So, how about all that social distancing due to the growing pandemic, eh? There is a lot more staying-at-home these days than we’re normally used to, and I think it’s important to keep our brains active as well as our hands washed and our homes stocked with toilet paper.
To that end, I’m doing a little experiment: a series of informal videos I’m calling The Biggest Ideas in the Universe. (Very tempted to put an exclamation point every time I write that, but mostly resisting.) They will have nothing directly to do with viruses or pandemics, but hopefully will be a way for people to think and learn something new while we’re struggling through this somewhat surreal experience. Who knows, they may even be useful long after things have returned to normal.
The idea will be to have me talking about one Big Idea in each video, hopefully with a new installment released each week. I’ll invite viewers to leave questions here (where I’ll be linking to each video), and at YouTube. Then I’ll pick out some of the most interesting questions and make another short video addressing them.
Full set of videos will be available here on the blog, or directly on YouTube.
Here’s the introductory announcement:
Before anyone jumps in to tell me — yes, I am very amateur at this! My green-screen usage could definitely use an upgrade, for one thing. Happy to take suggestions as to how to improve the quality of the video production (quality of the substance is what it is, I’m afraid).
Consider this a very tiny gesture in the direction of sticking together and moving forward during some trying times. I hope everyone out there is staying as safe as possible.
Thank you for this, Sean. I actually decided to check in on your blog/podcast today specifically because Big Ideas Wot Indicate The Unfathomable Enormity of It All are strangely comforting to me, you are very good at presenting these things and I am in need of the comfort. Guess I’ll be checking in more regularly for a bit.
As far as presentation goes, I think you’re fine – the only issue I see (or hear, rather) is that audio in this video seems to be left-side only. Beyond that, I don’t have any complaints, and the main reason for people to tune in is your ability to condense and explain, anyway, which is excellent.
As far as suggestions go, anything about time, please. Time is weird.
I’m a dedicated follower of your generous contributions to better understanding the universe. Your book The Big Picture, the Teaching Company lectures on the Higgs Boson and your podcasts are all inspirationally enlightening. I’m wondering if The Core Theory (which excludes purposes, causes, meanings, judgments and goals) is the best argument for a deterministic universe. I know that as humans, we will probably never have the capacity to know every existing variable at any given time, so we could never with 100% accuracy predict the state of the universe in the next moment. And it maybe makes sense to live as though we have free will, (especially because we seem to have an inherent need to judge, have goals and purposes, etc.) but do you personally believe this to be an illusion as I do? Your book has made me a Bayesian, so I look forward to continually updating my belief system with any new data you can offer, or even your best hunch will be valuable to me.
Awesome! I look forward to this!
Wow, you are a popular guy; I hope you will not tire of reading these comments before you get to mine. Will I get points to let you I have read your latest book and now do check your blog too! But I am so glad you’re sticking to the topics that you are most familiar with with these latest videos; so many of your blogs I have no interest in listening too.
So, after some thought, please address the updates on dark matter, dark energy, quantum mechanics, and the merging of it with general relativity (I know you made one strong case in your book, but what about others?); and are we ever going to get a complete standard model of physics; I have learned that the LHC is not producing the results we were hoping for; have we reached our limit of expenditure to build even bigger accelerators to answer the last questions… THANKS! It’s so refreshing to do this while we fret about CoVi 19.
is this entanglement : take a red and a yellow ball, put each into a box. now if a box is opened and it’s a red ball inside, then the other box must have a yellow ball.
what is the intuition for entanglement.
Would you share your thoughts on these questions: Does time proceed in the same way, in the same direction and at the same rate for someone “on the opposite side of the universe” from us? What about someone “90 degrees from us” elsewhere in the universe?
And this: With respect to the many worlds theory, have you considered the idea that multiple worlds (representing multiple possibilities) coalesce (into reality) rather than split into many worlds at the moment the wave function collapses? Perhaps fewer worlds exist now than existed yesterday. (The superposition of a single particle = 2 worlds. Wave function collapse = 1 world.)
Thank you for doing this. It is a great idea.
My question is,
Is there a clear, reasonable explanation related to why inertial and gravitational masses are the same?
The nastiest question 🙂
Before measurement, from our point of view (POV) the quantum world exists in a probabilistic form. When we observe it, measure it and extract information the quantum world gets refined and transition into a more “realistic” form with quantified and quantifiable interactions.
So two things :
A- From our point of view (Human Scale, Solar System, …) when we observe a massive astral system (Galaxies, Quazars …) aren’t we also seeing a probabilistic form ? For example, from our referential aren’t galaxies being observed in a probabilistic form from which we need to extract more information to correctly quantify its behavior and interactions ?
B-The opposite now, from the point of view of a massive astral system aren’t we also being observed in probabilistic form ?
Won’t we look like what atoms seems to us with all the time issues and the circus (position, momentum, …) that goes with it ?
Thanks Sean for starting your “biggest ideas in the universe”. I have always looked forward to reading your latest book and am now looking forward to digesting more frequent messages from you.
Could you please do a musical with hand puppets that demonstrates the nature of Schrödinger’s cat, while you’re making Tarte Tatin with Crème FraĂ®che, and how that likewise relates to quantum mechanics?
If not, that’s okay, as I’m sure that whatever you do will be fine by us.
How does 4d spacetime manifest itself in the 3 physical dimensions we interact with? Similar to a shadow left by a 3d hand, are the 3 physical dimensions a shadow of a projection from 4d space? Is there a world where we see two dimensions of space and one of time, and the third dimension of space is invisible to us? Can time be represented as a physical dimension?
Can’t wait!
Can you bring in your almost namesake Sean B. Carroll who wrote the superb book leading to an equally superb film “The Serengeti Rules”.?
With dolphins returning to the now clean waters of the Venice canals, and the skies temporarily clear of China as they stopped industrialized production while they dealt with COVID-19, I believe the pandemic might be teaching us that though many of us might have abandoned hope of restoring our planet to health and its wild biodiverse beauty, thinking it would just be too hard after how much we’ve plundered it, the speed with which the dolphins (and swans!) returned to the Venice canals — and possibly some significant climate change mitigation we may be able to measure thanks to the most industry, travel and all its noxious activity basically stopping for COVID-19.
I am big fan of Sean.
Conjecture: The Virus spreads because of the Second Law of Thermo. It will not be contained unless alot of Energy is used to combat the the Second Law.
Great!! thanks a million
I’m so ignorant. I’ve listened to you talk about free will, but I just can’t pull it together with the “block universe”. Is there a way you can explain to me such that I can understand how, if the past, present, and future, all exist equally, there can be free will?
The reason I ask is that if there is no free will, then nothing else matters. We will, each in our own way, do what we can not but do. I don’t see the point of exploring any other questions until there is an answer to this one. Or at least until we can say, as Martin Reese might opine “it must be left in the box of questions too hard to answer”.
If the many worlds theory is correct and there has been an infinite number of pocket universes going into the past could our universe be overlapping the location in spacetime of a previous pocket universe? What could the implications of that be?
I was wondering if you could make quiz out of the explanation in the video. It would test how much we learned out of it and it also helps in consolidation.
it would be interesting to hear your most far-out ideas, the ones that carry the most professional risk but excite you the most.
Hi Sean,
You are talking about symmetries and I have a suggestion related to the most fundamental symmetries in physics : The CPT-theorem (CPT) and Lorentz Invariance (LI).
The HAWC collaboration puts new constraints on a possible violation of the LI (https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.131101). It would be great if you could elaborate on the relationship between CPT and LI (my understanding is that CPT presupposes LI), and on the implications of the HAWC results for theories beyond the standard model and for quantum gravity theories.
Thanks and regards, Stefan
There must have been some great forces at work if it made Sean comb his hair!