Lifeboat Foundation

Theoretical physicists employ their imaginations and their deep understanding of mathematics to decipher the underlying laws of the universe that govern particles, forces and everything in between. More and more often, theorists are doing that work with the help of machine learning.

As might be expected, the group of theorists using machine learning includes people classified as “computational” theorists. But it also includes “formal” theorists, the people interested in the self-consistency of theoretical frameworks, like string theory or quantum gravity. And it includes “phenomenologists,” the theorists who sit next to experimentalists, hypothesizing about new particles or interactions that could be tested by experiments; analyzing the data the experiments collect; and using results to construct new models and dream up how to test them experimentally.

In all areas of theory, machine-learning algorithms are speeding up processes, performing previously impossible calculations, and even causing theorists to rethink the way theoretical physics research is done.

ARMONK, N.Y., April 30, 2024 — Today, IBM (NYSE: IBM) has announced an agreement with RIKEN, a Japanese national research laboratory, to deploy IBM’s next-generation quantum computer architecture and best-performing quantum processor at the RIKEN Center for Computational Science in Kobe, Japan. It will be the only instance of a quantum computer co-located with the supercomputer Fugaku.

This agreement was executed as part of RIKEN’s existing project, supported by funding from the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), an organization under Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI)’s “Development of Integrated Utilization Technology for Quantum and Supercomputers” as part of the “Project for Research and Development of Enhanced Infrastructures for Post 5G Information and Communications Systems.” RIKEN has dedicated use of an IBM Quantum System Two architecture for the purpose of implementation of its project. Under the project RIKEN and its co-PI SoftBank Corp., with its collaborators, University of Tokyo, and Osaka University, aim to demonstrate the advantages of such hybrid computational platforms for deployment as services in the future post-5G era, based on the vision of advancing science and business in Japan.

In addition to the project, IBM will work to develop the software stack dedicated to generating and executing integrated quantum-classical workflows in a heterogeneous quantum-HPC hybrid computing environment. These new capabilities will be geared towards delivering improvements in algorithm quality and execution times.

More information and choice may be welcomed by some consumers, however, for many others, they’re having to increase the time and effort needed to cut through the noise to decide on what to buy, so much so, they abandon the shopping basket completely.

The data backs this up. In the last three months of 2023, Accenture research found that just under three quarters (73%) of consumers reported being inundated by too much choice, and 75% reported feeling bombarded by advertising. This issue of “information overload” led to a similar number (74%) walking away from purchases because they felt overwhelmed.

It’s easy to see why. The endless number of choices, messages, ads and claims consumers now face, coupled with recommendations from friends, family, influencers, algorithms and apps is only adding to the noise.

A new study proposes modifications to the fundamental equation of quantum mechanics, potentially bridging the gap between these two seemingly contradictory frameworks.

The elegant equations of classical electromagnetism written by James Clark Maxwell in 1861 display a remarkable symmetry between electric and magnetic fields except for their sources. We know about electric charges but we have not found magnetic charges. Bar magnets are dipoles with two poles, north and south, for the magnetic field, resembling the configuration of an electric field sourced by a pair of positive and negative electric charges. However, we had never seen experimental evidence for a magnetic monopole, namely a magnetic charge with only one magnetic pole, a net north or south, from where magnetic field lines emanate, just like the electric field sourced by an electric charge. In a symmetric theory of electromagnetism, magnetic monopoles should exist.

The existence of monopoles with a net magnetic charge was proposed by Paul Dirac in 1931 to explain the quantized (discrete) values of electric charges. Dirac found that magnetic charges should be an integer multiple of a fundamental unit, g_D, equal to the electron charge, e, divided by twice the fine-structure constant, or about 68.5e.

In classical physics, the existence of magnetic monopoles restores symmetry to Maxwell’s equations. But in the broader context of quantum mechanics, Gerard ‘t Hooft and Alexander Polyakov showed in 1974 that magnetic monopoles are required in Grand Unified Theories of the strong, weak and electromagnetic interactions. Since the electric charge is quantized, magnetic charges are unavoidable in these theories. Magnetic charges with the lowest mass must be stable because magnetic charge is conserved and they cannot decay into lower-mass particles.

Could a future superintelligence bring back the already dead? This discussion has come up a while back (and see the somewhat related); I’d like to resurrect the topic because … it’s potentially quite important.

Algorithmic resurrection is a possibility if we accept the same computational patternist view of identity that suggests cryonics and uploading will work. I see this as the only consistent view of my observations, but if you don’t buy this argument/belief set then the rest may not be relevant.

The general implementation idea is to run a forward simulation over some portion of earth’s history, constrained to enforce compliance with all recovered historical evidence. The historical evidence would consist mainly of all the scanned brains and the future internet.

Russellian monism is a theory in the metaphysics of mind, on which a single set of properties underlies both consciousness and the most basic entities posited by physics. The theory is named for Bertrand Russell, whose views about consciousness and its place in nature were informed by a structuralist conception of theoretical physics. On such a structuralist conception, physics describes the world in terms of its spatiotemporal structure and dynamics (changes within that structure) and says nothing about what, if anything, underlies that structure and dynamics. For example, as it is sometimes put, physics describes what mass and charge do, e.g., how they dispose objects to move toward or away from each other, but not what mass and charge are. Thus, Russell writes the following about the events physics describes:

All that physics gives us is certain equations giving abstract properties of their changes. But as to what it is that changes, and what it changes from and to—as to this, physics is silent. (Russell 1959: 18)

Continue reading “Russellian Monism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)” »

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The universe seems to be ruled by equations and numbers. But why just these equations and why just those numbers? Is it just coincidence? In this video I have collected seven of the weirdest coincidences in physics.

Continue reading “The 7 Strangest Coincidences in the Laws of Nature” »

ETH Zurich researchers have developed a locomotor control that can enable wheeled-legged robots to autonomously navigate various urban environments.

The robot was equipped with sophisticated navigational abilities thanks to a combination of machine learning algorithms. It was tested in the cities of Seville, Spain, and Zurich, Switzerland.

With little assistance from humans, the team’s ANYmal wheeled-legged robot accomplished autonomous operations in urban settings at the kilometer scale.