Manifold

Peter Byrne is an investigative reporter and science writer based in Northern California. His popular biography, The Many Worlds of Hugh Everett III - Multiple Universes, Mutual Assured Destruction, and the Meltdown of a Nuclear Family (Oxford University Press, 2010) was followed by publication of The Everett Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, Collected Works 1957-1980, (Princeton University Press, 2012), co-edited with philosopher of science, Jeffrey A. Barrett, of UC Irvine.Everett's formulation of quantum mechanics, which implies the existence of a quantum multiverse, is favored by a significant (and growing) fraction of working physicists.Steve and Peter discuss:0:00 How Peter Byrne came to write a biography of Hugh Everett18:09 Everett’s personal life and groundbreaking thesis as a catalyst for the book24:00 Everett and Decoherence31:25 Reaction of other physicists to Everett’s many worlds theory40:46 Steve’s take on Everett’s many worlds theory43:41 Peter on the bifurcation of science and philosophy49

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned economics professor, bestselling author, innovative educator, and global leader in sustainable development. Professor Sachs serves as the Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and is a University Professor, Columbia's highest academic rank.Steve and Jeffrey discuss:0:00 Jeffrey Sachs’ experience on the Lancet Commission for COVID-1913:41 Potential for bioweapons research19:06 Why a lab leak is plausible32:38 Possible defenses for COVID coverup43:56 Government secrecy and other areas of concern48:08 Reflections on Nord Stream sabotageResources:The Lancet Commission on lessons for the future from the COVID-19pandemic, Sachs et al., Sept. 14 2022: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(22)01585-9/fulltextWhy the Chair of the Lancet’s COVID-19 Commission Thinks The USGovernment Is Preventing a Real Investigation Into the Pandemic,Current Affairs, Aug 3 2022: https://www.jeffsachs.org/interviewsandmedia/64rtmykxdl56eh

Rob Henderson grew up in foster homes in California, joined the Air Force at 17, attended Yale on the G.I. Bill, and is currently a Gates Fellow at Cambridge University (UK). He is an acute observer of American society and has coined the term Luxury Beliefs to describe ideas and opinions that confer status on the rich at very little cost, while taking a toll on the lower class.Steve and Rob discuss:00:00 Early life and foster experience20:21 Rob’s experience in the Air Force31:26 Transitioning from the Air Force to Yale and then Cambridge44:04 Dating and socializing as an older student50:06 Reflections on the Yale Halloween email controversy1:01:10 Personal incentives and careerists in higher education1:09:45 Luxury beliefs and how they show up in elite institutions1:31:08 Age and moral judgments1:42:50 Rob on resisting legacy academia and his futureLinks:Rob's substackhttps://robkhenderson.substack.com/Luxury Beliefs are the Latest Status Symbol for Rich Americanshttps://nypost.com/2019/08/17/luxury-beliefs-

Professor Lyle Goldstein recently retired after 20 years of service on the faculty of the U.S. Naval War College (NWC). During his career at NWC, he founded the China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) and has been awarded the Superior Civilian Service Medal for this achievement. He has written or edited seven books on Chinese strategy and is at work on a book-length project that examines the nature of China-Russia relations in the 21st century. He has a longstanding interest in great power politics, military competition, and security in the pacific region.Goldstein is Director of Asia Engagement at the Washington think-tank Defense Priorities, which advocates for realism and restraint in U.S.defense policy, and also a visiting professor at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University. He earned a PhD at Princeton, an MA from Johns Hopkins SAIS, and an AB from Harvard. He is fluent in both Chinese and Russian.Steve and Lyle discuss:00:00 Early life and background18:03 Goldstein

The guest for this episode is a recent graduate of Harvard College, now pursuing a STEM PhD at another elite university. We have withheld his identity so that he can speak candidly.Steve and his guest discuss:0:00 Anonymous student’s academic background and admission to Harvard21:37 Intellectual curiosity at Harvard29:36 Academic rigor at Harvard and the difference between classes in STEM and the humanities46:47 Access to tenured professors at Harvard50:08 The benefits of the Harvard connection and wider pool of opportunities58:46 Competing with off-scale students 1:00:48 Ideological climate on campus, wokeism, and controversial public speakers1:23:11 Dating at Harvard1:26:52 Z-scores and other metrics to add to the admissions processHarvard Admissions and Meritocracy:http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2009/11/defining-merit.htmlhttps://infoproc.blogspot.com/2014/09/what-is-best-for-harvard.htmlHarvard Affirmative Action Lawsuit:https://infoproc.blogspot.com/2022/01/supreme-court-to-take-up-harvard-unc.htmlhttps://

Richard Lowery is a professor of finance at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, Austin. In this conversation, he describes the ideological climate of his university and the consequent negative effects on undergraduate education and freedom of expression on campus.Links:Richard Lowery at UT Austin:https://www.mccombs.utexas.edu/faculty-and-research/faculty-directory/james-lowery/National Review coverage:https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/a-brave-prof-fights-the-woke-faculty-at-university-of-texas/Academic Freedom in Crisis:https://infoproc.blogspot.com/2021/04/academic-freedom-in-crisis-punishment.htmlMusic used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.–Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State University. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation at MSU and Director of the Institute of Theoretical Science at the University of Oregon. Hsu i

Tim Palmer is Royal Society Research Professor in Climate Physics, and a Senior Fellow at the Oxford Martin Institute.He is interested in the predictability and dynamics of weather and climate, including extreme events.He was involved in the first five IPCC assessment reports and was co-chair of the international scientific steering group of the World Climate Research Programme project (CLIVAR) on climate variability and predictability.After completing his DPhil at Oxford in theoretical physics, Tim worked at the UK Meteorological Office and later the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. For a large part of his career, Tim has developed ensemble methods for predicting uncertainty in weather and climate forecasts.In 2020 Tim was elected to the US National Academy of Sciences.Steve, Corey Washington, and Tim first discuss his career path from physics to climate research and then explore the science of climate modeling and the main uncertainties in state-of-the-art models.In this episode, we discu

Kishore Mahbubani is Distinguished Fellow at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore.  Kishore enjoyed two distinct careers: in diplomacy (1971 to 2004) and in academia (2004 to 2019). He is a prolific writer and speaker on geopolitics and East-West relations. He was twice Singapore’s Ambassador to the UN and served as President of the UN Security Council in January 2001 and May 2002.  Mr. Mahbubani joined academia in 2004, when he was appointed the Founding Dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKY School), NUS. He was Dean from 2004 to 2017.In this episode Steve and Kishore discuss:0:00 Introduction2:52 Upbringing in Singapore and Asia's rise11:35 How western thinking influences China-U.S. relations23:05 Is China a threat to U.S. hegemony in Asia?25:52 The United States' long-term strategy for China32:13 How trade with ASEAN influences U.S.-China relations40:58 Can ASEAN countries play a diplomatic role between U.S. and China43:05 Xi Jinping's leadership and the zero-sum vi

Gregory Clark is Distinguished Professor of Economics at UC-Davis. He is an editor of the European Review of Economic History, chair of the steering committee of the All-UC Group in Economic History, and a Research Associate of the Center for Poverty Research at Davis. He was educated at Cambridge University and received a PhD from Harvard University.His areas of research are long-term economic growth, the wealth of nations, economic history, and social mobility.Steve and Greg discuss:0:00 Introduction2:31 Background in economics and genetics10:25 The role of genetics in determining social outcomes16:27 Measuring social status through marriage and occupation36:15 Assortative mating and the industrial revolution49:38 Criticisms of empirical data, engagement on genetics and economic history1:12:12 Heckman and Landerso study of social mobility in US vs Denmark1:24:32 Predicting cognitive traits1:33:26 Assortative mating and increase in population varianceLinks:For Whom the Bell Curve Tolls: A Lineage of 400,000

This interview with John Mearsheimer was conducted in 2020 on the original Manifold podcast with Corey Washington and Steve Hsu. Parts of the conversation are prescient with respect to US-China relations and the situation in Ukraine.John Joseph Mearsheimer is an American political scientist and international relations scholar, who belongs to the realist school of thought. He is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago. He has been described as the most influential realist of his generation.Mearsheimer is best known for developing the theory of offensive realism, which describes the interaction between great powers as being primarily driven by the rational desire to achieve regional hegemony in an anarchic international system. In accordance with his theory, Mearsheimer believes that China's growing power will likely bring it into conflict with the United States.Steve, Corey, and John discuss:0:00 A quick message for listeners1:21 Introduction2:39 Realist foreign pol

Theodore A. Postol is professor emeritus of Science, Technology, and International Security at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is widely known as an expert on nuclear weapons and missile technology.Educated in physics and nuclear engineering at MIT, he was a researcher at Argonne National Lab, worked at the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, and was scientific advisor to the Chief of Naval Operations.After leaving the Pentagon, Postol helped to build a program at Stanford University to train mid-career scientists to study weapons technology in relation to defense and arms control policy.He has received numerous awards, including the Leo Szilard Prize from the American Physical Society for "incisive technical analysis of national security issues that [have] been vital for informing the public policy debate",  the Norbert Wiener Award from Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility for "uncovering numerous and important false claims about missile defenses", and the Richard L. Gar

Raghu Parthasarathy is the Alec and Kay Keith Professor of Physics at the University of Oregon. His research focuses on biophysics, exploring systems in which the complex interactions between individual components, such as biomolecules or cells, can give rise to simple and robust physical patterns. Raghu is the author of a recent popular science book: So Simple a Beginning: How Four Physical Principles Shape Our Living World.Steve and Raghu discuss: 1:34 - Early life, transition from Physics to Biophysics20:15 - So Simple a Beginning: discussion of the Four Physical Principles in the title, which govern biological systems26:06 - DNA prediction37:46 - Machine learning / causality in science46:23 - Scaling (the fourth physical principle) 54:12 - Who the book is for and what high schoolers are learning in their bio and physics classes1:05:41 - Science funding, grants, running a research lab1:09:12 - Scientific careers and radical sub-optimality of the existing system Resources: Book - https://press.princeton.edu

Carl Zha is the host of the Silk and Steel podcast, which focuses on China, history, culture, and politics. He is a former engineer now based in Bali, Indonesia.Find Carl on Twitter @CarlZha.Steve and Carl discuss:1. Carl’s background: Chongqing to Chicago, Caltech to Bali, Life as a digital nomad2. Xinjiang (35:20)3. Ukraine (1:03:51)4. China-Russia relationship (1:16:01)5. U.S.-China competition (1:49:26)Music used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.–Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State University. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation at MSU and Director of the Institute of Theoretical Science at the University of Oregon. Hsu is a startup founder (SafeWeb, Genomic Prediction, Othram) and advisor to venture capital and other investment firms. He was educated at Caltech and Berkeley, was a Harvard Junior Fellow, and has held faculty positions at Yal

Scott Aaronson is the David J. Bruton Centennial Professor of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Austin, and director of its Quantum Information Center. Previously, he taught for nine years in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT. His research interests center around the capabilities and limits of quantum computers, and computational complexity theory more generally. Scott also writes the blog Shtetl Optimized: https://scottaaronson.blog/ Steve and Scott discuss:Scott's childhood and education, first exposure to mathematics and computers.How he became interested in computational complexity, pursuing it rather than AI/ML.The development of quantum computation and quantum information theory from the 1980s to the present. Scott's work on quantum supremacy.AGI, AI SafetyMusic used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State Univers

Sebastian Mallaby is a writer and journalist whose work covers financial markets, international relations, innovation, and technology. He is the author of "The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future." Steve and Sebastian discuss venture capital, tech startups, business model and technology innovation, global adoption of the Silicon Valley model, and the future of innovation.Biography:https://www.cfr.org/expert/sebastian-mallabyhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sebastian_MallabyThe Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Futurehttps://www.amazon.com/Power-Law-Venture-Capital-Making/dp/052555999X--Music used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.--Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State University. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation at MSU and Director of the Institute of Theoretical Science at the University of Oregon. Hsu i

Vlatko Vedral is Professor in the Department of Physics at the University of Oxford and Centre for Quantum Technologies (CQT) at the National University of Singapore. He is known for his research on the theory of Entanglement and Quantum Information Theory.Steve and Vlatko discuss: History of quantum information theory, entanglement, and quantum computingRecent lab experiments that create superposition states of macroscopic objects, including a living creature (tardigrade)Whether quantum mechanics implies the existence of many worlds: are you in a superposition state right now?Present status and future of quantum computingResourcesWeb page:https://www.vlatkovedral.com/Entanglement Between Superconducting Qubits and a Tardigradehttps://arxiv.org/pdf/2112.07978.pdfMacroscopic Superposition States: entanglement of a macroscopic living organism (tardigrade) with a superconducting qubithttps://infoproc.blogspot.com/2021/12/macroscopic-superposition-states.html--Music used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Li

Richard Sander is Jesse Dukeminier Professor at UCLA Law School. AB Harvard, JD, PhD (Economics) Northwestern.Sander has studied the structure and effects of law school admissions policies. He coined the term "Mismatch" to describe negative consequences resulting from large admissions preferences.Topics discussed: 1. Early life: educational background and experience with race andpolitics in America. 2. Mismatch Theory: basic observation and empirical evidence; Lawschools and Colleges; Duke and UC data; data access issues. 3. CA Prop 209 and Prop 16. 4. SCOTUS and Harvard / UNC admissions case 5. Intellectual climate on campus, freedom of speech Resources: Faculty web page, includes links to publications:https://law.ucla.edu/faculty/faculty-profiles/richard-h-sander  A Conversation on the Nature, Effects, and Future of Affirmative Action in Higher Education Admissions (with Peter Arcidiacono, Thomas Espenshade, and Stacy Hawkins), University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law 683 (2015)   https://pa

Shai Carmi is Professor of Statistical and Medical Genetics at Hebrew University (Jerusalem).Carmi Lab: https://scarmilab.org/Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShaiCarmi Topics and links:Shai's educational background. From statistical physics and network theory to genomics.Shai's paper on embryo selection: Schizophrenia risk. Modeling synthetic sibling genomes. Variance among sibs vs general population. RRR vs ARR, family history and elevated polygenic risk. (Link to paper: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.11.05.370478v3)Response to the ESHG opinion piece on embryo selection. https://twitter.com/ShaiCarmi/status/1487694576458481664Pleiotropy, Health Index scores.Genetic genealogy and DNA forensics. Solving cold cases, Othram, etc. (Link to paper: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aau4832)Healthcare in Israel. Application of PRS in adult patients.Music used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.--Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Com

Jon Y produces Asianometry, which focuses on Asia technology, finance, and history: Podcast, YouTube channel, and Substack.Steve and Jon discuss the global semiconductor industry with an emphasis on U.S.-China technology competition. Topics discussed:Jon's background and his move to Taipei.Key components of the semiconductor ecosystem: fabs, lithography, chip design.US-China tech warTSMC, ASML, HuaweiTaiwan politics: Green and Blue parties, independencePRC invasion / blockade of Taiwan?Music used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.--Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State University. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation at MSU and Director of the Institute of Theoretical Science at the University of Oregon. Hsu is a startup founder (SafeWeb, Genomic Prediction, Othram) and advisor to venture capital and other investment firms. He was educated at Caltec

Richard Hanania is President of the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology (CSPI). He is a former Research Fellow at the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University. His interests include personality differences between conservatives and liberals, morality in international politics, machine learning algorithms for text analysis, and American foreign policy. In addition to his academic work, he has written in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. Hanania holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from UCLA and a JD from the University of Chicago.He is the author of the recently published Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategy: How Generals, Weapons Manufacturers, and Foreign Governments Shape American Foreign Policy.ResourcesRichard Hanania on Twitter - https://twitter.com/RichardHananiaCSPI - https://cspicenter.org/Public Choice Theory and the Illusion of Grand Strategyhttps://www.amazon.com/Public-Choice-Theory-Illusion-Strategy-ebook