Entanglement: The Hooks that Hold Space Together

Note: Edmonds Distinquished Lecture; Refreshments at 2:50 PM, Lecture at 3:20 PM
Speaker: Leonard Susskind, Stanford University

When: April 28, 2015 (Tue), 03:30PM to 04:30PM (add to my calendar)
Location: SCI 109
Hosted by: Lawrence Sulak
View the poster for this event.

This event is part of the Physics Department Colloquia Series.

Abstract:

A paradigm change is taking place which cuts across several fields of theoretical physics and mathematics. It is part of a broader “information revolution" in science; more specifically it is the quantum-information revolution. It is profoundly influencing physics, from condensed matter theory, to quantum gravity and the theory of black holes.The idea of quantizing gravity is an old one but it is probably not the right one. Recent developments strongly suggest that John Wheeler was right when he claimed that gravity and quantum mechanics are so closely joined at the hip, that it does not make sense to think of one without the other. This was Wheeler's “it-from-bit" philosophy. I will describe some of the most interesting aspects of the paradigm shift from a quantum field theory of gravity to a quantum information theory of gravity. Quantum Entanglement--Einstein's "spooky action at a distance"--plays a key role.