Discussion with Dr. Michio Kaku on Reddit in the Evening of 2/10/214 Part 1 :
bobthebobd :
If an alien spaceship lands in my backyard, what should my first message to them be?
DrMichioKaku :
Chances are, the aliens will not want to land on our backyard, or even the White House lawn, with their flying saucers. They may have tiny, robotic self-replicating probes which can reach near light speed and can proliferate around the galaxy. So instead of the Enterprise and huge star ships, the aliens might actually send tiny probes to explore the universe. One might land on our lawn and we won't even know.
LeftStep22 :
If I can make it 50 more years, will we be able to slice up my brain and cram my consciousness into a machine? That'd be swell.
DrMichioKaku : By midcentury, we may have Brain 2.0, a backup copy of the brain, the byproduct of the ambitious BRAIN project of Pres. Obama and the European Union. Hence, when we die, our Connectome and Genome still survive. So our consciousness does not have to die when we die. And this consciousness, I write, may be placed on laser beams and sent into outer space. This might be the most efficient way to explore the universe, as laser beams carrying our consciousness into outer space.
bellyv :
Hello Dr. Kaku! Love the book Physics of the Impossible. It really inspired me so thank you for that!
My question: What is your take on the theory that electrons can surpass large distances via tiny wormholes to support quantum entanglement?
i believe I'm using the right terminology...
DrMichioKaku :
Combining quantum entanglement with wormholes yields mind boggling results about black holes. But I don't trust them until we have a theory of everything which can combine quantum effects with general relativity. i.e. we need to have a full blown string theory resolve this sticky question.
Once again, my colleague Stephen Hawking has upset the apple cart. The event horizon surrounding a black hole was once though to be an imaginary sphere. But recent theories indicate that it may actually be physical, maybe even a sphere of fire. But I don't trust any of these calculations until we have a full-blown string theory calculation, since Einstein's theory by itself is incomplete.
rootbeerfetish :
First of all hows your figure skating going? Secondly I would like to know when do you think we'll have the ability to make real hover boards just like back to the future?
Raregan
Hi Dr Kaku, I just want to start by saying you're the reason I got into Physics. I was bought Hyperspace for my birthday when I was 16 and absolutely loved it. I'm currently in my second year of University studying Physics.
My question is how have you seen the attitudes of the Scientific Community change since the discovery of the Higgs Boson? Do you think that funding towards curiosity driven research, such as CERN, will receive more funding in the future as a result also?
DrMichioKaku :
I would hope that the publicity around the Higgs boson would increase the public awareness of physics and cosmology. The next big accelerator might be the ILC in Japan, a linear collider which might be able to probe the boundaries of string theory. So we physicists have to learn how to engage the public so that taxpayers money is used to explore the nature of the universe.
Cats_Like_Felix :
Hello there Dr. Kaku! I remember watching a documentary you made for the BBC on extending life expectancy in humans - do you still follow recent advances in this field and if so, can you tell us what excites you most recently in this particular area?
Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions
DrMichioKaku :
We are slowly isolating the genes involved with the aging process. We do not have the fountain of youth, but I think, in the coming decades, we will unravel the aging process at the genetic level. For example, we share 98.5% of our genes with the chimps, yet we live twice as long.
We will find these genes very soon that doubled our life span.
Mr-Who :
Do you believe we will eventually find some form of life in our own solar system? Such as on Mars or Europa?
DrMichioKaku :
Our best shot at finding life in our solar system might be to look at the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. Mars, increasingly, looks like a dead planet. But the oceans beneath the ice cover of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn may actually have more liquid water than the oceans of Earth.
RoswellSpaceman :
Dr. Kaku, What is your opinion of the COMETA Report, which concludes that there have been verifiable reports of UFOs making maneuvers and movements that are unexplainable by our scientific standards? The COMETA Report also offers the hypothesis that those UFOs most likely have an extraterrestrial origin.
Is this study flawed, or does it have real merit? And what is your personal opinion about UFOs?
DrMichioKaku :
I get lots of UFO reports in my email. 95% of them can be easily dismissed as meteors, swamp gas, radar echoes, the planet Venus. However, the remaining handful of UFO sightings take your breath away. The hardest to explain are the ones recorded by multiple witnesses using multiple modes, e.g. UFOs seen near airplanes, tracked by radar and by eyewitnesses.
pri35t:
Hey Michio. Big fan of yours. Read all of your books and am currently reading your newest The Future of the Mind. I just got it a day ago.
Of all the things you have covered, what are you looking forward to the most that you expect to happen within the next 20 years?
DrMichioKaku :
There are so many wonders awaiting us. If we can upload memories, then we might be able to combat Alzheimers, as well as create a brain-net of memories and emotions to replace the internet, which would revolutionize entertainment, the economy, and our way of life. Maybe even to help us live forever, and send consciousness into outer space.
Praise_the_boognish :
Of all the things you have covered, what are you looking forward to the most that you expect to happen within the next 20 years
I'm curious about this as well. I think speculating 50+ years is a bit of a stretch as far as plausibility goes, but what sort of advancements in physics and cosmology do you see happening over the next 10-20 years?
DrMichioKaku :
In the coming decades, I hope we find evidence of dark matter in the lab and in outer space. This would go a long way to proving the correctness of string theory, which is what I do for a living. That is my day job. So string theory is a potentially experimentally verifiable theory.
bobthebobd :
If an alien spaceship lands in my backyard, what should my first message to them be?
DrMichioKaku :
Chances are, the aliens will not want to land on our backyard, or even the White House lawn, with their flying saucers. They may have tiny, robotic self-replicating probes which can reach near light speed and can proliferate around the galaxy. So instead of the Enterprise and huge star ships, the aliens might actually send tiny probes to explore the universe. One might land on our lawn and we won't even know.
LeftStep22 :
If I can make it 50 more years, will we be able to slice up my brain and cram my consciousness into a machine? That'd be swell.
DrMichioKaku : By midcentury, we may have Brain 2.0, a backup copy of the brain, the byproduct of the ambitious BRAIN project of Pres. Obama and the European Union. Hence, when we die, our Connectome and Genome still survive. So our consciousness does not have to die when we die. And this consciousness, I write, may be placed on laser beams and sent into outer space. This might be the most efficient way to explore the universe, as laser beams carrying our consciousness into outer space.
bellyv :
Hello Dr. Kaku! Love the book Physics of the Impossible. It really inspired me so thank you for that!
My question: What is your take on the theory that electrons can surpass large distances via tiny wormholes to support quantum entanglement?
i believe I'm using the right terminology...
DrMichioKaku :
Combining quantum entanglement with wormholes yields mind boggling results about black holes. But I don't trust them until we have a theory of everything which can combine quantum effects with general relativity. i.e. we need to have a full blown string theory resolve this sticky question.
Once again, my colleague Stephen Hawking has upset the apple cart. The event horizon surrounding a black hole was once though to be an imaginary sphere. But recent theories indicate that it may actually be physical, maybe even a sphere of fire. But I don't trust any of these calculations until we have a full-blown string theory calculation, since Einstein's theory by itself is incomplete.
rootbeerfetish :
First of all hows your figure skating going? Secondly I would like to know when do you think we'll have the ability to make real hover boards just like back to the future?
Raregan
Hi Dr Kaku, I just want to start by saying you're the reason I got into Physics. I was bought Hyperspace for my birthday when I was 16 and absolutely loved it. I'm currently in my second year of University studying Physics.
My question is how have you seen the attitudes of the Scientific Community change since the discovery of the Higgs Boson? Do you think that funding towards curiosity driven research, such as CERN, will receive more funding in the future as a result also?
DrMichioKaku :
I would hope that the publicity around the Higgs boson would increase the public awareness of physics and cosmology. The next big accelerator might be the ILC in Japan, a linear collider which might be able to probe the boundaries of string theory. So we physicists have to learn how to engage the public so that taxpayers money is used to explore the nature of the universe.
Cats_Like_Felix :
Hello there Dr. Kaku! I remember watching a documentary you made for the BBC on extending life expectancy in humans - do you still follow recent advances in this field and if so, can you tell us what excites you most recently in this particular area?
Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions
DrMichioKaku :
We are slowly isolating the genes involved with the aging process. We do not have the fountain of youth, but I think, in the coming decades, we will unravel the aging process at the genetic level. For example, we share 98.5% of our genes with the chimps, yet we live twice as long.
We will find these genes very soon that doubled our life span.
Mr-Who :
Do you believe we will eventually find some form of life in our own solar system? Such as on Mars or Europa?
DrMichioKaku :
Our best shot at finding life in our solar system might be to look at the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. Mars, increasingly, looks like a dead planet. But the oceans beneath the ice cover of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn may actually have more liquid water than the oceans of Earth.
RoswellSpaceman :
Dr. Kaku, What is your opinion of the COMETA Report, which concludes that there have been verifiable reports of UFOs making maneuvers and movements that are unexplainable by our scientific standards? The COMETA Report also offers the hypothesis that those UFOs most likely have an extraterrestrial origin.
Is this study flawed, or does it have real merit? And what is your personal opinion about UFOs?
DrMichioKaku :
I get lots of UFO reports in my email. 95% of them can be easily dismissed as meteors, swamp gas, radar echoes, the planet Venus. However, the remaining handful of UFO sightings take your breath away. The hardest to explain are the ones recorded by multiple witnesses using multiple modes, e.g. UFOs seen near airplanes, tracked by radar and by eyewitnesses.
pri35t:
Hey Michio. Big fan of yours. Read all of your books and am currently reading your newest The Future of the Mind. I just got it a day ago.
Of all the things you have covered, what are you looking forward to the most that you expect to happen within the next 20 years?
DrMichioKaku :
There are so many wonders awaiting us. If we can upload memories, then we might be able to combat Alzheimers, as well as create a brain-net of memories and emotions to replace the internet, which would revolutionize entertainment, the economy, and our way of life. Maybe even to help us live forever, and send consciousness into outer space.
Praise_the_boognish :
Of all the things you have covered, what are you looking forward to the most that you expect to happen within the next 20 years
I'm curious about this as well. I think speculating 50+ years is a bit of a stretch as far as plausibility goes, but what sort of advancements in physics and cosmology do you see happening over the next 10-20 years?
DrMichioKaku :
In the coming decades, I hope we find evidence of dark matter in the lab and in outer space. This would go a long way to proving the correctness of string theory, which is what I do for a living. That is my day job. So string theory is a potentially experimentally verifiable theory.
