Nobel laureates praise Karnataka's efforts to become quantum leader
Physicists and Nobel Prize winners Prof Duncan Haldane and Prof David Gross met Science and Technology Minister NS Boseraju, along with senior officials from various departments, including IT/BT, Higher Education and Science and Technology.
The Nobel laureates said quantum technology has the potential to revolutionise multiple sectors in the future and opens up possibilities for students and researchers. They also welcomed the state's decision to organise the country's first summit in Bengaluru and said such initiatives would help position India on the global quantum map. They highlighted that the United Nations has declared 2025 as the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology, making Karnataka's push timely.
Minister Boseraju said the state government is taking steps to make Karnataka a global hub for quantum innovation. 'We have taken the initiative to develop the necessary framework to make Karnataka the quantum capital. A roadmap has already been prepared,' he said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Time of India
4 hours ago
- Time of India
Is it safer to be a nurse than a doctor in the age of AI? Google DeepMind CEO shares a surprising take
Not All Jobs Are Created Equal in the Age of AI When the "Godfather of AI" Says Be a Plumber A Heartfelt Future, Not Just a High-Tech One Humanity's Competitive Edge As artificial intelligence tightens its grip on nearly every industry, a quiet but profound truth is emerging: it may be the most emotionally intelligent among us—not the most highly qualified—who survive the next wave of automation. While corporate titans and tech pioneers debate the ethical and economic fallout of an AI-powered future, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis has offered a humanizing perspective that might surprise you. In a recent interview with Wired, Hassabis suggested that while artificial intelligence may one day outperform doctors, it will likely fall short of replacing nurses.'Maybe a doctor and what the doctor does and the diagnosis, one could imagine that being helped by AI tools, or even having an AI kind of doctor,' Hassabis explained to Wired. 'On the other hand, like nursing—I don't think you'd want a robot to do that. There's something about the human empathy aspect… that's particularly humanistic.'In other words, the future of work may not depend solely on your degree, but on your ability to comfort, connect, and care—qualities machines still cannot revelation adds nuance to the growing anxiety surrounding AI-led job disruptions. Just weeks ago, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy warned that AI advancements would lead to reductions in workforce across the company. Nvidia's Jensen Huang echoed this during a public interview, acknowledging that while AI will eliminate some roles, it will also create new Hassabis believes the real shift will come in the next five to ten years. 'As in the past, what generally tends to happen is new jobs are created that are actually better, that utilize these tools or new technologies,' he told argument gains added depth when placed alongside the words of Geoffrey Hinton, the Nobel-winning "Godfather of AI." Hinton, who left Google in 2023 to freely express his growing concerns, recently suggested something few would have expected: train to be a plumber.'It's going to be a long time before AI is as good at physical manipulation as us,' Hinton said during an appearance on The Diary of a CEO podcast. 'A good bet would be to be a plumber.'According to Hinton, while AI may revolutionize legal research and data-heavy desk jobs, it will struggle with hands-on work—like tightening a leaky faucet or holding the hand of a frightened an era when jobs are often judged by titles and salaries, it's ironic that roles like nursing and plumbing—often undervalued and overworked—are emerging as some of the most future-proof careers. These professions require human traits that no algorithm can code: intuition, improvisation, and above all, a compelling twist in the AI narrative. The conversation is no longer just about who is smartest or most productive. It's also about who is most Hinton warned, AI might one day control power grids and surpass human cognition—but it won't know how to comfort a crying patient or navigate the mess under your kitchen sink. As Hassabis puts it, there are things 'we won't want to do with a machine.' And that may just be our saving Big Tech races toward artificial general intelligence, some of the brightest minds behind the revolution are urging caution—and compassion. While machines may soon write better code, draft legal memos, or even suggest medical diagnoses, they still cannot that, perhaps, is why jobs rooted in empathy and physical presence—nursing, caregiving, plumbing—may outlast the digital storm.
Economic Times
7 hours ago
- Economic Times
Is it safer to be a nurse than a doctor in the age of AI? Google DeepMind CEO shares a surprising take
Synopsis Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis believes AI may surpass doctors in diagnosis but won't replace nurses, highlighting the irreplaceable role of human empathy. In a *Wired* interview, he emphasized that while AI can assist in clinical tasks, the compassionate care provided by nurses is uniquely human—suggesting empathy could be our most enduring asset in an AI-driven future. Agencies As AI advances, experts like DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis suggest that emotionally intelligent and hands-on roles will remain crucial. Hassabis believes AI may assist doctors but not replace nurses' empathy. As artificial intelligence tightens its grip on nearly every industry, a quiet but profound truth is emerging: it may be the most emotionally intelligent among us—not the most highly qualified—who survive the next wave of automation. While corporate titans and tech pioneers debate the ethical and economic fallout of an AI-powered future, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis has offered a humanizing perspective that might surprise you. In a recent interview with Wired , Hassabis suggested that while artificial intelligence may one day outperform doctors, it will likely fall short of replacing nurses. 'Maybe a doctor and what the doctor does and the diagnosis, one could imagine that being helped by AI tools, or even having an AI kind of doctor,' Hassabis explained to Wired . 'On the other hand, like nursing—I don't think you'd want a robot to do that. There's something about the human empathy aspect… that's particularly humanistic.' In other words, the future of work may not depend solely on your degree, but on your ability to comfort, connect, and care—qualities machines still cannot mimic. This revelation adds nuance to the growing anxiety surrounding AI-led job disruptions. Just weeks ago, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy warned that AI advancements would lead to reductions in workforce across the company. Nvidia's Jensen Huang echoed this during a public interview, acknowledging that while AI will eliminate some roles, it will also create new ones. But Hassabis believes the real shift will come in the next five to ten years. 'As in the past, what generally tends to happen is new jobs are created that are actually better, that utilize these tools or new technologies,' he told Wired . Hassabis's argument gains added depth when placed alongside the words of Geoffrey Hinton, the Nobel-winning "Godfather of AI." Hinton, who left Google in 2023 to freely express his growing concerns, recently suggested something few would have expected: train to be a plumber. 'It's going to be a long time before AI is as good at physical manipulation as us,' Hinton said during an appearance on The Diary of a CEO podcast. 'A good bet would be to be a plumber.' According to Hinton, while AI may revolutionize legal research and data-heavy desk jobs, it will struggle with hands-on work—like tightening a leaky faucet or holding the hand of a frightened patient. In an era when jobs are often judged by titles and salaries, it's ironic that roles like nursing and plumbing—often undervalued and overworked—are emerging as some of the most future-proof careers. These professions require human traits that no algorithm can code: intuition, improvisation, and above all, compassion. It's a compelling twist in the AI narrative. The conversation is no longer just about who is smartest or most productive. It's also about who is most human. As Hinton warned, AI might one day control power grids and surpass human cognition—but it won't know how to comfort a crying patient or navigate the mess under your kitchen sink. As Hassabis puts it, there are things 'we won't want to do with a machine.' And that may just be our saving grace. As Big Tech races toward artificial general intelligence, some of the brightest minds behind the revolution are urging caution—and compassion. While machines may soon write better code, draft legal memos, or even suggest medical diagnoses, they still cannot feel. And that, perhaps, is why jobs rooted in empathy and physical presence—nursing, caregiving, plumbing—may outlast the digital storm.
Indian Express
10 hours ago
- Indian Express
Time crystals: Matter that ticks without a clock and defies physics
In 2012, Nobel Prize–winning physicist Frank Wilczek was riding a wave of curiosity. He had spent his life thinking about the deep symmetries of nature — how things repeat, balance, and conserve. One day, while playing with equations, he had a wild idea: what if crystals could repeat not just in space but in time? He called this strange, hypothetical object a time crystal. At first, the idea sounded so strange that even other physicists raised eyebrows. How could something just keep ticking forever without using energy? Wouldn't that break the fundamental laws of physics? Wilczek himself later admitted: 'I thought people would laugh.' But a few years later, they were not laughing; they were building them in labs. You probably already know what a regular crystal is — think of a diamond or a snowflake. These are made of atoms lined up in neat, repeating patterns in space. Wilczek asked: Could something repeat in time instead of space? In other words, could a system, say, a set of atoms, tick on its own, changing rhythmically forever, even when it's not being pushed or fed energy? This would be totally different from a clock or a heartbeat, which needs batteries or food. A true time crystal would tick on its own, forever, in its lowest energy state. That's like a swing that moves on its own, without slowing down or needing another push. It sounded impossible. But then, it wasn't. For years, time crystals remained a theoretical curiosity—until a team at Google's quantum lab found a way to bring them to life in 2021. The key tool? A quantum computer called Sycamore. Sycamore's qubits—tiny quantum bits made from superconducting circuits—can be manipulated with exquisite precision using microwave pulses. The team engineered a special kind of system known as a Floquet many-body system, which is essentially one that's driven by a repeating, timed sequence of operations. They applied a carefully designed sequence of flips and interactions to the qubits, much like nudging a line of dominoes to fall in a loop, but in a way that the system responded with a rhythm that was not the same as the drive itself. This is what defines a time crystal: the system 'ticks' in a pattern that breaks the symmetry of time, repeating at intervals different from the external prodding. Meanwhile, a team at Harvard did something similar with lasers and atoms. In both experiments, something remarkable happened: the system found a stable, repeating pattern in time. One that didn't need extra energy to keep going. This was a new phase of matter. Not solid, liquid, or gas. Something else. To ensure this wasn't just a glitch or a fluke, the researchers had to show that this oscillating behaviour was stable, reproducible, and persisted despite imperfections—proof that they had truly built a new phase of matter. When Google first ran their time crystal experiment, the result seemed too good to be true. In their group, it was common practice to insert fake data into experiments to test if people were being too quick to celebrate. Every big discovery had to pass one final test: someone would open an envelope to check whether the signal was real or planted as a test. In this case? The envelope said: 'Congratulations. You found a time crystal.' It was an achievement that, just a few years earlier, had seemed nearly impossible. Most things in nature settle down. A hot cup of tea cools. A swinging pendulum stops. This is the second law of thermodynamics: energy spreads out, and systems go toward equilibrium. Time crystals break that rule. They don't settle. They don't use energy. And yet, they move. But don't get too excited — they're not perpetual motion machines, and you can't power your phone with one. They just have a kind of internal 'dance' that repeats, forever, under the right quantum conditions. One scientist joked: 'It's like finding a new way for matter to behave. Like discovering ice, but in time.' Right now, time crystals are scientific curiosities. But they might become useful. Because they're stable and predictable, researchers think they could help with quantum computing — a field where keeping information from being lost or scrambled is extremely difficult. If qubits could be stored in time crystals, they might become more reliable. Like using a humming, untiring rhythm to keep everything in sync. No one knows yet. But just like lasers or semiconductors started as weird lab experiments, time crystals could one day find their moment. The time crystal idea was born from math, laughed at by some, and then built in a lab. It reminds us that nature still has surprises waiting. And that sometimes, the laws we thought were unbreakable just need a closer look. Wilczek once said, 'If you're not a little bit crazy, you're not doing science.' Time crystals prove that sometimes, crazy is just what the universe needs.
