Eric Topol

Congratulations to both of you and your organizations, the Innovative Genomics Institute and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative for taking this on.

We'll be following it with very deep interest.

Thank you.

Hello, it's Eric Topol from Ground Truths, and I am really delighted to welcome Adam Kucharski, who is the author of a new book, Proof, a distinguished mathematician, by the way, the first mathematician we've had on Ground Truths, and a person who I had the real privilege of getting to know a bit through the COVID pandemic.

So welcome, Adam.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah, I mean, I think just to let everybody know, you're a professor at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

And also noteworthy, you won the Adams Prize, which is one of the most impressive recognitions in the field of mathematics.

This is the book.

It's a winner proof.

And there's so much to talk about.

So Adam, maybe what I'd start off is the quote in the book that kind of captivates in the beginning.

Life is full of situations that can reveal remarkably large gaps in our understanding of what is true and why it's true.

This is a book about these gaps.

So what was the motivation when you undertook this very big endeavor?

Yeah, well, I mean, I think these times, of course, have really gotten us to appreciate, particularly during COVID, the importance of understanding uncertainty.

And I think one of the ways that we can dispel what people assume they know is the famous Monty Hall, which you get into a bit in the book.

So I think everybody here is familiar with the show Let's Make a Deal.

And maybe you could just take us through what happens with door numbers with one of the doors are unveiled and how that changes the mathematics.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's a fabulous example because I think everyone would naturally assume it's 50-50 and it isn't.