Miscellaneous
When Dr. Stephon Alexander listens to the music of the cosmos, he hears structure, but also flexibility. He hears familiar cadences and novel riffs. He hears strings vibrating in ten-dimensional spacetime and resonating loops of quantum gravity. He hears Einstein’s musical mind and Coltrane’s cosmic sensibility. He hears the jazz of physics. And so will you. In this episode, Stephon tells Jocelyn and Bradley how a journey wending through the dusty halls of old jazz clubs and the chalky floors of physics offices ultimately led him from Trinidad to the Bronx to Brown University. He shares how his experience as a jazz saxophonist has shaped his approach to physics, and how incorporating more elements from the improvisational, inclusive culture of jazz will benefit the future of physics. Along the way, he explains how he is working to integrate general relativity with quantum mechanics by uncovering the quantum nature of gravity, and the friends speculate that the answer may ultimately shed light on the origins of consciousness itself. Follow Stephon on Twitter @stephstem, and learn more about his amazing work at the links below! Secret Lives of Scientists on NOVA: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/stephon-alexander-theoretical-physicist/ Big Think:“Sources of Inspiration”: https://bigthink.com/videos/sources-of-inspiration “Beyond Einstein”: https://bigthink.com/videos/beyond-einstein The Jazz of Physics: https://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Physics-Between-Structure-Universe/dp/0465034993 https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2016/06/11/481664722/scientist-stephon-alexander-infinite-possibilities-unite-jazz-and-physics TEDx Talk San Diego: https://youtu.be/v9_ZzY99-6U “Black Academics Have a Responsibility to the Next Generation” (New York Times editorial) : https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/02/04/do-black-intellectuals-need-to-talk-about-race/black-academics-have-a-responsibility-to-the-next-generation Brown University: https://vivo.brown.edu/display/salexan4 https://www.stephonalexanderlab.com/ Check out some of Stephon’s technical papers: Brane Gases: https://journals.aps.org/prd/pdf/10.1103/PhysRevD.62.103509 Noncommutative inflation: https://journals.aps.org/prd/pdf/10.1103/PhysRevD.67.081301 Gravitational waves: https://journals.aps.org/prd/pdf/10.1103/PhysRevD.67.081301 Chern–Simons modified general relativity: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037015730900177X Super strings and baryon asymmetry: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2006/06/018/meta Horava-Lifshitz theory: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1206.6296.pdf A Wrinkle in Time (2018) film trailer: https://youtu.be/UhZ56rcWwRQ John Coltrane music: Giant steps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xy_fxxj1mMY Cosmic music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC4tmbWzevg Related episodes: Quantum Whaaaat? (Part 1): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/30-discussion-quantum-whaaaat-part-1/id1471423633?i=1000464036509 Quantum Whatnot (Part 2): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/31-discussion-quantum-whatnot-part-2/id1471423633?i=1000464036508 The Musical Shape of Science (Tim Blais): https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/61-tim-blais-the-musical-shape-of-science/id1471423633?i=1000492250770