James Robert Brown: Thought Experiments Reveal Mathematical Reality

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Previously titled “James Robert Brown on Thought Experiments, the reality of mathematics, and the Continuum Hypothesis” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 3, 2026

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Recorded27 Sep 2020

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Graphics are included in the YouTube version to make it easier to comprehend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NV7BQZy1A6o Patreon for conversations on Theories of Everything, Consciousness, Free Will, and God: https://patreon.com/curtjaimungal Help support conversations like this via PayPal: https://bit.ly/2EOR0M4 Twitter: https://twitter.com/TOEwithCurt iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/better-left-unsaid-with-curt-jaimungal/id1521758802 Pandora: https://pdora.co/33b9lfP Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4gL14b92xAErofYQA7bU4e Google Podcasts: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Id3k7k7mfzahfx2fjqmw3vufb44 * * * 00:00:00 Introduction 00:01:17 The connection between mathematics and ethics 00:03:05 Mathematical concepts that are interpreted solely physically (thick and thin concepts) 00:16:33 The continuum hypothesis 00:19:23 A counter proof to the continuum hypothesis 00:24:45 What's possible can have probability of zero (measure zero, technically) 00:33:50 Platonism and "thick" mathematical concepts 00:34:39 Moral realism / objectivity, without God 00:36:59 Does 2+2=5? 00:40:43 Moral intuitions as serving a marker for what's "correct"? 00:46:42 What's makes some theory correct beside its ability to predict / explain? 00:47:54 Does libertarian Free Will exist, and how is it coexistent with physics? 00:53:13 VIEWER TEST: Platonism test for the audience 00:54:53 Did Shakespeare invent Hamlet, or discover it? 00:56:09 What created the Platonic world? 00:57:42 Eternal vs Sempiternal 00:59:12 Thought experiments as a tool of probing physics, without experiment 01:00:39 Galileo's thought experiment demonstrating objects fall at the same rate despite different masses / heaviness 01:03:39 Thought experiment demonstrating relative motion (invariance of physical laws given uniform motion) 01:05:01 The Tower thought experiment demonstrating the opposite of the above 01:09:43 VIEWER TEST: Are you a Newtonian absolutist, or a Leibnizian relationalist? 01:12:45 Why did Prof Brown go into the philosophy of math, instead of directly into mathematics (or physics)? 01:13:20 Have any philosophical problems ever been solved? 01:14:47 Is God good? Or is goodness independent of God? 01:15:41 Descartes vs Leibniz on God's power (God can do anything -- except what's logically impossible) 01:18:43 The parochial view of physicists / mathematicians to dismiss what they can't define 01:22:31 Thought experiment from Newton regarding the necessity of space 01:24:45 Einstein's variation on the above thought experiment 01:28:17 How to classify thought experiments 01:31:35 Prof. Brown's thoughts on Wolfram's TOE and Eric Weinstein's TOE 01:32:40 Nicholas Gisin's thoughts on real numbers, and free will 01:33:02 What other foundations are there to physics, other than classical logic? 01:39:05 What does Mathematical Realism look like when it's NOT Platonic? 01:45:31 The physical laws themselves as abstract entities, which have causal power 01:55:55 Lee Smolin's Principle of Precedence as a bridge between Platonism and non-Platonism 01:59:01 Deriving an "ought" from an "is" 02:03:29 What does James not like about Sam Harris? 02:06:45 Is Math discovered or invented? 02:10:18 Does Platonism entail some idea of a God? 02:14:49 Theism vs Deism 02:16:34 On the Sokal Affair and the trouble with Postmodernism 02:22:01 Limits of free speech? 02:27:41 The problem of commercializing research 02:33:09 On Jordan Peterson's "Darwinian" definition of truth Subscribe if you want more conversations on Theories of Everything, Consciousness, Free Will, God, and the mathematics / physics of each. * * * I'm producing an imminent documentary Better Left Unsaid http://betterleftunsaidfilm.com on the topic of "when does the left go too far?" Visit that site if you'd like to contribute to getting the film distributed (in 2020) and seeing more conversations like this Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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