Big Think Interview With Freeman Dyson | Big Think
Big Think Interview With Freeman Dyson
New videos DAILY: bigth.ink/youtube
Join Big Think Edge for exclusive videos: bigth.ink/Edge
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A conversation with the physicist and writer.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FREEMAN DYSON:
Freeman J. Dyson is Professor Emeritus of Mathematical Physics and Astrophysics in the School of Natural Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He has taught as a professor at the Institute since 1953, prior to which he was a professor for two years at Cornell University. His work on quantum electrodynamics marked an epoch in physics, with the techniques he used in this domain forming the foundation for most modern theoretical work in elementary particle physics and the quantum many-body problem. He is also celebrated as an author on science and related topics; his books include "Disturbing the Universe" (1966), "Weapons and Hope" (1984), "The Scientist as Rebel" (2006), and "A Many-Colored Glass: Reflections on the Place of Life in the Universe" (2007).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIPT:
Freeman Dyson: So my first name is Freeman and my last name Dyson and my title, Mister. I’m a physicist, but also a writer.
Question: How did you first become interested in science?
Freeman Dyson: Yeah, it’s hard to tell of course, but I’ve been interested in science certainly from a child. I was mostly interested in numbers. I was calculating things at a very young age. I just fell in love with numbers and then it spread from there to the rest of nature and I became… I remember the total eclipse of the sun, which happened when I was three, and I was furious with my father because he wouldn’t take us to see it. It would have meant about awhole day’s driving and anyways, so he said no, you can’t see the partial eclipse and that’s it, and I thought that was terribly unfair.
Question: What was your science education like?
Freeman Dyson: So, well I never learned much science in school. That was I think an advantage in the old days. I grew up in England and we spent most of the time on Latin and Greek and very little on science, and I think that was good because it meant we didn’t get turned off. It was… Science was something we did for fun and not because we had to.
Question: What was your experience of World War II like?
Freeman Dyson: Yes, well I was 15 when the war started, so for a long time I just stayed in school, but then so I was lucky. I had only two years of the war and so I went to work for the Royal Air Force when I was 19, which was already just two years before it ended, so I went to the **** headquarters and that was July ’43, and so I had just two years of it, the last two years and I was working as a statistician mostly just collecting all the information about the Air Force operations, particularly the bombing of Germany, so I had a sort of front-row seat view of that. Of course it was a total shambles, the whole campaign. It was a great tragedy for both sides and, well, there was nothing I could do about it.
Question: How did the physics community react after the dropping of the atomic bomb?
Freeman Dyson: Of course they talked about it incessantly. That was the main subject of conversation for many years and so people had very strong feelings about it on both sides and people who thought it was the greatest thing they'd ever done and people who thought it was just an unpleasant job and people who thought they should have never done it at all, so there were opinions of all kinds...
Read the full transcript at bigthink.com/videos/big-think...
Пікірлер: 101
Want to get Smarter, Faster? Subscribe for DAILY videos: bigth.ink/GetSmarter
What a humble, gentle, wonderful man.
I love you Freeman Dyson, source of infinite inspiration!!!
It's a pity he and his views aren't more popular.
R.I.P. freeman you will always be in my memory
What a great man! I love his views on Physics and Theology! Bravo!
Hey BIG THINK. Some folks work and listen to the interviews in the background - can't watch. Having the questions appear in print makes this hard to listen to. Why not just ask the questions. Skipping this one - can't spend almost 40 minutes figuring out what he's asnwering.
@Franciscasieri
Жыл бұрын
Hopefully in 9 years you have now learned to pause this video....and...incredibly the questions appear...
My heart melts down the whole I am hearing him. Lots of Love...
A beautiful mind... Yes! Indeed, a very beautiful mind: It seems that in a four-fold exciting message, Dr. Dyson wants to state something not easy to grasp about the near impossibility to detect a graviton and that enchants me. What would that be?
Ramanujan's divergent series' study provides a new perspective to reality, like strings (1+2+3...=-1/12) etc. Dyson was encouraged to pursue these series and became a master of the new perspective. Physicists are catching up and are discovering a new weapon/tool to frame new mathematics. Dyson did provide some insight, not well investigated. He should have been given the Nobel prize for this work alone.
The Orion ship design featured as a "final option" in the Larry Niven / Jerry Pournelle novel Footfall. Excellent book and a worthy interpretation of the design and its implications.
so glad i found this clip , thanks bigthink ^^
Wonderful man.
It's not so much the numbers he has a problem with, it's the predictive models they plug those numbers into. I saw a lecture of his where goes into detail about it, and he has some valid points. The popular models focus heavily on just a few well studied aspects and ignore or trivialize some of the less well understood factors which may have significant effects on the outcome. An intelligently formed alternative opinion is never a bad thing in science as it encourages further investigation.
merci pour votre incroyable travail et oeuvre. J'espère sincèrement qu'on réussira à construire un essaim de dyson .Votre talent de visionnaire continuera de nous inspirer.
brilliant
@acershund1
5 жыл бұрын
He is great!
Thats who i want to be, be someone in life make great contributions to humanity and have great stories of key events.
RIP Freeman. Incredible mind.
Freeman is the best!
Pure bombs of wisdom. OMG!
A great, great man.
This guy is amazing
Great Video! only over 1,200 views, 2 comments? Come on!?
Nice tie.
Oh wow. Did u hear at 15:00???? That's crazy.
I would like to call him my grandpa. Love you and rest in peace!
You know it's pretty funny that when I talk to people who actually work in science with computer models and ask if they would be confident in predicting future of a planet size system on which no tests can be run, how confident are they on a prediction of two hundred years with a mathematical model. I always get the same knowing look and the "yeah it's pretty bizarre" type of an answer. So I don't know, I think it is pretty sad to hear the confidence in these "the numbers say this and that".
its nice to hear someone intelligent talking; and accepting my stupidity.
Lol, in the first few seconds I could have sworn I was listening to Spike Milligan.
He was born in Berkshire, England, and has lived for the last 50 years in Princeton.
his title is mister , he is urging me not pursue a phd
I get a heavy feeling in my heart looking at the toll time has taken on poor old Freeman Dyson
@edwardjones2202
4 жыл бұрын
He's had a lucky life. Blessed with genius. Cushy, enjoyable, well paid jobs. His first wife was hot and super smart. He got good cards
@mercij7517
Жыл бұрын
Lol
@Franciscasieri
Жыл бұрын
@Edward Jones and he played those cards beautifully
❤❤❤
"Sputnik" has two meanings: "companion", and literally "satellite".
Anyone seeing this after the recent possible Dyson sphere discoveries?
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Atheism doesn't imply naturalism, there is no general atheists worldview because there is no general atheist.
What else a bright mathematician can do in a misunderstood-physics society? Virtual math products. Misunderstood-physics? Theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics.
Perfect gentelman.
There is a design for a ship!!!!????
"1,000 tons payload" = a small destroyer.
Putting a price on carbon is hardly "tricks and schemes." If you want to cost-effectively incentivize markets to start reducing carbon, pricing it via a tax or cap-and-track system is the best way to do so. I agree that carbon sequestration is exciting, as are dozens of other current and future technologies, but how do you propose we incentivize their use? A carbon price does just that, allowing the most cost-effective technologies to win out.
A true rebel without PhD
transatlantic
Eighty nine years old.
@ZacksMetalRiffs
5 жыл бұрын
95 now.
Can someone explain his accent to me?
@miguelteixeira2730
4 жыл бұрын
English.
@tonyoak2230
2 жыл бұрын
American
That is a preposterous statement. Many great geniuses throughout history have been devout believers. Freeman Dyson's work on QED and nuclear physics is internationally acclaimed. To call him an idiot is to badly misunderstand almost everything worth knowing. Maybe he just doesn't consider the question important. Some people don't. For goodness sake, get off your high horse, and learn how to construct a sentence before insulting anyone's intelligence.
Who down votes this?
he is a mathematician not a physicist.
@uplightuk8924
7 жыл бұрын
David He's both.
@David-sp9vd
7 жыл бұрын
run_crywolf in practice not education.
@dirkdugan
7 жыл бұрын
Isn't that what matters?
@David-sp9vd
7 жыл бұрын
James Siene Mathematicians who work with physicists, or assists them, are different. They differ in their way of thinking.
@dirkdugan
7 жыл бұрын
And then you have physicists like Ed Witten who think more like a mathematician much of the time. The work you do defines who you are, not your training. PS. I am in mathematics and I also do physics, and I can say there is no clear difference besides care for details.
What a stupid idea having a video with questions that cannot be here by people who are not haven't watched the screen. I've had to abandon after 10-minutes
💚💙🤎💜❤️
V
.
@charlesbeaudelair8331
3 жыл бұрын
No doubt, you made your point.
I like him a lot. His views on climate change are a bit strange, though. I sorta hope he's right. But I'll prepare for/assume the absolute worst. Since most other intellectuals have a much more pessimistic view of the whole thing.
@johnnonamegibbon3580
7 жыл бұрын
Because as far as I can tell, most scientists agree that the amount of carbon in the air is throwing off the original balance of gas in the atmosphere and that is and can have devastating consequences on the environment. Where we live what we eat, etc.
@bvdek
6 жыл бұрын
+John NoNameGibbon Even Dyson himself acknowledges that fact during this interview, strangely kind of contradicting himself. He talks about reducing carbon dioxide emissions by changing cattle farming and agricultural practices, as a practical measure against climate change. He straight up acknowledges co2 emission are a factor, even from human practices like cattle and agriculture, but somehow doesn't think the rest of the emissions from human activity - burning fossil fuels for energy - are having any effect. Indeed it is a very strange view, to disagree with human activity being the cause, yet advocating for some (minor) changes to human activity to reduce co2 levels. It's actually quite bizarre
The title 'mister' is a colonial fiction rooted in the word 'manure.' Same with Miss and Mrs. The concept is to posses land by "colonising" it, from the colon, on behalf of your makers or owners. Freeman is the opposite of a bondnam(e). Mr is his chosen bond to a sovereign state. The name his mom and dad gave him is his title. By rejecting the title they gave to him, he rejects their gift of their land. By taking the colonial title of 'mister', his inheritance must then come from the so-called sovereign state instead of from his maker, his mother. To accept to be addressed by colonial title is to accept to be the property of the colony. The term 'sovereign state' is not a secular statement. It is a statement of an anarchist institution that uses force to practice monarchy over a community. A sovereign state is a forced religion. A forced religion is a cult. Cults rename their 'members' as a sign of ownership and control. Think about that the next time you use a colonial title on a signed form. There is an ancient scripture that puts these concepts into a short phrase. "Call no man on earth Father." By which I take it to mean, call no one and nothing on earth your owner. The next time some colonial officer asks, "where do you come from?" Look them in the black of one eye and say, "I come from my mom and dad. Where do you come from?" Mister free man die son: #EndGlobalApartheid
A great chap, but unfortunately mistaken on climate change. For rebuttals by climate scientists on that topic, please see here: www.realclimate.org/wiki/index.php?title=Freeman_Dyson
@larryschultz7517
4 жыл бұрын
Timothy Musson ......mistaken because he doesn’t agree with you views?
@TimothyMusson
4 жыл бұрын
@@larryschultz7517, no - he was mistaken on climate change because on _that_ topic he was a layman who disagreed with established scientific consensus. Taking him seriously on climate science is like taking the Flat Earth Society seriously. You're welcome to do it, but... ;) [Edit: And like I said, he was a great chap - I like him a lot, and I was sad to hear he died in February :/ ]
@larryschultz7517
4 жыл бұрын
So....Freeman Dyson is a layman? You’re way off...
@TimothyMusson
4 жыл бұрын
Fine - whatever floats your boat ;)
He lost me on Climate Change, it's not a matter of belief, numbers are there, sir! You the great fond of numbers, do your homework, it's called longitudinal analysis. Disappointed!