174 | Tai-Danae Bradley on Algebra, Topology, Language, and Entropy

174 | Tai-Danae Bradley on Algebra, Topology, Language, and Entropy

Mathematics is often thought of as the pinnacle of crisp precision: the square of the hypotenuse of a right triangle isn't "roughly" the sum of the squares of the other two sides, it's exactly that. But we live in a world of messy imprecision, and increasingly we need sophisticated techniques to quantify and deal with approximate statistical relations rather than perfect ones. Modern mathematicians have noticed, and are taking up the challenge. Tai-Danae Bradley is a mathematician who employs very high-level ideas — category theory, topology, quantum probability theory — to analyze real-world phenomena like the structure of natural-language speech. We explore a number of cool ideas and what kinds of places they are leading us to.

Support Mindscape on Patreon.

Tai-Danae Bradley received her Ph.D. in mathematics from the CUNY Graduate Center. She is currently a research mathematician at Alphabet, visiting research professor of mathematics at The Master's University, and executive director of the Math3ma Institute. She hosts an explanatory mathematics blog, Math3ma. She is the co-author of the graduate-level textbook Topology: A Categorical Approach.


Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(436)

361 | Bonnie Bassler on How Bacteria Talk and Work Together

361 | Bonnie Bassler on How Bacteria Talk and Work Together

One of the characteristics of life is that living organisms gather information and put it to use. Even one of the simplest lifeforms, bacteria, are able to sense features of their surroundings and alt...

20 Jul 0s

Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | July 2026

Mindscape Ask Me Anything, Sean Carroll | July 2026

Welcome to the July 2026 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 Patreo...

13 Jul 4h 3min

360 | Marc Berman on the Science of Touching Grass

360 | Marc Berman on the Science of Touching Grass

Modern life has, in many ways, removed us from the environments in which our ancestors lived and adapted. Not only do we spend time looking at screens, but we spend time indoors, or outdoors but in ur...

6 Jul 1h 29min

359 | Solo: Theories of Dark Energy

359 | Solo: Theories of Dark Energy

The cosmological constant, as discussed last episode, provides a perfectly good (thus far) explanation for why we observe the universe to be accelerating. But it might not be the right explanation, an...

29 Jun 1h 56min

358 | Solo: Vacuum Energy and the Cosmological Constant

358 | Solo: Vacuum Energy and the Cosmological Constant

The most surprising discovery in fundamental physics during my career as a scientist was undoubtedly the acceleration of the universe, announced in 1998. The most straightforward explanation for these...

22 Jun 1h 59min

357 | Jeff Coller on mRNA, Vaccines, and Bespoke Therapeutics

357 | Jeff Coller on mRNA, Vaccines, and Bespoke Therapeutics

Messenger RNA (mRNA) plays a literally central role in the functioning of life as we know it, shuttling information back and forth between the DNA where it is stored to the ribosome where it is used t...

15 Jun 1h 19min

356 | Andrea Wulf on Enlightenment, Nature, Romanticism, and Modernity

356 | Andrea Wulf on Enlightenment, Nature, Romanticism, and Modernity

All ideas have a history, no matter how inevitable and well-entrenched they may seem to us today. The later Enlightenment was a heady time when people were exploring new conceptions of nature, humanit...

8 Jun 1h 17min

AMA | June 2026

AMA | June 2026

Welcome to the June 2026 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 Patreo...

1 Jun 3h 57min

Populært innen Vitenskap

fastlegen
tingenes-tilstand
forskningno
jss
liberal-halvtime
rekommandert
sinnsyn
dekodet-2
abels-tarn
villmarksliv
rss-nysgjerrige-norge
tomprat-med-gunnar-tjomlid
fjellsportpodden
hva-er-greia-med
mer-enn-hjerne
rss-rekommandert
rss-kunstig-intelligens-med-elisabeth-maren-og-morten
diagnose
vett-og-vitenskap-med-gaute-einevoll
rss-inn-til-kjernen-med-sunniva-rose