The Cartesian Cafe

Justin Clarke-Doane | Mathematics, Reality, and Morality

Justin Clarke-Doane is a professor of philosophy at Columbia University, whose interests span metaethics, epistemology, and the philosophy of logic & mathematics. In thi

Jay McClelland | Neural Networks: Artificial and Biological

Jay McClelland is a pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence and is a cognitive psychologist and professor at Stanford University in the psychology, linguistics, a

Michael Freedman | A Fields Medalist Panorama

Michael Freedman is a mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1986 for his solution of the 4-dimensional Poincare conjecture. Mike has also received numerous ot

Marcus Hutter | Universal Artificial Intelligence and Solomonoff Induction

Marcus Hutter is an artificial intelligence researcher who is both a Senior Researcher at Google DeepMind and an Honorary Professor in the Research School of Computer Sci

Richard Borcherds | Monstrous Moonshine: From Group Theory to String Theory

Richard Borcherds is a mathematician and professor at University of California Berkeley known for his work on lattices, group theory, and infinite-dimensional algebras. H

Announcements for 2024 and a Message to Viewers

Thought I'd share some exciting news about what's happening at The Cartesian Cafe in 2024 and also a personal message to viewers on how they can support the cafe. Patreo

Tim Maudlin | Bell’s Theorem and Beyond: Nobody Understands Quantum Mechanics

Tim Maudlin is a philosopher of science specializing in the foundations of physics, metaphysics, and logic. He is a professor at New York University, a member of the Foun

Antonio Padilla | Fantastic Numbers, Naturalness, and Anthropics in Physics

Antonio (Tony) Padilla is a theoretical physicist and cosmologist at the University of Nottingham. He serves as the Associate Director of the Nottingham Centre of Gravity

Boaz Barak | Cryptography: The Art of Mathematical Secrecy

Boaz Barak is a professor of computer science at Harvard University, having previously been a principal researcher at Microsoft Research and a professor at Princeton Univ

Sean Carroll | The Many Worlds Interpretation & Emergent Spacetime

Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist and philosopher who specializes in quantum mechanics, cosmology, and the philosophy of science. He is the Homewood Professor of Na

Daniel Schroeder | Introduction to Thermal Physics

Daniel Schroeder is a particle and accelerator physicist and an editor for The American Journal of Physics. Dan received his PhD from Stanford University, where he spent

Ethan Siegel | Demystifying Dark Matter

Ethan Siegel is a theoretical astrophysicist and science communicator. He received his PhD from the University of Florida and held academic positions at the University of

Alex Kontorovich | Circle Packings and Their Hidden Treasures

Alex Kontorovich is a Professor of Mathematics at Rutgers University and served as the Distinguished Professor for the Public Dissemination of Mathematics at the National

Greg Yang | Large N Limits: Random Matrices & Neural Networks

Greg Yang is a mathematician and AI researcher at Microsoft Research who for the past several years has done incredibly original theoretical work in the understanding of

Scott Aaronson | Quantum Computing: Dismantling the Hype

Scott Aaronson is a professor of computer science at University of Texas at Austin and director of its Quantum Information Center. Previously he received his PhD at UC Be

Grant Sanderson (3Blue1Brown) | Unsolvability of the Quintic

Grant Sanderson is a mathematician who is the author of the YouTube channel “3Blue1Brown”, viewed by millions for its beautiful blend of visual animation and mathematical

John Baez | The Algebra of Grand Unified Theories

John Baez is a mathematical physicist, professor of mathematics at UC Riverside, a researcher at the Centre for Quantum Technologies in Singapore, and a researcher at the

Tai-Danae Bradley | Category Theory and Language Models

Tai-Danae Bradley is a mathematician who received her Ph.D. in mathematics from the CUNY Graduate Center. She was formerly at Alphabet and is now at Sandbox AQ, a startup

John Urschel | Tackling Graph Theory

John Urschel received his bachelors and masters in mathematics from Penn State and then went on to become a professional football player for the Baltimore Ravens in 2014.

Richard Easther | The Big Bang, Inflation, and Gravitational Waves

Richard Easther is a scientist, teacher, and communicator. He has been a Professor of Physics at the University of Auckland for over the last 10 years and was previously