
Interview with Freeman Dyson - dedalus
https://www.52-insights.com/freeman-dyson-i-kept-quiet-for-30-years-so-maybe-its-time-to-speak-interview-science/
======
archgoon
There seems to be a bit of lack of knowledge about Freeman Dyson.

Freeman Dyson is the person responsible for legitimization and adoption of
Feynmann diagrams, via proof of equivalence with Schwinger's methods. Feynmann
didn't care about why his methods worked, Dyson did. Think a brilliant hacker
(Feynmann) who basically points to a working system in a new programming
language and says "Look it works. What more do you want? Clearly this is
because of my awesome new language." and another engineer (Dyson) trying to
get him to document the damn thing, explain how it works in terms of previous
programming paradigms, and then discovers failure modes in the process. As
usual, the engineer who did the documentation gets a bit of short shrift of
the glory.

Now, this of course does not mean that he's right about this issue; but please
do do not disregard his honesty or truly tremendous contributions to human
knowledge.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson)

------
reidacdc
It seems that the "heretical" parts are milder than I was expecting, though
still outside the mainstream.

On evolution, he says that Darwin got it right "up to a point", and asserts
that selection is only an effective mechanism if you have large populations,
but that small populations are often key turning points, and for small
populations, "random drift" is more important. It's said to have some
explanatory power in addressing why there is a variety of e.g. beetle species
inhabiting a given ecological niche, instead of a single super-optimized
beetle species. He's got a couple of authors he likes on this point.

On climate change, his position here is that since we don't understand how the
ice ages started or stopped, then we don't really understand climate. Further,
he says if we planted "all the wasteland over the globe" with trees, it'd be
enough of a carbon sink to absorb the increased atmospheric content.

I am not really equipped to defend either the scientific mainstream or Dyson's
views, but hopefully this is a useful summary.

~~~
emilga
> why there is a variety of e.g. beetle species inhabiting a given ecological
> niche, instead of a single super-optimized beetle species.

Are there really two or more beetle species occupying the same ecological
niche, though? It would violate the competitive exclusion principle [0], and a
quick google search doesn't return any results. (Also, the articles doesn't
specifically mention _niches_.)

I thought the large variety of niches, each of which requires different kinds
of specialization, is why there's such a diversity of beetles. (Different
niches requiring different types of camouflage, different jaw-shapes,
different digestive enzymes, different temperature tolerances, etc.)

It doesn't really make sense to expect a single "super-optimized" beetle, if,
for examples, being able to eat food A and food B requires fundamentally
different jaw-shapes.

Of course, random mutations in the genome is what makes different phenotypes
possible in the first place, but (according to my layman's understanding of
biology) this is already acknowledged.

And Dyson's example about a Peacock's feathers is famously explained by sexual
selection.

I really like Dyson's talk about living through four revolutions, though. [1]
(Space Technology, Nuclear Energy, Genomics, and the Computer Revolution.)
He's a super interesting guy.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitive_exclusion_principl...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitive_exclusion_principle#Experimental_basis)

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zq4p2qbE684](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zq4p2qbE684)

------
nafizh
"Certainly, one of the risks that we’re taking is the development of
artificial intelligence and the artificial intelligence people also are now, I
would say exaggerating the dangers and pretending to be more dangerous than
they really are, but that remains to be seen."

I work in the intersection of AI and another discipline. Unlike some people
(e.g. Elon Musk), he actually knows what he is talking about.

------
roryisok
Really interesting to learn the Dyson sphere is just a misunderstanding!

------
ItsMe000001
Before I start: My comment is not about the person, I don't know anything
about him, only about one specific section in the linked article. Also, I'm
making this a question rather than a strong opinionated statement, because I
am in no position to provide the latter. That means I'm ready to stand
corrected and post my observation for discussion.

I skipped to where I thought I see something about something "sciency", and I
found the section when you skip to

> _Just to clarify here for our readers, obviously, you’re poking holes in
> Darwin’s Theory of Evolution but you’re saying it only tells the story up to
> a certain point..._

I don't understand what he is talking about. I mean, where is that
"controversy"? I can only see what's in that article, I don't know what else
he may have said or written elsewhere. I only took biology classes on edX the
last few years (the most important one was [0]), and nothing he says in that
section is "controversial". Genetic drift and small populations are part of
the teaching, if you go to edX's course "Nature, in Code: Biology in
JavaScript" [1] you even get to simulate just that numerically, population
bottlenecks, genetic drift, and more. I recognize everything he said from the
courses I took, or from lecture videos on Youtube (by biologists and
geneticists, specifically, e.g. this one: [2] - very funny guy too).

Going _only_ by what I see in that article, in that section, I can only assume
he is making a mistake in declaring some imagined and made-up "controversy"
where none exists.

What am I missing?

To me his statements are like somebody trying to defend their "controversial"
point of view that the earth is on a course around the sun, making very
defensive statements because they _think_ , for whatever reason, they are
saying something incredibly controversial.

[0] [https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-
life-...](https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-biology-secret-life-
mitx-7-00x-7)

[1] [https://www.edx.org/course/nature-code-biology-javascript-
ep...](https://www.edx.org/course/nature-code-biology-javascript-epflx-
nic1-0x)

[2] [https://www.gresham.ac.uk/professors-and-
speakers/professor-...](https://www.gresham.ac.uk/professors-and-
speakers/professor-steve-jones/)

~~~
p1esk
To me, the main controversy is that evolution seems to work _too well_. Almost
as if some "intelligent designer" guided it.

~~~
heurist
No, that's just how existence works. Systems that perpetuate themselves are
more likely to continue existing. Systems that don't perpetuate themselves
stop existing. No intelligence required.

~~~
p1esk
Perpetuate themselves by making random changes? Or the changes are not quite
random? Software simulations of the former do not lead to much intelligence,
and the latter hints at some higher order.

I'm not an evolutionary biologist, so this is just a layman's pondering...

~~~
ithkuil
Higher order doesn't imply design by an intelligent agent. Higher order can be
an emergent property of a system under the pressure of raw, inanimated,
constraints.

~~~
p1esk
That's hand-waving. Again, how does it "emerge"? Through random mutations?
Perhaps so, but it is statistically highly unlikely. Clearly there's a
significant gap in our understanding of evolution, because otherwise we would
have modeled it by now.

Theory of evolution is like theory of how brain works: incomplete.

~~~
ithkuil
I didn't intend to start an argument in favour of proving or disproving one
point or the other. Just wanted to mention that the existence of an "higher
order" is not a proof in itself in the existence of a purposeful creator of
that higher order.

Consider for example the game of Go board game
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_(game)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_\(game\))).
It has an extremely small set of rules, yet it produces astounding patterns in
the way games develop. The Go board game obviously has a creator; humans
invented it. But that doesn't mean that whover thought up the rules of Go knew
upfront the intricate complexity that we explored throughout the centuries (by
playing games).

We gain no further insight in the higher order that emerges by following the
rules of Go by knowing the precise circumstances that led to its creation.

When thinking about the universe and life itself, I think this aspect is more
important than the unknowable answer about whether there was a creator or not:
would knowing the creator necessarily explain most of the complex behaviour we
see?

~~~
p1esk
Not only we don't know if there is/was a "creator", we don't even know the
"rules". Using your Go analogy, we are watching the game and assume the moves
are random.

~~~
ithkuil
sure we know the rules: laws of physics on which chemistry is based.

if a random mutation produces a protein that cannot act as a catalyst for a
given chemical reaction that reaction won't happen and that can make a hell of
a difference to the the organism that had everything else setup depending on
that thing to happen, decreasing the odds of survival (which often simply
means not even survive for long enough to develop).

There are so many constrains at so many levels, many we know of, many are in
plain sight, many are hidden, some we know since long time, some we have yet
to discover. There are so many things we don't know, but pretending we are
completely oblivious about the rules of the game is a stretch.

The sheer complexity of it all is mind-boggling, but that doesn't mean the
only reasonable approach is just to give up. So far every time humanity has
thought that we've reached our limit in understanding and that only the
existence of a deity can explain the next step, we unveiled the next layer of
the puzzle.

Even if a deity does exists, it doesn't appear reasonable to expect that we've
finally exhausted all there was to learn and we finally found the truly
unexplainable. We no longer have to posit the existence of a deity to explain
our diurnal cycle and other everyday miracles, because we now know; we
convinced ourselves that what seemed utterly incomprehensible to our ancestors
(who we have no reason to assume less intelligent individually than us) is to
be attributed to simple celestial mechanics governed that rules that no longer
seem that incomprehensible. We moved our questions to the next layer, to the
why those rules exist: what did set planets in motion etc; if you want, we
never really "answered" the question, we just pushed it one layer further, and
in the process we uncovered so many new beautiful layers of our reality.

~~~
p1esk
I agree with you. My previous comments were directed at those who believe that
there's nothing controversial about evolution. The example I gave was we don't
understand enough to explain why it works so well.

------
B1FF_PSUVM
_" The important invention in a way for the human species was grandparents.
Grandparents were the beginning of culture when we could sit around the cave
fire and the grandparents would sing songs to the children and the parents
would be out hunting so having three generations was what made us what we
are."_

That's a sharp observation. Sharper yet what it leaves unsaid about the
present.

------
Arubis
I want to read this, but only after someone goes through and puts all the
commas back in.

~~~
jeremyjh
I agree, I don't know why you are getting down voted. Writing this sloppy is
too distracting to be worthwhile.

~~~
stuntkite
This was a neat interview with a guy who is living history. I have never been
to this website before, I don't know how they got this interview, but they
should hire a copy editor. This thing read like a LiveJournal post.

------
ebbv
TL;DR - Guy who inspired a couple of interesting sci-fi ideas is speaking out
on topics he knows nothing about. Shockingly, his uninformed opinion disagrees
with people who are informed on the subjects.

~~~
convolvatron
guy had an interesting speculation (derived from someone elses work) about
dynamics of genetic evolution in small populations, and a general concern that
there isn't enough science to figure out whats going to happen after the
drastic rampup of atmospheric carbon. recommends planting lots of trees.

doesn't make for an adequately clickbaity headline though

~~~
gwern
The problem is, 'genetic drift' is not remotely controversial. Even Kimura's
strong claim that drift is responsible for _most_ genetic changes is a
respectable position, and the debate is a rather pedestrian one of 'exactly
how much change is drift versus selection' (like in the nature-nurture debate,
the expert consensus has settled down to a centrist 'both do a lot and how
exactly much of each depends on a lot of details and context'). Hard to see
why Dyson thinks it's so exciting or a dangerous heresy. I was expecting more
when he brought up Darwin...

------
TheAceOfHearts
Wow, what a toxic website. As soon as you open it it'll show you a modal
asking for money and to sign up for their newsletter.

~~~
superkuh
Turn off javascript. It works just fine and doesn't bug you. This is the best
way to surf by default.

But, more back on topic, it seems to me that despite the headline picked
suggesting something very controversial, nothing in Dyson's intereview really
was.

re: evolution and natural selection vs. random drift, it's not like this are
opposing concepts. They're mutually complementary.

re: climate, he's not wrong about humans not understanding how big climate
changes (ie: ice ages) worked or what they were caused by. It's not a huge
step to suggest that that inability to understand or create predictive models
of past climate records suggests current extrapolations may not be very
predictive.

No reasons to get everyone riled up like this HN thread has been. Read the
article and you'll see it's all very nuanced and not him just saying
"EVOLUTION IS WRONG." or "CLIMATE CHANGE ISN'T HAPPENING.".

