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Lex Fridman Podcast / episode intelligence

#403 – Lisa Randall: Dark Matter, Theoretical Physics, and Extinction Events

3 Dec 2023 34 published claims 2 attributable people
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Speakers in the public record

Lisa RandallLex Fridman

Claim mix

belief 13evaluation 11uncertainty 5observation 3prediction 1commitment 1

Evidence policy

Every row below preserves an exact excerpt. Identified speakers are linked; unresolved voices are labeled and excluded from people counts.

Claim ledger

The useful parts, with receipts.

34 published records

01 / evaluation

The most popular candidate for dark matter probably until pretty recently because they haven’t found it, is something called WIMPs, Weakly Interacting Massive Particles, particles that have mass about the same as the Higgs boson mass, and it turns out then you would get about the right density of dark matter.

“The most popular candidate for dark matter probably until pretty recently because they haven’t found it, is something called WIMPs, Weakly Interacting Massive Particles, particles that have mass about the same as the Higgs boson mass, and it turns out then you would get about the right density of dark matter.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

02 / evaluation

When we say it interacts just like any other form of matter, we have to be careful because gravitationally, it interacts like other forms of matter, but it doesn’t experience electromagnetism, which is why it has a different distribution.

“When we say it interacts just like any other form of matter, we have to be careful because gravitationally, it interacts like other forms of matter, but it doesn’t experience electromagnetism, which is why it has a different distribution.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

03 / evaluation

The reason it doesn’t collapse as far as we know is that it can’t radiate the same way. Because it can radiate ordinary matter collapses, and this actually, because of conservation of angular momentum, it stays a disk and it doesn’t just collapse to the center.

“The reason it doesn’t collapse as far as we know is that it can’t radiate the same way. Because it can radiate ordinary matter collapses, and this actually, because of conservation of angular momentum, it stays a disk and it doesn’t just collapse to the center.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

04 / belief

I think there’s something… It’s an event. You’re just watching. You’re not doing anything, you’re just looking at it, so maybe you could just recreate it.

“I think there’s something… It’s an event. You’re just watching. You’re not doing anything, you’re just looking at it, so maybe you could just recreate it.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

07 / belief

I think I have this underlying belief that it should make sense, even though the world comes at you in many ways and tells you nothing should make sense, but if you believe that it makes sense and you look for underlying logic.

“I think I have this underlying belief that it should make sense, even though the world comes at you in many ways and tells you nothing should make sense, but if you believe that it makes sense and you look for underlying logic.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

08 / belief

You could try to jump in and say I have a theory that I think is so perfect that I can predict everything from it or at least predict some salient features from it.

“You could try to jump in and say I have a theory that I think is so perfect that I can predict everything from it or at least predict some salient features from it.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

09 / belief

Sometimes I do think… You’re not asking this question, but sometimes I do think when I think about some of these conflicts, sometimes it’s just good to have a project that people work on together.

“Sometimes I do think… You’re not asking this question, but sometimes I do think when I think about some of these conflicts, sometimes it’s just good to have a project that people work on together.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

10 / belief

The scary thing is that they look really cool. It’s true that you have that, yes, this is scary, but you also have, this is cool feeling and I think we have to get around that because I think that yes, you can be in that, but I’m not sure that’s going to make people scared.

“The scary thing is that they look really cool. It’s true that you have that, yes, this is scary, but you also have, this is cool feeling and I think we have to get around that because I think that yes, you can be in that, but I’m not sure that’s going to make people scared.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

11 / uncertainty

One of the limitations of those is it seems to come up with convincing looking things, which we don’t know if it’s true or not, and that’s a big problem for physics.

“One of the limitations of those is it seems to come up with convincing looking things, which we don’t know if it’s true or not, and that’s a big problem for physics.”
Speaker
Lex Fridman
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

16 / prediction

One of the things we do as physicists is we actually want it to break down at some level, we’re looking for the precision measurement or the energy or whatever it will take where the standard model is no longer working.

“One of the things we do as physicists is we actually want it to break down at some level, we’re looking for the precision measurement or the energy or whatever it will take where the standard model is no longer working.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

17 / belief

I think we always have in our head maybe that we’d like to find that, but I have to… I might not seem so, but I think I’m more humble than a lot of physicists.

“I think we always have in our head maybe that we’d like to find that, but I have to… I might not seem so, but I think I’m more humble than a lot of physicists.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

20 / belief

Sometimes it’s hard to forget the role of physics, but I think Wilson said it really well when he said when they were building Fermilab, it was like this won’t defend the country, but it’ll make it worth defending.

“Sometimes it’s hard to forget the role of physics, but I think Wilson said it really well when he said when they were building Fermilab, it was like this won’t defend the country, but it’ll make it worth defending.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

21 / belief

I think one of the criticisms of your theory on the dinosaurs was that it requires, if I remember correctly, for dark matter to be weirder than it already is.

“I think one of the criticisms of your theory on the dinosaurs was that it requires, if I remember correctly, for dark matter to be weirder than it already is.”
Speaker
Lex Fridman
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

24 / belief

In my book, I make jokes about, it’s like when we think about a building, we think about the architect, we think about the high level, but we forget about all the workers that did all the grunt work.

“In my book, I make jokes about, it’s like when we think about a building, we think about the architect, we think about the high level, but we forget about all the workers that did all the grunt work.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

26 / evaluation

We think about what we’re doing now, and we certainly don’t think enough about all the animals that we’re destroying, all the things that are precursors to humans that we rely on.

“We think about what we’re doing now, and we certainly don’t think enough about all the animals that we’re destroying, all the things that are precursors to humans that we rely on.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

27 / evaluation

Maybe the dinosaurs were killed by some big rock that came and hit the earth, but then there really was a scientific story behind it. That’s also why I like the dark disk because there’s a scientific story behind it.

“Maybe the dinosaurs were killed by some big rock that came and hit the earth, but then there really was a scientific story behind it. That’s also why I like the dark disk because there’s a scientific story behind it.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

30 / observation

Scientists, many revel in uncertainty. It’s not that you want to be uncertain, you want to solve it, but you’re at this edge where it’s really frustrating because you don’t really want to not know the answer, but of course, if you knew the answer, it would be done.

“Scientists, many revel in uncertainty. It’s not that you want to be uncertain, you want to solve it, but you’re at this edge where it’s really frustrating because you don’t really want to not know the answer, but of course, if you knew the answer, it would be done.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

32 / evaluation

It is and it isn’t because I think what it’s teaching us is that we’re human, the universe is what it is, and we’re trying to interact with that universe and discover what it is.

“It is and it isn’t because I think what it’s teaching us is that we’re human, the universe is what it is, and we’re trying to interact with that universe and discover what it is.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

33 / evaluation

The interesting thing is that if some of the dark matter does radiate, and I like to call it dark light because it’s light that we don’t see, but dark matter would see.

“The interesting thing is that if some of the dark matter does radiate, and I like to call it dark light because it’s light that we don’t see, but dark matter would see.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast

34 / evaluation

On the other hand, I’ve been in physics long enough to know it was also a cautionary tale in some sense because at the time I started out in physics, we had proposed something in the United States called the Superconducting Supercollider.

“On the other hand, I’ve been in physics long enough to know it was also a cautionary tale in some sense because at the time I started out in physics, we had proposed something in the United States called the Superconducting Supercollider.”
Speaker
Lisa Randall
Publisher
Lex Fridman Podcast
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