Stephen Wolfram tackles the big questions—from God and free will to whether AI will destroy us all.

Dr Stephen Wolfram is one of the most restless and original talents in science. Since publishing his first paper in particle physics at just 15, he has created the pioneering software Mathematica, launched the knowledge engine WolframAlpha and developed a radical new framework for fundamental physics. Here, Dr Wolfram sits down with our director Thomas Fink and science writer Ananyo Bhattacharya to talk about the big questions. What are the deepest challenges facing science today? How should research be organised and communicated? And how might AI-assisted discovery transform maths and physics? In a rapid-fire round towards the end of the session, we give Dr Wolfram 90 seconds each to answer questions such as “How far away is Artificial General Intelligence?”, “Is there a God?”, “Do we have free will?” and “Are we in the midst of an AI market bubble?” Finally, we take questions from our invited audience of scientists, tech entrepreneurs, actors and writers. The London Institute is Britain’s only independent, privately funded theoretical physics institute. We are building an endowment of £60m, with a lead gift of £20m already secured. To find out more see https://lims.ac.uk/e6/ 0:00 Introduction and welcome 3:50 How does or should history of science play into contemporary discovery? 6:25 “The patent office was the Silicon Valley of its time.” 7:42 “The rate of growth in new fields is just so much greater than it is in well-developed institutionalized fields.” 8:35 On Richard Feynman. 9:00 Return to the foundations of established fields to make progress. 10:35 Why does physics say so little about the foundations of life? 12:47 Wolfram’s new work on cellular automata as a model of biology. 23:22 Contributions to AI-assisted discovery and how LLMs might contribute. 26:20 What is the role of the human mathematician? 30:55 Mathematics as an artistic endeavour. 33:41 What is science? 40:10 Building a discovery machine. 43:20 Why should societies support basic science? 47:13 “I haven't written a paper for an academic journal since 1986. So, I'm out of that business.” 49:38 The benefits of good science communication. 51:40 The secret to Stephen Wolfram’s productivity. 53:05 Rapid-fire questions: 53:42 What’s wrong with science today? 54:38 Is there a God? 57:07 Do we have free will? 58:40 Are we in the midst of an AI market bubble? 59:53 How far away is Artifical General Intelligence–and are you afraid of it? 1:01:43 What is the most intelligent species on Earth: the squid or the dolphin? 1:02:21 What will Mathematica look like in 2030? 1:05:03 Alexander Grothendieck or John von Neumann. Pick one. 1:07:25 Audience questions 1:36:58 Finis London Institute for Mathematical Sciences: https://lims.ac.uk/ Cognia AI Lab: https://cognia-lab.com/