Physics & Philosophy with Sean Carroll

Have aliens already secretly visited us? Neil deGrasse Tyson sits down with Steven Spielberg and screenwriter David Koepp to discuss their new film Disclosure Day, alien contact, and why Spielberg believes there’s more out there than meets the eye. NOTE: StarTalk+ Patrons can lis ... Show More

Is the fear of heights innate or learned? Neil deGrasse Tyson, Chuck Nice, and Gary O'Reilly explore taking risks, the neuroscience of fear, and how to overcome it with freestyle rock climber and subject of the film Free Solo, Alex Honnold, and neuroscientist Heather Berlin. NOTE ... Show More

Did the Milky Way used to be a quasar? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and comic co-host Chuck Nice explore quasars, the high energy universe, and the movie we’re making of the night’s sky with astrophysicist & host of PBS Space Time, Matt O’Dowd. NOTE: StarTalk+ Patrons can ... Show More

Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist at Caltech, specializing in quantum mechanics, gravity, and cosmology. He is the author of several popular books: one on the arrow of time called From Eternity to Here, one on the Higgs boson called The Particle at the End of the Universe, ... Show More

Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) is the Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium, host of StarTalk Radio, and author of New York Times bestseller Astrophysics for People in a Hurry. What We Discuss with Neil deGrasse Tyson: How a seasoned scientist maintains childlike ... Show More

It's easy to forget that long standing scientific theories are in fact, theories and therefore are subject to revision and change as new information comes to light or we develop new ways to understand our Universe. The current accepted theory on the creation of our Universe is, o ... Show More

Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) is the Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium, host of StarTalk Radio, and author. He is kind enough to rejoin us and discuss his latest book, Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization. What We Discuss with Neil deGrasse ... 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

Steven Weinberg is perhaps the most accomplished living theoretical physicist. Now based at the University of Texas at Austin, he has made substantial contributions to our understanding of all the fundamental forces of Nature. In this podcast, he reflects on his career in physics ... Show More

To be human is to question. This act of questioning is the essence of philosophy, as it allows ontology and epistemology to exist. For example, to understand what it is to be we must first ask the question of what it is to be. This insight, of the primacy of questioning, is at th ... Show More

<p><strong>#085 Rebroadcast<br /> </strong></p> <p>Well here in Texas, we just suffered through an intense freeze. And many a plant became a casualty of the cold, but why? What's going on at the molecular level that causes freezing temperatures to be bad for many plants? And is t ... Show More

Time can feel like a subjective experience—different at different points in our lives. It’s also a real, measurable thing. The universe may be too big to fully comprehend, but what we do know could help inform the ways we approach our understanding of ourselves, our purpose, and ... Show More