#359 – Andrew Strominger: Black Holes, Quantum Gravity, and Theoretical Physics

Andrew Strominger is a theoretical physicist at Harvard. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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EPISODE LINKS:
Andrew’s website: https://www.physics.harvard.edu/people/facpages/strominger
Andrew’s papers:
Soft Hair on Black Holes: https://arxiv.org/abs/1601.00921
Photon Rings Around Warped Black Holes: https://arxiv.org/abs/2211.01674

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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00)– Introduction
(06:34)– Black holes
(11:37)– Albert Einstein
(31:05)– Quantum gravity
(35:17)– String theory
(46:05)– Holographic principle
(54:02)– De Sitter space
(59:14)– Speed of light
(1:06:02)– Black hole information paradox
(1:13:41)– Soft particles
(1:22:48)– Physics vs mathematics
(1:31:58)– Theory of everything
(1:47:20)– Time
(1:49:45)– Photon rings
(2:05:26)– Thought experiments
(2:13:47)– Aliens
(2:19:25)– Nuclear weapons