Anthony Aguirre: Cosmological Koans (#184)

Physicist Anthony Aguirre studies the formation, nature, and evolution of the universe, focusing primarily on the model of eternal inflation—the idea that inflation goes on forever in some regions of universe—and what it may mean for the ultimate beginning of the universe and time. He is the co-founder and associate scientific director of the Foundational Questions Institute, which supports research on questions at the foundations and new frontiers of physics and cosmology. Anthony is also a co-founder of the Future of Life Institute, an organization aiming to increase the probability that life has a future, and of Metaculus, an effort to optimally aggregate predictions about scientific discoveries, technological breakthroughs, and other interesting issues.

Cosmological Koans: A Journey to the Heart of Physical Reality, physicist Anthony Aguirre explores deep questions about the nature of reality, using an approach inspired by Zen koans to take the reader on a thought-provoking tour of the cosmos and the core ideas of modern physics.

The book covers a wide range of topics, woven together with a fictional storyline that recounts a journey from Italy to Japan. Multiple universes, the nature of time, the meaning of quantum theory, and entropy and information are among the subjects explored.

• @AnthonyNAguirre
• http://fqxi.org/
• http://www.futureoflife.org/
• https://www.amazon.com/Cosmological-Koans-Journey-Physical-Reality/dp/0393609219

• 00:00:00 Intro
• 00:06:22 Why did you right Cosmological Koans?
• 00:11:48 How do you reconcile the mysteries unanswered by physics?
• 00:17:08 Are you a Buddhist? Views on theology and the nature of reality.
• 00:22:18 Do we need a theory of everything?
• 00:31:56 Why did you set the book for when you did in the 1600s?
• 00:39:01 About the historic period in which the book is set.
• 00:41:23 What you have to say about cosmogenesis and big bang cosmology?
• 00:50:52 Thoughts on the multiverse theory. Could other universes have different constants?
• 01:11:56 How much of physics/cosmology is really sociology and our need to believe?
• 01:21:42 What discovery gift of knowledge would you put into a time capsule for the ages?

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