Critical technological and societal changes of the last century have been spearheaded by entrepreneurs and the investors who...

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The universe is 13.8 billion years old and humans have existed for only 200,000 years. If that time...

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Most people want to help others with their career, but what's the best way to do that? Become...

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Brendan Eich is widely regarded as a 'Father of the Web'. He is the creator of JavaScript and...

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For thirty-seven years, Marc Cohodes has bet big money against bad companies. Due to his success, he is...

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Leonard Susskind is the Felix Bloch professor of Theoretical physics at Stanford University. He is widely regarded as...

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Leonard Susskind is the Felix Bloch professor of Theoretical physics at Stanford University.  He is widely regarded as the father of String Theory.

In this episode, Joe joins Leonard at Stanford to remember Leonard’s friend and mentor Richard Feynman, one of the great physicists of the twentieth century. They also discuss Leonard’s famous ‘Black Hole War’ with Stephen Hawking, String Theory, the multiverse, and what it’s like to be a 78-year-old physicist.

Selected links
Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman, autobiographical anecdotes from the great man himself
The Black Hole War: My Battle with Stephen Hawking to Make the World Safe for Quantum Mechanics, by Leonard Susskind
The World as a Hologram, Leonard Susskind (1994)
The Theoretical Minimum, by Leonard Susskind
The Theoretical Minimum website and courses
Leonard Susskind’s Stanford lectures, in podcast form, on classical mechanics and quantum mechanics

Topics discussed

• Leonard explains to his father that he won’t become a plumber. [5:00]

• What was Richard Feynman like? [10:44]

• Feynman’s theory about fathers in physics. [15:18]

• Leonard’s TED experience. [17:20]

• Leonard’s famous ‘Black Hole War’ with Stephen Hawking and the time in 1981 when he first met Hawking. [19:17]

• The Universe is a hologram! [33:53]

• What is String Theory, and is it a ‘Theory of Everything’? [38:45]

• How many universes are there? [49:00]

• The anthropic principle. [52:30]

• Our ability to visualise more than three dimensions is constrained by our evolutionary psychology. [57:48]

• What’s it like to be 78 year-old physicist? [1:01:24]

• What problem in physics would Leonard love to see solved? [1:03:20]

Harry Crane is a scholar who specialises in statistics and probability. He is currently a professor of statistics...

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Harry Crane is a scholar who specialises in statistics and probability. He is currently a professor of statistics at Rutgers University.

In this episode, Joe catches up with Harry in New Jersey to discuss the history of probability, how experts routinely misuse statistics, “The First Rule of Probability”, the replication crisis in science, and how Harry thinks about probability in shapes rather than numbers.

Selected links

Connect with Harry Crane: Website | Twitter
Harry’s book, Probabilistic Foundations of Statistical Network Analysis
Harry’s project, Researchers.one: Website | Twitter
Nassim Taleb, Foundations of Probability Seminar
Daniel Kahneman, Foundations of Probability Seminar
Harry Crane, Foundations of Probability Seminar
The Signal and the Noise, by Nate Silver
The modern-day snake oil salesman, Harry’s medium article on Nate Silver
A technical companion to the above medium article
Benjamin et al’s paper on redefining statistical significance
Harry’s paper on the replication crisis, a reply to Benjamin et al
Skin in the Game, by Nassim Taleb
Daniel Kahneman’s open letter on priming
Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman
The ‘Linda problem’ (original paper)
The ‘base rate fallacy’ (original paper)

Topics discussed

• Harry’s definitions of probability and statistics. [14:20]

• Misuses of statistics, including why Nate Silver is always right (and therefore wrong). [23:12]

• Harry introduces “The First Rule of Probability” - an application of “skin in the game”. [28:14]

• The replication crisis in science. [33:15]

• Harry’s radical proposal to address the replication crisis. [59:27]

• Joe and Harry discuss Kahneman and Tversky’s famous “Linda problem” and whether people being “bad intuitive statisticians” is necessarily a bad thing. [01:08:48]

• Gerd Gigerenzer’s riposte to Kahneman and Tversky. [01:19:39]

• Kahneman and Tversky’s “blue cab problem” and the base rate fallacy - and how they are predicated on the supposed rightness of Bayesian probability. [01:21:23]

• How Harry thinks about probability in shapes rather than numbers. [01:31:33]

• Harry’s new book Probabilistic Foundations of Statistical Network Analysis and the main idea it advances. [01:35:37]

• Harry’s project Researchers.one and how he’s hoping to improve academia. [01:39:00]