The Stephen Wolfram Podcast

Stephen Wolfram answers questions from his viewers about the history of science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: How much of your work on cellular automata was influenced by Ulam's work during the Manhattan Project? - ​How do you approach studying the history of technology to inform your work on current projects? Do you do very targeted studies when starting a project? How much historical context is enough? - ​Is there a list of Wolfram recommended history of science and technology books? - What was it about ancient Greece that allowed for great advancements in math and science and great thinkers? - Could you talk about the history on Ed Fredkin's work and if its similar to your work about Cellular Automata? - In 2001: A Space Odyssey, the alien monolith is a Von Neumann probe. Is it rectangular because of the cellular automata inspiration? - ​What is the book top right with the horse's head? Just curious! - What do you think is the significance of the antikythera mechanism? How close do you think the Greeks were to a technological civilization? - Have you read Asimov's Foundation? Do you think psychohistory could actually be an actual science with real predictive power? Does it need to find pockets of computational reducibility - ​You said the cellular automata experiments you did in the 80s could have been done in Los Alamos, why do you think those weren't done then?

Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: Are there any models that predict how society behaves? - What knowledge helps weather prediction and how? Like pressure, temperature, wind, distances, etc..? - When you (Stephen Wolfram) count in your head, do you count verbally or visually (or another way)? Feynman wrote an interesting story about this in one of his books. - If you write enough errors that cancel each other out perfectly, your code is perfect. - How do we improve our inductions towards producing creative results for science? - Which side of the quarter has better aerodynamics? If a quarter was flipped by a human hand 100,000 times on a windy day, and another 100,000 times on a non windy day, would the overall outcome still be 50/50 heads/tales in both instances? - How can you end up with a different set of rules while describing a system with definite and observable behavior? No matter alien consciousness or not, the rules will remain the same - How do you spell that? ooogleriffousness? - Why can't logic be easier to understand? What I mean is all this academic stuff that teaches logic, it seems all Greek to me. When I try to learn more, I get bored fast because they explain it too complicated.

Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: ​How closely are computer clocks synchronized in different parts of the world? How do they synchronize? - How does the body know when to create scar tissue? Does the body make different scar tissue based on the tissue it's repairing? - ​What is the meaning of light years? -  Could you say something about this year's Nobel Prize on complex system? Is there any relation to your Wolfram model? - ​How do messenger pigeons find their destination? - How to fix dizziness on a boat? (new navy sailor here) - ​Were you bitten by a pigeon as a child? #spiderman #pigeonman? - I wonder if there is a difference of accuracy in the sensing of the magnetic field depending on whether is just 1 bird, a few, or many flying together

Stephen Wolfram answers questions from his viewers about the history of science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: What does history have to say about combating anti science movements/wacky conspiracy theories, especially when it comes to the more dangerous ones such as the anti-vaccine movement? - How have people come to believe in grey-headed aliens? - ​The counter culture movement is sometimes associated with a renewed interest in quantum mechanics in the sixties. Would Richard Feynman, who lived the era, have agreed? - ​Did Dick Feynman ever prank you or pick a lock that belonged to you? - How much of your work on cellular automata was influenced by Ulam's work during the Manhattan Project?

Join Stephen Wolfram as he discusses updates on the Physics Project, the Ruliad, Multicomputation, and Metamathematics!

Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: Why do flies fly around seemingly constantly with no apparent goal whatsoever? - Why don't we make houses out of some kind of amber and then carve them? - How do traffic light systems work? - Does Stephen prepare any of the answers? they are all so clear and thought out - Hello, how are the magnetic north and geographical north related? - 1 How come oil is deposited in Arctic regions? -  Could you please explain what Eigenvalues/vectors and what you can do with them. Thanks.

Stephen Wolfram answers questions from his viewers about business, innovation, and managing life as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-business-qa Questions include: Do you believe billionaires should exist? are you one? - ​Why do billionaires make space rockets? - ​Do you have a fancy car? Or a boat? - At least 3! Elon Musk, Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos? - How do you determine your time is being well spent? - ​How many computers do you own? Do you build them yourself? - 9-5 job, graduated in physics, but work as an analyst. Tired when coming home, want to learn more skills, any advice? - Do you perceive yourself as Altruist? - Do you still systematically learn new science by textbooks? - ​Why is it so hard for independent learners outside of institutions to get access to decent tools and classes? It is hard not to default to python because of lack of financing. - How is the landscape of investing in technology startups changing? Where do you fit in?

Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: What technological and/or scientific capabilities must humans achieve to be able to manipulate and reprogram matter at will? - Can you explain CRISPR? How does the gene editing technique CRISPR work? - Why are routines for sleeping, eating, exercise, etc. so helpful for mammals? When is routine harmful? - ​Is there an example where self-assembly is industrially used? - ​How harmful are plane flights in terms of radiation exposure? - I were able to create a black hole the size of a marble in my living room, would it destroy the cosmos or just make a hole in my couch? - Is it true our electrical distribution networks and neuronal networks in the brain has same configuration? - Why do some speculate there's life - Isn't it weird that our body mostly works fine in zero gravity?

Stephen Wolfram answers questions from his viewers about the history of science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: Stephen, why are keyboards the default computer interface? - Why didn't someone invent the printing press earlier? It seems to have been quite financially valuable. Was it an engineering problem or a lack of entrepreneurship? - In your opinion if Physics didn't work out for Professor Feynman would he have been able to make it as a stand up Comedian - In the past or currently, how much 'science' and technology is published or publicly available... is the most 'advanced'/ useful science and tech in the published literature/ patents? Are there branches of secret science? Yes or No, are you personally or do you know a group sitting on tech that is not public facing? - Why is Turing's machine model today so dominant compared to the equivalent lambda calculus? - Would love to read an essay just about the printing of the NKS book. This is a wild saga. - ​Is it possible to identify the moment in history when scientific investigation as we know it today broke away from the study of philosophy? - When do the viewers get to hear more about the answer to the why there's something rather than nothing? - Why do you think certain cultures have had such a disproportional success in science discovery & business?

Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: Since photons do not experience the passing of time, does that mean that all their physical properties, such as wavelength, are fixed throughout their lifespan? - Do you think that it's worth investing and attempting cryonic suspension as a way to continue living? - ​Why does time seem to speed up as we age? - How can one learn physics or math at a young age? (organizing your life, order of topics, your experience as a young physics enthusiast) - If the center of the earth is really hot lava like the sun, how come it isn't melting everything between us & it?