Dr. Michio Kaku

The key is to choose your parents well.

Once again, my colleague Stephen Hawking has upset the apple cart. The event horizon surrounding a black hole was once though to be an imaginary sphere. But recent theories indicate that it may actually be physical, maybe even a sphere of fire. But I don't trust any of these calculations until we have a full-blown string theory calculation, since Einstein's theory by itself is incomplete.

Chances are, the aliens will not want to land on our backyard, or even the White House lawn, with their flying saucers. They may have tiny, robotic self-replicating probes which can reach near light speed and can proliferate around the galaxy. So instead of the Enterprise and huge star ships, the aliens might actually send tiny probes to explore the universe. One might land on our lawn and we won't even know.

There are so many wonders awaiting us. If we can upload memories, then we might be able to combat Alzheimers, as well as create a brain-net of memories and emotions to replace the internet, which would revolutionize entertainment, the economy, and our way of life. Maybe even to help us live forever, and send consciousness into outer space.

The fundamental problem facing string theory today is that it is too successful, i.e. it predicts millions of possible parallel universes. Originally, we hoped it could explain our universe. Yes, string theory can do that. It can explain the Standard Model of quantum theory and also all of Einstein's theory. But unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. String theory also describes universe which do no exist. The problem is, how do we select our universe from a multiverse of parallel universe?? If you find out the answer, we can split the Nobel Prize between us.

The idea that excites me the most concerns the two greatest puzzles in science: the origin of the universe, and the origin of consciousness. The origin of the universe is what I do for a living, working on string theory. But I am also fascinated by consciousness. Being a physicist, not a philosopher, I have devised an entirely new theory of consciousness, allowing one to numerically calculate the level of consciounsess of humans and even animals. Its all in my new book.

Einstein was once told that the net energy of star might be zero. The idea was so incredible that he stopped walking in the middle of the street, and almost caused an accident. You see, the energy of a star is positive, but its gravitational energy is negative, and the sum could be small. If the universe started out as a quantum fluctuation of nothing, then the two might balance out and hence universe are for free!

A soul might very well exist, but we, as physicists, try to measure and quantify everything. So far, no one has been able to create an experiment to do this for the soul. Efforts have been made to weigh the body after death, but each time we find no evidence of a soul. So a soul may very well exist, but it is not a testable theory.

Science is the engine of prosperity. From the Steam Revolution, to the Electric Revolution, to the Computer Revolution, each wave generated the wealth we see around us. However, politicians think wealth comes from taxes, which is actually a zero sum game, since you tax Peter to Pay Paul. I believe that science will give us a bigger pie, rather than slicing or taxing the same pie so it is thinner and thinner.

By midcentury, we may have Brain 2.0, a backup copy of the brain, the byproduct of the ambitious BRAIN project of Pres. Obama and the European Union. Hence, when we die, our Connectome and Genome still survive. So our consciousness does not have to die when we die. And this consciousness, I write, may be placed on laser beams and sent into outer space. This might be the most efficient way to explore the universe, as laser beams carrying our consciousness into outer space.