Stephen Wolfram - How Complexity and Emergence Create a Cosmos?

The universe began as a simple hot bath of particles and forces. How then the vast diversity of things we find on earth today? Much depends on the principles of 'complexity' and 'emergence'. What are they? How does each work and how do they work together?




Stephen Wolfram is the creator of Mathematica, Wolfram|Alpha and the Wolfram Language; the author of A New Kind of Science; and the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research.


Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[john]

Just outstanding. Wolfram is one of the most important theorists ever.

[billyc]

Wolfram is the smartest person I have ever heard speak.

[grnDestiny]

It’s cool seeing people like the founder of wolfram alpha talk here, thanks. I would like to hear more

[chayanbosu]

Still we may say conciousness is the biggest mystrey and this single arrow hits modern world so strongly that debate occurs in every sector, spiritual world and scientific world.

[owencampbell]

I like his introduction to the new laws of physics, that's what was missing to the picture since a stagnation on the basic rules that allowed no forthcoming.
Our developing conscious minds are understanding more and more and creating concepts to the complexity of the whole, we'll soon have answers to some complex appearances.

[Constantinesis]

Looking forward to watch the full discussion !

[chrisray]

Stephen has multiple math and science doctorates and owns a scientific software company, definitely not just some writer, his ideas from A New Kind of Science are novel and might be the edge we need to discover new things.

[fabsouth]

What beautiful words as I listen to these gentlemen speak it almost sounds like music to me

[francesco]

To understand how complexity emerge (basically a process) leave two questions open
1) that the starting set ALLOWED complexity (no complexity if was a rock...)
2) that complexity need the tools (as laws, as elements, as timing) to evolve.

[-by-_Publishing_LLC]

(11:00) *SW: **_"What are the basic things that come about when you start from the underlying stuff and you build up to the whole?"_* ... The evolutionary process of Existence always follows a "simplicity to complexity" template. If you want to start at the beginning, then you must first establish a _true_ beginning point. Since science can only address observable "stuff, " then naturally science wants to establish the starting point right at Big Bang, ... but is that really the _true beginning_ of Existence?

Is that how _we_ bring "stuff" into physical existence? ... *No!*

Whenever we invent "stuff, " our concepts are first conceived within our consciousness in the form of nondimensional information. We necessarily assign mathematics to this information to facilitate virtual structure. We then move all prior information into multidimensional "physical" information as one might do with a 3D printer, a CNC milling machine, or a chisel.

If you want to discover the true, bottom-tier beginning point of Existence, then you have to start with nondimensional information ... and not with the "stuff" that happens later.

[Virtues]

Robert Lawrence Kuhn _ The Man The Myth The Legend :)!

[scarter]

Were getting closer to the truth here!
Wolframs bottom up approach is where it's at but i think even the ^fundamental arbitrary rules^ he mentions are emergent from a lower level just as our scientific equations are.. emergent from Quantisation of logical states at the base level.. just like a Mandelbrot emerges from Quantisation of a simple iterative formula.

[danielogwara]

To create a cosmos, make Euler’s formula the mechanics of Leibniz’s monad, infuse it with Riemann’s sphere and Einstein’s relativity then you have the theory of everything.

[jf]

To be general is to particular and particular to be general!

[jamesruscheinski]

Could the laws of nature bring about complexity of universe?

[jamesruscheinski]

Do the simple rules have any relation to time?

[jamesruscheinski]

Can rules transition from possibility to probability in mathematics?

[jamesruscheinski]

Are there simple rules that bring about mathematics?

[scoreprinceton]

Interesting topic and interesting view point. Might a new scientific method or technology be “linking”? Linking through maps, nodes, edges etc., of words of languages for example to answer how could meanings emerge? Why are different interpretations possible for a sentence? Are those the kinds of complexities that needs studying? AI for example uses “graphs”

[anxious_robot]

It's incredible we exist, and what is this place? It just constantly blows my dumb mind.