Andy Matuschak

"Quantum mechanics distilled" is live!

We've now published "Quantum mechanics distilled," which explains the foundational principles of quantum mechanics in detail. Thank you for your thoughtful feedback during the preview phase! And, of course, for your support.

We're looking forward to learning from readers' interactions with the application prompts. We'll let you know what we discover.

Preview the final essay of Quantum Country, "Quantum mechanics distilled"

Hello, all! This evening we're sharing early access to the final essay on Quantum Country, which also includes the most significant expansion we've made to the mnemonic medium itself.

Quantum mechanics distilled

This essay explains the core principles of quantum mechanics in depth and explores its startling implications. If you've been following along with our essays on quantum computing, you may be surprised to learn that you've already covered much of quantum mechanics, too—this piece will help connect those dots.

In this piece, we stretch the mnemonic medium beyond its namesake. We've been describing it as a form which "makes it almost effortless for you to remember what you read." But with this essay, we expand the ambition to remember and apply what you read.

We're looking forward to hearing your comments on the essay and the new mechanism.

— Andy (for Andy and Michael)

Comments on new progress mechanics?

You may have noticed some significant changes in the notifications, cards, and progress displays in the last few weeks. We've been testing and iterating on a new set of designs with new users for months, and we expanded those new behaviors to older users a few weeks ago.

We'd be curious to hear your high-level impressions of the new behaviors you've been seeing. In fact, even just hearing what changes you've actually noticed is helpful.

If the new behaviors seem totally enigmatic, that may be because we added a bunch of material to the first few review sessions and emails explaining it—which of course, our older users mostly wouldn't see. Apologies if that's caused confusion!

Thanks,
Andy

Tangential: working notes on direct air carbon capture

This isn't directly related to Quantum Country.  It's a small private side project Michael carried out, which may perhaps be of interest to some of you. It's his working notes on the cost of direct air carbon capture as an approach to climate change:

http://cognitivemedium.com/dac-notes

Hard to sum up the conclusions briefly, but: it left him quite a bit more optimistic about climate!

Enjoy!

Michael

Public release: "How quantum teleportation works"

Hi Everyone,

We've just made the quantum teleportation essay public. In case you didn't see the announcement of the early release version, this is a new mnemonic essay which explains in detail how quantum teleportation works. Teleportation is fun (and surprising!), and also a fundamental primitive used in many ways in quantum computing and quantum information.

The essay is available at:

https://quantum.country/teleportation

Thank you for feedback on the early release version, which helped make this public release version better.

Please feel encouraged to share widely, tell your friends!

Finally, thank you all very much for your support, and hope you enjoy!

Michael (for Andy and Michael)

Public release: How can we develop transformative tools for thought?

Just to let you know, we did the public release of our new essay on tools for thought!  It's available at: https://numinous.productions/ttft/

Thank you to those of you who provided feedback on the early release version.

Enjoy!

Michael

[Back online] Early access essay: How can we develop transformative tools for thought?

[Hello, all! Earlier today, we had to take this essay down because it'd been shared, but now it should be accessible using your Patreon credentials. Please let us know if you have any trouble!]

This is a draft of an essay Michael and I have poured time into over the past few months. We thought you might enjoy an early peek, just for our backers:

https://numinous.productions/

The essay does what it says on the tin: it's a discussion of how best to develop transformative new tools for thought. We discuss mnemonic essays (like "Quantum Computing for the Very Curious") in depth - what the impact has been, ways we're been experimenting with the site, and many ideas for the future.  We also look more broadly at tools for thought.

Enjoy!

Andy (for Michael & Andy)

Early access essay: How can we develop transformative tools for thought?

Update: Unfortunately, we've had to temporarily take this down because it seems the link was shared. We'll put it back in the next day or so behind a Patreon login.

This is a draft of an essay Andy and I have poured time into over the past few months. Please don't share the URL, since we're still working on the essay! But we thought you might enjoy an early peek:

https://numinous.productions/

The essay does what it says on the tin: it's a discussion of how best to develop transformative new tools for thought. We discuss mnemonic essays (like "Quantum Computing for the Very Curious") in depth - what the impact has been, ways we're been experimenting with the site, and many ideas for the future.  We also look more broadly at tools for thought.

Enjoy!

Michael (for Michael & Andy)

Early access mnemonic essay: "How quantum teleportation works"

In this essay we explain in detail how quantum teleportation works. Teleportation is fun (and surprising!), and also a fundamental primitive in many ideas about quantum computing and quantum information.

If you'd like to read the essay, please use the following link:

https://quantum.country/teleportation?access=patreon

If you have any trouble with access, please do let us know. Please don't share the URL, as we're still doing final testing - we expect to go public with it in a couple of weeks.  

Thank you all very much for your support, and hope you enjoy!

Michael (for Andy and Michael)

Update on teleportation

Just a quick update: the teleportation essay, "How quantum teleportation works",  is coming along nicely, and should be available in alpha in early June. 

We're also working on a broader essay, setting out some ideas about how quantum.country can be developed as a learning medium. Hopefully that'll be in alpha in late June or July, though writing it is a slow (but enjoyable!) process. Lots of possibilities!

Thanks for your support,

Michael (for Andy and Michael)

We've published "How the quantum search algorithm works"

We've just published the second "mnemonic essay" in our series on quantum computation. It's an introduction to the world of quantum algorithms through the lens of the search algorithm in particular, which has the very surprising property of being able to search a list in √N time.

The essay is substantially better because of the feedback we've received from you all during the testing phase. Thank you so much for that and for your support. We'll continue to share work early here for you all.

—Andy (on behalf of Michael + Andy)

Early access mnemonic essay: "How the quantum search algorithm works"

This is a followup to "Quantum Computing for the Very Curious". Using just the ideas from that essay, we explain in detail how the quantum search algorithm works. This algorithm does something remarkable: it can search a search space of N items after examining the search space something like the square root of N times.   The first time I heard this I was shocked, and convinced it must be a mistake. In fact, it works (albeit with a few caveats), and uses clever and beautiful ideas.

If you'd like to read the essay, please use the following link:

https://quantum.country/search?access=patreon

If you have any trouble, please let us know - it can be tricky getting access rights to work. Please don't share the URL, as we're still doing final testing - we expect to go public with it in a couple of weeks.  

Thanks for your support!

Michael (for Andy and Michael)