January 20, 2026

Stuart Kauffman: There Is No Theory of Everything

1 hour 28 minutes

This is an interview with Stuart Kauffman, one of the founders of complexity theory. He invented random Boolean networks at only 23 years old and helped establish the Santa Fe Institute. Now 86, he makes a striking claim: there is no theory of everything. Kauffman argues that biological evolution creates genuinely new possibilities that cannot be deduced from prior states—paralleling the ancient Chinese Tao more than Plato's Logos. He also believes he's found something new in quantum gravity (and, in his words, "genuinely huge"). He unveils it here for the first time.

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LINKS MENTIONED:

- Investigations [Book]: https://amazon.com/dp/B00W0DHAH6?tag=toe08-20

- Stuart Kauffman's Books [Amazon]: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B000APT8XK

- A Third Transition In Science? [Article]: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rsfs/article/13/3/20220063/89381/A-third-transition-in-science-A-third-transition

- Genetic Regulatory Mechanisms In Protein Synthesis [Paper]: https://www.gs.washington.edu/academics/courses/braun/55106/readings/jacob_and_monod.pdf

- Is Mind In Spacetime? [Paper]: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38969235/

- The World Is Not A Theorem [Paper]: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2101.00284

- Origins Of Order [Book]: https://amazon.com/dp/0195079515?tag=toe08-20

- The Universal Constructor [Article]: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.157.3785.180.a

- Metabolic Stability And Epigenesis In Random Genetic Nets [Paper]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0022519369900150

- Antichaos And Adaptation [Article]: https://www.jstor.org/stable/24938683

- The Selfish Gene [Book]: https://amazon.com/dp/0199291152?tag=toe08-20

- Biological Organization As Closure Of Constraints [Paper]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022519315001009

- Physics And Philosophy [Book]: https://amazon.com/dp/0061209198?tag=toe08-20

- Combinatorial Chemistry: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/nursing-and-health-professions/combinatorial-chemistry

- Connections [Series]: https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/amzn1.dv.gti.484e32c5-60bd-4493-a800-e44fd0940312

- Gonen Ashkenasy's Papers: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=7kP7Fi4AAAAJ

- Michael Levin [TOE]: https://youtu.be/c8iFtaltX-s

- Anna Ciaunica & Michael Levin [TOE]: https://youtu.be/2aLhkm6QUgA

- Plato's Cave [TOE]: https://youtu.be/PurNlwnxwfY

- "Is God A Taoist?" [TOE]: https://youtu.be/P-jh6tRh3Jw

- Chiara Marletto [TOE]: https://youtu.be/40CB12cj_aM

- John Donoghue [TOE]: https://youtu.be/dG_uKJx6Lpg

- Yang-Hui He [TOE]: https://youtu.be/wbP0KjWm0pw

- Tim Palmer [TOE]: https://youtu.be/vlklA6jsS8A

- Tim Maudlin [TOE]: https://youtu.be/fU1bs5o3nss

- Lee Smolin [TOE]: https://youtu.be/uOKOodQXjhc

- Carlo Rovelli [TOE]: https://youtu.be/hF4SAketEHY

- Geoffrey Hinton [TOE]: https://youtu.be/b_DUft-BdIE

- Richard Dawkins's Lecture: https://youtu.be/nfZMyJq6BBM

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