Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | September 2022

Patreon: / seanmcarroll
Blog post with audio player, show notes, and transcript: www.preposterousuniverse.com/...
Welcome to the September 2022 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by Patreon supporters (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by Patrons, whittle them down to a more manageable number - based primarily on whether I have anything interesting to say about them, not whether the questions themselves are good - and sometimes group them together if they are about a similar topic. Enjoy!
Mindscape Podcast playlist: • Mindscape Podcast
Sean Carroll channel: / seancarroll
#podcast #ideas #science #philosophy #culture

[@timyassa4343]

Who else woke up to this

[@mrmicksniffertherd]

Who didn't wake up to this, is the big question

[@Catseyes07]

Me Right now, uk 7.30am lol

[@bjpafa2293]

Your opinion about the Electoral College is absolutely correct on my point of view. Congrats, Professor, that needs to be declared. Thank you so much.

[@Mutual_Information]

It would be pretty exciting to have Sean Carroll as a professor.. I'm slightly jealous of those students.

[@wither8]

@Sean Carroll can you mic + tape your lecture set? Considering how awesome "The Biggest Ideas in the Universe" was, I'm sure the quality would be stellar. I'd happily pay a few hundred dollars to compensate for the extra labor to get a lecture set for myself, or for some 15 year old kid who is specifically interested in this sort of exposition but can't afford it (The Oxford lecture set that you and Nima both did were fascinating to watch. As someone who would read Hume, then Russell on Hume, then a psychedelic here and there, if I had found them @15 rather than @25, my career trajectory might very well have changed. I can say with 100% certainty that despite discovering them 'past neuroplasticistic-prime', they're still worth their weight in gold.)

[@musictheorytree]

@@wither8 after watching Robert Sapolsky's lecture series from Stanford, I second how super high-value Sean's participation in such endeavours would be.

[@auslander6710]

​@@wither83:09

[@dfsfdsfsdfsdfsadsdfsfdsdsf3587]

theologian

[@BrianFedirko]

Nobel Prize: If anyone deserves a prize it's Sean Carroll. The talent of this person to understand and teach how this universe works is beyond anyone in history. His recall and dedication to being unbiased in the pursuit of knowledge are beyond and deserving of money and recognition. As far as prizes go, I wouldn't wish the aftermath of this prize on anyone. The money would be good, but prizes for artistic endeavors such as creative knowledge don't make any sense to begin with. They seem a curse more than a positive. Gr8 Peace ☮💜

[@DunsmoreFamily]

On the secrets to black holes physics and a good theory for gravity at really large scales I was watching a video on tensors planes and how gravity wells behave. You know the standard Lycra / spandex sheet with weights set in the in the center, as balls where being thrown around it, and I realized that they were only simulating a two dimensional plane of an actual three dimensional object. and as I watched the masses in the center started to stack up in the third dimension. But since it’s only a two dimensional plane, the matter was starting to stack in the third dimension. What if, gravity inside a black hole does the same thing but instead of three dimensions we consider four, and the matter is stacking in the fourth dimension like, a hyper cube inside the black hole. What if, for a new model of gravity we have to go to four dimensions? We always said gravity was so much weaker because it’s effects where in more then three dimensions. Why not try and simulate it. Could somebody models this and confirm or rule out this theory? Link to the video. But I’m sure you’ve seen them or something like them before. kzbin.info/www/bejne/g4W8Yn6gmpWsgsk Eric W. Dunsmore

[@spaceinyourface]

Good to hear Brian Keating asking Sean a question. 👍

[@NoLuv4Hoz]

Ah I think I'm starting to get it...entanglement is the building block of the very concept of 'closeness' or spatial proximity. Therefore, "spooky action at a distance" is not really distant, as two entangled objects are actually very close and are effectively "touching" each other. ER = EPR and Mind = Blown.

[@smlanka4u]

Observer/detector is the hidden function in the wave function.! Probably, there are different types of natural observations. Thank you so much for the best explanations.

[@user-sb3wh3dd4v]

"Physics of democracy" sounds like an interesting course!

[@gonejegory3345]

Maybe it used to be what was called Political Science.

[@finalfandy4766]

.. this channel deserves way more subscribers; viewers can help by just clicking the 'like' button.. the more 'likes' it gets the more often it appears on the general KZbin viewers page .. because there are so many irritating junk 'sciencey' garbage channels on KZbin all with clickbaity titles many with way more subscribers and views. I don't understand why some people prefer listening to fantastic nonsense rather than facts

[@gilbertanderson3456]

2:47:25 Sandra Stuckey's question about singular impacts on the future brought to mind the Montreal Protocol as an example where a few people had a tremendous impact on a global problem.

[@nmarbletoe8210]

Life: an eddy in the flow of entropy.

[@bobdole57]

Sean. You are 100% correct that it's impossible to directly compare or sum interpersonal utility. It's ordinal and not cardinal.

[@travisfitzwater8093]

Kant: Intuition is clear insofar as objects are given to us. What he means is that our immediate understanding of a freshly contemplated object depends on the manner in which we are able to regard an object. Objects refers to anything contemplatable which is anything we are able to regard. Our perception of things is limited by they way they present to us or are presented to us. The classic example would be an iceberg, only the top of which can be seen (at least this was the case in his day). Or if you saw a rock or an artificial object showing only 5% out of the ground. I hope this makes sense

[@christianhujer346]

I would love to see Dave Snowden and Sean Carroll having a conversation about complexity. Has that already happened? If not, can we make that happened?

[@rajdeepkhurana7495]

😊😊

[@rajdeepkhurana7495]

😊😊

[@bentationfunkiloglio]

Professor, hope you enjoy your first day back at school this year! Thank you for another thought expanding discussion. Got a real kick out of the temporally interrupted Alice question.

[@andanssas]

1:35:36 Dr. Brian Keating's question about NFTs and blockchain in science and/or publishing. My 2 cents: (1) reviewers ledger for transparency of the peer-reviewing process; (2) publishing token, awarded while articles = NFTs are publicly available and could be exchanged to fund research.

[@at-last]

Dave Snowden addresses Complex Systems: See Cynefin

[@rainazarhayat]

What a GREAT podcast... The best in the business... 👏

[@jackfrosterton4135]

1:07:00 I'd like to know, if you cloned 1000 Alices, should all of them be punished for Alice's crime? If Alice's memories were implanted into Sean, and Sean was given surgery to resemble Alice, should Sean be punished for Alice's crime? What if the rest of his memories were erased? Or weren't? I wish Sean were explicit in his opinion of where the seat of personal identity is.

[@squamish4244]

"Life after death. Some say no, theologians disagree. Thoughts?"

[@scambammer6102]

go down to your morgue and ask them

[@chromabotia]

@@scambammer6102 I'll go down to the local morgue, if you explain consciousness fully to me.

[@scambammer6102]

@@chromabotia sure. Consciousness is when you are thinking. I can see why you are confused about that

[@bjpafa2293]

Ethics and morality are historically different areas and concepts. It is not wrong to say the first is secular, while the second is religion related or enforced into social tissue in a more subtle, ambiguous, manipulative way. Ethics asks what's the minimum amount of rules to a optimal society, or other philosophical posture, Moral says you should behave like this, or you are bad to the bone. You may research the evolution of the terms, and may say that today they are "almost" interchangeable, which is to say, is decoherence and branching precisely interchangeable? And I believe the last is closer to interchangeability.

[@johngiraldi1150]

At about 36:00... what if quantum mechanics describes the base classes for the simulation technology.

[@stt5v2002]

Oh wow, I graduated from Johns Hopkins with a major in biophysics. It’s been a minute, but if you had been there when I attended I’m sure I would’ve taken one or two of your courses.

[@BigZebraCom]

Hey @Sean Carroll how do we submit questions? I hope it doesn't require a patreon link. As you know, there is no currency among Zebras. But If you agree to answer my question, I promise to kick a lion in the face for you.

[@Choofalong]

It is explained at start but yes, it is for Patreons to ask questions. Originally, the whole thing was going to be Patreon only but everyone voted to make the answers public. I really enjoy this format, even though some does get repeated, having public access to a world-class well, anything, can only help get people interested in the field!

[@BigZebraCom]

@@Choofalong Yes. I am amazed at how productive Dr Carroll is--so many courses to teach, papers to read, papers to write and he still manages to engage the public in this way.

[@rajeevgangal542]

Good pitch 😁

[@denalozecon9074]

Sean Your usage of terminology is very precise and I appreciate that. At about 1:51 time in video you said their are an infinite number of choices possible for a Human in a five minute time-frame. Okay so my question is did you mean that literally or did you mean that informally in this way I will describe next? Informal phrase 'There are so many choices possible you might as well consider it to be infinite' ? Personally I think what you meant was the second meaning. My next post will be about how huge the number of choices are possible in X time period.

[@denalozecon9074]

So subjectively I think that I consciously make up to ? choices per second. Hmm instead of maximum I will guess 5 to 500 choices per second that are conscious choices. Most meaningless even to me such as distinction from a foot placed at point X or same foot placed 1/8th inch from point X. Also ignore subconscious choices that could be 100 times more per second; if I am not even aware of subconscious choices I cannot say to myself they are me, but just blame my brain and brownian motion and quantum weirdness and random biochemistry...all working together to not prevent free will, but to put my mind in a box of allowed choices for my conscious mind. That box is not real but still metaphorically it exists. The box is choices I can think of while I am awake, thoughts reasonably likely for me personally given my memories and my personality. Outside the box is Thoughts technically possible for me to have, but that would only happen as me reacting to external events I consider unlikely. Outside the box is also choices unlikely for me because they are contrary for my personality or they are reactions to unlikely external events.

[@denalozecon9074]

I will not claim there are infinite choices possible in five minutes.I will arbitrarily do a WAG. My wag is there are Tree(3) choices possible for each Human, in each 24 hour period. A finite number so large that if you tried to fit that number in a Human Brain...brain implodes into a Black Hole. It's really hard to even imagine a computer AI mind in a Jupitor size computer...being able to really understand Tree(3) Monster Group or Rayos Number are far larger concepts than Tree(3) but still not infinite...

[@Corvaire]

I'll have to dissagree on both the question and the answer concerning the pressure of the universe causing gravity. The energy density of the universe is a direct outcome of pressure via trans--dimensional dark energy. When you refer to negative pressure, you are referring to a linear concept of local space, not the overall volume of space. As particle/waves move closer together their movements are not just constrained locally, but also 4 dimensionally. It's the 4d spin (across the quantum field [cross-dimensional]) that keeps dark energy repelled, as it slows down that 'pressure' is then applied. So technically, pressure does directly contribute to gravity, just not locally. Or, you can think it as anti-pressure in route of negative space, but that would be considered a double negative. ;O)-

[@weverleywagstaffe8490]

Love u Stan!! Thanks for education!!

[@Inyobizzness]

41:42

[@davidc.2279]

Have a great new week at "school" Sean!

[@paulc96]

Hi Professor Sean, I'm sure you'll be glad to hear that I have finally joined the Mindscape Patreon subscribers. I will try to compose a question for October's AMA. All the Best, Paul C.

[@michaeljfigueroa]

I finally sent you $30 for your charity. Thank you for everything.

[@LeeLightfoot]

The 1 hour 7 debate: demonstrates why the foundational Mens Rea idea, that Henrich would signal as originating in western Weirdness, is inferior in many ways to some concept of social quarantine; in the quarantine methodology it would only matter if an individual is a further risk to society. A reconstruction of an individual with a theoretical gene for mindless violence, for instance, still poses a threat without any need for assigning guilt.

[@Confuseddave]

If the justification for getting a vote in a democratic system is having a stake in the outcome, wouldn't that imply that non-residents should have a vote too? As a citizen of the UK (who has never lived anywhere else and has no intention of living anywhere else), I absolutely have a stake in the outcome of the US presidential election, because of all the ways that US foreign policy affects the world at large; am I justified in asking for a vote?

[@destinationcentauri]

The USA fought an entire war to be free from UK voter influence!

[@nmarbletoe8210]

Logically, yeah you should at least get a vote in what the US exports to y'all and what you export to us. Products, pollution, pop culture... Perhaps all countries could form a new United Notions with an actual democratic parliament. It could take on stuff like bird migration, international tax shelters, CO2, and fair trade and work for the people instead of the presidents!

[@bjpafa2293]

I shouldn't have prejudices against religious apparatus behevior? Maybe suspections should be a good base line to depart. Then, there's always hope, even in death, as we know. 😊

[@helicalactual]

In regards to the memory question; what you are entangled with is not the same, as is the “soul” being of what your entangled with. And because you can’t measure entanglement, you cannot say anything about it. You again have set up false axioms prof doc. 1:05:00 conversation

[@Lance_Lough]

Manipulating the DNA code should be approached with great caution. For one thing individual genes may have multiple functions and effects (a fact which wasn't realized until recently)

[@nmarbletoe8210]

yup. I've heard it said that every gene affects every trait

[@tcarr349]

Really good questions on the cutting room floor…Lol I keep striking out everywhere!

[@nujuat]

I'm at an Australian university, and the culture here is that all lecturers are addressed to by their first name, even by undergraduates. As opposed to high school where title is really important even though everyone has lower qualifications. I guess because no one uses a title (day to day), the "cool professor" thing doesn't really apply? I haven't thought about the power dynamics between lecturers that much though. Also the title of "professor" is reserved for only the top level of staff in a department/school, which is why I'm using the term "lecturer" instead.

[@Corvaire]

They'll never achieve perfect Supersymmetry until they except trans-dimensional space and the quantum field seperation as both a bridge and an active pivot (4d spin) of wave functions. :O/-

[@Corvaire]

There, I said it, the emperor has no clothes. ;O)-

[@lovefeelsbest]

Two adults afraid to google a Bigfoot doc. 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣

[@bomoanbomoan9259]

I think scholarships should be granted based on merit and competence not based on gender or race.

[@h.p.b.2956]

And what's the best predictor of achievement (ie, your "merit and competence" ) is among high school students/graduates? Zip code. Which is to say, how much money your parents have. And then who is best positioned to pursue higher education regardless of actual merit? Students whose parents can already afford college, who didn't, eg., have to carry a job and all their classes, who had the time and resources to pursue interests outside of school, the kind that are so critical to setting one's self apart in college applications, etc., etc. I assume you're a bright person. Why must we pretend that childhood achievement is a meritocracy, against all the evidence to the contrary?

[@Corvaire]

Flipping the Globe? Then Australia won't be down under. ;O)-

[@czerskip]

Profit from scale is the only way to become a billionaire.

[@MyWissam]

A Canvas shell for a course is the (local) universe; the modules are the molecules, and the module pages are the atoms of each molecule. The design principles aim to glue together these modules into a comprehensible story (universe)...and this is where we get to play god.

[@romliahmadabdulnadzir1607]

Keep it smart and simple (KISS) and it works! However, even yesterday (ancient) it still worked. Sometimes we may ask "why shouldn't it work, yet so simple yet complex, with so many challenges so hard to lift"?

[@bentationfunkiloglio]

Popular vote vs. Electoral College, hrmmmmmm.... fairness is an important consideration. However, fairness seemingly demands more than simply electing the President by popular vote. At a minimum, Constitution Ammendment thresholds also have to change. Would be more fair to swap out the 3/4 ratification by state legislatures requirement with a 3/4 country-wide popular vote. Right? Now, to maximize fairness, one should also reform (or perhaps eliminate) the U.S. Senate. Why should small states and huge states have the same number Senators? That's extremely unfair. Wait a sec ...Hold the phone! Keep them pants on! Dagnabbit, let's not go off all half-cocked here! Seems like all the above-described fair-minded reforms might have unintended and unfortunate consequences. In particular, I'm seeing much rampaging of tyrannical majorities in our future should we make the above changes. More seriously, one doesn't have to look too far back into our country's past to appreciate how horrifically wrong-minded the political majority can be. Sacrificing a bit of fairness to promote and protect diversity of political thought is a really good tradeoff, IMHO. Electing the President by popular vote would probably do more harm than good by further concentrating political power. Just my opinion. Yours might differ.

[@nmarbletoe8210]

How about proportional representation? To me the biggest problem is the two-party duopoly. A majority party can be bad, but when they work together... we get the Patriot Ax and a Drawer on Wugs.

[@pauldhoff]

On this one, you are way off the mark. The clone of Alice is not in anyway responsible for the crimes of the first Alice and should never be punished for them. It seems that you think that someone else in this or any other universe is not you, so how could the clone Alice be the same as the first Alice and then be responsible. If anyone is responsible for a crime, it would be the scientist that created the clone of Alice and and giving her the memories of things she did not do and her being burden by them. It is the same in many ways of making the kids responsible to the actions of their parents and ancestors, the old bible stuff.

[@spaceinyourface]

Sean agreeing its OK to pass judgement on Alice 2.0 is just wrong in my eyes,,,regardless of how identical in every way she is to Alice 1.0 she didn't commit that crime regardless of what Alice 2.0 now believes,,we know different. Leave Alice 1.0 dead,,,& with all that cloning technology,,bring back the victim.

[@TheFuzzician]

I was quite confused by Sean's answer here. Does he think that the two Alice's are a single entity somehow? If Alice 2 was created while Alice 1 was still alive, would he want both of them held responsible? They each would have a separate conscious point of view, which makes them two separate entities, regardless of if they have the same "pattern". His definition of self seems incredibly odd to me.

[@spaceinyourface]

@@TheFuzzician totally. I guess no matter how you cut it ,,Alice 2.0,, still didn't do it.

[@jamesmantooth7364]

I sympathize with the disagreement. You're creating a clone, and you're forcefully inserting criminal memories. Very unethical in my opinion, and would be against it. But if we're more charitable with (what I suspect is) the point of the question, I think it could be reworded like this: If the criminal's microstate was somehow restored back to the state it was prior to death, should she still be processed by the justice system, or not? Should she be treated like a new person and allowed to carry on as she was before her death? If we lived in a society where this thing could happen, we would have to rethink the rules in lieu of the reality that there may be strong incentives for some criminals to reincarnate their way into legal immunity. To the criminals exploiting this, They are the same person. To the outdated legal system, they are just a new person who did nothing wrong.

[@ray17506]

@@jamesmantooth7364 It's really interesting to think about and you make great points. Things start to change as you add context. Id imagine in a world like this rules would need to be followed before reincarnating is green lit. Not anyone could do it. As you pointed out a criminal cant just loop hole through crimes like that. I'd imagine in a world like this if you have a criminal record you lose the privilege of being reincarnated unless you absolve it somehow. Therefore unauthorized reincarnation is also a crime. Here's a thought, perhaps if a criminal commits a crime, any copies that proceed to have this memory inserted does NOT get there criminal record wiped. every crime that was committed until the date of memory recorded also gets that memories criminal record copied as well. It would mean that they would still have to absolve any outstanding crimes afterwards. But this would fix the already alive problem. The already alive don''t get convicted, only the one committing the crime. But that individual still has to deal with the carried over crime record. This would mean multiple copies with the memory would all have to absolve their records. In a sense its convicting the memory not the body. You can imagine that a criminal could frame some one by placing their memory in another persons body not identical to their body of origin. Just to add there is already laws that criminalize people aiding in a crime. So even if someone else reincarnates you, if you both planned it and it was unauthorized. Both of you would get a criminal record.

[@jamesmantooth7364]

@@ray17506 I totally agree that it should be a crime to knowingly create a criminal. In my opinion, criminals shouldn't be sentenced to prison/jail out of revenge, or because of who they are... I see it more as risk-reduction/ prevention/ deterrent. A criminal who commits a crime has demonstrated that under some circumstances, they are likely to commit that type of crime and society has to deal with that somehow. If you made copies of a mass murderer, even five copies... It doesn't even really matter if you consider them the same person. They have the same risk profile as the original and that needs to be considered. But the person creating the copies could be even more dangerous.

[@DeathBender]

It occurs to me Sean is progressive in so many ways and i like it !

[@williamsmith6376]

787uuu

[@martmarriner6793]

bout time you got a job, O'Carroll.