Dror Bar Natan on Knot Theory, Learning from Ed Witten, Eric Weinstein, and Quantum Field Theory

YouTube link: https://youtu.be/rJz_Badd43c Dror Bar-Natan is a Professor of mathematic who's interests include knot theory, QFT, and Khovanov homology Sponsors: https://brilliant.org/TOE for 20% off. http://algo.com for supply chain AI. Patreon: https://patreon.com/curtjaimungal Crypto: https://tinyurl.com/cryptoTOE PayPal: https://tinyurl.com/paypalTOE Twitter: https://twitter.com/TOEwithCurt Discord Invite: https://discord.com/invite/kBcnfNVwqs iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/better-left-unsaid-with-curt-jaimungal/id1521758802 Pandora: https://pdora.co/33b9lfP Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4gL14b92xAErofYQA7bU4e Subreddit r/TheoriesOfEverything: https://reddit.com/r/theoriesofeverything LINKS MENTIONED: PDF link of notes: https://tinyurl.com/4u4ru2yh TIMESTAMPS: 00:00:00 Introduction 00:03:29 Quantum Field Theory and Knot Theory 00:10:19 Another QFT / Knot Theory connection or analogy 00:20:46 Knot Theory and Gravity + Bar-Natan's PhD on Chern-Simons 00:24:08 Homology and Cohomology 00:32:54 Dror's average day / routines / laziness 00:35:23 What is "work" for a Professor? How much of it is thinking vs. reading etc.? 00:36:50 All the research is to support teaching 00:41:34 Motivated examples are what's missing in math teaching  00:47:35 Are you more creative when younger or older? 00:48:43 Being "systematic" with learning and research 00:50:37 Rant against theorems and proofs (emphasis) 00:54:51 What understanding a mathematical concept looks like 01:03:35 On laziness, strengths, and weaknesses in mathematics 01:07:47 Advice for the struggling mathematician 01:09:30 What did Dror learn from studying with Ed Witten 01:12:12 On Eric Weinstein 01:19:32 Knot Theory and Physics (again) 01:20:10 Why can't physics of 2 or 3 dimensions be extended to 4 easily? 01:34:21 Hard Problem of Consciousness 01:35:54 The problems Dror thinks about daily 01:37:49 What direction would he like mathematics research to head in? 01:40:26 Philosophy of math (ultra-finitism) 01:44:45 Pure mathematics in service to applied mathematics 01:47:14 How to learn a new field of mathematics 01:47:15 [the scientific mystical philosopher] Unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics 01:48:28 [Romain Gicquad] On IQ 01:51:06 [Tori Ko] ​What do you think about biology / psychology / philosophy 01:54:03 [Phill Thomas] What led him into the field of mathematics? Can anyone can learn advanced math? 02:03:52 [Tyler Goldstein] Do we need to make new research institutions not linked to academia? 02:06:04 Bias in academia 02:10:15 What's a mathematician? Who's a mathematician and who's not? 02:14:31 [Ashley Shipp] Does he think there is a connection between knot theory and protein folding? 02:19:49 [Jack Dysart] Is math a human construct? 02:22:50 [cx777o] Does he believe in a concept of god? 05:19:49 [Bill McGonigle] Ramanujan and his Goddess 02:23:47 Revealed story that Dror has about Curt and the Prisoner's Dilemma 02:30:27 [Harinivas P] Bible Code and applying advanced math in one's life 02:37:26 [Roy Dopson] Why does it take 360 pages to "prove" that 1+1=2? * * * Just wrapped (April 2021) a documentary called Better Left Unsaid http://betterleftunsaidfilm.com on the topic of "when does the left go too far?" Visit that site if you'd like to watch it.

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Exploring theoretical physics, consciousness, Ai, and God in a technically rigorous manner. If you'd like to support this endeavor, then please visit the Patreon ( https://patreon.com/curtjaimungal ). Thank you for your charitable and kindhearted support. My name's Curt Jaimungal, a Torontonian with a degree in mathematical physics from the University of Toronto and I analyze various Theories of Everything from this analytic perspective, though more and more opening up to alternative approaches. The separating factor of TOE from other podcasts is its focus on depth even at the risk of limiting the audience due to how much detail we delve into subjects. Paralleling the intensity found in academic discourse, we're increasingly embracing a spectrum of unconventional ideas to conduct research during this podcast, rather than merely conveying existing information. Contact toe [at] indiefilmTO [dot] com for business inquiries / sponsorship.