Ep 1. What can physics tell us about ourselves?

Humans can live up to age 100, and not 1000 - why? Are there limits in how much our brains can think and compute? The laws of physics can help explain a lot, both about our own human bodies and how we are connected to life all around us.
Guests:
Vijay Balasubramanian, External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, Cathy and Marc Lasry Professor of Physics at the University of Pennsylvania
Geoffrey West, Shannan Distinguished Professor and Past President, Santa Fe Institute
Hosts: Abha Eli Phoboo & Chris Kempes
Producer: Katherine Moncure
Podcast theme music: Mitch Mignano
Other Music: Blue Dot Sessions, Pink House Music, Eardeer, and Craig Smith.
You can listen to us on Simplecast - Spotify, Apple, Google Podcast, Pocketcast, Overcast and KZbin.
Follow us on:
Twitter • KZbin • Facebook • Instagram • LinkedIn • Bluesky
SFI programs:
Complexity Global School
Complexity Explorer: Fractals & Scaling
Education
Books & Stories:
Tell Me Why by Arkady Leokum
Scale by Geoffrey West
“Funes, the Memorious” by Jorge Luis Borges
Talks:
How the Brain Makes You: Collective Intelligence and Computation by Neural Circuits by Vijay Balasubramanian
The Future of the Planet: Life, Growth and Death in Organisms, Cities and Companies by Geoffrey West
Energy, Scaling & The Future of Life on Earth by Geoffrey West
Complex Time Working Group: “What is Sleep?” with Geoffrey West, Van Savage, Alex Herman
Papers:
“Brain Power” in PNAS (August 2, 2021) doi.org/10.1073/pnas.210702211
“The Physical Effects of Learning” preprint published in biorxiv
“Unraveling why we sleep: Quantitative analysis reveals abrupt transition from neural reorganization to repair in early development” in Science Advances (September 18, 2020) DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aba0398
“The Scales That Limit: The Physical Boundaries of Evolution” in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution (August 7, 2019) doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2019.00242
Learn more, follow us on social media and check out our podcasts:
linktr.ee/sfiscience