The Skeptics Society & Skeptic magazine


EPISODE # 354

Michio Kaku on How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything

Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything (book cover)

Shermer and Kaku discuss:

  • AI, GPT, and the end of humanity or civilization or something bad
  • AI and sentience/consciousness
  • What is intelligence?
  • quantum physics
  • decoherence
  • Uncertainty Principle
  • Schrodinger’s cat
  • multiverse, parallel universes, and Many Worlds hypothesis
  • Einstein
  • the evolution of the computer
  • quantum computers and…

    • the origin of life
    • climate change solutions
    • feeding 10 billion people
    • energizing the world
    • economics and money (cryptocurrency?)
    • health
    • gene editing and curing cancer
    • immortality
    • simulating the universe
  • UAPs and UFOs
  • chaos theory and indeterminism
  • Are we living in a simulation?
  • free will and determinism
  • Is the universe predetermined?
  • the end of science?
  • Is there a God?

Michio Kaku is the co-founder of String Field Theory and is the Henry Semat Professor in Theoretical Physics at the City University of New York. He graduated with a BA from Harvard and a PhD in physics from the University of California at Berkeley. He has hosted several TV specials for BBC-TV, the Discovery Channel, and the Science Channel. He hosts two national science radio shows, Exploration and Science Fantastic. He is the author of numerous New York Times bestselling books including: The God Equation, The Future of the Mind, The Future of Humanity, Physics of the Future, Hyperspace, Parallel Worlds, Physics of the Impossible, and Beyond Einstein. His new book is Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything.

About the Book

The runaway success of the microchip processor may be reaching its end. Running up against the physical constraints of smaller and smaller sizes, traditional silicon chips are not likely to prove useful in solving humanity’s greatest challenges, from climate change, to global starvation, to incurable diseases. But the quantum computer, which harnesses the power and complexity of the atomic realm, already promises to be every bit as revolutionary as the transistor and microchip once were. Its unprecedented gains in computing power herald advancements that could change every aspect of our daily lives.

Automotive companies, medical researchers, and consulting firms are betting on quantum computing, hoping to exploit its power to design more efficient vehicles, create life-saving new drugs, and streamline industries to revolutionize the economy. But this is only the beginning. Quantum computers could allow us to finally create nuclear fusion reactors that create clean, renewable energy without radioactive waste or threats of meltdown. They could help us crack the biological processes that generate natural, cheap fertilizer and enable us to feed the world’s growing populations. And they could unravel the fiendishly difficult protein folding that lies at the heart of previously incurable diseases like Alzheimer’s, ALS, and Parkinson’s, helping us to live longer, healthier lives. There is not a single problem humanity faces that couldn’t be addressed by quantum computing. Told with Kaku’s signature clarity and enthusiasm, Quantum Supremacy is the story of this exciting frontier and the race to claim humanity’s future.

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This episode is sponsored by Wondrium:

Wondrium (sponsor)

This episode was released on May 23, 2023.

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