Who is Stephen Wolfram?

You know who Stephen Wolfram is, right?
Whether you love him or, you know, don’t love him, there’s no denying that Stephen Wolfram has founded a host of fascinating projects... most of them named Wolfram-something-or-other.
What are all these Wolfram-branded projects?
Who is Stephen Wolfram?
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Some of the things Stephen Wolfram created:
• 1987 Wolfram Research www.wolfram.com/company/
• 1988 Mathematica www.wolfram.com/mathematica/
• 2009 Wolfram Alpha www.wolframalpha.com/
• 2014 Wolfram Language www.wolfram.com/language/
• 2020 Wolfram Physics www.wolframphysics.org/
not to mention:
• Wolfram Cloud www.wolframcloud.com/
• Wolfram One www.wolfram.com/wolfram-one/
• Wolfram Notebooks www.wolfram.com/notebooks/
• Wolfram Player www.wolfram.com/player/
• Wolfram Script www.wolfram.com/wolframscript/
• Wolfram Engine www.wolfram.com/engine/
• Wolfram Foundation www.wolframfoundation.org/
More about Stephen Wolfram:
• Stephen Wolfram’s web site www.stephenwolfram.com/
• Timeline www.stephenwolfram.com/scrapb...
Stephen Wolfram’s education:
• University of Oxford www.ox.ac.uk/
• California Institute of Technology www.caltech.edu/about
Some of Stephen Wolfram’s special subjects:
• particle physics en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particl...
• cellular automata en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellula...
Some of Stephen Wolfram’s books:
• A New Kind Of Science lasttheory.com/book/a-new-kin...
• A project to find the Fundamental Theory of Physics lasttheory.com/book/a-project...
Other people involved in the Wolfram Physics Project:
• Jonathan Gorard www.wolframphysics.org/people...
• Max Piskunov www.wolframphysics.org/people...
Reference:
• Wolfram Research now has over 800 employees pitchbook.com/profiles/compan...
Image:
• Animation. 1200 iterations of the ‘Rule 110’ Automata commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi... by Mr. Heretic licenced under CC BY-SA 3.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/...
Some of my own projects:
• things made thinkable www.thingsmadethinkable.com/ - visualization of nuclides www.thingsmadethinkable.com/i... - tap the binding energy button bottom right to show the binding energy per nucleon
• Open Web Mind www.openwebmind.com/ - subscribe to the newsletter www.openwebmind.com/newsletter/ or KZbin channel / @openwebmind for more on shared human intelligence
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The Last Theory lasttheory.com/ is hosted by Mark Jeffery markjeffery.com/ founder of Open Web Mind www.openwebmind.com/
Prefer to listen to the audio? Search for The Last Theory in your podcast player, or listen at lasttheory.com/podcast/056-wh...
The full article is at lasttheory.com/article/who-is...
Kootenay Village Ventures Inc.

[@EugenethePhilostopher]

I've been using Mathematica for something like 15 years at this point. The system is unbelievably flexible and can be used for anything. I love it.

[@lasttheory]

Thanks, good to hear that Mathematica inspires such enthusiasm!

[@houstongalloway6380]

He showed up in person at MIT Lincoln Lab when I worked there and gave a talk. So, I did see him in person. He had no notes with him and appeared to be speaking extemporaneously with his laptop connected to Wolframalpha an shown on the big screen. It was fascinating but felt like a random walk though his thoughts.

[@lasttheory]

Interesting, thanks for the insight, Houston! Stephen Wolfram seems to hold an impossible number of things in his head and do an impossible number of things with his time, so it makes sense that he might seem a little random sometimes!

[@generaltheory]

This is the result of reading 10,000 books. I've read over 2,000. I know more than 99% of people, and I don't need any associations with my writings unless I need to write to focus my thinking. My memory is enough, and memories are built on associations, which are built on reading.

[@hyperduality2838]

@@lasttheory Syntax is dual to semantics -- languages, communication. If mathematics is a language then it is dual! Messages in a communication system are predicted into existence according to Shannon's information theorem hence the use of probability and this is a syntropic process -- teleological. Teleological physics (syntropy) is dual to non teleological physics (entropy). Syntropy (prediction) is dual to increasing entropy -- the 4th law of thermodynamics! Predicting messages or probability waves into existence is a syntropic process. All languages are dual, sender is dual to receiver. The observed is dual to the observer -- David Bohm. "Always two there are" -- Yoda. Stephen Wolfram is using duality if he wants languages or communication. Large language models are duality machines as they build models, equivalences or predictions (simulations) of reality.

[@chrisbarry9345]

​@@generaltheoryjealous of your memory. Anything I take in gets distilled for key take away based on an intuitive sense of other things I've read/watched. This results in having a ton of "trust me bro" arguments 😅🤦

[@generaltheory]

@chrisbarry9345 Can't get rid of rid of that - healthy brain is always in search. More focus is needed to connect the dots sometimes; I love using pen and paper for the best focus. I write things down all the time using all methods available, from screenshots to voice recordings. When I create texts, I usually make a KZbin voice rec (often lasting MANY hours), and then KZbin will auto-create a transcript for me, which I later read to find moments that I'll have to back up with data. This happens all of the time. Between 0 and 2% of my ideas can still lead to nothing. And when it comes to just reading fast, it's OK to forget most everything. It's almost always the case that only three pages out of 500 are really interesting and original. The more you read, the more your ideas self-normalize, you see repetitions, confirmations, details,.. And 3/500 is just pure gold.

[@harriehausenman8623]

Interesting insight! 🤗 Great video, as ususal.

[@lasttheory]

Thanks, as ever!

[@GGoAwayy]

He's so elusive! Rarely does he ever speak publicly. This figure is shrouded in mysteries.

[@lasttheory]

I assume you're being sarcastic here? I, for one, am grateful that Stephen Wolfram speaks so often on other people's podcasts and in his own videos. He has a lot to say!

[@User53123]

Lol

[@donny7lewis]

Steven has done live wolfram physics and wolfram alpha trainings on KZbin for free for years. They are amazing. I find him to be one of the more accessible CEO geniuses out there. (Not that there are a great number of CEO geniuses).

[@lasttheory]

@@donny7lewis Yes, thanks Donny. I agree, Stephen Wolfram is second to none in putting his ideas out there. He gets a lot of criticism for going straight to the public, but I think it's a _good_ thing.

[@harriehausenman8623]

🤣good one!

[@generaltheory]

I'd say two things to answer the question: 1) He wrote a book-length summary called “The Physics of Subatomic Particles” when he was 14. He published his first scientific paper at the age of fifteen, and received his PhD in theoretical physics from Caltech by the age of twenty. 2) He has read 10.000 books.

[@lasttheory]

Yes, Stephen Wolfram is an extraordinary person, for sure!

[@marshalmcdonald7476]

I've heard a few of Wolfram's interviews...dude has a good vibe. He seems warm and sincere. I value these traits highly.

[@lasttheory]

Thanks, Marshal. Stephen Wolfram's a brilliant and engaging guy, for sure!

[@marshalmcdonald7476]

And thank you for your channel, efforts and insights. @@lasttheory

[@PURE.EVIL.]

Nice!

[@CrazyAssDrumma]

When I first saw his introduction to his physics project, it was the first I'd ever seen him talk. I knew then that he was a genius, and possibly the next Einstein. I know a lot of people will think that's going too far, but I would bet money on it. I am VERY into science and physics so I know a lot about the scientific method, and the problems plaguing physics right now. I then learned that some people already knew who he was and they didnt really like him, but I didn't understand why... It didn't make sense to me. Such a brilliant mind, such a brilliant communicator, and you hate him because he appears a bit too pompous? kinda fucking ridiculous in my opinion. I've never seen him as pompous... He's just a fascinating mind with child-like enthusiasm for science and technology.

[@CrazyAssDrumma]

Also, this channel is the first "layman" channel I've seen to recognise his work and recognise the potential genius of his new formalism! Well done! I would have loved to do this job myself but I don't have enough time to do a good enough job. You're doing a great service! Thank you for spreading awareness. The haters will hate, but at the end of the day, his ideas are mathematically applicable, and falsifiable! He's not saying "the universe is a hypergraph", he's saying "hey look! look what happens when we analyse a hypergraph! look at all the things that just 'drop out', it's insane!"

[@CrazyAssDrumma]

I absolutely love the Jonathon Gorard interviews also!!! We don't really get enough "content" from Wolfram himself, so hearing about updates and ideas from Gorard is just as fascinating! I will stop spamming now lol

[@lasttheory]

Thanks, that's really good to hear. You give a good defence of Stephen Wolfram. I'm going to do my best to defend him, too, in my next video. Thanks for the comments!

[@generaltheory]

@@CrazyAssDrumma Wolfram's been live working three or more days a week for two years or maybe more. Not enough content?

[@CrazyAssDrumma]

@@generaltheory thats a fair statement tbh. I don't have time to watch all these details and so having short videos answering some of the more interesting questions is a much better format for me personally :)

[@drgetwrekt869]

If the Universe is procedurally generated, the first credit goes to the 2 writers of the classic videogame Elite tho!

[@ai_serf]

I'm been toying around with subtitution systems, ala AABA with several rules { AA->AB, BB->BA, AB->BB } and playing around with the idea of pluralism vs ordered rules or a precedence list. How do we deal with contradictions? EIther have rules for a conflict, or mabe branch out the graph such that there isn't a contradictions.. le sigh. difficult stuff for me.

[@lasttheory]

Interesting, that's great that you're experimenting with this! What do you mean by contradictions/conflicts?

[@createurzatsit8762]

My hope is that these new ideas, and computational irreducibility in particular, will result in a general theory of emergence. We see emergent phenomena everywhere, in every field of science, and we can define everything, and ourselves, as a vertiginous interweaving of emergences. What immense progress if we could conceive of the deep, universal springs of emergence! In my humble opinion, this would be even more fruitful than the project to refound physics alone.

[@lasttheory]

Right, that would be incredible. Jonathan Gorard is working on wider applications of emergent properties of hypergraphs at The Centre for Applied Compositionality. But yes, a truly general theory of emergence would be something else entirely!

[@thesleuthinvestor2251]

I'd like to challenge Steven Wolfram to do what-- in my opinion-- can not be done: Write a program (or train an AI, if he wishes) to write an original novel that, 1. when a human reader picks up and starts reading, he / she could not put it down, and 2. when finished reading, he / she could not forget it. That is, create a program or AI that can write an unputdownable and unforgettable novel. The inherent problem is of course that all math, logic, programming, e c., depend on categories, aka features. No categories, no math. And in order to write novels, the writer must know human ontology, which starts where categories end, as per the old Greek parable of Plato's cave, aka Reductionism. My contention is that an AI could not do this. But I'd be happy if Steve can prove me wrong...

[@lasttheory]

That's an interesting challenge. Personally, I'm less interested in _artificial_ intelligence than in _human_ intelligence. So we might have something in common there: I'd much rather read a novel written by a human than by an AI, however "good" the AI. The question of AI is outside the scope of this channel, which focuses on Wolfram Physics, but I will be covering these questions on my Open Web Mind channel, which you can find at www.youtube.com/@openwebmind Thanks for the comment!

[@stevevitka7442]

Simple question, why doesn't computational irreversibility, just like the halting problem and Godel incompleteness, lead to the conclusion that it is impossible to build strong, safe AI using statistical or maybe any methods? I'd think Wolfram would be sounding the alarm.

[@lasttheory]

I think you're right, Steve, AI can't be fully modelled or controlled, at least through the kinds of methods you mention. Personally, I don't think AI is a unique risk; I think the tech-complexification of our society in general is the true risk. But in any case, there are plenty of people who _are_ sounding the alarm about AI.

[@lined01]

Seems like a question of communication, representation, perspective and network tags - likes and/or dislikes besides - recognition, appreciation or respect and participation are more important and less questionable. Positioning, connectivity could influence emotions one or another way.. Why is science apparently gaining dominance above rudimentary emotions??

[@SB324]

Wolfram is playing for keeps.

[@marshalmcdonald7476]

Yep, he's a sincere seeker.