

The Stephen Wolfram Podcast
Wolfram Research
Stephen Wolfram is the creator of Mathematica, Wolfram|Alpha and the Wolfram Language; the author of A New Kind of Science; and the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research. Over the course of nearly 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.
On his podcast, Stephen discusses topics ranging from the history of science to the future of civilization and ethics of AI.
On his podcast, Stephen discusses topics ranging from the history of science to the future of civilization and ethics of AI.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Feb 25, 2022 • 1h 24min
History of Science and Technology Q&A for Kids and Others (April 7, 2021)
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: History of Lisp? - What was ctrl+enter used for in Mathematica before Wolfram|Alpha? Were you saving that the whole time for such an important purpose? - Its crazy to think that the history of computing has less than 100 years - I'm guessing the first ASCII table was only 8 bit? or maybe even that was luxurious - Have you used Forth? What do you think about stack based programming languages? - What about the history of void/zero throughout science? - What about for debts and stuff like that? - Which pieces of v1 did you mostly code yourself vs other areas, who else worked on v1 team? - How did you develop code at that time, given there was no cvs/git? Did you send mail with the updated code? - She almost discovered Benford's law (too many nines?)

Feb 17, 2022 • 1h 18min
Stephen Wolfram Q&A, For Kids (and others) [April 2, 2021]
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 is beta decay? - I'm confused about the mass of quarks inside of protons/neutrons, somewhere I saw numbers of only a few electrons and the rest is binding energy? - Do you think you'll be able to wirelessly "charge" your house in your lifetime? [like Tesla's wireless electricity experiment but practical] - Didn't Tesla invent wireless electricity? - Does solar count as wireless charging - Can human electromagnetic field interfere with electricity? - What is something you have recently changed your perspective or opinion about? - "I've answered why there is something instead of nothing, tune in next week"

Feb 11, 2022 • 1h 23min
Business & Innovation Q&A for Young Entrepreneurs & Others (March 31, 2021)
Stephen Wolfram answers questions from his viewers about business and innovation as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-business-qa
Questions include: Tell us about your failures as an entrepreneur and what you learnt from them? - What is your opinion about software patents? - How many hours did you work in academia compared when you went to industry? - How can young people, like my niece obsessed with Fusion Rockets, follow their dreams? - How much should one be projected in the future, rather than staying focused on the present? - Why was Steve Jobs so successful? Was he a good engineer or a good seller? Or a good designer? - What is more important: focus or a good idea? - How quickly did you get help with Biz Admin, accounting and such? - How much of the operations of the biz are you able to automate with functions in WL, are there special functions for this unique purpose? - What is your success/failure ratio for ideas/projects you've started, that haven't quite worked out? - How much do you think that the title of your degree affects what projects you will be able to work on? Do you think the label traps you in one field or type of job? - Have you ever thought about talking on the Indie Hackers podcast? They showcase self-funded businesses - In what category am I? is 39 considered young, or am i in the "Others" category? Thousands of ideas I have, so thousands things to do, but how to prioritize? That I don't care about the money when doing something interesting and working on a project, is that a good idea?

Feb 4, 2022 • 1h 1min
Stephen Wolfram Q&A, For Kids (and others) [March 26, 2021]
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 are the biggest differences you notice about how physicists think vs. how mathematicians think? - A typical text file is a few KB, a typical audio file is a few MB, a typical video file is a few GB. What would a typical file size be for smell, taste and touch? Is there a reason why a quantitative change leads to a qualitative change? - Do you think there is a market for small rockets in Europe? - Would those LEO satellites block out sunlight? - If we keep getting more precision with atomic clocks, can we use a set of well placed atomic clocks to use gravity's effects on time to create a 3D map of some region of space (say to spy in a room, or see into the ground) to make out things with a centimeter feature?

Jan 28, 2022 • 1h 24min
History of Science and Technology Q&A for Kids and Others (March 24, 2021)
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 is the history of black holes discovery? - Is gravitoelectromagnetism sufficient to get black holes with event horizon or do you need the full GR framework to get them? - Ernst Mach has a great book on history of mechanics (reading at the moment). The whole development of General relativity is very German until like Hawking and Chandrasekhar. Did you ever meet Stephen Hawking or Chandrasekhar? - Is there an instance or phenomenon where an instrument uses a theory to test or advance that theory... is there a something like Godels incompleteness theory that applies to the instruments in physics? - What is the history of UFO observations? - There was a new physics announcement from CERN this week. something about a new kind of force. did you catch it Stephen? "The LHCb results strengthen hints of a violation of lepton flavour universality"

Jan 14, 2022 • 2h 33min
A conversation between Mario Carneiro, Norman Megill and Stephen Wolfram (August 18, 2021)
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, on-going series of intellectual explorations with special guests, this time specifically with Mario Carneiro and Norman Megill. Watch all of the conversations here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-conversations

Dec 30, 2021 • 1h 40min
A conversation between Terry Sejnowski and Stephen Wolfram (August 12, 2021) Part 2
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, on-going series of intellectual explorations with special guests, this time specifically with Terry Sejnowski. Part 2 (of 2)
Watch all of the conversations here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-conversations

Dec 30, 2021 • 1h 35min
A conversation between Terry Sejnowski and Stephen Wolfram (August 12, 2021) Part 1
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, on-going series of intellectual explorations with special guests, this time specifically with Terry Sejnowski. Part 1 (of 2 parts).
Watch all of the conversations here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-conversations

Dec 22, 2021 • 2h 25min
A conversation between Jan Ambjorn and Stephen Wolfram (August 5, 2021)
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, on-going series of intellectual explorations with special guests, this time specifically with Jan Ambjorn. Watch all of the conversations here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-conversations

Dec 17, 2021 • 1h 53min
A conversation between Andy Strominger and Stephen Wolfram (June 26 2021)
Stephen Wolfram plays the role of Salonnière in this new, on-going series of intellectual explorations with special guests, this time specifically with Andy Strominger. Watch all of the conversations here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-conversations