124 | Solo: How Time Travel Could and Should Work

124 | Solo: How Time Travel Could and Should Work

Time! It doesn't stop, psychological effects of being under lockdown notwithstanding. How we experience time depends on our situation, but time itself just marches forward. Unless, of course, it's possible to travel to the past, as countless science-fiction scenarios have depicted. But does that really make sense? Couldn't we then change the past, even so dramatically that our own existence would never have happened? In this solo podcast I talk about both the physics and fiction of time travel. I point out that it might be allowed by the laws of physics, and explain how that would work, but that we really don't know. And I try to make sense of some of the less-sensible depictions of cinematic time travel. Coming up with a logical theory that could account for Back to the Future isn't easy, but podcasting isn't for the squeamish.

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But wait, there's more! I was contacted by Janna Levin, who we fondly remember from Episode 27. Janna moonlights as Chair and Director of Sciences at Pioneer Works, an institution dedicated to bringing together creative people in art and science. Like the rest of us, they've been looking for ways to offer more online content in these pandemic times, so we thought about ways to collaborate. Here's what they came up with: artist Azikiwe Mohammed has created an animated video backdrop to this podcast episode. The visuals are trippy, colorful, and inspired by (without trying to directly illustrate) what I talk about in the episode. You can check out a brief write-up at the Pioneer Works site, or view the video directly below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHy1j4LiyGQ

Jaksot(416)

212 | Chiara Mingarelli on Searching for Black Holes with Pulsars

212 | Chiara Mingarelli on Searching for Black Holes with Pulsars

The detection of gravitational waves from inspiraling black holes by the LIGO and Virgo collaborations was rightly celebrated as a landmark achievement in physics and astronomy. But ultra-precise grou...

26 Syys 20221h 26min

211 | Solo: Secrets of Einstein's Equation

211 | Solo: Secrets of Einstein's Equation

My little pandemic-lockdown contribution to the world was a series of videos called The Biggest Ideas in the Universe. The idea was to explain physics in a pedagogical way, concentrating on establishe...

19 Syys 20221h 51min

210 | Randall Munroe on Imagining What If...?

210 | Randall Munroe on Imagining What If...?

What's the fastest way to get a human being around a racetrack, if we ignore all the rules of racing? How many pages would you have to read to absorb all of the government laws that apply to you? It's...

12 Syys 20221h 8min

209 | Brad DeLong on Why the 20th Century Fell Short of Utopia

209 | Brad DeLong on Why the 20th Century Fell Short of Utopia

People throughout history have imagined ideal societies of various sorts. As the twentieth century dawned, advances in manufacturing and communication arguably brought the idea of utopia within our pr...

5 Syys 20221h 24min

AMA | September 2022

AMA | September 2022

Welcome to the September 2022 Ask Me Anything episode of Mindscape! These monthly excursions are funded by Patreon supporters (who are also the ones asking the questions). We take questions asked by P...

29 Elo 20223h 30min

208 | Rick Beato on the Theory of Popular Music

208 | Rick Beato on the Theory of Popular Music

There is no human endeavor that does not have a theory of it — a set of ideas about what makes it work and how to do it well. Music is no exception, popular music included — there are reasons why cert...

22 Elo 20221h 11min

207 | William MacAskill on Maximizing Good in the Present and Future

207 | William MacAskill on Maximizing Good in the Present and Future

It's always a little humbling to think about what affects your words and actions might have on other people, not only right now but potentially well into the future. Now take that humble feeling and p...

15 Elo 20221h 42min

206 | Simon Conway Morris on Evolution, Convergence, and Theism

206 | Simon Conway Morris on Evolution, Convergence, and Theism

Evolution by natural selection is one of the rare scientific theories that resonates within the wider culture as much as it does within science. But as much as people know about evolution, we also fin...

8 Elo 20221h 17min

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