Topping the Math Twitter Feeds

Last Sunday the new monthly ranking of Twitter math feeds (from Kelly Truelove) came out with polymath Eric Weinstein leading the pack,** which rather surprised me (though it seems based solely on total number of followers) -- I don't recall if he'd been in the listings in recent prior months. Eric is trained in math, economics, physics, but more recently is known best as a central member of the so-called "Intellectual Dark Web," and doesn't actually tweet much about mathematics.
Moreover, while I generally enjoy Eric in long form (where he often stresses depth and nuance and clarity, in addition to being provocative), I find his Twitter feed far more annoying/irritating (and lacking in depth/nuance/clarity!).
Meanwhile, he appears on many podcasts these days, including his own relatively new one, "The Portal," and in a bit of synchronicity within hours of noticing the Twitter rankings, I discovered his latest (~hour-long) Portal episode focuses on some esoteric aspects of math (and physics and art), not often talked about, with mathematical artist London Tsai (it starts off a bit slow, but begins building at around the 5 minute point):

https://podtail.com/en/podcast/the-portal/14-london-tsai-the-reclusive-dean-of-the-new-esche/

(this is just audio; video version will likely be up on YouTube at some point)

Here's a (completely separate) clip I've used before of Weinstein talking to Joe Rogan about the octonions (and more):



...Speaking of math podcasts, Numberphile has been doing a great irregular series of them (interviewing various individuals), that you should check out if you haven't already done so:
https://player.fm/series/the-numberphile-podcast

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** interestingly, on a separate page, the listings show an individual's "public" vs. peer group ranking, and while Eric was #1 in the public sphere he was only #95 among "peers," which makes a bit more sense.
And who, you might wonder ranked #1 among math Twitter peers....
Evelyn Lamb! (no. 10 on list)

Octonions, C. Elegans, Mystery, and More...

Replacing the usual meditative musical interlude this Friday with a lovely (meditative in its own way) 13-minute clip that Cliff Pickover passed along on Twitter last weekend, of Eric Weinstein 'explaining' octonions to Joe Rogan. Enjoy:



[this clip actually comes from a recent 3-and-1/2 hr. Rogan episode]

A Li'l Physics, and more, With Eric Weinstein

Polymath (and member of the so-called “Intellectual Dark Web”) Eric Weinstein is a bit of an odd-duck — I often agree with his take on various matters and usually find him interesting (whether in agreement or not), but also occasionally find him infuriating. Anyway, he recently did a long (almost 4 hr.!) stint with Joe Rogan where he attempts at one point (beginning ~41:20 mark) to give Joe and listening audience a primer on fundamental physics that lasts about an hour:

A couple other shorter segments I enjoyed:

A bit of discussion of the ‘craft’ of comedy versus that of physics (starting ~1:36:10):

Followed by a short lesson from Eric on harmonica music (starting ~1:40:20):

There are many other interesting bits in the whole podcast (which touches on a LOT of diverse topics), though I thought the first half more interesting overall than the 2nd half.

Eric, an economist by trade and mathematical physicist by academic degree (who, in his spare time, is working on his own 'theory of everything'), has appeared in many other podcasts/videos as well.

[...by the way, he should NOT be confused with "Eric Weisstein" who runs "Wolfram MathWorld" -- 2 completely different people.]

The Literature of Ed Witten

This Eric Weinstein tweet from a week ago, and the comments that follow, can entertain you for awhille:
https://twitter.com/EricRWeinstein/status/928296366853328896

Eric Weinstein on Math and Modern Physics Theory

10 interesting/skeptical minutes with Eric Weinstein on progress (or lack thereof) in modern physics:

Eric Weinstein in Discussion With Dave Rubin

Eric Weinstein is a bit of an odd duck… child prodigy, adult polymath, and I would almost say provocateur; sometimes fascinating, sometimes perhaps infuriating. In addition to math he more than dabbles in economics, physics, and public policy. Below is the first of a 3-part interview with Dave Rubin from The Rubin Report. I’ve posted it primarily for the first 10 minutes-or-so that include some interesting thoughts on math and science. After that they wander to other, but still interesting topics:

Here is a link to Part 2 of the interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofDXJsKsA30

Part 2 is mostly social/political in nature, but Part 3 turns out to include a lot more math/science so am adding it below:

Authentic Math...

Short and simple; for Sunday reflection, this recent tweet from Eric R. Weinstein:

"Unless you majored in math you have no idea whether you are good at math. That thing you weren't good at? Yeah, so, that wasn't really math."

Improving the 'Dismal Science'

Edward Frenkel's twitter-feed led me to this 19 min. conversation with mathematician Eric Weinstein in which Eric "explores many creative ways that physics and more sophisticated forms of math can be used to rescue economics from itself and restore its now tarnished reputation":

Woit, Weinstein, Lisi... Oh My!

For the physics crowd....

Eric Weinstein via Wikipedia

When Peter Woit writes about mathematician/economist Eric Weinstein and surfer-physicist Garrett Lisi in the same post, well, I have to take note of it!:

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=5927

Weinstein is apparently giving a lecture at Oxford today (invited by Marcus du Sautoy) on some mathematical physics ideas (called "Geometric Unity") he has been working on for awhile (but not shared much about), which Woit analogizes to the outside-the-box thinking of surfer/physicist Garrett Lisi. Further, Peter writes:

"Both he [Weinstein] and Garrett are pursuing what seems to me one of the deepest questions around: what is the relationship between the SU(3)xSU(2)xU(1) geometry of the Standard Model, and the 4d pseudo-Riemannian geometry of space-time and general relativity? Garrett was trying to understand this in terms of E(8) symmetry, and I’m looking forward to seeing what Eric’s ideas about this are."

A bit above my pay grade, but still interesting-sounding stuff! Maybe in a day or two we'll hear more about it.

Until then, you can also read this long Guardian piece on Weinstein's work, which Peter linked to as well:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2013/may/23/roll-over-einstein-meet-weinstein