Stephen Wolfram: “Back in 1981, I had the idea that, perhaps, just as I’d been able to find primitives for computations people want to do, I might somehow also be able to find primitives for what nature does.

The crucial thing that I realized is that those primitives don’t have to be based only on traditional mathematical constructs. I mean, if one’s going to be able to do theoretical science, one has to assume that nature follows some kind of definite rules.

But why do those rules involve only the kinds of constructs that have been invented in human mathematics?

Can’t the rules be somehow more general?

Perhaps the kinds of rules that can be embodied in programs might actually be what nature is using.”