A weekly video podcast that builds science news up from what is actually known.
From First Principles, the FFP Pod for short, takes the week’s science and reasons it out the way scientists do, from foundational truths rather than assumptions, so that anyone can follow along. Made in Los Angeles by Krishna Choudhary and Lester Nare. Get in touch.
The show
The name and the figure
First principles thinking strips away assumptions and builds understanding from foundational truths. It is how scientists think, and it is how the show works: every topic taken down to its core so that complexity becomes clarity. The five Platonic solids, the tetrahedron, cube, octahedron, dodecahedron, and icosahedron, are the only convex regular polyhedra there are, the shapes you reach when you reduce three-dimensional geometry to its most fundamental forms. A natural emblem for a show built this way.
- Format
- Weekly video podcast
- First aired
- Jul 27, 2025
- Episodes
- 56 to date
- Papers
- 61
- Hosts
- Krishna Choudhary and Lester Nare
- Made in
- Los Angeles, California
Hosts
Physicist. Answers the questions.
Krishna Choudhary
A physicist and working researcher. Krishna studied physics at Princeton, then earned his PhD in physics at UCLA, where his work sat between physics and the life sciences. He has been published in Nature and Nature Neuroscience and still publishes today, most recently as one of the authors of the July 2026 Nature cover story on silicon quantum computing, with the HRL quantum team he was part of. Born in Odisha, India, and raised in Udaipur, Rajasthan, he spent a year in Huntsville, Alabama before settling in Los Angeles.
- Born
- Odisha, India. Raised in Udaipur, Rajasthan.
- Studied
- Physics, Princeton, Class of 2014
- Doctorate
- PhD in physics, UCLA, 2021
- Research
- Silicon quantum computing, with the HRL quantum team
- Profile
Technologist. Asks them.
Lester Nare
A technologist and serial founder. Lester has spent more than a decade building software companies. He is the Co-Founder and COO of Steadworth, a fintech platform that helps home buyers find down payment assistance, and COO of the Disclosure Foundation, a 501(c)(3) working on government transparency around UAP. Born in Montreal to Zimbabwean immigrant parents, he brings an outsider’s eye and a builder’s instinct to the show.
- Born
- Montreal, Canada, to Zimbabwean parents
- Studied
- Visual arts, Princeton, Class of 2014
- Builds
- Steadworth, Co-Founder and COO
- Serves
- Disclosure Foundation, COO
- Before
- A decade of software companies. DJ and producer at Princeton.
- Profile
The story
What a friendship sounds like when you press record
Krishna and Lester have been close friends since they met as members of Princeton’s Class of 2014. They came from different worlds, one a visual artist and competitive athlete, the other a physicist, and bonded over music. Lester was a DJ and producer. Krishna sang a cappella with the Nassoons. Both are immigrants who found their way to the United States and then to each other on Princeton’s campus.
The show grew out of conversations they were already having. Lester would come to Krishna with a science question, and Krishna would break it down from first principles, patiently, rigorously, and with real enthusiasm. After more than a decade of a friendship built on curiosity, they decided those private conversations deserved a public stage.
The show launched in July 2025 and the format clicked at once, because none of it was manufactured. It is what their friendship sounds like when you press record.
- 2010Krishna and Lester meet as freshmen at Princeton.
- 2014Class of 2014. Lester in visual arts, Krishna in physics.
- 2021Krishna finishes his PhD in physics at UCLA.
- Jul 2025The first episode of From First Principles.
- Mar 2026Krishna and Lester appear on The Dave Chang Show on Netflix.
- Jul 2026WIRED names the show one of the best science podcasts.
- Jul 2026Krishna is an author on Nature’s cover story on silicon quantum computing.
In the press
- WIRED
Named one of the best science podcasts
“Two Princeton graduates (one PhD, as they jokingly point out), cover the top science news of the week, breaking down complex research into fun and understandable stories anyone can get excited about.”
Read the list - Nature
Co-host authored the July 2026 cover story
Krishna is one of the authors of Nature’s cover story on silicon quantum computing, with the HRL quantum team he was part of.
Read the paper - Netflix
Featured on The Dave Chang Show
March 12, 2026. Dave Chang introduces From First Principles to his audience, in his own words.
Watch on Netflix
The mission
Sports have ESPN. Finance has CNBC. Science has no equivalent, and the public’s understanding of it is drifting further from the frontier.
Artificial intelligence and accelerating technology are driving a Cambrian explosion in the volume of scientific research. Discoveries that once took decades now unfold in months. Yet the general public’s grasp of science is drifting further and further from where the work is actually happening.
Entertainment and music have award shows, press tours, and streaming charts. Science has no popular cultural infrastructure of its own: no broadly accessible place where everyday people can follow the action and feel the excitement of discovery.
From First Principles is building that bridge. The goal is to make frontier science accessible and engaging for curious people who have no natural entry point. Much of the anti-science movement runs on fear of what we do not understand. Close the gap between researchers and the public, and fear can turn into fascination.
Both hosts grew up in households where science was not just respected. It was the family business. Their parents are published researchers whose work has been cited thousands of times at the top of their fields.
Both are immigrants whose families put fundamental research and the pursuit of knowledge first. The importance of science is not only something they talk about on the show. It is how they were raised.
| Parent | Field | Citations |
|---|---|---|
| Krishna’s father | Solar physicistProfessor and Chair, Physics and Astronomy, Cal State Northridge | 3,423 |
| Krishna’s mother | Botanist | – |
| Lester’s father | Parasitologist | 4,208 |
| Lester’s mother | Clinical data scientistMerck, more than 25 years | – |