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The Age of Big Math (Robert Wright & Steven Strogatz)
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The Age of Big Math (Robert Wright & Steven Strogatz)

This episode includes an Overtime segment that’s available to paid subscribers. If you’re not a paid subscriber, we of course encourage you to become one. If you are a paid subscriber, you can access the complete conversation either via the audio and video on this post or by setting up the paid-subscriber podcast feed, which includes all exclusive audio content. To set that up, simply grab the RSS feed from this page (by first clicking the “...” icon on the audio player) and paste it into your favorite podcast app. If you have trouble completing the process, check out this super-simple how-to guide.

0:00 Teaser
0:37 Steve’s new book, Big Math: The Hidden Codes that Run Our World
4:04 What is “big math”? And why do we need it?
11:46 The key to the neural network’s power
18:33 AI’s black box problem
23:52 Is human insight going extinct?
32:34 How math has continually changed humanity
43:07 Insight via 100 ants
51:17 The intersecting origins of network theory and a jazz legend
57:34 Heading to Overtime

Robert Wright (Nonzero, The Evolution of God, Why Buddhism Is True) and Steven Strogatz (Cornell University, Infinite Powers, Big Math). Recorded October 13, 2026.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/NonzeroPods

Overtime titles:

Will quantum computing finish off human insight?
Recursive self-improvement, hive minds, and the AI-China question.
Terence Tao vs(?) AI.
AI’s Bob Beamon moment.

Overtime video:

This post is for paid subscribers