Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others: Stephen Wolfram Livestreams

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 53] »

51 minutes

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Hi, Stephen. Why does the universe exist? In a recent interview, you said that you have been considering this over the past month. When was the last time you weren't the smartest person in the room? If all knowledge about physics was to be lost, which theory would be most difficult to rediscover in your opinion and why? Wolfram|Alpha uses a curated knowledge graph rather than some Wikipedia crowdsourced approach. You had a bunch of people in an office authoring a lot of data for it, correct? Or does it draw from other databases? Kids and teenagers are less and less interested by mathematics. What do you think is the reason for this? How would you change it? View Less »

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 52] »

1 hour 15 minutes

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How can I, as a hobbyist computational explorer, experiment with multiway hypergraphs in areas other than physics? I am interested in information science, but have not taken computer science yet. How can one convince the scientific community it has inadvertently accepted a false result, when the bug is subtle? Can a virus mutate and replicate again and again in your own body while the immune system is fighting it? And every time the immune system figures out one form of it and kills it, there is already a new form replicating? A viral cat-and-mouse game, so to speak. Do you think that there could be some low-hanging fruit to be collected in biology? I feel like all the smartest people chose to study physics or math, and I wonder if more should go into biology. What techniques do you use to memorize information when studying in such broad fields? Thank you! Do you have any opinions as to why Mars One failed? They went bankrupt in 2019. Mars One had a massive recruitment drive from 2012-ish for people to go to and colonize Mars by 2023. How do we know that gravity is not a "pushing force" instead of a pulling force? Do we for certain know that "dark matter" is not caused by shielding of this pushing force ("dark matter" being an artifact in this case and not a real thing)? If time stops in a black hole, does that mean all matter in the black hole stops aging? Why do we need to super-cool materials (for superconductors or quantum systems)? Why can't we drive them mechanically at a set frequency, so "cool" them preferentially in one direction? What is the difference between science and technology and how do they complement each other? View Less »

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 51] »

1 hour 16 minutes

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Can you define the "scientific method"? What is a double-blind randomized control trial? What caused the split between the evolutionary paths of plant life and animal life? Why haven't any animals evolved to be the same size as large dinosaurs? For example, the T. rex and Brontosaurus were massive creatures. I'm only 12, but how do you deal with detractors? I hear some things about you—it does sound like jealousy, if I'm honest—but regardless, how do you continue on your path and disregard the critics? View Less »

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 50] »

1 hour 39 minutes

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What is dark matter? What is the "fabric" of spacetime? What gives rise to it? What is it made of? Is there something smaller than quarks? How do black holes appear? Going continuously from 0 topological holes to 1... Is there a computational system similar to quarks? In the Wolfram Physics Project, could something, say a black hole, leave a wake/churn in the atoms of space in its past light cone? Perhaps there is something lingering that's detectable. Is the structure of electrons a mystery? And if we knew what electrons were made of, would we be able to duplicate objects? Is it really possible to get something from literally nothing? It is often said that "nothing can escape black holes, not even light." Can gravitational waves escape black holes? If you manage to send two orbiting black holes that are about to merge into a larger black hole, will the gravitational waves still be produced? Does your theory of physics have anything to say about that? How could we be reliable judges of what is metaphysically possible, rather than what seems possible to us given our current evidence (epistemic possibility)? How could we get evidence about which formal systems are metaphysically possible to realize? What are the implications of "hypercomputation" being a possibility and hence existing? What was your last "crazy" or "unrealistic but interesting" thought with regard to science or your thoughts about reality? A speculation that isn't based in any research, but is an intuition? If a piece of space breaks off, does it just "float around" in the universe? If so, does gravity increase where that piece passes? If a piece of universe detaches from our universe in a supercritical black hole, is that piece of universe contained in such a black hole still subject to hashing radiation? Was the universe created from an explosion from a super super super super super... black hole? Regarding the close-to-critical black holes: What would you see the "handful of threads" that connect it to our universe against? In an actual microscope, you see a structure against a black background. What's the background here? Could black holes be a pinch in space where it goes inside out? If a black hole rotates with that critical speed, could it expose hypercomputation? Are there any plans to somehow incorporate any formal method tooling? View Less »

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 49] »

1 hour 22 minutes

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What happens if you fall into the ocean from a great height? From what I have read, it's like hitting concrete. Can you explain the science behind this? Dr. Wolfram, can you explain the origin of the white trail from jets at high altitude? Thank you. If we rubbed mineral oil/baby oil on us, would we move faster in the water? How long would we survive if the Earth left the Sun's orbit, going away from the Sun? Could everything that gets sucked into all black holes everywhere in the universe go to the same place? Do black holes rotate? Can they distort the spacetime around them? What is the reason for the distribution of matter and antimatter throughout the universe? Why is there much less antimatter? View Less »

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others:

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and Others) [Episode 48] »

1 hour 13 minutes

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Are you familiar with knot theory? Apparently former NASA physicist Thad Roberts derived the charge of the electron from the hyperbolic figure-eight knot. He recommended using Mathematica to verify. Why does computer code involve math? Why isn't it just a set of linear instructions that sometimes hop around, like a choose-your-own-adventure book? What type of computer logic is most efficient (binary, ternary, ...)? I hear that all Boolean functions can be constructed from only NAND. Is this true of any other simple Boolean function? Why does NAND realize NAND? Why are we only considering first-order derivatives of position (velocity) and second order (acceleration)? Why are higher-order derivatives apparently not relative? What is the derivative of acceleration called? Do you think emotions will emerge out of intelligence? If computer scientists continue to make general AI, do you think the more "general" or "intelligent" it gets, the more "emotional" it will get? View Less »

Stephen Wolfram Livestreams

Science & Technology Q&A for Kids & Others (143 videos)