Podcast Interview with Alexander Wendt
In this episode of Trustees Without Borders, Dr. Alexander Wendt discusses the possibility of using quantum tools for refining empirical and theoretical social science, rethinking topics such as international relations and game theory, and enhancing our understanding of human agency, relational identity and entanglement. The interview compares quantum and classical systems regarding the conceptualization of consciousness and the mind-body relationship, material and quantum constructs, and how quantum models could help to overcome the divisions between the natural and social sciences. Dr. Wendt explains how more work is needed to quantize social science research to determine if quantum is, indeed, a revolutionary opportunity.
Alexander Wendt is Mershon Professor of International Security and Professor of Political Science at The Ohio State University. He received his PhD in 1989 from the University of Minnesota, and before coming to OSU in 2004 had taught previously at Yale University, Dartmouth College, and the University of Chicago. Wendt is interested in philosophical aspects of social science, with special reference to international relations. He is the author of several well-known journal articles, as well as Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge, 1999), which in 2006 received the International Studies Association award for “Best Book of the Decade” in the field. In the 2013 TRIP survey of 1400 International Relations scholars he was named as the most influential scholar in the field over the past 20 years. Wendt's recent book, Quantum Mind and Social Science (Cambridge, 2015), explores the implications for social science of the possibility that consciousness is a macroscopic quantum mechanical phenomenon – in effect, that human beings are walking wave functions.
Interviewers: Nada Berrada, Ph.D. candidate in ASPECT; Linea Cutter, Ph.D. student in ASPECT; and Molly Todd, Ph.D. student in ASPECT at Virginia Tech
