"Something else has happened with computers"
About this Quote
Seth Lloyd hints at a subtle revolution: computers stopped being merely fast calculators and became a medium that reshapes the worlds they measure. Early machines automated arithmetic and logic; their triumph was speed and reliability. Over time, the locus of power shifted from calculation to connection. Networked devices, platforms, and feedback loops now structure communication, markets, and culture. Algorithms are no longer backstage tools; they set prices, curate news, navigate cars, and influence moods. The machine moved from the desk to the environment, turning computation into infrastructure. That shift is the something else: computers as active participants in social and physical systems, not just instruments for solving pre-existing problems.
Lloyd, a physicist known for quantum information and the idea that computation is a physical process, pushes the point further. If all physical interactions can be seen as computation, then computers are not only modeling the world; they are tapping directly into the same substrate of reality that makes the world compute. Quantum computing makes this vivid. It is not simply a matter of faster processing, but of exploiting superposition and entanglement to perform qualitatively different tasks, such as factoring large numbers or simulating quantum materials in ways classical machines cannot. The boundary between simulation and participation blurs when a device embodies the very physics it aims to study.
Another aspect of the transformation is agency. Machine learning systems discover patterns without explicit instruction, generate novel designs, and collaborate with scientists and artists. Their outputs feed back into human decisions, altering the conditions under which new data is produced. Computation becomes a loop that shapes the phenomena it analyzes. Lloyd’s remark captures the moment when computers ceased to be passive mirrors of reality and became engines that reorganize it, forcing us to rethink not only technical limits, but responsibility, interpretation, and control in a world where information and matter are entwined.
Lloyd, a physicist known for quantum information and the idea that computation is a physical process, pushes the point further. If all physical interactions can be seen as computation, then computers are not only modeling the world; they are tapping directly into the same substrate of reality that makes the world compute. Quantum computing makes this vivid. It is not simply a matter of faster processing, but of exploiting superposition and entanglement to perform qualitatively different tasks, such as factoring large numbers or simulating quantum materials in ways classical machines cannot. The boundary between simulation and participation blurs when a device embodies the very physics it aims to study.
Another aspect of the transformation is agency. Machine learning systems discover patterns without explicit instruction, generate novel designs, and collaborate with scientists and artists. Their outputs feed back into human decisions, altering the conditions under which new data is produced. Computation becomes a loop that shapes the phenomena it analyzes. Lloyd’s remark captures the moment when computers ceased to be passive mirrors of reality and became engines that reorganize it, forcing us to rethink not only technical limits, but responsibility, interpretation, and control in a world where information and matter are entwined.
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| Topic | Technology |
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