Lugh

They used a powerful machine called a quantum processor to make, for the first time, a brand-new phase of matter called non-Abelian topological order. Previously recognized in theory only, the team demonstrated synthesis and control of exotic particles called non-Abelian anyons, which are neither bosons or fermions, but something in between. Anyons are quasiparticles in a two-dimensional space.

What's exciting is that they can be used to make a quantum computer that is much more stable than current efforts with superconducting qubits.

This is exciting good news for several reasons. Firstly, geothermal energy makes a 100% renewables grid easier, than if that was just solar+wind. As it's effectively on-demand, it irons out the problems with solar+wind's variability.

Secondly, it eases the job transition for fossil fuel workers. Many of the skills and experience in the fossil fuel industry are transferable to solutions like this. Now that the conversation has moved from fossil fuel reduction to setting the timeline for their complete elimination, being able to point to things like this will help win arguments quickly.

It seems like the tech to completely eliminate fossil fuels has arrived, now the remaining issues are political. How can we constantly accelerate and move faster to eliminate coal and oil use more quickly.

Virtual Power Plants are where you use software to integrate a wide variety of power sources to balance large-scale national grids. This means things like home solar, heat pumps, car batteries, and so on.

The US government is working to triple its VPP capacity by 2030. That capacity is equivalent to 80 to 160 fossil-fuel plants that don’t have to be built. VPP's are also a huge boost to the concept of a 100% renewables grid. Objections to that idea usually center around rare use cases when renewables and storage might fail (times when wind and solar have been low for weeks - e.g. extended calm weather in winter). VPP's provide an additional huge source of storage to lessen those concerns.

Computers are starting to use staggering amounts of electricity. There is a trade-off here between the utility of the tasks they perform and the climate damage caused by generating all the electricity they need. Bitcoin mining is thought to be currently using 2% of America's electricity and seems an especially egregious waste of energy.

Radically diminishing computer's electricity requirements as they become more powerful should be seen as an urgent task.

Wow, Feb 15th 2024 will be looked back on as a big day in the history of AI. OpenAi's Sora & this announcement by Google. Both with huge implications.

I've been keeping on top of text-to-video AI as I work with video a lot. Up until now, text-to-video hasn't been able to produce anything impressive, but this is. It's interesting to wonder where this will be in 12 months.

The usual caveat here is that it takes time to go from the laboratory testing like this to viable treatments that are widely available. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in many countries. A treatment that could reverse it by growing brand new heart muscle could save millions of lives and extend many people's lifespan.

We're so used to the idea of the speed of light constraining us from studying the vastness of space up close, that we often forget a simple fact. Sometimes, some of that distant space comes to us. 40,000 tons of interstellar dust hits our atmosphere every year. The vast majority of it comes from within our solar system - but not all. It's fascinating to wonder if the first evidence of alien life might be contained in it.

Ditto suggestions like this. This might be our best chance to study material from other distant solar systems elsewhere in our galaxy.

One common meme about the future is that you'll rent everything and own nothing. However, given the monthly costs of owning a car and paying back its purchase price - €100 a month (approx $110) seems like a bargain.

The bottleneck here is that the cars have to be French manufactured, and demand is outstripping supply. Chinese firm BYD is selling its Seagull car for $11,000.

I suspect if European and American millennials could live in a world where they could lease cars for €100 a month or buy utilitarian vehicles for $11k, the existing car industry would start to collapse.

Knowing humankind we'll learn our lesson the hard way. Disaster first, lamentations afterwards. I wonder what the first big disaster will be ?

Some countries (such as the US) are already oversupplied with law school graduates. The implication of this research is that they will soon be even more oversupplied. Law degrees are expensive to obtain. Apart from tuition costs, you need to devote years to study when you are not earning anything.

One of the obvious questions posed by this research is why should anyone invest tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in starting to study law in 2024? The old assumption was that investment would pay for itself in lifetime earnings. Those old assumptions seem to be collapsing around us.

I've no doubt AI will either be the number one transformative technology of the 21st century or only come second to something like genetic bioengineering. That said, it's riding a wave of investor-fueled hype in 2024 that seems like a classic speculative bubble. Gary Marcus, the OP in this article, does a good summary of why this is so.

There's a tendency for commentary about AI to pivot around fanboyism for success with investors. Gaining multi-billion dollar valuations = significance. Perhaps when history looks back on AI in 2024 they will see the real action was happening elsewhere. I can't help noticing how free open-source AI is almost as good as the AI investors are valuing at 10s of billions.