source file: mills2.txt Date: Fri, 29 Sep 1995 20:30:16 -0700 Subject: Quantum Mechanical Psychoacoustics From: MMCK@delphi.com The following message verges on science fiction, but I just can't help myself. A few days ago, I read an article in the October, 1995 Scientific American called "Quantum-Mechanical Computers" by Seth Lloyd. The author describes the construction of a quantum mechanical computer which makes use of the Heisenburg uncertainty principle to solve difficult problems in combinatorial mathematics--a super fast factoring algorithm, for example. The quantum computer would use particle energy state/positions to encode information. I can't pretend to understand all the details yet, but if this really works is could be the scientific breakthrough of the century, IMHO. A day or so later I read Brian's post on psychoacoustics, and was struck by the idea that the brain might be a quantum mechanical computer. This would explain many anomalies about how such an apparently slow system could consistently outperform silicon which seemingly operates hundreds or thousands of times faster. It could also mean that far from a simple on/off coding for each neuron, that each exchange of an ion between two neurons could encode a multibit packet of information. If you've read this far, remember that I tried to warn you. Marion Received: from eartha.mills.edu [144.91.3.20] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Sat, 30 Sep 1995 17:21 +0100 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id IAA11855; Sat, 30 Sep 1995 08:21:12 -0700 Date: Sat, 30 Sep 1995 08:21:12 -0700 Message-Id: <9509300820.aa01733@cyber.cyber.net> Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu