Difference between revisions of "A Portal Special Presentation- Geometric Unity: A First Look"

<p>[00:27:45] "What do I think" is the question I'm asked frequently and there are two things that I'll say. Many years ago, around 1987, I put forward some equations that I thought might become my thesis at the Harvard Department of Mathematics. And they were disallowed for a variety of reasons. Those equations were later discovered in, I believe, 1994, and I sat in a lecture in which I saw these equations go up on a board, at the very end [of a lecture] at MIT.

<p>[00:28:06] And I looked at those equations, and I said, huh, those are the exact equations I was told, could never work. Why is the leading physicist in the world placing them on the board and saying that these are the equations from which all of something called Donaldson theory can be derived. What I'm giving you, at least at a minimum, had the ability years earlier to provide those equations from a different source.

<p>[00:28:33] There's something called [[Seiberg–Witten theory]], which I have no claim on it. But the actual equations that are called Seiberg–Witten equations came originally as an outgrowth from investigations of this theory. So at a bare minimum, the Seiberg–Witten revolution should have happened at Harvard, rather than Princeton, and it should have been recognized that this theory was capable of at least, at a minimum, giving birth to that, as a side project.

<p>[00:29:01] The other thing that I think is incredibly important is that we've never seen how a univers that looks like ours could possibly emerge from almost no assumptions whatsoever. And I believe that even if this theory were to turn out to be wrong, which I don't think is likely, I believe that it would give us something to go on.

<p>[00:29:50] Lastly, I want to just talk about a personal aspect of this, which is: "What does it mean to come to an end?" Whether or not this theory, in fact, does what I claim I think it does.  

<p>[00:30:00] I don't know, but I do know that sooner or later in the era of intercontinental land exploration, someone found the last landmass, and that must've been a very strange moment when there was nothing left to do.

<p>[00:30:20] I think whether or not this theory, in fact, accomplishes that is one question, but we all have to plan for what it is that we think will happen when man, at last, learns his own source code. In fact, this was the last Edge question that I answered for John Brockman, which is: "Does something unprecedented happened when man, at last, learns his own source code?".

 

<p>[00:31:04] In fact, there is a belief that there are no lone researchers and that everything is produced by a community. And pardon my French, but this is absolute horseshit. I've been so long alone with these principles, equations, and ideas that I don't even know what my adult life will look like once I disgorged them and I began to talk about them with the community at large.

<p>[00:31:49] What I hope to show you is a lecture that was the first of three versions of this lecture that were delivered in Oxford over the course of a week. And one of the things that has held me back is that I have a great number of people who I have to thank for effectively being my Underground Railroad when my career got into serious trouble to make sure who made sure that I always had an opportunity to fight another day.

<p>[00:32:15] And some of the most important of those people, one of whom occurs on this video is [[Marcus du Sautoy]]. And Marcus, I just wanted to say thank you for your bravery, your courage, your friendship, and your encouragement. I know I've been absolutely impossible to you. I've made you wait for this and I just want to say how much I love you.

<p>[00:32:34] I also want to thank [[Isadore Singer]] for effectively saving me from not getting a PhD. By, I think, putting pressure on the Harvard department and for coming to my assistance, making sure that I got a postdoc at MIT, despite not having any publications at all.  

<p>[00:32:56] I'd like to think Raoul Bott, who's no longer with us. Who I should have invited to my wedding. I was very angry at him, but I didn't realize that he was saving me in a very difficult situation against the department that probably just wanted to see me gone. I'd like to thank Peter Thiel. One of my closest friends is like a brother to me for allowing me these seven years since this lecture to lick my wounds, to get strong, to have a 401(k), to buy a house. And, to begin coming back to regular society after a very difficult and strained career.  

<p>[00:33:21] I'd like to thank Adil Abdulali and Michael Grossberg. The two greatest, best friends from college a guy could have. I'd like to thank my grandfather, Harry Ruben, who believed in things that couldn't possibly be true and made some of them happen.

<p>[00:33:46] I'd like to thank my parents, Karen and Les Weinstein for all the good things that they did. I'd like to thank my brother Bret Weinstein and his family, Heather and the kids, for sticking by me. And I'd like to thank my inlaws in Bombay, India, and I hope you guys are well. And lastly, I would very much like to thank my wife and my two kids for putting up with a lot of lost weekends, a lot of lost vacations.

<p>[00:34:12] And believing that just maybe there was something to this and sticking by me all of these years. So I hope everybody really enjoys this. It may not be comprehensible. And after this video finishes, I'll do a short presentation of some of the constructions that took place, not all of the equations and things, which I think some of them were sort of botched on the board, because they became disoriented the night before and [I] rearranged things in a way that probably wasn't optimal.

<p>[00:34:42] But I'll attempt to clarify these things going forward and to begin to present the theory as I see whether or not I can bring myself to once again, work on it somewhat close to full-time as a 54-year old, father of two. So sit back, relax, and coming up. Next is the first of my three lectures at Oxford University on Geometric Unity.