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History of the Universe from a Neural Network

Vitaly Vanchurin, physicist and cosmologist at the University of Minnesota Duluth speaks to Luis Razo Bravo of EISM about the world as a neural network, machine learning, theories of everything, interpretations of quantum mechanics and long-term human survival.

Timestamp of the conversation:

00:00 — Opening quote by Vanchurin.
00:53 — Introduction to Vanchurin.
03:17 — Vanchurin’s thoughts about human extinction.
05:56 — Brief background on Vanchurin’s research interests.
10:24 — How Vanchurin became interested in neural networks.
12:31 — How quantum mechanics can be used to understand neural networks.
18:56 — How and where does gravity fit into Vanchurin’s model?
20:39 — Does Vanchurin incorporate holography (AdS/CFT) into hid model?
24:14 — Maybe the entirety of physics is an “emergent” neural network.
28:08 — Maybe there are forms of life that are more fit to survive than humans.
28:58 — Maldacena’s “principle of Maximal life“
29:28 — Theories of Everything.
31:06 — Why Vanchurin’s framework is potentially a true TOE (politics, ethics, etc.)
34:07 — Why physicists don’t like to talk to philosophers and ask big questions.
36:45 — Why the growing number of theories of everything?
39:11 — Apart from his own, does Vanchurin have a favorite TOE?
41:26 — Bohmian mechanics and Aharanov’s Two-time approach to quantum mechanics.
43:53 — How has Vanchurin’s recent paper been received? Beliefs about peer review.
46:03 — Connecting Vanchurin’s work to machine learning and recommendations.
49:21 — Leonard Susskind, quantum information theory, and complexity.
51:23 — Maybe various proposals are looking at the same thing from different angles.
52:17 — How to follow Vanchurin’s work and connect to him.

Vanchurin’s paper on the world as a NN: https://arxiv.org/abs/2008.01540
Vanchurin on a theory of machine learning: https://arxiv.org/abs/2004.

Vanchurin’s website and research interests: https://www.d.umn.edu/cosmology/

Learn more about EISM at www.eism.eu.

A Boiling Cauldron: Cybersecurity Trends, Threats, And Predictions For 2023

By Chuck Brooks


There are many other interesting trends to look out for in 2023. These trends will include the expansion of use of a Software Bill of Materials (SBOM), the integration of more 5G networks to bring down latency of data delivery, more Deep Fakes being used for fraud, low code for citizen coding, more computing at the edge, and the development of initial stages of the implementation of quantum technologies and algorithms.

When all is said and done, 2023 will face a boiling concoction of new and old cyber-threats. It will be an especially challenging year for all those involved trying to protect their data and for geopolitical stability.

Fluxonium qubits bring the creation of a quantum computer closer

Russian scientists from University of Science and Technology MISIS and Bauman Moscow State Technical University were one of the first in the world to implement a two-qubit operation using superconducting fluxonium qubits. Fluxoniums have a longer life cycle and a greater precision of operations, so they are used to make longer algorithms. An article on research that brings the creation of a quantum computer closer to reality has been published in npj Quantum Information.

One of the main questions in the development of a universal quantum computer is about . Namely, which quantum objects are the best to make processors for quantum computers: electrons, photons, ions, superconductors, or other “quantum transistors.” Superconducting qubits have become one of the most successful platforms for quantum computing during the past decade. To date, the most commercially successful superconducting qubits are transmons, which are actively investigated and used in the quantum developments of Google, IBM and other world leading laboratories.

The main task of a qubit is to store and process information without errors. Accidental noise and even mere observation can lead to the loss or alteration of data. The stable operation of often requires extremely low ambient temperatures—close to zero Kelvin, which is hundreds of times colder than the temperature of open space.

Black Holes and Holograms: A New Theory That Changes Our Understanding of the Universe

Confusing? It may sound so, but it isn’t actually. What Benini and Milan have done is apply the theory of the holographic principle to black holes. In this way, their mysterious thermodynamic properties have become more understandable: by focusing on predicting that these bodies have high entropy and looking at them in terms of quantum mechanics, which allows us to describe them as a hologram: they have two dimensions, in which gravity disappears, but they reproduce an object in three dimensions.

But there’s more. Much more.

According to the authors of the new studies, this is only the first step towards a deeper understanding of these cosmic bodies and the properties that characterize them when quantum mechanics intersects with general relativity.

David Deutsch — What is Ultimate Reality?

What is the deepest nature of things? Our world is complex, filled with so much stuff. But down below, what’s most fundamental, what is ultimate reality? Is there anything nonphysical? Anything spiritual? Or only the physical world? Many feel certain of their belief, on each side of controversial question.

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David Elieser Deutsch, FRS is a British physicist at the University of Oxford. He is a Visiting Professor in the Department of Atomic and Laser Physics at the Centre for Quantum Computation (CQC) in the Clarendon Laboratory of the University of Oxford.

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Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

Two Paths to a Magnetic Gradiometer

From the slivers of natural magnetite used as the earliest magnetic compasses to today’s cryogenically cooled superconducting quantum interference devices, researchers have employed many diverse means to measure magnetic fields. Now Robert Cooper at George Mason University, Virginia, and colleagues have added two more [1]. Their instruments, which are variations on a high-precision instrument called an optically pumped atomic magnetometer, are the first demonstrations of “intrinsic radio-frequency gradiometers.” These devices are especially suited to measure weak, local radio-frequency sources while excluding background fields.

At the heart of an optically pumped atomic magnetometer lies a gas of alkali atoms whose spins are aligned by a circularly polarized laser—the optical pump. The presence of an external magnetic field perturbs the spin axis of these atoms, showing up as a change in the polarization direction of the probe beam—a second, linearly polarized laser that is also transmitted through the gas.

In the devices devised by Cooper and his colleagues, the probe beam makes multiple passes through the alkali gas, maximizing the device’s sensitivity to weak fields. In one setup, a high-power probe beam takes a single M-shaped route through the gas, passing twice through a pair of vapor cells. In the other, a low-power beam traces overlapping V-shaped paths, passing 46 times through a single vapor cell.

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