Episode 83: Do Aliens Speak Physics with Daniel Whiteson

Jim talks with Daniel Whiteson of the University of California at Irvine about his new book _Do Aliens Speak Physics,_  In this discussion we look at his "extended Drake equation that asks, "if aliens do exist, will we be able to talk to them?"  Or learn anything from them.Show Notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/83(May be delayed)

Jim talks with Koustubh Phalak about quantum random access memory (QRAM), a proposed technology that would allow the storage of quantum states in qunatum computation.  Koustubh discusses quantum computing, the need for QRAM, proposed implementations of QRAM, and some of the difficulties in its implementation.Show Notes:  http//frontiers.physicsfm.com/82

Jim talks with Philip Tee about the effects of a fundamental length scale.  Phil uses doubly special relativity to try to find observable effects of the pixelization of space, including its effect on light bending and the Casimir effect.Show notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/81

Jim talks with Philipp Strasberg about his simulations of branching and recombining processes in the evolution of quantum states, and their meaning for not only for the many worlds interpretation but also for understanding quantum mechanics in general.Show Notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/80 

Jim talks  with Elba Alonso-Monsalve and David Kaiser about the prospects to describe dark matter as tiny black holes that were created at the end of cosmic inflation.  Due to the large inhomogeneities in the distribution of matter at that time, the black holes could form directly from the matter distribution and not be color neutral (in the sense of QCD).Show notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/79 

Jim talks with Bruna Shinohara of CMC Microsystems. Quantum computing and machine learning are both currently making huge strides.  So it is not strange that people are trying to use quantum computing for machine learning.

Jim talks with Alex Jurgens about Maxwellian ratchets, automata that are similar to Maxwell's Demon.  They talk about their implications for information processing and entropy.http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/77

Jim talks with Claus Kiefer about the implications of Goedel's incompleteness theorems on the search for the theory.Show Notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/76

Jim talks with Nick Ormrod and V. Vilasini about their use of categorical probability theory to analyze the measurement problem.  We discuss categorical probability theory, which allows them to abstract from particular mathematical formulations of quantum mechanics to more general ideas about states and measurements and observers than found in Hilbert space formulations.  They use this to look at the various properties of quantum mechanics and how they relate to each other, in particular how relativity affects the measurement problem.Show Notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/75

Jim talks with David Wolpert about the non-equilibrium behavior of computation, what it means for entropy, and how it relates to traditional thermodynamics.Show Notes: http://frontiers.physicsfm.com/74