I like my solo episodes to be short and sweet. I aim for 8 minutes.

This one’s 36 minutes.

It’s the pivotal episode in my exploration of Wolfram Physics.

How do we go from the complex, chaotic hypergraphs generated by even the simplest rule to something simple and regular enough for the simplicity and regularity of physics to emerge?

I confess that I was suspicious of Stephen Wolfram’s treatment of this step in his book A project to find the Fundamental Theory of Physics.

Or his lack of treatment of this step.

On one page, there’d be a beautiful taxonomy of dozens of different universes generated by dozens of different rules. On the next page, we’d be back to one-dimensional string substitution. Physics, it seemed, could emerge only from the latter.

I was determined to prove this step valid. If I couldn’t, I’d lose all confidence in Wolfram Physics.

It took me a couple of years to get there. I needed to know exactly how a simple causal graph could be constructed for a simple rule.

Here’s what I found. Here, step-by-step, is how to simplify the causal graph.

Honestly, I don’t know how many of my subscribers will be interested in this level of detail.

Regardless, I needed to do this for myself. I needed to prove that my suspicions were unfounded. I needed to know that what comes next is based on a firm foundation.

Because what comes next is mass/energy, momentum, special relativity, general relativity, quantum mechanics... all of physics.

This is the pivotal episode. From here on, we’ll be able to make serious progress... with episodes that’ll be back down to 8 minutes long!

Mark

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The Last Theory is hosted by Mark Jeffery founder of Open Web Mind