146 | Emily Riehl on Topology, Categorie...

<p>Machine learning using neural networks has led to a remarkable leap forward in artificial intelligence, and the technological and social ramifications have been discussed at great length. To understand the origin and nature of this progress, it is useful to dig at least a litt ... Show More

<p>Welcome to the November 2025 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by&nbsp;<a href="https://www.patreon.com/seanmcarroll" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Patreon supporters</a>&nbsp;(who are also the ones asking the questions). We ... Show More

<p>Science has an incredibly impressive track record of uncovering nonintuitive ideas about the universe that turn out to be surprisingly accurate. It can be tempting to think of scientific discoveries as being carefully constructed atop a rock-solid foundation. In reality, scien ... Show More

<p>Math wants to be friends. Let mathematician, author and Abstract Mathematologist Dr. Eugenia Cheng introduce you to a secret world: the artsy and emotional side of math. Dr. Cheng helps answer the age-old and (recently viral) question, “IS MATH REAL?” We chat about Fibonacci s ... Show More

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Dr. Eugenia Cheng is Scientist In Residence at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She won tenure in Pure Mathematics at the University of Sheffield, UK, where she is now an Honorary Fellow. Alongside her research in Category Theory and ... Show More

Mathematics as a subject is distinctive in its symbolic abstraction and its potential for logical and computational rigor. But mathematicians tend to impute other qualities to our subject that set it apart, such as impartiality, universality, and elegance. Far from incidental, th ... Show More

When does a crowd of people become unsafe? How well will the football team Aston Villa do next season? When is it cost-effective to replace a kitchen? The answers may seem arbitrary but, to Nira Chamberlain, they lie in mathematics. You can use maths to model virtually anything.D ... Show More

<p>In a fascinating conversation, renowned theoretical physicist Marika Taylor and acclaimed philosopher Julian Baggini explore the history and evolving relationship between these two disciplines. Listen in as they delve into the intricacies of how science and philosophy have bee ... Show More

One of the hottest topics in modern physics is trying to understand the scattering of fundamental particles with neither shape nor size - one step up from nothingness. Amazingly, attempts to understand these simple processes theoretically require state-of-the-art mathematics. The ... Show More

The interplay between fundamental physics and pure mathematics has led to many remarkable mathematical insights over the past fifty years. Karen Uhlenbeck is one of the mathematicians who made pioneering insights into geometry when studying the physicists' gauge theory of particl ... Show More

The nature of proof and mathematics as a creative enterprise. Not all that is true can be proved as such, the high hopes of David Hilbert for placing the entirety of mathematics on a "firm foundation", the mathematical world-shattering results of Kurt Gödel which frustrated that ... Show More

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The Cognitive Crucible is a forum that presents different perspectives and emerging thought leadership related to the information environment. The opinions expressed by guests are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of or endorse ... Show More

Covering Part 8 of Alain Badiou’s Being and Event on “Theory of the Subject,” Alex and Andrew discuss the theory of subject and the event, and Badiou’s wider work. Guest Andrei Rodin contextualizes Badiou’s project through its relation to the wider philosophy of mathematics. Rodi ... Show More