Clear In Vivid is supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation's program in public understanding,

which aims to enrich people's lives through a keener appreciation of our increasingly

scientific and technological world, and to portray the complex humanity of scientists,

engineers, and mathematicians.

I'm Alan Olga, and this is Clear In Vivid, conversations about connecting and communicating.

Even in grad schools, I had dreadlocks, and I had my way of talking and, you know, a

Trinidadian Bronx accent, kind of cookie in my own way, I still am.

Many of my classmates, I mean, some even admit it to me today, they like, they read me

in this way as if like, stuff art is not smart, he's not really a physicist, he doesn't,

he's not, doesn't fit the bill.

That's Stefan Alexander.

After that rocky start, he went on to a notable career as a theoretical physicist, where he

blends his passion for jazz with his research into the exotic worlds of cosmology and quantum

gravity.

A professor at Brown University, he heads the Stefan Alexander theory lab.

I'm very eager to talk with you because your work gives a fresh look at communication,

which I care about a lot, but also at music, at the way the universe is made, and I think

even at thinking itself, a fresh look at all of those things.

Let me start with communication, you love analogies, don't you?

Yes.

I always think of Richard Feynman when he was explaining physics.

He would say, I'm only telling you part of the story, I'll tell you more later.

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