Merry Christmas to all readers and subscribers! And special greetings to the paid subscribers!
Please scroll down for more thoughts inspired by Christmas. But first:
Watch the VIDEO of the Terasem Colloquium held on December 14, 2022, the 50th anniversary of the last day astronauts have been on the Moon. Apollo 17 astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt launched back to Earth from the Moon on December 14, 1972. 50 years later, we are going back. Speakers: Michelle Hanlon, Giuseppe Reibaldi, Marlène Michèle Losier, Adriano Autino, Keith Henson, Frank White.
Congratulations to the scientists at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for the first controlled fusion experiment in history to achieve and exceed energy breakeven: the experiment produced more energy from fusion than the laser energy used to drive it. This is a small but important step toward commercially viable nuclear fusion reactors that could, one day, provide unlimited energy to people on this planet and beyond. This feasibility demonstration should also stimulate interest in mining lunar Helium-3 for clean, environmentally safe fusion reactors (see also my book “Futurist spaceflight meditations”).
Like everyone, I have been playing with the Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT. I have no doubt that AIs will soon be able to pass the Turing Test and do most things much better than humans. However, I don’t think this counts as an indicator of sentience. See “Chatbots are not sentient and the Turing test is obsolete - But future computers based on new physics will be sentient.” Note to self: write a follow-up.
Since the 11 years old me watched the Christmas mission of Apollo 8 around the Moon with total rapture on an old black-and-white TV, Christmas has been a magic time for me to reflect on the future and the universe. Turing Church is inspired by Christmas magic and the spirit of Apollo!
May Christmas magic and the spirit of Apollo lift us toward the stars!
Yes, I’m mixing religion and sci/tech. Turing Church is all about the fusion of religion and sci/tech.
I don’t remember believing in Santa Claus. I guess I did when I was 3, but as far as I can remember I’ve always known that Santa Claus doesn’t exist in the same way a Christmas tree exists. But so what? The important thing was that I was loved and received presents. Similarly, we are loved and will receive the gift of resurrection in a better world. Perhaps by a “supernatural” (whatever that means) God, or perhaps by naturally evolved God-like entities by means of ultra-sci/tech. But who cares? The important thing is that we are loved and will receive the gift of resurrection in a better world.
I have started reading Eric Steinhart’s new book “Atheistic Platonism: A Manifesto” (2022).
Eric joined me to discuss his last book “Believing in Dawkins: The New Spiritual Atheism” (2020) in a recent episode of the Turing Church podcast. See also my review of his previous book “Your Digital Afterlives: Computational Theories of Life after Death” in my book “Tales of the Turing Church” (Chapter 12).
I’ll soon write a full review of “Atheistic Platonism.” But let me share a first impression: it seems to me that the spiritual naturalists who, like Eric, want to replace God with natural principles, are actually describing the core concept of God found in traditional religions like Christianity and Islam, without the mythological infrastructure of these religions. Technically I feel close to the spiritual naturalists, but I find their hostility toward religion annoying.
The awesome dearMoon project has announced the crew of artists and influencers that will join Yusaku Maezawa in a trip around the Moon on a SpaceX Starship. I think dearMoon could be the new Apollo 8, and a cultural game changer. Like so many other space enthusiasts, I applied to participate. Of course I knew that I was not notable enough and much too old to be selected, but I applied to show my support for the project. Congratulations to Yusaku Maezawa and the dearMoon crew. In particular, congratulations to Tim Dodd, the Everyday Astronaut who brings spaceflight down to Earth for everyone to enjoy.
An article by Natalie Wolchover published in Quanta, titled “Physicists Create a Wormhole Using a Quantum Computer,” has provoked angry reactions on Twitter (e.g. this one). The title of the article was then changed to “Physicists Create a Holographic Wormhole Using a Quantum Computer.”
Wolchover’s article is based on a Nature paper titled “Traversable wormhole dynamics on a quantum processor.” The paper is not on Sci-Hub at this moment, but a free to read version has been shared. Read also the comments by Scott Aaronson and Dennis Overbye (unpaywalled version).
Those who criticized the original title of Wolchover’s article are not entirely wrong. The term wormhole is associated in the collective imaginary to faster-than-light travel to the stars and time travel, so the original title of Wolchover’s article can give the impression that the scientists found a way to do just that, which is not the case.
But the original title of of Wolchover’s article is not entirely wrong either. Long story short, the same mathematics can describe different “dual” universes with different dimensions and physical phenomena. The wormhole that the scientists have created is in a dual universe. Do the dual universe and the wormhole *really* exist? This is a subtle question that admits different answers.
But it’s Christmas! Allow yourself to think that scientists have created a wormhole in some meaningful sense, and that this is a small step on a long road on which, one day, scientists could create physical wormholes for faster-than-light travel to the stars and time travel.
Here are some good books that you can read between Christmas and the new year, and/or give others as a Christmas present. You might be still in time to get paper copies, or of course you can get / gift the Kindle editions right now.
I started reading the science fiction novel “Beyond the Hallowed Sky” by Ken MacLeod. The first chapter is a page turner. Highly recommendable so far. Will review.
You want to read everything by Ted Chiang. He hasn’t written full-length science fiction novels yet, but his shorter works have achieved cult status and Hollywood fame. Literary critics love Chiang, and so do scientists! Get Chiang’s collections “Stories of Your Life and Others” and “Exhalation: Stories.”
“Lost and Wanted” by Nell Freudenberger follows a physicist after the death of her best friend. Inner life and feelings, thoughtful meditations on fundamental physics, and a mystery. Perhaps there’s a ghost? Of course there are other explanations. But this doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s no ghost.
“Give Space My Love: An Intellectual Odyssey with Dr. Stephen Hawking” by Terry Bristol follows the author, a philosopher of science and technology, on a road trip with Stephen Hawking. The book has been compared to Robert Pirsig’s “Zen.”
And don’t forget my books!