Consciousness and Quantumcomputers
dal 19/1/2007 al 20/1/2007
Segnalato da
19/1/2007
Consciousness and Quantumcomputers
Swiss Museum of Transport, Luzern
The Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics is a discourse-oriented and interdisciplinary platform which has been focussing for some years on the polemical relationship between quantum physics and brain research.
The 7th Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics
The “Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics" is a discourse-oriented and
interdisciplinary platform which has been focussing for some years on the polemical
relationship between quantum physics and brain research. The goal of the lectures,
talks and discussions at the Biennial has been to provide a better comprehension of
physical realities including critical, epistemological positions and debates
contributing to the relation of knowledge and reality, science and rationality,
language and understanding, cognition and society.
More than half a century after inventing the transistor which triggered the
development of modern electronics, computing, and telecommunications, research is
challenged by the theoretical and technical problems of Quantum Computing.
Fascinating experiments like quantum teleportation not only reveal the brilliant
work of quantum physicists, but they are also of epistemological and special value.
The new research field is about to explode; technical publications are increasingly
available world-wide; market studies about the new technique refer to its potential
being worth billions. A New York Times’ report comparing quantum computers to
classical PCs concludes that it’s like comparing nuclear power to
fire. And acclaimed quantum physicists attest quantum computers yet undreamt
capacities: By manipulating so-called quantum bits or qubits, they are expected to
solve problems millions of times faster than today’s machines.
The 7th Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics "Consciousness and Quantumcomputers" presents internationally acclaimed speakers and specialists
from the disciplines of quantum physics, consciousness research, art, and philosophy
for interdisciplinary discussion (among them are the physicists Hans-Peter
Dürr, Alternative Nobel Prize 1987, and Brian Josephson, Nobel Prize in Physics
1973). The debate’s major issues have their roots in earlier Lucerne conferences:
Does our brain function according to quantum mechanical principles as some
researchers claim? How does the new key technology challenge our conventional
conception of matter, mind and information? Do we have to expect basic modifications
of our understanding in computing as the Austrian physicist Anton
Zeilinger states? Does quantum teleportation represent a method that allows quantum
computers to communicate with each other in the near future? Do conscious actions in
the brain
- as the British mathematician Roger Penrose suggests - lie beyond the possibilities
of computer simulations? How can we understand the Dalai Lama’s predication that
the physical basis of a computer decides if it can carry a stream of
consciousness in the Tibetan-Buddhist sense?
What is the function of art in view of the current dramatic development of
scientific specialization, or the adjustment of the production of scientific
knowledge to the technosciences? What kind of methodologies will be able to meet the
dynamic development of the (natural)sciences most effectively?
Swiss Museum of Transport
Lidostrasse 5 - Lucerne