Scott Aaronson on Computational Complexity, Philosophy & Quantum Computing | Episode 6

Philosophical Trials

Scott Aaronson is a world-renowned expert in the fields of Quantum Computing and Computational Complexity Theory. He is a David J. Bruton Centennial Professor of Computer Science at The University of Texas at Austin. Every Computer Science enthusiast knows who Prof. Aaronson is because of his extremely clear and engaging way of communicating difficult theoretical ideas. His book Quantum Computing since Democritus is a wonderful resource of dipping into the topics that we are discussing today.

Conversation outline:

00:00 Introduction

01:04 What draws you to Philosophy?

04:36 The importance of focusing of subproblems of the big questions: insights into space, time and thinking machines

09:19 The Turing Test and the chinese room argument

15:37 What other philosophical areas would benefit from looking at Complexity Theory?

21:35 What is Computational Complexity after all?

30:03 NP, complexity classes and the P=NP problem

45:27 Complexity Theory in light of time and memory limitations

52:24 Why do we believe in Quantum Theory?

55:36 What is Quantum Computing?

01:05:45 How are qubits physically implemented?

01:11:14 Quantum Supremacy

01:13:26 Would the construction of a quantum computer which could run Shor’s algorithm confirm the many-worlds interpretation? Remarks on David Deutsch’s quantum views.

Enjoy!

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