Assignment 10, due Dec. 14, 2005
Read (at least) Sections 1, 2, 7, 8, and 9 of:
R. P. Feynman,
"Simulating Physics with Computers",
Int. J. Theor. Physics, vol. 21, no. 6/7, pp. 467-488, 1982.
(Feynman 82 in the usual place.) Section 7 uses as an example exactly
the kind of calcite crystal and polarizing filters I showed you, plus
an EPR pair in state (1/sqrt(2))*(|00> + |11>).
This is an almost no-math argument that shows that ordinary computers
can't simulate quantum mechanics, and is another proof that quantum
computers are inherently more powerful than classical---in some sense.
It is really a simple version of the violation of Bell's Inequalities.
Another Feynman brilliancy; we'll go over it next week.
The task:
Come prepared to discuss the topic of your term paper.
I'd like to go around the class and see if people can help one another focus
his or her topic on an interesting and sharp question, hypothesis, world-view,
thesis, refutation, or any other kind of idea. The more original and outrageous,
the better. Such a topic can be technological, historical, or even political,
economic, or cultural. What's important is that you try to bring together some ideas
in a new way, and that you ask questions that are really interesting to yourself.
That will make your paper interesting to everyone else, including me.
Some of you have already carved out nice areas. Some of you are open at
this point. I ask you to put in some time in the shower thinking about a
topic that will be fun to work on and interesting to report about.