Our universe is expanding. Not only that, but this expansion is probably accelerating. Now two authors, Lawrence Krauss and Glenn Starkman, have proposed that a consequence of this acceleration is that in such a universe only a finite amount of information processing can be performed: astro-ph 0404510. This means, according to the authors, that the [...]
A most powerful idea in computation is that the program and the data can be one and the same. (That this distinction is often lost in higher level programming languages is a shame.) Thus a program which is some form of data can manipulate the data which is itself part of the future program. We [...]
From Valis by Philip K. Dick: “To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement. This is a paradox; whoever defeats a segment of the Empire becomes the Empire; it proliferates like a vius imposiing its form on its enemies. Thereby it becoes its enemies.”
From an interview with Neal Stephenson: Hooke, for example, when he figured out how arches work, published it as an anagram. He condensed the idea into this pithy statement: “The ideal form of an arch is the form of a chain hanging, flipped upside down.” Then he scrambled the letters to make an anagram and [...]
Goodbye Pepper. You threw up on me (twice!) on the ride home from where we picked you out. You herded the washing machine and the lawn mower. You barked at everyone except family. Mostly you snored loudly. The floor will be a little dirtier, the days a little quieter, and the washing machine will be [...]
The number one most irritating question I was asked during my faculty interviews was “what will you do if quantum computation doesn’t pan out?” At first glance this question seems perfectly valid: a department should concern itself with whether they are hiring someone whose work will quickly become irrelevant. But I’ve got news for you [...]
Today I sent in my acceptance for a postdoc at the Santa Fe Insitute. 16 miles to Ski Santa Fe and 72 miles to Taos.
If theodicy is “defense of God’s goodliness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil,” what word describes “defense of God’s evil and falibilty in view of the existence of good?”
Suppose Alice and Bob perform a test of a Bell inequality. They start together and produce an entangled quantum state. Then the parties move apart such that when they make their measurements on the entangle quantum state they are spacelike separated and are at rest with respect to each other’s motion. Let’s suppose that Alice [...]
Email from a master: Two theorists were walking through the forest of quantum mechanics.There they came across an ATM machine. In front of the ATM machine was a long line of experimentalists. The student asked, “Surely master an ATM machine deep in the forest of Quantum Mechanics must have an incredible surcharge.” The master, “Can [...]
Today I learned that they offered the job I interviewed for in Vancouver to “an experimentalist.” Today is Buddha Day. Repeat after me: “I will not lose my Zen-Buddha nature, I will not lose my Zen-Buddha nature…”
The Physical Review response of a few days ago reminded me of this favorite quote, part of which I read at at the celebration we had after my dad passed away, Poets say science takes away from the beauty of the stars — mere gobs of gas atoms. Nothing is “mere.” I too can see [...]
