Talk About the Passion

Physicist Sabine Hossenfelder on how music is math–and math is music. [View in browser]( [Join Nautilus]( Did a friend forward this? [Subscribe here.]( This Thursday, your free member newsletter includes one article, below, by editor Kristen French. Then afterward, be sure to check out this week’s Facts So Romantic. ARTS Talk About the Passion Physicist Sabine Hossenfelder on how music is math–and math is music. INTERVIEW BY KRISTEN FRENCH I use music to clear my head. If I’m trying to solve a problem and I feel super stuck, then concentrating on the music does a very good job. Often, I feel like it unlocks something in me. It’s not so much that I use the patterns or concepts that come up in the music itself. It’s more an indirect way of shaking up some things in my head that didn’t quite work as I wanted them to. For instance, three years ago, I was trying to solve a problem in quantum mechanics. I was sure there was an answer, but I couldn’t find it. It was a math problem and I’d written down all the requirements and I was like, “there’s gotta be a way to do it.” So I took a few days off and was working on a song at the time, a cover version of “Things Can Only Get Better,” by D:Ream. I had to shift the whole thing into a higher key to get it into my vocal range, and that changed the feel of the song. So then I started rearranging some other parts, and while I was at it, there were a few phrases in the song that didn’t really make sense to me, so I replaced them with something else, and I changed the interlude, and the instruments, because I don’t actually play an electric guitar. I use synthesizers. It all comes out of the computer and then I sing. And so the song morphed quite a bit. I was working on this song for some while and then I just had this very visual understanding of the solution to the math problem I had been working on. It was like my brain suddenly decided “this is how it has to work.” Similar things have happened to me on other occasions. I get this feeling that there has to be an answer, and I can kind of see in the equations that there is an answer, but I don’t know what it is. Often that means my brain has solved the problem, but it doesn’t want to spit it out, so I have to do something else to bring it into my consciousness, like play or write music. Music is very mathematical, and the way that I think about mathematics is that it’s basically an art form with very strict rules. If you’re writing a song, you have to learn the techniques, the parameters, but you can break these once you’ve learned them. In mathematics, it’s much more rigid. It’s basically all about the rules. So if you’re doing music, your brain tries more new things. And those new things may lead you through the back doors and side doors that open up to the solution you were seeking. That’s why music can be such a muse for me when I’m stuck on a math puzzle. This is one of six interviews with prominent scientists and artists discussing their inspiration in the other arena. Read the other five interviews [here](. More from Nautilus: • [The pandemic your grandparents forgot]( • [Parasites can also be friends]( Experience the endless possibilities and deep human connections that science offers [JOIN TODAY]( The 2023 Jackson Wild Media Awards Finalists Jackson Wild has announced [the finalists]( for this year’s competition recognizing the best of the best in nature, science, and conservation storytelling. From 1,100 category entries filmed in 74 countries, find out [who made the cut](. 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[Nautilus→]( Insects’ brains are dramatically rewired during metamorphosis, which means adults likely don’t retain memories of their youthful, larval days. [Quanta Magazine→]( P.S. The seminal rumination Walden; or, Life in the Woods by Henry David Thoreau was published 169 years ago yesterday. The book, which many have credited as a spark for the contemporary conservation and environmentalism movements, has also served as an extraordinarily useful [snapshot of climate and ecological conditions]( from the mid-19th century. And its author has continued to inspire naturalists and conservationists striving for [a different understanding]( of [nature]( and [its creatures](. Today’s newsletter was written by the Nautilus Editors GIVEAWAY See Oppenheimer on Us Still haven’t seen the movie everyone is talking about? Follow [@NautilusMag]( and tag a friend in the comments to enter for a chance to see #Oppenheimer on the house. 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