{"podcast":{"title":"Into the Impossible With Brian Keating","slug":"into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783","podcast_index_feed_id":324783,"rss_url":"https://feeds.megaphone.fm/ITI7213486251","website_url":"https://briankeating.com/podcast","image_url":"https://megaphone.imgix.net/podcasts/82ed9870-601b-11eb-8196-478a251a046e/image/73e6d21c3fbe038e695dbefe71da6842.jpg?ixlib=rails-4.3.1&max-w=3000&max-h=3000&fit=crop&auto=format,compress","author":"Brian Keating","episode_count":607,"summary":"Think like a physicist. Wonder like a human. Into the Impossible is where Cosmic Conversations happen — uniting Nobel Prize winners, iconoclasts, authors, and technologists to explore reality’s deepest questions. From AI to aliens, from biophysics to the brain, from the cosmos to the multiverse, Brian Keating, Chancellor’s Distinguished Professor of Physics at UC San Diego covers it all. If you’ve ever asked What’s out there? or What’s next?, this is where curiosity meets clarity. Learn to think like this. 🎙 Full episodes, notes & more: briankeating.com/podcast","last_synced_at":null,"page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783"},"episode":{"title":"Genius Philosopher: The Law of Physics That Explains Why Your Life Falls Apart. Rebecca Goldstein - #549","slug":"genius-philosopher-the-law-of-physics-that-explains-why-your-life-falls-apart-rebecca-goldstein-549","published_at":"2026-04-07T18:38:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783/genius-philosopher-the-law-of-physics-that-explains-why-your-life-falls-apart-rebecca-goldstein-549","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783","url":"https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/traffic.megaphone.fm/BBPI5783552567.mp3?updated=1775613001","audio_url":"https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/traffic.megaphone.fm/BBPI5783552567.mp3?updated=1775613001","summary":"Please join my mailing list here 👉 https://briankeating.com/list to win a meteorite 💥 Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is a MacArthur Genius Award recipient, philosopher, novelist, and author of The Mattering Instinct. Her verdict on why human beings are driven to matter — and what threatens that drive — might change how you think about your own life. Check out her recent appearance on Mindscape here. In this conversation, we discuss why every human being is haunted by the need to matter, the four types of people and how each one tries to satisfy that longing, why Ludwig Boltzmann's tragic death is a thermodynamic story, how depression maps onto entropy, whether AI can ever have a mattering instinct, and why heroic strivers are the most threatened by artificial intelligence. We also get into what Freud got wrong about what women want, the physics of matter versus the philosophy of mattering, and why the second law of thermodynamics may be the most personal law in all of science. Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is a philosopher, novelist, and MacArthur Genius Award recipient. She is the author of multiple books including Plato at the Googleplex and 36 Arguments for the Existence of God. Her newest book, The Mattering Instinct, is one of Apple's most anticipated books of the year. 00:00 Why every human being needs to matter — and what happens when they can't 03:30 The second law of thermodynamics and what it has to do with your life 13:10 The 4 types of people: Transcenders, Socializers, Heroic Strivers, and Competitors 16:25 Why fame-seeking millennials will give up everything — including relationships 22:05 Zero-sum mattering: the competitor who was happy for 15 minutes after winning a Nobel Prize 23:20 Ludwig Boltzmann solved one of physics' greatest paradoxes — then despaired…","meta_description":"Please join my mailing list here 👉 https://briankeating.com/list to win a meteorite 💥 Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is a MacArthur Genius Award recipient, p…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2500,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783/episodes/genius-philosopher-the-law-of-physics-that-explains-why-your-life-falls-apart-rebecca-goldstein-549/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/into-the-impossible-with-brian-keating-324783/genius-philosopher-the-law-of-physics-that-explains-why-your-life-falls-apart-rebecca-goldstein-549.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}