Lloyd, a professor at MIT, works in the vanguard of research in quantum computing: using the quantum mechanical properties of atoms as a computer. He contends that the universe itself is one big quantum computer producing what we see around us, and ourselves, as it runs a cosmic program. According to Lloyd, once we understand the laws of physics completely, we will be able to use small-scale quantum computing to understand the universe completely as well. In his scenario, the universe is processing information. The second law of thermodynamics (disorder increases) is all about information, and Lloyd spends much of the book explaining how quantum processes convey information. The creation of the universe itself involved information processing: random fluctuations in the quantum foam, like a random number generator in a computer program, produced higher-density areas, then matter, stars, galaxies and life.

Prologue: The Apple and the Universe

PART ONE: THE BIG PICTURE

 CHAPTER ONE: Introduction

 CHAPTER TWO: Computation

 CHAPTER THREE: The Computational Universe

PART TWO: A CLOSER LOOK

 CHAPTER FOUR: Information and Physical Systems

 CHAPTER rIVE: Quantum Mechanics

 CHAPTER SiX: Atoms at Work

 CHAPTER SEVEN: The Universal Computer

 CHAPTER EIGHT: Complexity Simplified

Personal Note: The Consolation of Information

Acknowledgments

Further Reading

Index