Sean Carroll

Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist at Caltech in sunny California. Most of his career has been spent doing research on cosmology, field theory, and gravitation, looking at topics such as dark matter and dark energy, modified gravity, topological defects, extra dimensions, and violations of fundamental symmetries. These days his focus has shifted a bit to more foundational questions, both in quantum mechanics (origin of probability, emergence of space and time) and statistical mechanics (entropy and the arrow of time, dynamics of complexity).

Sean has also written a few books, both popular-level and textbook-level, the most recent being The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself. He has also done a few lecture courses for The Great Courses, has a podcast called Mindscape, which features Sean conversing with smart people about interesting ideas in science, philosophy, culture, and the arts, and he give talks, organizes conferences, writes in a number of modes, and does science consulting for film and television.