EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,106 words- 0:00 – 15:00
(laughs) …
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs)
- NANarrator
All right.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, wait a minute. Are we going live? Can-
- NANarrator
Boom, and we're live. Mr. Carroll, how are you, sir?
- SCSean Carroll
Very good to be back.
- JRJoe Rogan
Very good to have you back. So, uh, you have a podcast now.
- SCSean Carroll
I do. I've joined the ranks. You inspired me.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, you, uh, it's important.
- SCSean Carroll
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
We need people like you out there. Uh, you're, uh, you have, like, what, seven episodes so far?
- SCSean Carroll
Seven episodes up, got a few more in the can. Gonna try to drib 'em out once a week, uh, for the first six months or so, see how it goes. Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Are you enjoying the process?
- SCSean Carroll
I am. Mindscape, by the way, is the name, for those out there in podcast land. Yeah, I'm loving it. You know, the, the real, the thing that tilted me over toward doing it... 'Cause like, look, it's, I have a day job, right? I can't spend too much-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
... time doing this stuff. Um, but what I realized, it was an excuse, uh, a license to talk to people who are not just physicists, right? 'Cause like-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes.
- SCSean Carroll
... I have intellectual interests that go way beyond just what I do for a living. And in academia, you're not allowed to take seriously anything other than your discipline, your job, right? I'm allowed to be talking about physics, but nothing else. But so now I can talk to historians and economists and philosophers and psychologists and it's great.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, you could've just gone to Evergreen State and then you could talk about anything.
- SCSean Carroll
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
I mean, you're teaching a professor, you could just, if you're a professor, you could teach them dance.
- SCSean Carroll
We have to break out-
- JRJoe Rogan
Literally.
- SCSean Carroll
... of the system. We have to do it ourselves.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, man.
- SCSean Carroll
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Gotta break outta that system. So your, uh, podcast, you decided that this would be a great venue for you to just, uh, expand on subjects and just get into anything that you'd like.
- SCSean Carroll
Well, you know, I, I have opinions about things, and I've never been one who's said you shouldn't talk about things unless you're a PhD-credentialed expert, right? I think everyone should be talking about everything, but you should know what your level of expertise is.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
So if you're not an expert, you should listen to people, and you should then make your own decisions, but you should first gather the information. And so I don't feel quite like I can go... I, I have a blog, and I can write whatever I want on my blog, but I can't really expound on my theories of economics 'cause what do I know about economics?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- 15:00 – 30:00
If you looked at…
- SCSean Carroll
that work is done by robots and machines and human beings are free to be creative or artistic or athletic or just sit on their butts if that's what they wanna do? If you believe that that's a possible future, then the way to get there is to, as robots and machines do more and more, make it more and more possible for people to live without working. I think that's a, is at least... I have no idea whether it works in practice. I'm not an economist. I haven't studied it, but I think it should be taken seriously as an idea.
- JRJoe Rogan
If you looked at it as a pessimist, and if you looked at it with a cynical perspective, you'd say, "Uh, well, people just, what, they don't have motivation. Then they behave like rich kids or entitled people or people who won the lottery. They blow all the money. They don't take it seriously 'cause they didn't earn it. It goes against human nature."
- SCSean Carroll
Yep, I get that. And maybe it does. Let them do it. Who, who am I to tell people that they need to be virtuous by earning a living in some-
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
... you know, job they may or may not be able to keep for very long, right? People who say that usually haven't gotten fired from their jobs recently, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) Right, right. Yeah, and I always feel like the people that are actually ambitious... But the- the real problem I think would be growing up with that. I think if you- you got it as an adult, you'd probably recognize it as the safety net that it is. But as, if it was during your developmental process, you might rely on it as a constant.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
And so that might be a problem in terms of motivation.
- SCSean Carroll
I think so, and I think that, uh, and you see it, right? I mean, I- I- I have friends at various levels of income and- and class-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
... that they grew up in, and you can always tell people who grew up in very comfortable, uh, environments because they don't have jobs, they have projects.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
(laughs) Say I'm working on a project. Because they're not really worried about the project failing, you know? Like, the, if- if you grew up without that safety net, you're more cautious, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes.
- SCSean Carroll
Like, you have to have a- a fail safe. You have to have a- a backup plan. And, but what if everyone had that backup plan? What if we could all do projects instead of work? Is that really a worse world? I don't know.
- JRJoe Rogan
Do you know any trust fund people?
- SCSean Carroll
Oh, yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
I know plenty.
- JRJoe Rogan
The ones that I know all blow their money. (laughs)
- SCSean Carroll
Actually, I know some, I know some very wealthy people who raise their kids really well. And you know-
- JRJoe Rogan
As trust fund people?
- SCSean Carroll
Oh, yeah, as people who, like, never need to work a day in their lives and they all work really hard.
- JRJoe Rogan
That's so weird. You- you-
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah, it's possible. Possible.
- JRJoe Rogan
Find those people and clone them.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) Find out what made them tick. What was their-
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
So they found a passion. They found something that they're actually...
- 30:00 – 45:00
Yeah. …
- SCSean Carroll
brain computer interfaces, you know, all that stuff is going to, within the next 100 years, totally change what it means to be a human being. And we're totally not ready for it, and so I was saying this to Carl. He, he, Carl's like not that, Carl Zimmer...... was, is more or less sanguine about it. It's like, "Don't worry, just, you know, we'll put regulations on, it'll be fine." And my attitude was, no, actually we should think of the absolute craziest science fiction scenarios 'cause I wanna be prepared, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
Even if it doesn't come to pass, I wanna worry about the least probable things because it might spark something that actually helps us down the road.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah, there was a recent discovery, they figured out a way to shut off whatever it is that causes wrinkles and reverse the process.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
So, whatever is causing your skin to get wrinkly and sag-
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... they're reversing that process.
- SCSean Carroll
We might be, uh, members of the last generation to die. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Whoa. Or of old age.
- SCSean Carroll
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
We won't be immortal.
- SCSean Carroll
Well, then if you thought you were immortal, if you thought that, well, let's say if you thought that your average lifespan was a million years, would you suddenly become way more cautious?
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, I'd start jumping off buildings and shit.
- SCSean Carroll
(laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
I would do, like, I have a friend of mine who does that, uh, flying squirrel suit stuff. He holds the world record-
- SCSean Carroll
You don't become invulnerable, you just don't age. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
Yes, exactly. Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
That flying squirrel stuff is truly dangerous.
- JRJoe Rogan
Oh, it's super dangerous.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah. But-
- SCSean Carroll
Base jumping, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
What if they could just fix you? If you, if like, even-
- SCSean Carroll
But that's a separate thing. Yes, that's-
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
... possible, right? Like maybe if they could back you up-
- JRJoe Rogan
Take your goo-
- SCSean Carroll
... back you up and then-
- JRJoe Rogan
... and throw that in a machine.
- 45:00 – 1:00:00
Mm-hmm. …
- JRJoe Rogan
enhance that process on top of it. I think there's gonna be a bunch of different things going on at once.
- SCSean Carroll
Mm-hmm.
- JRJoe Rogan
I mean, if you think about CRISPR being something where someone eventually figures out a way to design various aspects of the human brain that are more open to interface with technology-
- SCSean Carroll
Right.
- JRJoe Rogan
... changing various receptors, make them, uh, more efficient for data to go straight to the dome.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah, and I think that, uh, there is a short-term versus long-term question here, right? Like, even if what I said is a long-term truth, on the short term, improving our thinking skills in direct ways with stimulation or whatever sounds, you know, pretty good. But maybe you can just do that through beta blockers or some drugs or something like that.
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
Like, I think that that's another thing very plausible that will have safe, super efficient drugs someone can take, and over the next six hours, they're, they're way clearer thinkers than they were before.
- JRJoe Rogan
Yeah.
- SCSean Carroll
Right? And-
- JRJoe Rogan
Is there any concern with what's the endgame? Like, what's the endgame-
- SCSean Carroll
I hope so.
- JRJoe Rogan
... with all this stuff?
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah, I hope so. I mean, if you're super far advanced, uh, the endgame is you realize that life is not that interesting. (laughs)
- JRJoe Rogan
(laughs) You went too far.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah. You're like, "Well, why am I here? What am I doing with all this?" Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
A little challenge is helpful, actually.
- JRJoe Rogan
Well, in particular, if you develop immortality-
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah.
- JRJoe Rogan
... if there's no concern about getting injured or, or killed.
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah. I think that people who envision super far ahead science fiction scenarios, and especially people who envision uploading brains and consciousness, underestimate the importance of our bodies to who we are as human beings, right? Not just that we're in a body, but, like, hunger, thirst, exhaustion-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
... being horny. Like-
- JRJoe Rogan
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
... these are motivating factors that really affect who we are and, and what we say and what we do. And if you remove all that, if you're just a thinking processor in a computer, what's your motivation? What's your motivation?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
Why are you going on, right?
- JRJoe Rogan
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
Like, why are you doing anything at all? Like, I don't think it'll be, I don't think it'll be anything like the personality, the person who you were, if your body is taken away.
- 1:00:00 – 1:10:33
Okay. …
- SCSean Carroll
and one, it's that the two-bit system is in a combination of 00011011, right? So it might be that it's 50% 00 and 50% 11. So you don't know what either bit is, but you know they're the same. Right?
- NANarrator
Okay.
- SCSean Carroll
So that's entanglement. So you take these two ideas that the, you have a combination of zeros and ones rather than just one or the other, and that the different bits can be entangled with each other. And then you just say, "Well, what is a computer?" A computer is something that takes bits in, does manipulations, and spits out the answer, right? You solve problems, you, that's what's literally going on in your computer is a bunch of zeros and ones being pushed around. So a quantum computer is pushing around a bunch of qubits, right? A bunch of spinning particles or something like that. The spin of a particle that can either be spinning clockwise or counterclockwise is a qubit. And so these particles can interact with each other, they can become entangled, and you invent a quantum algorithm, right? Like there's algorithms for, you know, finding the area of a surface or something like that, factoring large numbers, you know, solving the shortest distance between two different points. You can do this using the rules of quantum mechanics instead of the rules of classical mechanics. And the belief, which is not yet 100% established, but we think is true, is that there are some problems that are really, really hard to solve for a classical computer, which means that you can easily make the problem long enough that it would take the lifetime of the universe to solve it on a classical computer, which quantum computers can solve quite quickly and efficiently. And so it's, we're not, we haven't proven that. That's not a mathematically precise-
- NANarrator
Why is the-
- SCSean Carroll
... statement.
- NANarrator
... why would they think that quantum computers would be able to solve it quicker?
- SCSean Carroll
There's more information in the quantum computer. Like if you have two bits, 0001, et cetera, there's only four things it can be, right? If you have a quantum computer, there's an infinite number of things it can be, because it's any combination of those four things, right? 10% this, 20% that.
- NANarrator
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
So there's like a continuum of possibilities. It's, it's analog rather than digital in some sense. And so what you, what you can do, you know, the, the quantum computer can just sort of take advantage of that extra power, um, to look, I mean, because of this entanglement, what, this is, this is, I'm gonna get in trouble with my quantum computing friends 'cause it's not quite fair, but roughly speaking, rather than manipulating bit by bit, because of the entanglement between the bits, the quantum computer can move all the bits a little bit at once. So let's say that you're, you're searching for something in a list, right? A very elementary, uh, computer science program is I'm giving you a list, find an element that is equal to a certain number, right?
- NANarrator
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
It sounds easy, but if that list is 10 trillion things long, that's hard, right? So what the quantum computer can do is say, take every element in the list, nudge it a little bit towards zero if it's the wrong answer and towards one if it's the right answer. And you don't know where it is in the list, but you can do that nudging over and over again, and at the end of the day, you look for where, where's the one, it's very easy to find.
- NANarrator
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
So you can get the answer much quicker, it, it is believed. And so things like cryptography, privacy, right, are dramatically changed by this because if, one of the things that we think quantum computers should be able to do faster is factor large numbers, which is the, the, the difficulty in factoring large numbers is the, uh, basis for much modern cryptography, uh, but also simulating systems that were just too difficult to simulate, you know, just, just it took too much computer power to do it. Now, maybe we can do it 'cause nature is truly quantum mechanical at, at the core. It turns out to be very hard because the problem is you have all these bits, if you touch one of them, if the outside world bumps into one of them, right, like a cosmic ray or an atom hits it-
- NANarrator
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
... the whole entanglement is ruined between everything. So it's very, very delicate, and that's what the, you know, right now, um, they're, they're working on systems of, let's say, dozens of qubits entangled at once. You would, you would like it to be way more than that 'cause you can store an enormous amount of information in these things, and, uh, if, if it works, it's, I think it'll be way better at computing if it works. I'm not at all sure that quantum computers will be efficient or cost-effective or anything like that in the near term, but, you know, doing computations faster is something a lot of people wanna be able to do.
- NANarrator
So right now, they're working with dozens of qubits, and what's preventing them from expanding that or they're doing it slowly to sort of make sure that it all works correctly and get a, a, a, an accurate model?
- SCSean Carroll
Yeah, so the, the problem is if you have a qubit, it can be in a combination of zero or one, right? Any combination whatsoever, but as soon as you look at it, you never see the combination. You see zero or you see one, that's it. And you've ruined, you've erased this preexisting combination, right? If you see zero, now it's in the state zero.
- NANarrator
Right.
- SCSean Carroll
If you see one, it's in the state one. So if you have a group of many, many qubits, what I mean by "look at" is literally anything else in the world bumping into it.
- NANarrator
Mm-hmm.
- SCSean Carroll
So like if, like I said, if photons hit it, if particles, uh, you know, if, if molecules of, of air and, uh, oxygen or nitrogen bump into the qubit, that'll count as an observation, and it will collapse as we say, it collapses the wave function, and then all of your quantum information is ruined. So, uh, you have to make them sort of very cold, very isolated, very shielded from external influences, and the more qubits you add, the harder that is to do.
- NANarrator
Ooh. Now, is there a proof of concept to this?
- SCSean Carroll
Yep, they have working quantum computers.
- NANarrator
Oh.
- SCSean Carroll
Um, I, I forget, there was a joke, uh, Scott Aaronson, who's a friend of mine who's a genius, uh, theoretical computer scientist, used to joke that the quantum computers are able to, to say that the number 15 is equal to 5 times 3 with very high probability (laughs) .
- NANarrator
(laughs) .
- SCSean Carroll
That was the state-of-the-art. I think they're able to say that 21 equals 3 times 7 with very high probability now, but, uh, what you would like to say is, you know, some 100-digit number is the product of, of two other numbers, not able to do that right now.
- JRJoe Rogan
Now, what are they looking at with this? When- when- when they're looking in terms of, uh, the future of this stuff, what are they... how do they wanna implement this?
- SCSean Carroll
Lots of different ways, actually. Like, look, you know, the actual physical technology that they're using, some people are using, uh, atoms, some people are using sort of, um, (smacks lips) uh, features of condensed matter systems, like two-dimensional systems where electrons are moving slowly and can wind around each other and things like that. This is- this is way beyond what I actually, uh, know about. But also, you know, the sort of sidelight of this is that this e- existence of entanglement, um, is kind of a shared information between two different things in a way that classical physics just would not allow. And that's interesting and exciting because it opens up ways, uh, for, you know, for sharing information that other people can't get to, because you have some information, your friend has some information, but it's- it... you need both pieces of it to get to it, right? Um, Seth Lloyd, who's a- another friend of mine, an MIT professor, said that he was... He tells this story where he was in a hot tub with the, uh, Google guys, right? With Sergey and, and Larry and, you know, the heads of Google, the founders. And he said, "Oh, I came up with this brilliant new idea where we can use quantum mechanics, build a quantum computer so that a person who does a search, a Google search using this quantum computer, they can do a search and they can get their answer, but it is literally impossible for anyone else to ever know what they searched for."
- JRJoe Rogan
Hmm.
Episode duration: 2:34:27
Install uListen for AI-powered chat & search across the full episode — Get Full Transcript
Transcript of episode ZtxzMb9CpTM
Get more out of YouTube videos.
High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.
Add to Chrome