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Programming the Universe: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes on the Cosmos |
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Programming the Universe: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes on the Cosmos |
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基本信息·出版社：Vintage Books USA
·页码：256 页
·出版日期：2007年03月
·ISBN：1400033861
·条形码：9781400033867
·装帧：平装
·正文语种：英语
内容简介 Is the universe actually a giant quantum computer? According to Seth Lloyd, the answer is yes.
All interactions between particles in the universe, Lloyd explains, convey not only energy but also information–in other words, particles not only collide, they compute. What is the entire universe computing, ultimately? “Its own dynamical evolution,” he says. “As the computation proceeds, reality unfolds.”
Programming the Universe, a wonderfully accessible book, presents an original and compelling vision of reality, revealing our world in an entirely new light.
作者简介 Seth Lloyd is Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT and a principal investigator at the Research Laboratory of Electronics. He is also adjunct assistant professor at the Santa Fe Institute. He designed the first feasible quantum computer, and works on problems having to do with information and complex systems from the very small (how do atoms process information? how can you make them compute?) to the very large (how does society process information? And how can we understand society in terms of its ability to process information?).
His seminal work in the fields of quantum computation and quantum communications--including proposing the first technologically feasible design for a quantum computer--has gained him a reputation as an innovator and leader in the field of quantum computing. Lloyd has been featured widely in the mainstream media including the front page of
The New York Times,
Los Angeles Times,
The Washington Post,
The Economist,
Wired,
The Dallas Morning News, and
The Times (London), among others. His name also frequently appears (both as writer and subject) in the pages of
Nature,
New Scientist,
Science, and
Scientific American.
编辑推荐 From Publishers Weekly Lloyd, a professor at MIT, works in the vanguard of research in quantum computing: using the quantum mechanical properties of atoms as a computer. He contends that the universe itself is one big quantum computer producing what we see around us, and ourselves, as it runs a cosmic program. According to Lloyd, once we understand the laws of physics completely, we will be able to use small-scale quantum computing to understand the universe completely as well. In his scenario, the universe is processing information. The second law of thermodynamics (disorder increases) is all about information, and Lloyd spends much of the book explaining how quantum processes convey information. The creation of the universe itself involved information processing: random fluctuations in the quantum foam, like a random number generator in a computer program, produced higher-density areas, then matter, stars, galaxies and life. Lloyd's hypothesis bears important implications for the red-hot evolution–versus–intelligent design debate, since he argues that divine intervention isn't necessary to produce complexity and life. Unfortunately, he rushes through what should be the climax of his argument. Nevertheless, Lloyd throws out many fascinating ideas. (For another take on information theory, see
Decoding the Universe on p.53.) 12 b&w illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to the Hardcover edition. From Booklist *Starred Review* Lloyd's specialty in physics is the hot topic of quantum information. And his book may do for quantum information what Brian Greene did for strings (
The Elegant Universe, 1999) and Stephen Hawking did for spacetime (
A Brief History of Time, 1988): popularize a far-out scientific frontier. Will Lloyd's listeners have the same head-scratching reactions as his MIT students do on their first encounter with the idea that information is a quantifiable physical value, as much as mass or motion? Or with the proposition that any physical system--a river, you, the universe--is a quantum mechanical computer? Not if they've read his book, which offers brilliantly clarifying explanations of the "bit," the smallest unit of information; how bits change their state; and how changes-of-state can be registered on atoms via quantum-mechanical qualities such as "spin" and "superposition." Putting readers in the know about quantum computation, Lloyd then informs them that it may well be the answer to physicists' search for a unified theory of everything. Exploring big questions in accessible, comprehensive fashion, Lloyd's work is of vital importance to the general-science audience.
Gilbert TaylorCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition. Review “Reassembling the bits of a shattered Newtonian apple of knowledge into a quantum computer of the Universe, Seth Lloyd has unified the sciences of physics, information, mechanics and complexity in a prodigious book, incandescent with novel ideas and grand syntheses that dare the reader to imagine that we have a new Feynman among us.”–George Gilder, author of
Microcosm,
Telecosm, and
The Silicon Eye“This is a fascinating book. The author’s message is that information is at the core of everything. Weaving in his own intellectual journey towards quantum computation makes it a very exciting read. I was unable to put it down.”–Anton Zeilinger, Professor of Physics at the University of Vienna
“The modern version of the grand question ‘Mind or Matter?’ is ‘Information or Physics?’ Seth Lloyd has engaged it with enthusiasm and persistence. In his vision, reached after hard study and thought, the question is transcended: the deepest reality is simultaneously information
and physics.”–Frank Wilczek, Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, MIT, 2004 Nobel Laureate
“Seth Lloyd is one of the gurus of quantum and information theory, and in this accessible book he presents an insightful new perspective on the cosmos.”–Sir Martin Rees, Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics, Trinity College, University of Cambridge, Author of
Just Six Numbers“What an astonishing book! Seth Lloyd, a quantum bit wrangler at MIT, proves that not only is the universe really a computer, but the universe is a computer we can program! He is not the first to see the world this way, but he is the first to translate this mathematical intuition into plain English. Lloyd is at the forefront of a revolution in science that says everything that exists (atoms, energy, space) is just bits of information. The beauty of this book, and LloydR...
--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition. Review “Lloyd is one of the gurus of quantum and information theory, and in this accessible book he presents an insightful new perspective on the cosmos.”
—Sir Martin Rees, University of Cambridge
“What an astonishing book! Lloyd is at the forefront of a revolution.”
—Kevin Kelly, Editor-at-Large,
Wired“Lloyd thinks he has found a new way to explain one of the most basic questions in science: Why is the world so complex? . . . Fascinating and profoundly comforting. . . . Seth Lloyd certainly gives his readers a lot of bang for their buck.”
—
The New York Times Book Review"Renowned for his innovative conflation of pure physics and computation, Lloyd is well positioned to hack his way into space-time and come back with answers."
—
Seed 文摘 This book is the story of the universe and the bit. The universe is the biggest thing there is and the bit is the smallest possible chunk of information. The universe is made of bits. Every molecule, atom, and elementary particle registers bits of information. Every interaction between those pieces of the universe processes that information by altering those bits. That is, the universe computes, and because the universe is governed by the laws of quantum mechanics, it computes in an intrinsically quantum-mechanical fashion; its bits are quantum bits. The history of the universe is, in effect, a huge and ongoing quantum computation. The universe is a quantum computer.
This begs the question: What does the universe compute? It computes itself. The universe computes its own behavior. As soon as the universe began, it began computing. At first, the patterns it produced were simple, comprising elementary particles and establishing the fundamental laws of physics. In time, as it processed more and more information, the universe spun out ever more intricate and complex patterns, including galaxies, stars, and planets. Life, language, human beings, society, culture-all owe their existence to the intrinsic ability of matter and energy to process information. The computational capability of the universe explains one of the great mysteries of nature: how complex systems such as living creatures can arise from fundamentally simple physical laws. These laws allow us to predict the future, but only as a matter of probability, and only on a large scale. The quantum-computational nature of the universe dictates that the details of the future are intrinsically unpredictable. They can be computed only by a computer the size of the universe itself. Otherwise, the only way to discover the future is to wait and see what happens.
Allow me to introduce myself. The first thing I remember is living in a chicken house.
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