Why Yang’s story still matters

1:36:21these advancements that are effectively hot air. And that conception >> may have been true 20 30 years ago, but it is certainly it is certainly not true today. And you can not only see that in the fundamental research side, but you can also see that in how that research ends up in enduser products where the best phones, the the best cars, like all the frontier modern western things that we have historically been like with the exception of really AI right now, which is still, you know, we still have the edge. The the Huawei stock phones are better. the the Yang Wang cars are better. Um, not only like and that's proven by them selling in the West,

1:37:01right? And feature for feature. And so this is like a really like you can certainly say that these some of these seminal figures have their roots that they've now reestablished are clearly bearing fruit. Yeah. >> And the evidence of that is undeniable at this point. >> Exactly. Yeah. >> It's Oh my god. >> Yeah. Exactly. and you know he's he he was an instrumental part of that reawakening of China's fundamental science and fundamental physics ecosystem. Um in 2015 he actually renounced his US citizen so he could obtain and resume his Chinese citizenship. Um he spoke candidly pretty much about this journey. He actually said that um when he became a US citizen, his father never forgave him

1:37:43for that until he lived, which that's crazy. And I can understand like I mean my dad would never do that, but if if your dad does that and you want to, you know, I can understand. So So he went back to his um his Chinese citizenship. He loved the United States. He called it a beautiful country that had given given him incredible opportunities to pursue science. He's also not one of these evangelists, these particle physics evangelists. When China wanted to make the next particle accelerator, he was actually against it >> because he was like, "Particle physics is not like going places." >> Yeah. >> What are you going to do with a larger accelerator? You're not going to find new particles.

1:38:23>> You're just going to make a bigger accelerator. >> Which and everyone in the particle physics community was like didn't talk to him for like 2 years or something. But, you know, he he was very candid about what he thought about where physics is going. Um, it's it's an he it's an incredible life that he lived, >> you know. >> Yeah. >> Um, coming up during the war during World War II in China, which is not >> the best place to be in World War II. It's one of the worst, in fact, >> um, given all of the atrocities that happened under Japanese imperialism there. He managed to make it out, managed to create a name for himself in

1:39:04America, managed to not only create a name, but like, you know, he's he's sitting down with Einstein and Fineman and and the big guys. And he's holding his own. And to to those in the high energy physics community and the particle physics community and the mathematical physics community, Yang is the mount one of the Mount Rushmore. You know, Young Mills theory is is really really like fundamental. And I hope you get an idea of now that I've talked to you about like what it really means like how it turns its head, how it turns the head of all of physics >> to become this axiomatic kind of pursuit

1:39:44from symmetry to to laws rather than from laws to the other way around >> everything else.