The Eric Weinstein/Timothy Nguyen Affair
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- čas přidán 4. 07. 2024
- In February 2021, Timothy Nguyen published a rebuttal of Eric Weinstein’s theory, Geometric Unity. What motivated him to do this, and what events have transpired since?
#EricWeinstein #GeometricUnity #BrianKeating #DecodingTheGurus #Eigenbros #RobertWright #RebelWisdom #JoeRogan
0:00 Intro
1:41 Why Tim left academia
14:11 This isn’t an Eric Weinstein hit piece
15:18 A chronology of relevant events
24:57 The math and physics
54:55 Is Eric Galileo?
1:01:44 Tim’s only interaction with Eric
1:05:15 Tim’s motivation to write the rebuttal
1:11:08 Did Tim’s rebuttal cause Eric to revise GU?
1:16:44 Eric’s public reaction to Tim’s rebuttal
1:23:00 Brian Keating’s support for Eric
1:37:27 Summary of the story so far
1:40:06 Mainstream and alternative sensemaking structures
1:45:40 Eric wields the DISC against Tim
1:52:13 Analyzing Brian Keating’s role
1:55:56 The good news
1:59:41 Vaccine hesitancy and dialogos
2:05:31 Back to the good news
Links (listed chronologically):
Eric Weinstein, “Eric Weinstein (Solo), Ep. #018 of The Portal - Slipping the DISC: State of the Portal/Chapter 2020” - • Eric Weinstein (Solo),...
Eric Weinstein, “A Portal Special Presentation - Geometric Unity: A First Look” - • A Portal Special Prese...
Timothy Nguyen and Theo Polya, “A Response to Geometric Unity” - / 1364352524942118913
Eric Weinstein, “Geometric Unity: Author’s Working Draft, v 1.0” - geometricunity.org/#download
Clubhouse Podcast, “Let’s Talk about PHYSICS! Eric Weinstein & Brian Keating on Clubhouse Podcast | 16 May 2021” - • Eric Weinstein & Brian...
Eigenbros, “Eigenbros ep 120 - Timothy Nguyen (Problems with Eric Weinstein’s Geometric Unity)” - • Eigenbros ep 120 - Tim... - Krátké a kreslené filmy
Eric Weinstein will fight jake Paul before he legit debates anyone on this theory.
@Some Person nobody with bigger audience should give that embarassment of human garbage any publicity to his dying channel
@Some Person sam seder is a tool
Honestly, we should all just say he is right about GU if he agrees to the fight
@@wl1861 It isn't possible to say if any theory is right as it can always be made obsolete by observation of new phenomena that don't fit its explanation or by a more fundamental description which assumes fewer, or ideally no, finely tuned constants. Besides _Geometric Unity_ is an incomplete work in progress and not yet a theory, and that's fine as he has done an impressive amount of work on an incredibly difficult topic in mathematical physics which relies on mastery of a lot of different things over the 37 years he has worked on it.
The interviewer is really thorough and fair-minded, and the editing was well-executed and not distracting. This is a really good podcast.
Eric went off the deep end starting with a discussion with Tyler Cowen.
In it, Tyler suggested that Peter Thiel might be the greatest mind of our time, right after he suggested that Weinstein was (merely) an original thinker. He didn’t take that comparison well.
Then Tim Dillon came along with a joke about him not actually producing anything of value.
His response to the Dillon joke was to go on Joe Rogan and nearly cry while insisting that Joe take a copy of his theory, which Joe couldn’t possibly understand, seemingly to prove that he had produced something of value.
Now he’s stuck defending something that a more sober mind would have never presented as serious without first subjecting it to scrutiny by the physics community.
You do know he was told these equations he wanted to do for his PhD would violate the spin statistics theorem?
𝐷ψ = 0
ᴬ
𝐹⁺ = 𝑖𝜎(ψ, ψ)
ᴬ
and he was told to base his thesis on something else, so he wrote about the _Extension of Self-Dual Yang-Mills Equations Across the Eighth Dimension_ which could be generalised to higher even numbered dimensions (such as 14 which is the cardinality of the unrestricted set of dimensional measures needed to chart an abstract mathematical psuedo Riemannian manifold with 4 dimensions - i.e. that is so simple that it is space without time). He then attends a lecture being given by Edward Witten and sees him write this on the blackboard:
𝐷ϕ = 0
ᴬ
𝐹⁺ = 𝑖𝜎(ϕ, ϕ)
ᴬ
Aside from an arbitrary change of notation this are the same equations he was told wouldn't work. It was remembered that he had proposed them. He was given zero credit for this. He was disgusted by their conduct and left mathematical physics for a career in finance. He then worked in his spare time for 37 years on a _Unified Field Theory_ that seeks to replace _General Relativity_ with something less restrictive which allows for a much more elaborate and symmetric _Quantum Field Theory._ This is still an incomplete work in progress, however the parts that are finished make coherent sense and follow established rigorous mathematical rules for how to build an elaborated SU(n) theory. The only response that has been made was to an inconsistent presentation of his ideas in an eight year old speculative Oxford University lecture. Its author knew that Eric was about to publish a paper but went ahead and published their "concerns" anyway, incorrectly guessing at what he was likely doing, and mischaracterising and misrepresenting and fundamentally misunderstanding his work. When his paper had been published this "critic" admitted that "I didn't look at it that carefully" and it was later established he only checked §8 and the Appendix rather than read all 69 pages. Had he done this he wouldn't have gone on the Eigenbros. channel months later and repeated his irrelevant concerns about _Geometric Unity_ being based on a gauge group which was too large in being U(128). He might have had a point here if it wasn't actually based on U(64, 64). Were this smaller guage group to still have the same problem is something we have not had confirmation of from him as he has made no further serious critique of Eric's April 2021 paper in the past three years since publishing his response in February 2021.
So, Eric is "stuck defending" anything as this isn't a serious critic. They don't understand his work at all, and all the concerns they raise in their response are invalid.
.
I actually started paying attention to Eric Weinstein because I had thought he was Eric W Weisstein, the guy behind Eric’s treasure trove of physics and mathematics (now a CRC press publication). These could not be more different people. The GU Eric is an obfuscator that deliberately uses PhD jargon on general audiences in an attempt to appear intellectual. He might be smart but that’s not how actual intellectuals communicate. True intellectuals are able to make their ideas clear to any audience. The GU Eric has some kind of personality defect that happens to strike a rhyming chord with internet libertarian underdogs. That’s the only reason he can get so much attention, IMHO.
100% agree about the jargon. Been saying the same for years.
Obfuscator is a good term for him. I thought he was a troll. I mean, he also released it on April 1st and has said in the blast he enjoys trolling.
The way I see it Eric is capitalising on internet attention. I would not have heard of him if not for his GU theory and the way he portrays himself as this genius outsider that the theoretical physics community should take seriously.
I'm not surprised that he wouldn't want to draw attention to any rebuttal or response from the community which challenges his theory and qualifications, harming his image and facade of intellectual superiority in front of his audience. He'd rather keep saying the academic community has wrong and no one has seriously looked at his theory.
Part of the reason Eric triggers red flags for some is that he has the characteristic intense energy of many people who deal with dyslexia. His life was partly shaped by feeling misunderstood and seen as unintelligent due to that limitation.
His energy around topics he is knowledgeable about reflects those experiences, which can be perceived by some as desperate fumbling.
Cheapest sex trafficking is in Thailand. 12 year olds Dude. I haven't seen this b interview Roger Penrose
It was really disappointing to hear a lot of this and hard to sit through; just like Bob's show. Were Eric to publish a dud paper, I can live with that, I don't really care about that metaphysical theory of everything stuff. But this was a failure in character, which makes it harder to continue appreciating him and his ideas.
Well put.
@@johongo You have both been gaslit by this geeky grifter.
yep i know@@____uncompetative
What I dont get is why Eric doesnt welcome all the scrutiny he can get...If he has something wrong these guys can point it out and he can work on it..
Especially Eric
@@goyonman9655 We are all humans. I remember not just once Eric telling that GU is his lifes work etc. He is clearly a genius, but even geniuses can be wrong and/or act like humans. I am kind of feeling betrayed because he is using the disc and the interviewer has a valid point when questioning whether this or that is the right way (not going into details). So well, thanks for the info and keep up the work ;)
because he is a charlatan
@@ivanarciniegas7324 Yes a Harvard Ph.d in mathematics is a charlatan. Very intelligent observation. I'd call you Einstein but you have less than one stone. Arrogance and having errors in a model doesn't make one a charlatan. You are part of the L.O.L. culture that just dismisses people based on how they deliver info and not focusing on the info itself.
I dumped Eric about 12 months ago when I couldn’t shake the feeling his ego got in the way of the truth. This confirms it for me.
Insightful conversation, but sad.
At the very least, it seems Eric has intentionally misled those of us who don’t share his intellectual capabilities into thinking he had far more expertise and credibility in physics than he actually does.
Although I will never be able to comprehend the technical aspects of this issue, I appreciate Timothy for taking his time to raise his concerns and defend the credibility and scientific process of his field.
Hopefully we will see Timothy on JRE soon.
Thank you, and Tim on JRE would be awesome. I was thinking yesterday that JRE could probably get them to talk. If JRE said to Eric, "if I'm going to continue to have you on and let you promote your ideas, you need to engage with legitimate criticism rather than dismissing it," Eric would probably change his tune.
@@brandonvandyck I don't think there's a chance that Rogan would have Tim on to debate with Eric. He's hosted debates before, e.g., vegan vs. carnist, etc. but Eric is in Rogan's IDW circle so I think that he has instincts to protect him. People can make judgements one whether IDW is a grift, but at the core, Rogan will protect those he deems as friends.
@@davidshmavid5 Rogan wont have Tim on his show because he is not that interesting or articulate. He doesn't put himself out there with any sense of vulnerability or risk. He's like the Groundhog who is forecasting 6 more weeks of winter. He has established nothing of himself other than as an opponent to Eric and a petty and insulting opponent at that. The first time he speaks to Eric was when Eric was entertaining his fans and he was lurking with an "easy" answer after "30 seconds" to a question Eric posed on Discord. The people in the Discord were "ooh"ing and "aah"ing at who is this "new guy" "Tim". He gained the spotlight and like a little toddler girl was running giggling to open his presents. Tim tried to show up Eric in front of his fans in order to force some recognition out of Eric; instead he should have used that opportunity to get Eric's contact information and figure out how he can make a real connection instead of this super-fan superficial connection on Discord.
Having failed miserably the first time he decided to double down on his fanboy approach and got rejected again by someone who doesn't have time for his bullshit.
But Tim had time. When Eric released the Oxford lecture he stated why he did it and it wasn't "because he wasn't going to write a paper"......he said it several times......his goal was to expose the general concepts and overall framework of GU so that he could work through whether he could craft a coherent narrative by playing with key concepts in each specialty within the physics community. He didn't release the Oxford lecture for academic critique of GU he released it for academic critical thinking of the framework for GU.
This is why Joe Rogan will never have Tim on as a guest or as a debater. He has no original ideas of his own. He has made no effort to make his own way. He has grifted off of the popularity of Eric to push for an interaction he has only ever been insulting in engaging in. And he is content with this victory and to keep putting Eric down.
When I realized Eric and Bret were incapable of viewing the right as a place where they could be welcomed and where they could fit in I lost almost total respect for both of them. Their constant over the top criticism of Trump and his supporters honestly makes me want to reach through my screen and slap some sense into them. They are insulting, arrogant, pigheaded, self-righteous asshats but at least they lay themselves out there with honesty and integrity. I'm sure their blindspots have had them cross lines they never wanted or believed they crossed but they do a lot of self-reflection and when they identify a line they have crossed they regret they don't hide from it they make it central. They deal with it and move on.
Does Tim regret having done anything yet? I could Big Kahuna Tim right here but I'll just Pulp Fiction him instead......just because you are a character.....doesn't mean you have character.
@@TangieTown81 that's an interesting alternative take. I think both Eric and Tim are grifters here for promoting their work via social media in a big way. They should have privately worked this out first.
@@CrucialFlowResearch I am unaware of any of Tim's work on anything except being critical of and insulting to Eric. If he does have any work then I think social media is a great place to share and present it. This is why I consider Tim a grifter and not Eric. Eric presents us with his ideas and his work; we know who he is, like him or not. Tim presents us with a critique of someone else's work; as such we have no context by which to judge where he is coming from, he could be anybody. I mean for all I know his anonymous co-Author could have provided the totality of the critique and Tim could be a charlatan. I don't know Tim, I have never seen him before this. He is using Eric to make a name for himself.
Eric shows all the signs of a narcissist.
He shows all the signs of having Asperger syndrome, definitely not narcissism. The lack of reverence for certain typical social queues can present similarly to the lack of empathy that narcissists display.
@@gorilladigits8223 Maybe, but look at the behaviour, it is not really autistic. It is a grift. Weinstein is out to monetize pseudo-science while it lasts. It can last long enough to make a few bucks.
He is a manager of big hungry firm. He does sh1t like this for a living.
@@gorilladigits8223 ^^^
There was an interview with both Eric Weinstein and Stephen Wolfram, where for someone who is not a mathematician, it's almost impossible to understand Eric's idea, always referring to obscure vocabulary that makes no sense to anyone unfamiliar with the subject, whereas Stephen Wolfram does a great job explaining his ideas to someone without an advanced mathematic background. Feynman's saying that if you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough seems to apply here. It also seems logical that a theory of everything or something close to it would have to start from the bottom up (starting with quantum mechanics), rather than top-down (starting from general relativity). It seems Eric just suffered from a bit of wishful thinking (easy to fool yourself into thinking something you really want to be true is true, Feynman had a lot of things to say about that as well).
Why should Dr Weinstein waste the opportunity of talking real mathematical physics with Dr Wolfram just so people like you don't feel left out. Would you rather the discussion be at your level and be held back as a result? Also, Dr Richard Feynman never said what you said he said. Your personal preference for bottom-up over top-down is just a personal preference. Bottom-up has been tried, a lot. It is hardly hurting anyone for Dr Weinstein to be exploring a different approach. Feel free to ignore him.
Tim speaking of meeting Eric is similar to Eric speaking of his meeting with Jeffrey Epstein.
That was an expert knifing of Eric’s facade.
Yes, Eric plays a construct . As does his brother.
Eric is a very skilled and charming charlatan. To the point where he has himself fooled.
Eric Weinstein has shaped my thinking a lot, it's refreshing to hear a story that makes me go back to the drawing board with all that
Glad you found it useful :)
This is a highly embarrassing admission
Wait .. Eric is working on GU
I like Eric in doses, but anyone who's watched him for any length of time would very clearly see and come to expect that the entirety of his problems in academia stems from his personality, much moreso than any legitimate criticism he has and that he is doggedly adamant about being the smartest guy in the room. So, yeah, this was all pretty much stuff I would have expected to happen when legitimate pushback against GU came to be (and I, just a layman who's been around a while, knew it wasn't going to be what he claimed).
“Doggedly adamant” is kind of redundant
does not stem from legitimate issues he has with academia? how od you figure? how could anyone with half abrain not have legitimate issues with academia?
@@wasdwasdedsf OP didn't say Eric doesn't have legitimate criticism of academia, but that it's likely not where his problems in academia stem from.
andybaldman
That’s how a lot of charlatans operate. Smuggle their own ideas under a cloak of other legitimate grievances against a system. This is how Eric (and Bret) both operate. Eric with academia, and Bret with vaccines.
@@andybaldman Bret isn't promoting original ideas about vaccines. His comments related to the covid vaccine are part of his legitimate grievances against the system.
the one really interesting thing about this is that lex knows theo. That means that theo isnt completely anonymous since if lex knows he probably told eric. If eric is this upset about theo being anonymous when he probably knows his actual identity it only makes his outburst of "who is theo polyia" look even worse.
"lex knows theo"
source of this claim?
@@ethanmartin2781 Watch from around 1:28:53
@@brandonvandyck my bad, read this before i watched that far lol
@@KCrimson00 probably because he doesn't respect anonymous cowards. He's put his name on the line, i think he expects the same of his critics? Just spit balling..
@@KCrimson00 doesn't seem likely your guess is accurate given we're talking about an anonymous person/s unless you have some special gift at guessing anonymous people's motivations...
And what legal action are you talking about?
First time watching this podcast. Excellent conversation formatting/guest preparation, subscribed.
This is a great discussion. Demonstrates the old principle we used to be taught by our parents and in school which is something like "we can disagree without being disagreeable."
Eric W is clearly a uniquely intelligent individual and find so much of what he discusses so insightful. I also get the impression that, while he may not always be right, he's never unsure.
Glad you enjoyed!
He does not sound unsure even when he is in fact unsure. I think that's the difference.
Intelligence is no guarantee against delusional self aggrandisement and narcissism.
So long as you pose yourself as against some 'establishment' and speak with complete confidence you will gain a loyal following on the internet
This is a new Law for the internet.
What a stunningly good interview, well done!
I, like you, am a big fan of Eric and his podcast, and I am also disappointed with Eric's reaction to what is simply a high-level mathematician actually taking his theory seriously.
To be critiqued (and yes, that includes anonymously!) is not a personal slight and I hope Eric responds scientifically rather than personally.
Many thanks. Hopefully, this kind of feedback will influence Eric to be more humble and rigorous.
@@brandonvandyck I think you have misjudged Eric. I think a lot of people have misjudged Eric. You should look at this old interview:
czcams.com/video/TrZmq1Ti3Po/video.html
Here he seems completely different in manner than he is now. I think this is closer to the real Eric. I think Eric is actually quite shy.
To do The Portal podcast Eric constructed a more robust persona which could be misconstrued as arrogant. I think he accepts this as a tradeoff where people will not like him and his assumed arrogance and actually become annoyed and seek to challenge him, which will mean they will have to engage with his ideas. This is deliberate and I don't think Eric is being arrogant with those who know him personally, and some of this side of him comes through in this conversation with his brother Bret:
czcams.com/video/XjOg-OP_69Y/video.html
This is subjective and impossible to determine what is persona and what is real, but I just thought you should be able to judge yourself.
I like many thought Eric was a bit infuriatingly arrogant and somewhat conceited until I saw the old interview I linked first. It really helps that he is talking about something that his interviewer fully understands and is applied to his work for Thiel Capital, so has had practical application, whereas Geometric Unity has not.
I have read this:
geometricunity.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com/Geometric_Unity-Draft-April-1st-2021.pdf
It is incomplete and admits that it is incomplete. This is openly admitted in §1.5 on page 10.
My guess is that Eric has been noodling around with Geometric Unity for years as an intellectual hobby and felt he had better get it out there where others could look or laugh at it or leave it languishing in a dusty drawer forever with no one able to ask him to clarify any part of it. As someone who has themselves worked for twenty eight years on my own intellectual hobby (a new multiparadigm programming language intended for use with a new operating system which includes an entirely new form of user interface that radically rethinks familiar things like Cut & Paste) and which is more than five years from being in a fit state to show anyone, I empathise with his predicament with regards to talking about his hobby. So, I don't read too much into him not leaping to defend it from detractors. I expect he knows it is flawed, and incomplete, and just an invitation to think about the universe in a way that doesn't involve it being composed of tiny vibrating Strings. I welcome new thinking and even if nothing comes of Geometric Unity, but it shines a spotlight on the lack of progress in String Theory / M-Theory and make some physicists consider some new direction of their own, whether it be other outsiders like Garrett Lisi or Stephen Wolfram with their 248 dimensional or 0 dimensional Theories of Everything works-in-progress, then I feel Eric Weinstein's reasonably justified 14 dimensional Geometric Unity hypothesis, yet to be completed or properly instantiated and I don't think yet quantised, is a worthy contribution to the field and better than being completely ignored in a dusty drawer.
It is quite possible I will not finish my computer project, and what differs between me and Eric is that were I to finish I would have something to show for it that people could play around with and decide whether it was any use to them. I anticipate they would complain that they couldn't access Twitter or Facebook through it, the language wasn't C-like so they would grumble about having to learn an unfamiliar syntax, and the way they would have to adjust to editing documents and the keyboard not being QWERTY would probably put off most people acclimated to how computers have been up until now, and all the legacy compromises that have created a burden of learning to "do it this way as this way is the way that the computer likes it" when just about all of that is completely arbitrary and not the product of refined design. Design is personal so it is likely only I will be truly happy with my design choices. Similarly Geometric Unity suits Eric Weinstein's own idiosyncratic taste to some extent.
He is a Managing Director of a fund, and I think if you are patient and find he has resumed The Portal podcast yet still hasn't spoken to your guest, or had him on his podcast to challenge his ideas, then you might be right to criticise his apparent inability to respond to critics. Geometric Unity is not his career, but his hobby. A huge time investment, but not something he can focus on dealing with and his work situation may well have changed since he published his draft paper on it. Were he still active with The Portal his silence here would be more suspicious. As it is I wouldn't read too much into it.
So I do think he is humble, but he puts on a persona of some calculated arrogance to mask it.
I also think he doesn't think his own work is rigorous or complete or correctly instantiated (see his early remarks about Dirac).
@@brandonvandyck The sheer time and effort Nguyen put into coming out with a paper criticizing Eric's Oxford lecture evidences his motivation. Eric had long said, and long understood, that in order for GU to be taken seriously by academics he would need to produce a paper detailing the Theory. What he had hoped to accomplish with the release of the lecture video and the subsequent social media discussions was to discuss the high level concepts and framework of GU with as many different academics as possible. Playing with some of the most key concepts in each specialty and trying to work through an idea if the big picture was coherent enough to provide a narrative that made sense.
Eric fully expected when he finally would release his paper that it would be ripped to shreds and rightfully so. He was prepared for that and it would have been a sobering and welcome challenge. What he did not expect was for a grifter within the academic community to present, in a scientific framework, a critique of his Oxford lecture.
His Oxford lecture is time constrained and therefore mis-speak and inaccurate notations plague the talk because you have a limited time in which to communicate very difficult concepts. The effect of Nguyen and anonymous "paper" is to ridicule GU as if the 69-page paper is nothing more than a transcript of the Oxford lecture. And why would Nguyen do this? Well, we see it here, his goal was to be the one who discredited GU so he could grift off of Eric's social media popularity and increase his own popularity to serve as the PhD who had revealed GU for the fraud that he claims it is.
So why doesn't Eric respond? Eric would not be responding to any criticism of GU. If Eric responds to Nguyen's criticism it will be a response to mistakes made in the lecture. So he would be explaining Nguyen's misconception; his own mistake in the lecture; what is missed by Nguyen compared to the actual conception......at the end of the day this is way too much effort when he is fully prepared to revisit some serious issues that exist within GU in the paper itself.
It clearly angers him that Nguyen has duped the academic community into believing Nguyen's critique is of GU when in fact it is of his lecture. And having to run through that each and every time is a source of immense frustration. He would prefer if we could move on to the paper and leave the lecture critique in the dumpster. So if Nguyen want's to be an honest and professional academic; he can now review Eric's paper and provide a critique and we can all move forward and I'm sure at that point Eric will be more than happy to sit down and discuss it with him and even have some private conversations to work through various concepts and ideas.
Nguyen has indicated he has no interest in doing so and feels comfortable at this point sitting back with his victory and throwing ad hominem attacks on Eric while making the rounds on academic podcasts trying to bolster his own image while continuing to discredit Eric to ensure no academic will even consider reviewing his paper because Nguyen is already first. Even though, as he himself admits, his critique is based off of the lecture not the paper. These are the facts, with some conjecture thrown in. I don't know Nguyen's motivation, but grifting makes the most sense to me especially considering how extremely insulting he is referring to Eric as "not really a scientist" and "a crackpot" and doubling down on the same.
I think people are being a bit too glib about this *anonymous* *coauthor* especially given today's information climate. we live in a permanent state of psyberwarfare, why should I trust some anonymous source's work or opinion on anything, especially on subjects which few people have the knowledge to assess?
@@____uncompetative I'm really fascinated by your new programming language and GUI project. I've always wanted a GUI that was deliberately designed for the way humans actually think and not only based on boring simulations of desk-related activities. In 2006 I was sitting in college and I had an idea as I was using a word processor for taking notes on my laptop.. I realized how inefficient the virtual "page" is. *Why is it that we're still simulating endless scrolls of papyrus which only go up and down?* I thought to myself. It wasn't working the way my brain worked.. it wasn't organized correctly. Why is it that if I want to find something in a document, I have to "scroll" to it or hit crtl + F to search for it? Anyway, I would really love to talk to you about my ideas considering I have zero coding ability and I'm curious if you've had similar solutions to the problems we've had polishing these old style GUIs as if they're not already antiquated in many ways. Can I pick your brain on that?
Wow Tim... this is the first video of yours I encountered - your questions, framing of each topic and level of preparation on this one are superb.
I really really respect how honest and charitable you were here Brandon. It is something that I shall definitely try to emulate myself.
I really loved how prepared and focused the interviewer was. I wasn't going to listen to the whole thing because I thought it'd be a repeat of earlier podcast interviews with Tim - but prep. work clearly goes a long way. =)
Your a legend for posting the JRE podcast number and timestamp. Great conversation all round.
Many thanks 🙏🏻
Everything is about connections and a little bit of confidence. I have never heard Weinstein brothers before Breit Weinstein's incident at Evergreen College, but hey, like Peterson Family inc, the brothers understood the situation and made use of it very well to the point where Eric is now bringing his son to the spotlight and Breit is telling people not to take Corona vaccination. There are probably millions of people who are as qualified or more qualified to say something about the topics they, brothers, speak about, but unfortunately they either don't have connections, confidence or both.
Great job, you can tell the host has done its research beforehand. Tim is great, as always! :)
Really enjoyed this beautifully presented conversation on the whole affair. Thank you kindly.
*Years back, there was a This American Life episode about armchair "scientists"* The gist of the story was this: a math or physics prof at a university was describing how he'd be occasionally approached by an average Joe claiming to have come up with a groundbreaking theory of gravity, relativity, or the like who would say "I just need help with the math." But as the prof always had to tell them, "the math" was the bedrock on which a theory is based, so no valid theory could be devised without it.
I like Tim's point that while true, revolutionary ideas have always generated skepticism, there are far more examples of bad or non-revolutionary ideas (correctly) being met with skepticism. That said, this affair makes me want to read a detailed account of Einstein's development of, and the physics community's reaction to, his theories. My cartoonish understanding is that Einstein wasn't particularly good at math but had once-in-a-millennium physical intuition, and the math came after (through his work or others', I don't know). I really know nothing about this stuff.
@@brandonvandyck Einstein did well enough at math in school [1,2] but he made numerous errors, perhaps out of carelessness, perhaps out of the fact the test he purportedly "failed" (though he passed the math section) was in French, a lang he barely knew. In his early career, Einstein conversed and corresponded with recognized math experts [1,3]. As he grew into his own, he made mistakes - 20% of his papers contain errors [4]. Some of those he corrected [5] or he shelved the mistaken idea [4]. Ultimately, he and his competitors/colleagues went back and forth getting the math wrong until Einstein finally got it right [6].
[1] www.bbvaopenmind.com/en/science/mathematics/mathematics-and-albert-einstein/
[2] www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2016/02/11/was-albert-einstein-really-a-bad-student-who-failed-math/
[3] www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/may/22/science.research
[4] www.npr.org/2014/03/20/291408248/einsteins-lost-theory-discovered-and-its-wrong
[5] www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/einstein-made-his-share-errors-here-are-three-biggest-ncna855731
[6] www.thegreatcoursesdaily.com/how-einstein-solved-the-general-theory-of-relativity/
Bonus: This www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/einstein-made-his-share-errors-here-are-three-biggest is a deliberate 404 error page, but the background image is worth a look.
@@censorshipbites7545 thanks!
@@EvsEntps I know exactly who Weinstein is. My reference to the TAL story wasn't to compare him to an average Joe but to highlight the fact that a physics theory without a mathematical foundation is essentially worthless, just like a medical theory without case data. Indeed, Einstein's theories were rightfully dismissed by the scientific community until he (or later Straus) eventually worked out the math and his predictions were substantiated by Eddington.
Let me be perfectly clear: I'm agnostic on GU, but not fully elucidating the "workman-like" math was a poor harbinger. Moreover, it demonstrated that the "theory" he put forth was by definition incomplete. Furthermore, Weinstein's apparent treatment of Nguyen was atrocious and inexcusable. So I agree that Weinstein's no crank, but I also think he's a nasty piece of work.
@@censorshipbites7545 But isn't the point of GU that his ideas actually come more from the Mathematical domain?
Regarding Einstein and GR: if I remember correctly he actually called in the help of mathematicians to get the geometric descriptions up to par. I believe this is also one of the reasons SR came first and GR later as he needed more mathematics to fully develop GR.
I’m looking to find the video on club house titled “let’s talk about physics” I can’t find it anywhere?
The discussion of the complexification issue - not just in this video (37:20), but everywhere it is brought up - is frustrating to me because there is so much more that could be said about it. In his draft paper, Eric actually hints at how he wants to deal with it, in footnote 5, page 29, where he cites a 1991 paper by Bar-Natan and Witten ("Perturbative expansion of Chern-Simons theory with noncompact gauge group"), which describes the construction of a perturbation theory for gauge theory with noncompact gauge groups, such as these complexified groups.
That paper involves a three-dimensional theory that is not quite Yang-Mills theory; can its specific techniques be adapted to the higher-dimensional Yang-Mills case? I do not know. But it's not the only context in which a complex gauge group makes sense. And perhaps more significantly, complex gauge groups and complex gauge transformations feature in many *mathematical* applications of gauge theory, such as the Donaldson theory that was revolutionized by Seiberg and Witten. It seems extremely likely that Eric's thoughts on how this should work in physics, are related to how he thinks it works in mathematics.
Another thing that's lacking is any discussion of the core ideas of Geometric Unity - apparently because no one tries very hard to understand that part. So for the benefit of any physicists or mathematicians who may ever read these words, here's my understanding:
Eric works in the metric bundle over 4d space-time. Any particular 4d metric is a section of that bundle. From a given 4d metric, he can construct a 14d metric *on the bundle*. He then defines a 14d gauge theory on the bundle (this is the potentially anomalous theory). There is a coupling between this gauge theory and the section - the shiab operator describes this coupling. The equation in question is Yang-Mills modified to abstractly resemble the Einstein equation of general relativity. This coupling between the gauge curvature and the metric torsion is only meant to work for certain gauge groups. This is where the complexification issue arises.
One more comment: independently of whether something like this is physically correct, it is of interest to understand what kind of mathematical construction this is. There are many kinds of classical and quantum field theory. What known concept does this most closely resemble? I'm not sure. The most I can say for now, is that the 14d gauge field is vaguely like a Berry connection on the Wheeler-DeWitt superspace of the 4d manifold.
Mitchell, thanks for this. I hope your comment is useful to our more mathematical viewers :)
Thank you for your considered comments. I hope that at some point Eric will get grounded out of his insecurities and be able to respond along the lines that you have.
frankly, comments like this irk me. If you think you understand "the core ideas of GU" and have these technical reasons to believe the theory may be sound, and are irritated why Tim is not covering these ideas in discussions, then why not just do exactly what Tim and Theo did, but in support of GU? But _no_ , instead, you decide the best place to leave your deep understanding of Eric's theory is in a youtube comment that maybe hundreds of people will ever see, and quite possibly only you will ever understand.
This is a more astute analysis than I would ever expect to find in a youtube comment - you never know where to go looking for insight. In my wildest dreams, observation of quantum systems really does work like a projection of 10d fibers onto SO(1,3) space times along the cotangent bundle of the 14d bundle space of arbitrary metrics on an arbitrary 4 manifold, because beautiful formulations of the path integral are inexplicably hard to come by, and we should all (Tim included) feel grateful when someone who has obviously studied mathematics extensively happens to give us some insight about theirs.
@@EvsEntps Okay, I don't really see how any of this is relevant to what I said? My question is (and its really directed at Porter): why are there people supporting GU who sound like they know what they are talking about (like Porter), but no paper/response to Tim and Theo's critique, or even just a paper illuminating GU to people with a technical background?
You (Evan), make it sound as if there is some "community" of Eric-followers with sufficiently technical backgrounds working on GU. I am skeptical of this. Where is the evidence? Again, there are _zero_ expositions which shed light on GU other than what Eric, Tim and Theo have already put out; not even Eric acknowledges anything supporting GU other than what he has put out.
And I don't understand why you are bothering to postulate about the critics' motivation/character. I say who cares! By generating reasons not to take Tim and Theo's critiques seriously, you are gatekeeping who can make contributions to science. How is this not exactly the same "DISC" concept that Eric himself has talked about? The hypocrisy. These are topics of this video, so I'm surprised you are not catching yourself doing this.
At 44:00, Brandon says, "he [Weinstein] is implying that quantum theory is false, which was Einstein's intuition if I'm not mistaken."
To be clear, Einstein disagreed with the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, but accepted that there had to be a quantum mechanics.
Thanks for this clarification.
This interview was great work!!
The clubhouse podcast where Eric argues with the math professor is gone. Anyone know why? Is there an alternative link? I want to see that argument.
I got to know Tim a little consulting on sound engineering details for the early iterations his collaborative youtube lecture series "The Cartesian Cafe" (which I highly recommend) and I can say personally that I think he is a man of great integrity in addition to being one of the most intelligent beings I have had the pleasure to interact with.
Eric criticizes the rebuttal because allegedly Tim doesn't correctly understand GU. This stance is at least strange for me. When even people that are proficient in the relevant field can't "understand" your theory, maybe the theory is bad? At least Eric should have enough humility to acknowledge this and try harder in explaining what he means. There is so much wrong with Eric's behavior.
Didn’t he update his paper on April 1st? How has everyone missed this detail.
He also said on one of his appearances on JRE that he likes to play mind games or something like that. Not sure if that was the term.
Really excellent conversation, well moderated. While I can't comment directly on any of the physics stuff since I don't understand any of it, and this story of what happened to Tim is very disturbing, I still do believe that Eric has a lot to offer to our culture, regardless of his flaws.
The arquive didn't accept the paper because one of the authors (Theo) is anonymous and that violates the ethical guidelines of the platform!
The major issue btw with such a world being properly and rigorously described, systems that require an uncountable hilbert space ect is that you simply cannot faithfully describe all the details, its like a teacher that requires you to do uncountable amount of homework to pass a class and you can only work at a finite speed, its just not going to happen. At least not in a fashion where you actually complete all the work. But the sort of meta description can make sense you can describe the problem of completing all the problems loosely and analyze that, but it won’t give you the finished problem sheets so to speak. IF that is how the world works in its totality then we basically have a bunch of physics problems to attack forever, doesn’t mean a whole lot more than that for the science but for tge philosophy and metaphysics it leaves a sort of open doubt about the rigorous nature of features and descriptions there on the table forever, with an actual rigorous argument to be had for why and how that can be the case.
Finally someone calls him out on his elitist arrogant behaviour. Thank you 👏👏👏
Well done.
Thank you :)
The chapter "Isn't an Eric Weinstein hit piece" - This is how I feel. To be honest, a bit disappointed, and disillusioned. Thanks for this video.
I really appreciate your super informed position and points. It was good to hear a bit more about Tim's journey.
I'm a bit annoyed at myself for being so invested in this now. Eric really excited me in his earlier podcasts that I was listening to. A plausible human with a plausible idea... I suppose this is the social part of science *sighs*.
Tim is doing important work, and your channel is doing a good job of getting the details out.
Having said all this. I really do love you all...
Eric, if you ever read this, you're a great human and you have taught me a lot. Critique is awesome, embrace it... we'll embrace it with you! We're all in this together.
Tim, if you read this... your detail, and ability to teach has pushed me into trying harder with my learning. I am very grateful. Thank you for defending science.
Don't beat yourself up too much.
Is not like the writing was on the wall when Eric denied evolution, said science was unscientific, claimed his brother should've won a Nobel, used his contacts who bank roll twitter to unblock his (or his brothers) twitter accounts whilst claiming the elitists are trying to take him down, Eric thinks ufo's are real and using GU to fly faster than the speed of light, and he set up a intellectual gang that's full of conspiracy theorists and crazy right wing reality deniers.
But apart from missing all that, its good to see there's podcasts and intellectuals happy to point out Eric's nonsense 😉
the amount of effort you put in this podcast is astounding, hope you find success.
Hi - Interesting talk. I would be interested in an assessment of CIG Theory. Parts of it may be correct and if so, CIG would have a major impact on Physics and Cosmology. Thank you.
What a fantastic video. Phenomenal Interview and Interviewer. Couldn't help but watch all the way through, liking and subscribing.
About G.U. : I can be charitable (explain away as miscommunication) to a lot of Eric's reactions except his behavior on Clubhouse. It goes well against his professed principles of engagement. I have no strong feelings against or in favor of Eric: I have consumed a lot of his material, but half the time I have no idea what he's talking about (even when I only consume his non-physics, non-mathematical stuff). Your guest often uses qualifiers that make somebody quite unpersuasive and unappealing... e.g.: "crackpot"... "I [Eric] think he conflates in a bad faith way [is Eric Galileo?]", "if he was very serious about his theory he should be writing it down"... the type of statements that I find highly speculative and unproductive... not to mention.. how can he be so sure that somebody conflates "in bad faith" and is not genuinely confused or plain wrong? I'd highly recommend your guest to use more neutral language...his case speaks for itself. Otherwise it does feel like he's trolling.
About your "Mainstream vs Alternative" gatekeeping/sense making structures: Outstanding idea. Personally I fall into the "free speech is messy, but is the best thing we've got"... in other words: No gatekeeping... However I remain open to hear conflicting opinions as to what "good gatekeeping" would be like. I'm really looking forward to your video essay, but I DO want to say this: Careful not to conflate the circumstances by which your guest didn't get an invite to the bigger podcasts (Lex, Rogan, Brian Keating) with the idea of Mainstream Gatekeeping. The mainstream gatekeeping goes as far as getting utility companies involved (credit card, internet hosting, blocking all sorts of income source, demanding bans from the platforms where people distribute content: CZcams, Facebook, Twitter, etc)... and what's happening in this case is nothing close to that. Your guest mentioned that Eric has tried to keep him from distributing his paper? That's wrong... But the fact that Lex decided not to take place on this, Keating declined, and Rogan can't be reached IS NOT deplatforming. Your guest characterized this as "disappointing", which obviously is.. but at the same time neither of such podcasters have an obligation to have him on. You have a right to free speech, not a right to an audience. I can easily understand Lex's, Keating's and Rogan's position, which doesn't have to be nefarious: They know there's a rebuttal to GU... they know there's a bit of drama brewing (having a podcast out, with the title "Crackpot" doesn't help)... You quickly learn that there are a lot of allegations of lying, bad faith, mistreatment on Discord servers, exasperation on a ClubHouse event, etc... Personally? I wouldn't have anything to do with it because I don't have the time and energy to figure out what is going on. I put myself on Brian's shoes: since I know Eric (and this is not a "FRIENDSHIP" argument) I would ask him briefly... and quickly conclude that there's a lot of personal stuff here, possibly misunderstandings, misinterpretations, confusion... I, as Brian Keating, would rather do something else than going through discord servers, podcast allegations, reddit posts to try to figure out what's going on, objectively. That "vetting" is a heuristic we employ everyday.... is not perfect, at all, but we have very limited time as to try and figure out every single allegation, every single email we receive, every comment given. It's just not possible.
Here's the thing... Your guest employed the same heuristic on the Bob Wright podcast when he characterized Bret Weinstein as "engaging in a misinformation campaign" and "antivac".. even though, on his own admission, he hasn't consumed enough material from Bret to know. He, however, relied on his friends' interpretations. To put it simple, your guest is wrong and his friends are wrong about this. You can easily find detailed videos of both Bret and Heather explaining their position. Which takes me to the last thing I wanted to say.
Your guest mentions that a "throwaway comment" about Brett engaging in "misinformation" took a lot of attention on Wright's podcast. You [Interviewer] elaborated that Wright's podcast was really good and that sadly that comment early on is what people talked about. I agree with you, it is sad, but also perfectly understandable.I hear this a lot... a critique that people will stop engaging with your content if you say something they don't like, or something that is wrong. Would I want this behavior to be different? Yes, of course. But again, it is behavior that is actually expected and which has a very simple explanation, and indeed to some degree reasonable. I wonder if this has been tackled by Game Theory?.... We are human beings with very limited time and very limited resources. We try to make sense of the world, but we don't have infinite time to do so. We develop mechanisms to try to discern who to trust. This is something perfectly normal and (sadly) necessary... and it is why, in my opinion, people should refrain from speaking so firmly about something they have no idea about, or at least keep a humble attitude (in this case your guest's opinion on Bret Weinstein and his "misinformation", and the conviction with which he delivered such "throwaway comment" is one of those mechanisms people develop: a red flag to probably go and look for another source, maybe another topic if no other source is available).
To elaborate on this: we go to work, we come back 10 hours later, tired but excited to learn and understand the world a little bit better, and we need mechanisms to discriminate information. Sad, but such is our circumstance, that we need to disfavor certain sources to favor other ones. Especially in this time and age, we have access to commentary by academics, lectures, independent journalism, digital books, blogs, substacks, video essays... Our mechanisms to discriminate information are going to be imperfect, but it shouldn't be a shock that people will scrutinize what you said, particularly when you're somebody "new" (like your guest is). In fact, if you're trying to gain an audience that should be at the top of your considerations: that people will scrutinize what you say. So, a throwaway comment can be crucial to signal where you're coming from, your level of expertise in one matter (granted, your guest expertise is Science, not social commentary, but nobody forced him to make a comment on Bret Weinstein's work... he wasn't even asked about it). Additionally, it also matters how you deliver such a throwaway *and dead wrong* comment. We, as human beings, also have the capacity to see if the person is humble or not in the way they deliver a comment like that, a comment which your guest, on his own admission, hadn't invested time digging into.
Finally I want to overemphasize the circumstance in which people are refining their mechanisms to discriminate information: it's information warfare out there. One tightens its filters, becomes more skeptical and distrustful... The key is to still remain open and remember that human beings make mistakes... so it's crucial to incorporate a sense of "forgiveness" in our "information discrimination algorithms"... bearing in mind that we can forgive only those who would ask for forgiveness and accept wrongdoing. Ultimately "accepting wrongdoing" is something I can't remember when was the last time that I saw the "Mainstream" sense-making institutions do.... They are never ever wrong, they never make mistakes, everybody else is misinforming and deceiving.
Thank you again for this fantastic and engaging piece of media. Terrific job guiding the interview and looking forward to your video essay. I'm humbled beyond words if you managed to read this far. This is the first time in my life I've left such a lengthy message.
P.S. Pardon my English, it is my second language. Greetings from Mexico
Best regards,
Hugo
Hugo, really glad you liked the video. Thanks for your kind words, and you might tweet Tim if you'd like his feedback on your critiques.
One quick comment. I agree with you that gatekeeping isn't the clearest term to use. I would also say, though, that gatekeeping and deplatforming are not synonyms. Deplatforming is taking away someone's platform, and although gatekeeping sometimes takes this form, more often it takes the form of denying someone a platform to begin with. I think it's pretty clear that Eric and Brian are denying Tim a platform; we needn't get into why, or whether they're justified, here. In effect, they're not letting Tim in the gate and obstructing, or at least retarding, sensemaking on the issue of GU.
I lived in Xalapa for a year in 2002-03! De qué parte eres?
@@brandonvandyck Xalapa Veracruz!!! No way!! I'm from Tabasco, the neighboring state! Wow! I used to visit Xalapa often. Hope you had a great time there? ... As for the topic at hand: Point taken. Gatekeeping does not necessarily imply deplatforming and it certainly looks like Eric and Brian could be denying Tim a platform. There's still a lingering interesting conversation: as an alternative sensemaking entity... what are your moral obligations?... to platform everybody? what's the "acceptable" criteria by which you decide you won't have somebody on? How to deal with the bandwidth problem? ... Going back to Tim's and Eric's case, I honestly still keep my position, and I have no dog in this fight: 1. Some of Eric behavior might be simply a misunderstanding of Tim's approach 2. Eric's attitude on Clubhouse is completely inconsistent with his idea of discussion/sensemaking, unfair to Tim and unfair to the Mathematician who asked the question 3. GU is still a draft, Eric might be working on addressing the big problems raised by Tim. 4. Tim, and no one really, has a right to an audience with Eric to discuss GU (how do you veto who "deserves" an audience?) 5. There seems to be some drama surrounding this, so I perfectly understand Lex and Brian position to not allocating time to figure out who is either misunderstanding, exaggerating, misrepresenting or downright lying about "backstage" events.
P.S. I've been watching some of your other videos. Fantastic stuff you have on your channel. James Lindsay? Great
It is fascinating to watch mice play with a cat.
Very cute,
Unfortunate though...
You know very well that not one of us comes out well with a one on one, private, week long chat with Eric.
It would take him that long to explain the first question to you.
The reason he is avoided at all costs in real battle of the mind.
I have seen the look directly in all of his peers' eyes, and it is fear.
Fortitude.
Eric rang me up and he was patient and kind. He asked what did I want to ask him about and I asked if it would be okay for me to explain my gist of an understanding of _Geometric Unity_ to him using terminology I understood and have him jump in at any point to correct any misunderstandings I may have had. He was happy with my superficial level of understanding of his work which I wanted to check I had grasped before I then try to use it to explain _Geometric Unity_ to a layman. This is because there is almost a meme now that _Geometric Unity_ is all but completely incomprehensible and inexplicable to the ordinary person, and it is so hard that no one who understands it can explain any part of it to the ordinary person. This isn't true.
He had one correction, saying that Howard Georgi's _Grand Unified Theory_ was Spin(10) and not SO(10) as it is referred to on Wikipedia, and that Spin(10) is the double cover of SO(10). There wasn't much I could do to understand §8-12 of his paper as it relies on a custom operator which currently lacks a formal definition, and the rest of the draft paper relies on it quite a lot. Also, I am not at all familiar with _General Relativity_ so I have been having to teach myself about that since I spoke to him and may yet attempt a Quora answer suitable for laymen. I was hoping someone else would do this, but thus far no one has, which indicates that those who are curious lack the knowledge of _Quantum Field Theory_ and _General Relativity_ to be able to make reasonable sense of what Eric is trying to do with his work in progress, and how he is currently going about doing that in this initial endogenous (7, 7) instantiation, or have the knowledge but lack the inclination to get involved for any number of reasons, ranging from being too busy, to being jealous Eric gets to put his ideas out into the world when their ideas are effectively suppressed by academia only really allowing freedom to those who secure tenure and even then the fashionable theory will steal all your PhD assistants you might have wanted helping you.
I feel so betrayed. I looked up to him but he had to go make this theory part of his identity. He could have settled with the fact that he gave it a shot. He just wants to be the mysterious guy that has a theory of everything that the establishment wouldn’t let him develop.
very good and fair interview
To me the harshest critique by Timothy on Eric Weinstein's GU was actually what he said during the discussion on 54:55 "Is Eric Galileo". I was actually very interested in the question that was discussed in this section; although the particular instantiation of an idea might be wrong or incomplete, the broader idea could have merit, and could have value as a stepping stone to a theory that does work. However, what Timothy seems to say or imply (in a convoluted way) is that Eric's ideas in GU do not have such value. I see this as the biggest blow to Eric's work on GU, but at the same time, from my layman perspective, it seems something that is difficult to assert; in general, you never know what new ideas sprout from Eric's work. How did others, here, understand what Timothy said in this section? In any case, it's indeed disappointing that no healthy scientific discussion followed after the publication of the critiques.
Summary: The video discusses the controversy surrounding the release of Tim's rebuttal of Eric Weinstein's theory of geometric unity. It mentions that Tim's paper was rejected from the archive, but he still managed to publish it on other platforms. The video also highlights Tim's interactions with Eric, including their conversations on Discord and a heated exchange on a clubhouse conversation. It suggests that Tim's decision to release the rebuttal on Twitter and appear on various platforms to discuss it further has sparked interest and debate. The video concludes by stating that Tim's critique of academia and his decision to leave have influenced his current work at Google.
Main Themes:
1. Controversy surrounding the release of Tim's rebuttal and the rejection of his paper from the archive.
2. Interactions between Tim and Eric, including their conversations on Discord and a heated exchange on a clubhouse conversation.
3. Impact and implications of Tim's critique of academia and his decision to leave on his current work at Google.
Follow-up Questions:
1. How has the rejection of Tim's paper from the archive affected the reception and discussion of his rebuttal?
2. Can Tim provide more insights into his interactions with Eric Weinstein and the specific points of disagreement between them?
3. How has Tim's perspective on academia and his decision to leave influenced his current work at Google and his approach to research and intellectual stimulation?
Q: How has Tim's perspective on academia and his decision to leave influenced his current work at Google and his approach to research and intellectual stimulation?
A: Tim's perspective on academia and his decision to leave have had a significant influence on his current work at Google and his approach to research and intellectual stimulation. He felt that academia did not provide the freedom to think and work on whatever he wanted, and he observed that those with tenure were not necessarily pushing the frontier or being daring and bold in their research. This led him to seek new opportunities outside of academia, particularly in the field of machine learning, where he saw a lot of potential.
Now at Google, Tim is able to pursue his research interests and engage in intellectual stimulation without the constraints and pressures of academia. He describes his work at Google as a "completely side pet project" that is separate from his main job. This allows him the freedom to explore and comment on topics that he is passionate about, such as Eric Weinstein's theory of geometric unity and his own rebuttal of it. Tim's experience in academia has also made him more willing to engage in controversies and touch on topics that may not align with the mainstream information landscape. Overall, his decision to leave academia has given him the opportunity to pursue his intellectual interests more freely and without compromising his trajectory or reputation.
Chat
I used to be an Eric Weinstein fan and like many others something was off about him, besides all the connections and employers.
He doesn’t want to have a dialogue or interact or engage with you he wants to engage the people at the very top and he wants his particular niche of high class to be allowed to sit at the table with the ruling class.
He’s a “I can rule better and be more benevolent” type of dude.
Lmao at the disappointed weinstein cultists in the comments. Has he ever talked any sense ?
Indeed. Weinstein cultists are like Peterson cultists, Trump cultists, or any other deluded cultists. They proliferate in this day and age when real expertise is disparaged and equated with the most revolting quackery. The uneducated classes (encouraged by the elites) now feel entitled to openly display their appalling ignorance and stupidity, when they should STFU.
good to question everyones personality flaws always, also good to understand your instinctual unconscious response
Great video!
Highly interesting-I must say it only took me about four times of listening to Eric's podcast before my intuition turned sour on him For example, when he praised his wife to the sky as a genius economist, and I saw that she didn't know diddly-squat, it wasn't really very hard to grasp what a scientific blowhard he can be.
To borrow one of Eric's metaphors, we may have to dine a la carte with his arguments.
Yes, exactly-I in fact made this point when chatting with a fan of his from the Canaries in April 2020 during lockdown.
On the plus side, I expressed it thus: as a thinker, you really only need get one big thing right scientifically to be celebrated for the rest of eternity. So Newton failed spectacularly in his attempts at Biblical exegesis and predictions of the coming of the Apocalypse (on which he purportedly spent more time than on all his physics), but crushed the physics so completely that no one cares in the slightest. (In baseball we might call this the Dave Kingman approach to batting.)
In sum: every human being is an inescapable 'package deal', both characterologically and intellectually. (This is extremely important to remember when settling on a marriage partner.)
Sony needs a VR app that allows a simple level creator…. with a music creator included …. and tons of special effects and animations included
Great interview. Subbed!
Nice work.. Very fair. I hope he gets his debate.
Appreciate the clarity you two. An interesting conversation that consumed my day here and elsewhere.
Glad you found it useful.
almost done with the video. i would say this interview makes the best attempt at staying unbiased. the host seems very insightful and makes excellent points throughout the video (though somewhat subdued, maybe out of some sense of diplomacy?), so good job to him. personally i'm going to wait until eric responds. also glad the host was fair to bret and heather too.
@Robert Hunt ahh i see. and yea i agree, bret and heather should never be brought up in these discussions at all.
Diplomas have become a sort of fiat currency for knowledge.
I probably shouldn't editorialize in this way, but I would refine the statement in the following way: diplomas, except in a few cases, are like fiat currency in countries with politically or ideologically captured central banks.
@@brandonvandyck so you would include the US then?
Tim is great on Eric, but "my friends say Brett is spreading misinformation dangerously so I called him an anti vaxxer, even though I don't watch his show" is pretty crappy.
I've watched Bret's statements on modern medicine and mRNA applications in biomedicine. That is in no way an unfair characterization of Bret's views/statements, even going as far as to agree with the statement "modern medicine kills more people than it saves on an annual basis", a ludicrous proposition.
@@connorfinnerty1366 Absolutely is. As a person who has more vaccines than people in general, Brett can only be considered an anti vaxxer if you want to manipulate the definition. His specific issue is not with vaccines in general, but the covid ones.
Doctors kill like 280k people a year from malpractice, aside from most treatments only deal with symptoms that end up causing things like the opioid epidemic.
The vaccines for covid have not been adequately tested,and there is no scientific history with gene therapy from the mrna. On top of that, the vaccines we do have are questionable in efficacy/efficiency, people still sick and die from it and you're supposed wear a mask even if you got the vaccine. Add on the extreme politicization of everything Trump and covid, why would anyone actually think these specific vaccines are anything but questionable?
@@comeonman5667 yea, agreed. i also really dislike how they feel the need to trash bret in every new installment of this campaign. like what's he have to do with any of this, and why mention it every time if you're not even sure???
BTW, has any one ever seen an explanation of how the "graviton" mediates gravity? Yes, string theory predicts the existence of a spin 2 "particle" that can be fitted to represent a quantization of a gravity wave, but gravity is the curvature of spacetime itself, so how is it a particle like a photon? There is something very very hand-wavy about this!
I've been curious about this exact question myself.
Ironic that I believe existence is a story that we all keep repeating to each other….. words are what makes things things…
It's funny how all of these guys start out as idealists, high on their horses when it comes to values. And once they get a podcast following, they form cliques, and don't want to upset the applecart (Lex). If you're really about finding truth, none of that should matter. But all of these podcast personalities are about themselves. Eric the most of all of them.
Also, Keating is an odd one. He actually plays both sides of the fence. If you read the comments of his vids, he''ll agree with many criticisms of Eric. But on-camera, all he does is kiss his ass. It's like he's trying to 'keep his friends close, and enemies closer.'
I agree that there are powerful people in both establishments who control narrative but I think if new theory is good it would eventually win over any censor. For some reason I think about Mayan language. Academia was dominated by Eric Thomson's theory until unknown Soviet scientist offered better explanation. Despite suppression and cold war very soon flow of deserters from Thompson camp was unstoppable. ..
I wonder how much of Eric's behaviour should be considered against a background of varying mental health.
i feel like eric is smart enough to be a physicist, but he isnt one. thats the issue. meaning hes some sort of slapped together self made physicist. yes, i will still call him that. thats why he runs into errors within his own theory making.
What I like is that as I read these back…. I can see T. Nguyen nodding his him agreement and smiling…. he’s confirming all my ideas 🤩😎🤣
I’m see how these comments can be used as a free online journal…. I can watch a video, comment what I’m thinking at that moment best I can… and then CZcams stores the journal in my data settings.
Subscribed. Loving this conversation with Tim. I have a cultural fascination with the rise of characters like the Weinstein brothers, IDW, and the nexus of: intellectualism, ani intellectualism, chicanery, wounded academics, tortured modes of masculinity (power), grifters and stoners, and how this all gets ciphoned through new media.
Nice breakdown of your gatekeeping analysis. Looking forward to the video essay that was teased.
I first became aware of this debate(?) via Tim's appearance on Bob's podcast. In reading the comments for that, I was eye rolling over the pearl clutching about Tim's anti-vax comment towards Bret W. Anyone with a moderate measure of reason or common speak understood what Tim meant and besides, Bret is essentially anti covid vax. He even had Tucker Carlson help him share that message, the dope.
Thank you, and I also look forward to the video essay :) Its scope keeps expanding, and it's getting hard to manage; there's so much to think through. I'm working on a shorter video right now that is relevant and should be up within a few days. Thanks again!
An anti vaxxer who took the vaccine. And had his child vaccinated. Curious.
*Yes 100% Brett is Anti forced/mandated vax, to healthy people whom are given no other alternative. To mislead people into taking it for fear or for greed, to suppress all other ideas and to cancel, isolate and vilify people who entertain them. I wonder if you have come around yet, like most people will come to agree that **_this_** mRNA **_treatment_** was a thanatophobia driven error precipitated by a financially driven greed pileup.*
For a disease that for most people, "not as bad as we thought"-- Bill Gates.
More equality - more science - lost art. Talkers rule the world. 🖖
Indeed. Talkers rule the world, instead of thinkers.
Btw brett also had on a guy who says he is the inventor or mrna vaccines, which he kind of isn’t at all. Look into that guy
I’m going to do some coverage of the Ivermectin issue soon. Really interesting case study.
Robert malone, the inventor of mRNA technology when he was 28 years old, not the inventor of mRNA vaccines. I think you got that bit confused.
I don't get it
Without words…. your thoughts are not yours to have…. they exist without you
SHIAB operator -- Eric Weinstein refers to this as "Ship in a Bottle" I am not sure whether this is a metaphor or a memory aide.
Symmetry -- he talks about symmetry of hand one hand is not symmetric because of thumb and pinky but right and left hands are symmetric.
Just language notes -- I don't understand the physics.
I think the hyper specialisation meme slows down progression. There isn't enough comparing notes and the perspective is too narrow and limited.
Life is eternal…. but knowledge is fleeting
Seems to me that this is just the usual rivalry between people who know a lot about subjects that most people don't know much about, and that all sides may be partially right and partially wrong. Also seems to me that's what science is all about, that rivalry between all factions to work our more information. Also seems to me that reasonably intelligent people can hold various ideas in sort of suspended animation and watch as more facts unfold. One does not have to take one side or another, especially in a field most of us are amateurs in.
I like to finish the quote Timothy referenced as: "Academics tend to learn more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing."
Ha!
Maybe he could say you know a few more times
This is great, should start a movement to break up the old way
What if Elon doesn’t make it to Mars? Like I feel the same way as you about why Erics not concretising the theory for us. Perhaps he doesn’t have it yet. Perhaps he’s still languaging it. And dropping bits or teasing helps him to map it out. Perhaps your criticism will help. I have no doubt you’re doing entirely your part in the situation. His supporters are backing him across a number of fields. And I still give him space to play because I feel like ppl who enjoy the work of him or his brother are kinda anti-cult. I’ve actually been a member of a cult and feel quite repulsed by any hint of them. Pop or counter pop. Those two don’t give me cult vibes.
They’re ‘secular gurus’, like Jordan Peterson. Cult might be a bit strong but their followers are delusional about their status in their respective fields.
@@HkFinn83 Peterson’s not secular little homie. So the leaders aren’t delusional you say but their followers are? That’s a possibility. It’s possible they’re delusional. It’s also possible you’re delusional. Both Weinsteins appear to be correct across a multitude of fields IMO. Eric may indeed never have a TOE. But the pursuit is itself a purpose. Just like Mars.
@@noahfine7518 secular doesn’t mean atheist 😂😂
He’s a guru who isn’t a priest, get it?
Forgive me if this sounds rude but you sound like you can only think in absolutes - that is a personality trait of people who are vulnerable to gurus, cults, conmen etc. Try to be more comfortable with nuance and subtlety. Notice how you try to set up a false dichotomy between this chap and his followers. You said that, not me. It’s that ‘either/or’ extremism that lands you in a cult
@@HkFinn83 from Oxford dic: denoting attitudes, activities, or other things that have no religious or spiritual basis.
I don’t believe that fits Peterson bub. Also your attempt at belittling me doesn’t work by the means you’ve expressed. You’d have to explain how anything I said was lacking nuance. Saying you feel like that’s what I’m expressing is a little dickhead move.
Instinct is behavior inherent to the organism… so limited free will…. so where is the limit of human instinct to live, eat, speak
Eric and Sabine have wisdom and grace. Timothy is young and punkish. I don't see Brian promoting GU per se.
To the person conducting the interview, you did a great job. Tim has some good points, but also states some things I disagree with, but that is fine.
San jose in the house....
Interesting and significant that weinstein here receives the attention his theory demands; I always thought that Eric was looking to resolve some of the many puzzles or incompletenesses of the various theories, especially the Weinberg-Glashow-Salam, Standard model; that he was in some way seeking to synthesize his own theory with this other. Until now few were responding to his lecture at Oxford. Sabine Hossenfelder excepted. She did make appearances and engaged Eric directly. Maybe his star is rising now-at least it should be admitted on all sides, that he has made a contribution of obvious significance.
The math stories and word stories….. come from with…. and are shared without in a variety of ways
Lex doesn’t like controversy? Really? He recently had an anti vaxer - what else could be the point other than driving clicks.
Only to return
Hope CZcamss AI gets better at predictive typing and error correction
Timothy gets very personal in relation to Eric, I would not engage with him after he made me look like an idiot, why can't this be a purely scientific rebuttal, why does it have to be personal? I doubt Eric thinks that there is no one who is able to pick faults in his theory. Clearly anyone doing innovative science has not a lack of ego. Timothy is so negative and verbally abusive, wtf....?
I'm glad somebody noticed that. Even if some people dislike Eric or his brother or the whole _Intellectual Dark Web_ for whatever reason there is no need to be nasty.
I still struggle with idea of 0…. so I’m afraid none of the math makes sense
I that a Wassily Kandinsky on his wall?
Wish I could tell you :)
why is it so high up on the walll..?
@@onseayu Tim could be sat on the floor with a laptop. Just guessing.
Wow, what a well done, thorough, and balanced interview. I have appreciated some of Eric’s conversations on other podcasts, but I think he tends to use some rhetorical tricks that portray himself as smarter than he is. Maybe it’s done unconsciously. Maybe he’s projecting. Maybe he’s just a narcissist.
Nevertheless, it takes balls to claim you have a theory for everything and invite criticism. Just a shame he hasn’t seemed to roll with the critics well.
Clearly so. It is much more pleasant to the ego (even if self-deluding) to present oneself as a misunderstood genius than acknowledge one's limitations, no matter how much "verbal fireworks" (purportedly demonstrative of genius) one displays online.
I gotta say… the student/master kinda thing is entertaining….. Loeb using students to write articles, (and shamelessly using the superstition of laymen to fund a space robot to study space)Weinstein is trying to find students ….. and Wolfram is about to be exponent of Google…. Like a Wolframplex.
Sounds like Eric is an imposter who is full of it. Smdh
Hi, lovely convo, well presented and well argued. With respect to your investigation/paper on alternative sensemaking institutions, I would suggest interviewing Yuri Deigen, who Bret had on his podcast to talk about lab leak repeatedly, and who now feuds with him on Twitter, and whom Bret refuses to engage with honestly, although with significantly more theatrics.(this is about Bret’s Ivermectin... tomfoolery)
That's a good idea. I'll see if I can connect with him. Thanks!
We need to split into two
Then argue who designed the best club….