Language, and is the Author of 'A New Kind of Science' as well as a number of other books.

Stephen's attempt to derive all of the laws of nature (including gravitation, statistical mechanics, and general relativity) rests on two key ideas:

1. The idea of computational irreducibility. In physics we usually deal with systems for which we are able to predict the state of the system at a later time as long as the initial conditions are known. For example, the trajectory of a bullet can be calculated at any point along its path. There are, however, complicated systems like cellular automata where there isn't a closed formula that lets you calculate the state of the system at some arbitrary later point. Instead you are forced to compute the development of the system one step at a time if you want to know how it evolves. Such systems are 'computationally irreducible'.

2. The idea of computational boundedness. This is the idea that we have finite computing power in our brains. There are many complex systems that scale so fast that our bounded computing power isn't enough follow every element of the system (e.g. we can't visualize the motion of the billions of cells in our own bodies, and so instead we develop an aggregated model of ourselves).

Starting with these two ideas, Stephen asks what a world with computational irreducibility would look like to a computationally bounded creature living in that world. He then builds a computational model based on hypergraphs (which you can think of as a kind of cellular automata), and from there attempts to re-derive all the laws of nature. This is an extraordinarily ambitious project, that lies somewhat outside of mainstream approaches to physics. The claim is, however, that significant progress has been made, and that this approach really is able to derive interesting aspects of the physical world. This conversation explores the key ideas behind the program.

►Watch on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/T0s_H9c2O28

► For more information about Stephen's work see:
www.stephenwolfram.com
www.wolframphysics.org

►Thumbnail source images can be found here:
https://company.wolfram.com/press-center/stephen-wolfram/
https://www.wolframphysics.org/visual-gallery/

►Follow Stephen on X: @stephen_wolfram

These conversations are supported by the Andrea von Braun foundation (http://www.avbstiftung.de/), as an exploration of the rich, exciting, connected, scientifically literate, and (most importantly) sustainable future of humanity. This interview is one of a series of interviews that explores the impact of economics on sustainability and the environment. The Andrea von Braun Foundation has provided me with full creative freedom with their support. As such, the views expressed in these episodes are my own and those of my guests.
A big thank you to anonymous for letting me use their space as a temporary studio.