Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
I look at a forest from afar, I see a dark green velvet. As I move toward it, the velvet breaks up into trunks, branches and leaves: the bark of the trunks, the moss, the insects, the teeming complexity. In every eye of every ladybug, there is an extremely elaborate structure of cells connected to neurons that guide and enable them to live. Every c
... See moreSimon Carnell • Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution
Traditionally, science seeks order by understanding the simplest parts of a system. How does a single gas particle behave given a certain temperature? Which gene in our DNA determines eye color? Scientists then try to develop theories that explain more general observations based on their detailed understanding of the individual parts.
Jessica C. Flack • Worlds Hidden in Plain Sight: The Evolving Idea of Complexity at the Santa Fe Institute, 1984–2019 (Compass)
Where Galileo differed was in his conception of the relationship between physical reality on the one hand, and human ideas, observations and reason on the other.
David Deutsch • The Fabric of Reality
The difference between the world where Iris was born and the world of early hominids resides not in the physicality of matter but in the way in which matter is arranged.
Cesar Hidalgo • Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from Atoms to Economies
The ‘building blocks’ of the supposedly mechanical universe behave like patterned flows of energy, or force fields: they are constantly moving and changing, have no precise boundaries, overlap and mingle with other equally elusive entities, cannot be precisely predicted or specified, change their nature and behaviour depending on circumstances and
... See moreIain McGilchrist • The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World
Wiener was as worldly as Shannon was reticent. He was well traveled and polyglot, ambitious and socially aware; he took science personally and passionately. His expression of the second law of thermodynamics, for example, was a cry of the heart: We are swimming upstream against a great torrent of disorganization, which tends to reduce everything to
... See moreJames Gleick • The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
In the twentieth century, scientists identified the elementary building blocks of nature: particles, atoms, and molecules are the constituents of all matter; genes, proteins, and cells are the components of life; bits, codes, and networked systems underpin intelligence and information. In this century we will begin to engineer new realities with th
... See moreThomas Hertog • On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking's Final Theory
7 months ago
My learnings
The importance of curiosity: Richard Feynman emphasizes the value of curiosity and questioning the world around us. He believes that asking why is essential to understanding how things work.
The need for a framework: Feynman suggests that to explain why something happens, we need to have a framework that allows us to... See more