EPISODE · May 26, 2023 · 1H 45M
Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and others) [August 12, 2022]
from The Stephen Wolfram Podcast · host Wolfram Research
Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: How is computation in nature different than the computation that a computer does? - Why do cars get much hotter than the outside air temperature? In Austin this week, my car's internal air temperature was 130° F, while it was 100° F outside. - Why haven't we discovered a cure for baldness? Compared to the other great apes, we have lost most of our body hair, so I wonder if baldness is not just our further evolutionary progression of losing all body hair. - Think about things in nature as having autonomous rules. For example, a flower is one rule, but different shapes, colors, etc. of flowers have different initial conditions. Is this too crazy an idea? - To what extent are plant cells Voronoi meshes? How about animal cells? To what extent could one build a simulation of a tree using something like a "Voronoi mesh automaton"? - Do you believe there is a concrete description of evolution waiting to be fleshed out in the multicomputational paradigm? If so, does its basic rule relate to the expansion of the hypergraph? - If mammals have a common ancestor, then how did they get divided into carnivores and herbivores? - What do you think of the notion of chemical interspecies communications? - Can we think of some fungi species that could reach some kind of intelligence like the human one in the future? - Are bubbles round because of gravity?
What this episode covers
Stephen Wolfram answers general questions from his viewers about science and technology as part of an unscripted livestream series, also available on YouTube here: https://wolfr.am/youtube-sw-qa Questions include: How is computation in nature different than the computation that a computer does? - Why do cars get much hotter than the outside air temperature? In Austin this week, my car's internal air temperature was 130° F, while it was 100° F outside. - Why haven't we discovered a cure for baldness? Compared to the other great apes, we have lost most of our body hair, so I wonder if baldness is not just our further evolutionary progression of losing all body hair. - Think about things in nature as having autonomous rules. For example, a flower is one rule, but different shapes, colors, etc. of flowers have different initial conditions. Is this too crazy an idea? - To what extent are plant cells Voronoi meshes? How about animal cells? To what extent could one build a simulation of a tree using something like a "Voronoi mesh automaton"? - Do you believe there is a concrete description of evolution waiting to be fleshed out in the multicomputational paradigm? If so, does its basic rule relate to the expansion of the hypergraph? - If mammals have a common ancestor, then how did they get divided into carnivores and herbivores? - What do you think of the notion of chemical interspecies communications? - Can we think of some fungi species that could reach some kind of intelligence like the human one in the future? - Are bubbles round because of gravity?
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Science & Technology Q&A for Kids (and others) [August 12, 2022]
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