245 | Solo: The Crisis in Physics

<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>Last time, we introduced the biggest open problem in theoretical physics - the problem of combining gravity with quantum mechanics. In this first part of a three-part series, we introduce the leading candidate for how to do that: String Theory.<br/><br/>For ad-free episodes an ... Show More

<p>Can a whole universe fit inside a black hole? Neil deGrasse Tyson and Paul Mecurio explore grand unification, dark matter, wave function collapse, and other problems in physics with theoretical physicist and author of “<i>Existential Physics</i>,” Sabine Hossenfelder. </p><p>N ... Show More

In this special celebratory 100th episode, I discuss six major unsolved problems in science: the P vs NP problem in computer science, the mystery of dark matter in physics, the existence of the island of stability in chemistry, the historical occurrence of a snowball Earth scenar ... Show More

Quantum mechanics is full of weird findings – for example, that systems widely separated can somehow still be correlated, and that a system may be in two different possible states at the same time. Entanglement and superposition, among other phenomena, have prompted debate since ... 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

<p>For the past century, physicists have been building particle colliders as a way to learn about the fundamental laws of physics. Today we talk about why smashing particles together has proven to be such a powerful tool.<br/><br/>For ad-free episodes and other exclusives, join u ... Show More

As the title suggests: this is about Quantum Information. It is “Quantum Information Theory” to be more precise. Now physics is sometimes regarded as strange by people who know little about it. And even for people who know a little more about it - well they might regard quantum p ... Show More

"Slides" are referred to in this episode. Their absence will not hinder understanding for audio-only listeners - enjoy! This is a "talk about a talk". Back in 2015 David Deutsch gave a lecture titled "Physics without Probability" which ranged over the history of probability, it's ... Show More