The genius of Edward Witten | Edward Frenkel and Lex Fridman

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GUEST BIO:
Edward Frenkel is a mathematician at UC Berkeley working on the interface of mathematics and quantum physics. He is the author of Love and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality.

PODCAST INFO:

SOCIAL:

[LexClips]

Guest bio: Edward Frenkel is a mathematician at UC Berkeley working on the interface of mathematics and quantum physics. He is the author of Love and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality.

[Nakameguro]

With Witten, you do not have to know physics or mathematics to notice how concisely and precisely he speaks; only a supremely clear mind with mastery of the subject at hand can convey ideas in this way.

[chriskindler]

I feel like at this point Lex tried numerous times to get Ed Witten on the show, but he either hasn't replied or agreed to it

[liberty-matrix]

"Nuclear physics is incredibly complicated but it's described by extremely simple equations." ~Edward Witten

[dannygibson]

So basically everyone is so impressed by him because he knows both math and physics at the highest possible level. It would be like someone being a hall of famer in 2 professional sports simultaneously. That is wild.

[davidcantu]

“He takes an idea in physics and then find the interpretation of it in mathematics”. This sounds in some situations more effective than the usual thinking of finding a mathematical equation and then finding the intrinsic reality

[alexjbriiones]

I think that would be one of your great interviews if you could ask Ed Witten to be interviewed by you.

[Kivas_Fajo]

Isn't Witten the only physisist that has been awarded the Fields Medal of Mathematics?

[darwinlaluna]

Is the electromagnetism from north pole to south pole is much stronger than to electromagnetism going south to north?

[sonarbangla]

Frenkel claims Witten keeps discovering more and more connections with QM and mathematics. Lex should ask him how does Witten explain connections of the quantum with classical objects?

[oppamaclare]

I had a revelation watching this video clip. You can tell where you are in the overall longer video by observing amount of coke left in Lex's bottle.

[paxwallace]

He's A) a very humble and soft spoken introvert. And B) not exactly the Best at doing popularisation of these highly elusive concepts. But yeah couldn't hurt🤷 What about Brian Greene who's definitely in his Camp Or Even Kaku always loves an interview. Also an interesting possibility would be Lisa Randall from Harvard or the very cool Janna Levine who's arguably the best at speaking in a completely uncompromising yet popular science way about this stuff. Long live the Higher Dimensional multiverse!

[LearningWithSuj]

Edward is like if Jean Claude Van damne had gone into mathematical physics instead of martial arts/ Hollywood.

[oldrusty]

Is it just me or is everyone talking about Witten lately?

[tombentley]

When I listen to Witten I am reminded of the governor of Texas in The Best Little Whore House in Texas—-doing the Texas Side Step. After the Texas governor did his little dance one reporter said to another reporter “what did he say”—-the reply was “a possible maybe”

[VCT]

The bigger problem with the emphasis on solving the discrepancy between Gravity and QFT is that it still leaves out any real explanation of Dark Matter and Dark Energy which actually compose 95 percent of the universe. This dicking around with string theory has got to stop and theoretical physicists should look into not only the DM and DE and it's nature, but also all the results coming from JWST in terms of Cosmology, especially early universe.

I have a feeling that String Theory is going to be looked at by the future generations, like we look at phlogiston, Aether or Lamarckianism.

[paulwary]

Mathematicians: No way!
Witten: Way!
Physicists: We're not worthy!

[rauckr]

Ed Witten appears to be the strongest advocate of applying mathematical equations to physics. Steven Wolfram is the number one advocate of attempting to understand Physics using simple programs instead of equations. This is a new paradigm, and we will see which approach yields more progress.

[glennpaquette]

How many predictions has he made for observable quantities, and how many of those predictions have been confirmed experimentally?

[ronjon]

Wonder what it’d be like for a couple of average lay parents, like my wife and me, to have a kid like Witten. We don’t have children, so I’ve not a clue, but it’s got to be hard to recognize, nurture, foster the kids’ gifts, get him or her the proper education, shelter and protect them, etc.

I also wonder how many protégés are or have been out there who weren’t encouraged or directed to utilize their talents and gifts effectively.

I dunno, just a random thought.