Talk:Leonard Susskind/Archive 1

Archive 1

Wesley Clark's Endorsement Of Susskind's Book

Wesley Clark endorses the book? Since when has he become an authority on physics? In fact, since when is his opinion on matters of theoretical physics worth anything at all? And what does Madonna think of the book? And if it comes to political advancement being equivalent to knowledge of one sort or another, then let us recall that Lysenko's theories were endorsed by Stalin, the Corypheus of All Arts And Sciences, and Greatest Genius Of All Times And Peoples! And as Stalin was a far more successful politican AND military leader than was Clark, and more famous too - a world-historical figure in fact! - well, in light of all this, then perhaps you want to get those Lysenkoist texts out of the trash heap and begin to study them assiduously. Hi There 11:25, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Wesley Clark is so hip, he has his own MySpace home page. http://www.myspace.com/securingamerica 65.95.42.64 22:59, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't know that Clark could be said to have endorsed the book. He said it was interesting to read, if you check the actual reference. I doubt that it belongs in an encyclopedia entry on Susskind.

Tex 14:44, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

You think he started talking about the book for no reason? 67.70.57.232 03:32, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

You think he started talking about it to get into Wikipedia?

Tex 00:05, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

For publicity? Absolutely. 70.48.251.229 03:25, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Whether or not the mention of Clark's endorsement belongs in wikipedia, the placement of that piece of information (if it is fact true) amounts to a non-sequitor. I'd say move it or loose it.... The place to move it would be to a section on The Cosmic Landscape itself and the book's political relationship with "the illusion of intelligent design." funkendub 21:35, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

It's more a statement about Clark than it is about Susskind, and it belongs in Clark's article if anywhere. I think, from actually listening to the speech in question, that it was an incidental mention, and doesn't rise to the level of something that should be in an encyclopedia at all. It's not part of his political program. If he mentioned the Bible, would we find "Wesley Clark endorses Bible" in that article? And don't tell me string theory is more controversial than the Bible, that would be patently false.

Tex 22:53, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

How Much Of His Work Will Be Discarded If String Theory Is Abandoned?

Pretty much what this section's title says: How much of Susskind's work and how many of his "Contributions To Physics" must be discarded and how much will be retained if String Theory is abandoned? How dependent on, and closely tied to, String Theory, is his work? Hi There 00:07, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 09:58, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Banned user edits: rewrite, don't revert

Please see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics#Strange_edit_summaries_by_Golumbo. Text should be rewritten if relevant, not resurrected. BeforeAfteread (talk) 18:24, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Seeming contradiction

From this article:

The story goes that "In 1970, a young physicist named Leonard Susskind got stuck in an elevator with Murray Gell-Mann, one of physics' top theoreticians, who asked him what he was working on. Susskind said he was working on a theory that represented particles 'as some kind of elastic string, like a rubber band.' Gell-Mann responded with loud, derisive laughter."

From Murray Gell-Mann:

"[Gell-Mann] is also known to have played a large role in keeping string theory alive through the 1970s, supporting that line of research at a time when it was unpopular."

While these statements are in theory not necessarily mutually exclusive (he could have quickly changed his mind), the impression is that they contradict each other. I think some more explanation is needed in either or both articles. 81.159.78.94 (talk) 12:35, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Lectures

Susskind's newest lecture series published by Yale is available now on youtube.com, however it hasn't been put by them as a playlist yet. Therefore I added this series to the existing list as a link to very limited search result page from youtube.com (where it was officially published), containing all parts of this series at the top and separated from other search results by whole section of physics-related playlists. I think it does not violate wiki external url policies to the extend that would require to remove such a link. Is is probably a temporary solution (as Yale should create a playlist with this lectures eventually).

This kind of "bending" wiki external url policy seems harmless from the community point of view (as it gains access to the valuable materials which has already been published by the given author).

Piotr Szalkiewicz (talk) 04:40, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I cant thank you enough for this. These lectures are fantastic !! Maybe i download all of them. Greets --109.193.77.188 (talk) 18:56, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Atheist

http://physicsweb.org/articles/review/18/12/3

But does his religion really belong in the infobox next to his academic information? It is a personal detail, and should be moved elsewhere in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kevin S. (talk • contribs) 02:07, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Someone recently changed his stance to atheist. He has said in interviews cited here that he doesn't know if there is a God or not and specifically said the string theory multiverse does not rule out a supernatural creator. The fact that he doesn't believe in intelligent design does not make him an atheist. Many religious people don't believe in intelligent design.

67.249.240.96 (talk) 05:03, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Btw, what kind of nonsense is that intelligent design paragraph? I don't see how it warrants a special mention. should we spam pages of other scientists with their views on intelligent design, ufo's, kennedy assasination etc as well?--193.198.105.178 (talk) 13:24, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

In "The Black Hole War," he says a few positive things about religion in general (with special mentions of Mormons, Jews, and Christians), notes that religion and science seems pretty easily reconcilable, and seems to go out of his way to make sure he doesn't describe himself as an agnostic, atheist, or theist (rather, skeptical of superstition). He states that he was "without a religious bone in his body" in his youth, but found himself questioning the idea he held that everything was made up of "protons, electrons, and neutrons," calling it "hollow." He also claims his skepticism over his own beliefs of science, as well, but that's really not related, jsut found that interesting. 98.198.85.83 (talk) 06:22, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Felix Bloch Professor?

What means "is the Felix Bloch Professor"? Assianir (talk) 09:04, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

What happens with that article: "Leonard Susskind (born 1940)[1] is the Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University." Is there any relation to "Felix Bloch"? And if there is - explain! Regards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.171.41.16 (talk) 20:45, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

What happens with that article: "Leonard Susskind (born 1940)[1] is the Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University." Is there any relation to "Felix Bloch"? And if there is - explain! Regards. 87.171.41.16 (talk) 20:47, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

It's his title, as I understand it, as the head of the Felix Bloch department at Stanford. 98.198.85.83 (talk) 06:25, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

It's a named professorship, just like Stephen Hawking is the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, even though he didn't have anything to do with Henry Lucas. It's a prestige thing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.18.217.111 (talk) 05:17, 13 June 2013 (UTC)

DOMA being a "bad law"

I have two main issues with this section: 1. How is this in any way relevant? Susskind hasn't, to my knowledge, expressed any strong views on DOMA except for the short remark in the source about it being a "bad law". Why does this deserve a full section? 2. The article uses "Same-sex marriage" as a heading for the quote. There is no indication in the source that Susskind's issue with it is that it's about same-sex marriage. There are many reasons why someone might disagree with a law (e.g. the details of the law, how/why it was produced, constitutionality, et cetera). It might not be weasel words, but it's pretty close. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Christian.palmstierna (talk • contribs) 16:43, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Father of String Theory

Off-topic: uncited debate on BLP subject

GABRIELE VENEZIANO, a theoretical physicist at CERN, was the father of string theory in the late 1960s--an accomplishment for which he received this year's Heineman Prize of the American Physical Society and the American Institute of Physics. At the time, the theory was regarded as a failure; it did not achieve its goal of explaining the atomic nucleus, and Veneziano soon shifted his attention to quantum chromodynamics, to which he made major contributions. After string theory made its comeback as a theory of gravity in the 1980s, Veneziano became one of the first physicists to apply it to black holes and cosmology.[1] Susskind's 'father of string theory' claim is nothing but a marketing gimic associated with his book. People working in theoretical physics who know the history know there are several people more deserving of that title. Susskind's trolls or bots can keep trying to hide this all they want, but the truth will keep coming back.--GaeusOctavius 16:14, 6 August 2006 (UTC) Gabriele Vaneziano's theory is a model of quark interaction not string. Susskind discovered that the euler beta function in the Vaneziano model can be viewed as the potential energy function of a vibrating string, so he suggested that 2 interacting quarks are just end-points of a single string. 65.95.41.136 01:02, 7 August 2006 (UTC) Yeah, I have to say I suspect a lot of the hagiographic bullshit in this article was either written by Susskind's graduate students as his direction or misinformed YouTubers who think Susskind's YouTube lecture series, wherein he claims (among other blatant falsities that any year-one undergraduate should recognise) that the colour charge of a quark is directly observable in particle accelerators (!). Susskind has got to be among the most egocentric of self-promoting physicists on the planet, and given the company, that's saying a lot! Given that Nambu published the quantum-string interpretation of the dual-resonance model of the strong force first, and with much greater rigour, it's a wonder Susskind's name is EVER mentioned in conjunction, incessant self-popularising aside -- just look at everything else Nambu did on the strong force! And for the record, Susskind had NOTHING to do with the idea that string theory could be a theory of quantum gravity or model all fundamental particles, contradicting the absurd, self-serving elevator anecdote -- that work was spearheaded mainly by John Schwartz. So what's left? The holographic principle stolen shamelessly from Nobel Laureate 't Hooft, which may be a mathematical tautology if the AdS/CFT duality is correct? Give me a break -- the only thing that Leonard Susskind is the "father" of is four children, and if not for his relentless publicity campaign -- the Never-Ending Story of Leonard Susskind, as told by Leonard Susskind <OH AND BTW STEVEN HAWKING NAME-DROP GOES HERE!> -- he wouldn't be nearly as "widely regarded" as he is today. One is reminded of the previous generation's stories of Dr Abdus Salam's similarly interminable political manoeuvering...someone who spends more time making sure he's famous than doing actual physics is the WORST kind of physicist. Perhaps I'm overly critical, but damn well the neutrality of this article is disputed -- it's clearly another one of Susskind's attempts to buffer his celebrity legacy, given that his scientific legacy will be awfully meagre -- a decent set of "physics-for-amateurs" YouTube videos notwithstanding. 70.113.70.30 (talk) 02:32, 6 April 2013 (UTC) "perhaps I'm overly critical" - you're certainly overly something :-) Susskind hasn't claimed that the colour charge of a quark is directly observable - that would be absurd. I'm not sure talk pages for Wikipedia bios are the best place for over-capitalised and under-informed rants. You could try Reddit Bobathon71 (talk) 14:44, 22 April 2013 (UTC) FROM THE TOP ROPE!50.147.26.108 (talk) 23:06, 10 November 2013 (UTC)

Deletion of Theoretical Minimum lectures section

Please elaborate on the objections to this section. This is a large and popular body of freely available work. The page's section on these lectures has been contributed to by a number of editors over at least several years (see the comments above as an example). This is factual, descriptive material about the lectures, much as one would see for a book or scientific paper. Acmedogs (talk) 15:57, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

The narrow administrative reason is WP:BLPSOURCES, the section has no WP:SECONDARY WP:RS's. If there's mainstream media coverage that we can cite regarding the existence of the lectures, definitely put that part back in. However, the detailed list of lectures will still be problematic due to WP:NOTTVGUIDE; consider WP:ALTERNATIVEs for hosting that content. Rolf H Nelson (talk) 03:54, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Susskind vs. Hawking on The Wormhole documentary

Someone may want to add that the recently aired The Wormhold documentary has stated that Susskind through his Holographic View of the universe and information had resolved the argument he had with Hawking, such that Hawking admitted Susskind's theory held water, and agreed he (Hawking) was wrong in his previous thinking that all information is lost in a black hole.

Perhaps you are unaware of the bet that Hawking & Kip Thorne had with regards to that subject? It can be found in the article Thorne-Hawking-Preskill bet. The disagreement with Susskind needs to be either differentiated from the Black Hole Paradox, or placed in the context of the other (more notable?) Physicists' similar (?) arguments, my *guess* is that it is secondary and is inconsequential to physics.173.189.77.242 (talk) 13:30, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Theoretical Minimum Lecture series.

I am changing the incorrect and misleading assertion:"The courses are intended for the general public as well as students." I've taken most of the courses, and there is no way most people ('the general public') could possibly be the intended target audience. Not even 'most college graduates' will have the requisite math background. My estimate is that the courses will appeal to those who have had at least some college level physics and a solid introduction to differential and integral calculus. Vectors, matrices, and differential operators would also help. I will add that almost no extracurricular study (homework) is necessary.173.189.77.242 (talk) 14:10, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Smolin–Susskind debate

Is the Smolin–Susskind debate really noteworthy enough to merit a whole section in an encyclopaedic biography? The content and prose does not seem appropriate for Wikipedia. If this is actually an important enough event then the reason needs explaining for readers who are not already familiar with the debate and the scientists involved. My point is that presumably there are many debates between scientists but they aren't necessarily newsworthy enough to be described in detail on Wikipedia.

82.3.104.139 (talk) 04:57, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

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Name

I just watched a 2013 Santa Fe Institute talk Dr Susskind gave on Time and his colleague and friend for 40 years noted that he was named after Leonardo Da Vinci and that his first name is Leonardo, not Leonard. In that introduction, it was claimed that one of his popular books won him a prize, fwiw.71.29.171.136 (talk) 09:51, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Entanglement of different sized black holes

It's easy to imagine and describe an entanglement of two black holes of equal size.

1. can different sized black holes be entangled
2. their holographic surface is degenerately and maximally informationally compressed, so encryption won't work, either we
   1. cause the bigger black hole to shrink
   2. generate a partial entanglement

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