Recently, I was lucky enough to chat with theoretical physicist Professor Michio Kaku . Professor Kaku is one of a rare breed; working at the cutting edge of complex maths and physics, but also able to talk about his research topics with a layperson, in their language. He specialises in string field theory, but is also an eloquent populariser of science, having appeared on nearly every major television network in the United States and hosted a number of documentaries. He also has written numerous popular books on cutting edge science and future thought, the latest being Physics of the Impossible (Amazon US and UK ). Professor Kaku was quick to assure me that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will definitely not destroy the world, instead listing some of the benefits that science could reap from the project - not least, a refining of the current understanding of particle physics. He didn't shy away from the fact that in its current form "the Standard Model...is supremely ugly... It's like gluing together an aardvark, whale, and platypus and declaring it to be nature's supreme evolutionary creation." We also touched on the 'mainstream' view that human consciousness is simply an epiphenomenon of the brain - which in many respects, does not match up with the supreme importance that some branches of quantum physics accord consciousness. Professor Kaku agreed that "consciousness is one of the great problems facing science," and stated plainly ...
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Recently, I was lucky enough to chat with theoretical physicist Professor Michio Kaku . Professor Kaku is one of a rare breed; working at the cutting edge of complex maths and physics, but also able to talk about his research topics with a layperson, in their language. He specialises in string field theory, but is also an eloquent populariser of science, having appeared on nearly every major television network in the United States and hosted a number of documentaries. He also has written numerous popular books on cutting edge science and future thought, the latest being Physics of the Impossible (Amazon US and UK ). Professor Kaku was quick to assure me that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will definitely not destroy the world, instead listing some of the benefits that science could reap from the project - not least, a refining of the current understanding of particle physics. He didn't shy away from the fact that in its current form "the Standard Model...is supremely ugly... It's like gluing together an aardvark, whale, and platypus and declaring it to be nature's supreme evolutionary creation." We also touched on the 'mainstream' view that human consciousness is simply an epiphenomenon of the brain - which in many respects, does not match up with the supreme importance that some branches of quantum physics accord consciousness. Professor Kaku agreed that "consciousness is one of the great problems facing science," and stated plainly ...