[MUSIC PLAYING]
SPEAKER: So I
think before we get
into some of the exciting things
that come up in your book,
today was a pretty
big day in astronomy.
There is some news
about a black hole.
Can you talk about that?
MICHIO KAKU: Yes.
A black hole is a
cosmic roach motel.
Everything checks in,
nothing checks out.
And we photographed this.
This is incredible.
History was made
when we actually
showed a photograph of
a gigantic black hole.
It weighs six and a
half billion, with a B,
billion times more
massive than the sun.
It is 55 million
light years away.
It is a gigantic monster.
And it's sort of like a unicorn.
We physicists knew at some
point this exotic object would
be found.
Einstein's equations
predicted it in 1916.
We've known for a hundred
years that a black hole
could be lurking in the
heavens, but we finally--
we finally photographed it.
And it was revealed
this morning.
Next, in a few weeks,
we'll reveal the black hole
at the center of the
Milky Way Galaxy.
So tonight, when you go
outside, look in the direction
of Sagittarius.
There's a raging black hole in
the constellation Sagittarius,
in the center of the
Milky Way Galaxy.
It weighs about two to
four million times more
massive than the sun.
And it's in our backyard.
So children ask the question--
if the moon goes
around the Earth
and the Earth goes
around the sun,
what does the sun go around?
And the answer
is-- a black hole.
SPEAKER: So you talk about
children asking questions.
And you've talked
about that you had
a moment when you
were growing up,
of what sparked your
interest in science.
MICHIO KAKU: Yeah, when
I was eight years old,
something happened which
changed my life completely.
They made the
announcement, when I
was in elementary school, that
a great scientist had died.
And they flashed a picture
in the newspaper of his desk.
And on the desk was a
book, an unfinished book.
And the caption said, this
is the unfinished manuscript
of the greatest
scientist of our time.
So I was eight years old.
I said to myself, why
couldn't he finish that book?
It's a homework problem, right?
Why didn't he ask his mother?
So, I went to the library.
And I later found out his
name was Albert Einstein.
And that book was "The
Theory of Everything."
He wanted an equation no
more than one inch long
that would allow us to,
quote, "Read the Mind of God."
So I said to myself,
wow, that's for me.
I want to work on this
theory of everything.
And in fact, that's
what I do for a living.
I'm the co-founder
of string field
theory, one the main
branches of string theory.
And we think that that is
the theory of everything,
that everything we see
around us is nothing
but vibrations of tiny strings.
Each subatomic particle is a
note on a vibrating string.
What is physics?
Physics is the harmonies we
can write on vibrating strings.
What is chemistry?
Chemistry is the melodies we
can play on vibrating strings.
What is the universe?
The universe is a
symphony of strings.
And then what is
the mind of God?
The mind of God is
cosmic music resonating
through eleven
dimensional hyperspace.
That is the mind of God.
SPEAKER: I think
for all of us who
are not theoretical
physicists in the room,
we appreciate that clarifying
explanation, really
elegant metaphor as well.
One of the things
that I found when
I was sort of thinking about
questions that I might want
to ask you, or that
might be interesting,
is that, in looking at
the breadth of your work,
it's really hard to
know where to start,
because your work spans an
incredible range of fields
from the history of
astronomy, to string theory,
to theories of consciousness.
And so I was going
to ask you, what
do you feel like is at
the heart of your work?
If your body of work
were a solar system, say,
what would be the
sun at its center?
MICHIO KAKU: Well,
when I write books,
I write for myself as a child.
Because when I was a child
going to the library,
I would look up things
like the fourth dimension,
like anti-matter, like
parallel universes.
And there was nothing,
absolutely nothing
in the library for
a young kid who
wants to know about all
these fantastic things they
see in the movies.
So I said to myself,
when I grow up,
and I become a professor
of theoretical physics,
and I work at the
unified field theory,
I want to write for
myself, as a child.
And then when I
was in high school,
I decided to put
this into motion.
So I went to my mom one
day, and I said, mom,
can I have permission to build
an atom smasher in the garage?
SPEAKER: As one does.
MICHIO KAKU: Yeah.
I grew up in Palo
Alto, where a lot
of young people in their
garages built machines.
So I built a beta-tron
particle accelerator.
I got 400 pounds of transformer
steel, 22 miles of copper wire,
and I built a
6-kilowatt, 2.3 million
electron vol beta-tron
in my mom's garage.
I plugged it in finally.
I closed my eyes.
I shut my ears.
And I heard this
huge crackling sound
as 6 kilowatts of raw power
surged through the capacitor
bank.
And then I heard this
pop, pop, pop, sound,
I blew out all the
circuit breakers and fuses
in the house.
So my poor mom, she'd come
home from a hard day's work
and say to herself,
why couldn't I
have a son who plays baseball?
Maybe if I buy
him a basketball--
and for God's
sake, why can't you
find a nice Japanese girlfriend?
Why does he have to build
these machines in the garage?
But it earned the attention
of another physicist.
A physicist took
an interest in me
at the National
Science Foundation--
at the National Science
Fair in Albuquerque.
And he arranged for me to
get a scholarship to Harvard.
His name was Edward Teller,
father of the hydrogen bomb.
SPEAKER: And from
then to now, how
do you feel like the course
of your career has changed,
or what--
have your interests
shifted since then,
since that beginning
of you want to solve
the theory of everything?
MICHIO KAKU: Yeah,
that's still the goal.
But as a hobby I like
to read science books.
I'm a science junkie.
And I have the privilege
of interviewing
hundreds of scientists for
BBC Television, the Discovery
Channel.
And whenever I interview these
scientists-- about one a week,
for my radio show and TV--
I always ask them
the key question,
the question of all questions.
And that is-- is there
intelligent life on the earth?
Well, I was watching the
Kardashians on TV last night.
And I'm convinced that
there's no intelligent life
on this planet.
But maybe in outer space,
maybe in outer space
there's intelligent
life out there.
SPEAKER: So, in
your book, you talk
about how we might leave
the earth to possibly meet
intelligent life elsewhere.
MICHIO KAKU: And we may have to.
The dinosaurs-- the
dinosaurs did not
have a space program and that's
why they're not here today.
That's why there are not
dinosaurs in this room,
because they didn't
have a space program.
But we do have a space program.
And prices are
dropping every day.
Things are getting cheaper.
Silicon Valley billionaires
are writing checks.
And, for example, how many
people in this room have seen
the movie, "The Martian"-- raise
your hand-- with Matt Damon?
Whoa.
That movie cost $100 million.
But the Indian government sent
a probe to Mars for $70 million.
So a Hollywood movie
about going to Mars
costs more than
actually going to Mars.
That's how much
prices have dropped.
And rockets are going to
be reusable in the future.
When we commute to work, and you
drive your car to work and park
the car, do you junk your
car and sell it for scrap
after one trip?
That's what we do
for rocket ships.
We take one trip in a rocket
ship and dump it in the ocean.
You'd bankrupt the
world if every car had
to be junked after one ride.
That's going to change the
economics of space travel
when we have reusable rockets.
SPEAKER: So, one thing I
like about your book is
you've structured it as sort
of like, we're starting with,
how do we get off the planet?
How do we colonize
our solar system?
And then how do we think
beyond that and beyond that?
So, when someone
asks you, like, well,
how close are we actually
to living on Mars,
how do you answer that?
MICHIO KAKU: Well, first of
all, we're going to the moon
next year.
After a 50-year gap,
the SLS booster rocket
is going to be fired up and
we're going to go to the moon.
And not only that, there's
going to be a traffic
jam around the moon, because
Elon Musk has his Falcon Heavy
rocket capable of going not
just to the moon, but Mars.
He has sent a Tesla sports
car on a trajectory to Mars.
And then we also
have the richest man
in the world, Jeff Bezos--
or the former richest
man in the world--
he has the Neil
Armstrong rocket.
And then the Chinese have
the Long March rocket.
We're going to have a
traffic jam around the moon
pretty soon.
And I think our grandkids--
our grandkids may
have the option
of honeymooning on the moon.
The moon is-- the moon
is only three days away.
It's a hop, skip, and a jump.
SPEAKER: So the moon is closer,
Mars is a little bit farther.
So, you talk in your book
about also possibly colonizing
some of the moons around
Jupiter and Saturn.
How do you imagine
us getting there?
How far-- I mean, is this within
our generation, our lifetime?
MICHIO KAKU: Well
starting next year,
we're going back to the
moon with an unmanned space
probe that will orbit
around the moon.
Around 2023, humans will
go back to the moon.
And so we'll begin the process
of making the moon a base,
to eventually go to Mars.
And then SpaceX already has the
preparations for a Mars rocket.
It is a huge rocket, the
biggest one ever conceived.
It's called the BFR,
the biggest rocket.
B for Big, R for Rocket,
and F for your imagination.
It's already being built.
So we're already laying out
the steps to go to Mars.
And when Elon Musk was
a high school student,
he read the book,
"Foundation" by Isaac Asimov.
How many people have
read the "Foundation"
series by Isaac Asimov?
Then you know that that
is a dream of becoming
a multi planet species.
It's not going to
happen anytime soon.
But we begin the process of
terraforming Mars perhaps
in this century.
SPEAKER: I love how you talk
a lot about science fiction
and that there's-- that science
fiction has both inspired
and predicted some of the
technological advances that
we've seen and some of the
things that we learn about
our universe.
Do you have a favorite
anecdote or story
of where fact and
fiction have intersected?
MICHIO KAKU: Well, I'm on radio.
And people call me.
And many times people say,
professor, you're wrong.
You're wrong because the
aliens are already here.
They're not in outer space.
They've already landed
with their flying saucers.
So, I tell them,
well, how do you know?
And they say, well,
they've been kidnapped,
kidnapped by flying saucers.
So if any of you have
ever been kidnapped
by a flying saucer, for
God's sake, steal something.
There's no law
against stealing from
an extraterrestrial
civilization, no law
whatsoever.
Steal anything-- an alien
chip, an alien hammer,
an alien paperclip,
anything, so you
have bragging rights about
going into outer space
on a flying saucer.
SPEAKER: I like that idea.
Noted.
Not that Google endorses
any kind of that activity.
MICHIO KAKU: But there's
no law against stealing
from an extraterrestrial
civilization.
SPEAKER: Should there be?
MICHIO KAKU: No.
SPEAKER: No.
So what are the-- once
we've established a presence
within our solar system, and
we know how to get around,
what's beyond that?
MICHIO KAKU: Well,
already we physicists
are looking at starships.
NASA has a 100 year
starship program.
My colleague, the
former Steven Hawking,
already was responsible for the
break through Star Shot program
to send the first
starship to a nearby star.
It would be the size
of a postage stamp.
It's a chip with a
parachute, inflated
by a bank of laser beams,
which would accelerate it
to 20% the speed of light.
And it would reach Alpha
Centauri in 20 years.
And so we are talking about
the first microchip starship
to take us to the heavens.
And then we physicists have
looked at Ram jet fusion
engines.
Fusion engines-- of course,
we don't have them yet,
but one day we will--
Ram jet fusion engines
require no fueling whatsoever.
They scoop up hydrogen in the
forward direction like an ice
cream cone, burn interstellar
hydrogen in the engine,
and run forever with no
refueling whatsoever.
That's the Ram jet fusion
engine, which could possibly
take us to the nearby stars.
And then even
beyond that, there's
a possibility of maybe
using a black hole.
And, of course,
just this morning we
had the first picture ever
of a black hole that's
been revealed to the public.
And what is a black hole?
A black hole is a
cosmic roach motel.
Everything checks in,
nothing checks out.
And we photographed it.
And there's a
controversy as to what's
on the other side
of the black hole.
Some people say nothing.
Things just fall in, and
that's the end of the story.
But if you look at
the mathematics,
we have an exact solution
of Einstein's equation,
given by Roy Kerr in 1963,
of a rotating black hole.
A rotating black hole does
not collapse to a dot.
That's the old
fashioned thinking.
It collapses to a ring,
a ring of neutrons.
And if you fall through the
ring of neutrons vertically,
you wind up in Wonderland.
You wind up on the
other side of forever.
It's a gateway to a wormhole.
And if you fall
through a second time,
you wind up on a second
parallel universe.
So it's sort of like hitting
the up button of an elevator.
You have different floors.
Each time you go to a
different floor, every time
you go through the gateway.
And then the question
is, is that a solution
of Einstein's equations?
And the answer is, yes.
What's the catch?
There's always a
catch someplace.
And that is, we don't know
how stable the wormhole is.
That requires us to
go beyond Einstein.
Einstein's equations give
us rotating black holes,
where there's a gateway
to a parallel universe.
That's Einstein's theory.
However, we don't know whether
radiation effects, as quantum
effects, will destabilize it.
That's where string
theory comes in.
String theory is
a quantum theory.
Now we can calculate
quantum corrections
and calculate the
stability of the wormhole,
but that is still an
active area investigation.
And then the question is, if
you go through the wormhole,
can you go backwards in time?
And the answer is, yes.
These things are potentially
time machines as well.
And then the question
is, what happens
if you go backwards in time meet
your mother before you're born,
and she falls in love with you?
Well you're in deep doo
doo if that happens.
But yeah, the quantum theory
does make possible the fact
that you might be able to
build a time machine if you
can stabilize the Kerr metric.
SPEAKER: Did we have
anyone who wanted to ask
Professor Kaku any questions?
AUDIENCE: Hi, so, I wanted
to ask about string theory
specifically.
And one of the things that I
understand about string theory,
is that it's proven very
difficult to find tests,
to find out whether
string theory is actually
the way the universe
works, or maybe there's
some other way that
the universe works.
And I wanted to
get your thoughts
on that in sort of a
philosophical level.
Do you think that
you eventually will
discover some aspect of string
theory that will be verifiable?
Or do you think that
we're sort of destined
to have to guess at
some level of what's
going on at the very most
basic levels of the universe?
MICHIO KAKU: Well,
first of all, we have
the mystery of dark matter.
Dark matter holds
the galaxy together.
And that's why we're here today.
If there was no dark matter
holding the galaxy together,
the galaxy would have
disintegrated billions of years
ago, and we wouldn't be here
to talk about this question.
And then, what is dark matter?
It is invisible
and it has gravity.
If I held it in my hand, it
would seep through my fingers,
go right to China, reverse
direction in China,
and oscillate between
here and China.
And then what is it?
The leading candidate
for dark matter
is the photino, the next
octave of the string.
We are the lowest octave
of vibrating strings.
We can fit protons,
neutrons, electrons,
using a very low energy
approximation to string theory.
But string theory has
higher vibrations.
The next vibration
up is the photino.
Photino has mass.
It has gravity, but no
electromagnetic interactions.
It's stable.
That, we think, is dark matter.
And we hope to create
it with the Large Hadron
Collider or the next
generation beyond that.
Already, the Japanese, the
Chinese, and the Europeans
are proposing the next step
beyond the Large Hadron
Collider.
The Japanese have the ILC.
It's a linear accelerator.
The Chinese are also proposing
a linear accelerator.
And even CERN is proposing the
next generation beyond that.
We may find dark matter
in the laboratory,
and that could clinch
it right there.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: Hi Professor, what
are your thoughts on quantum
computing and the future of it?
And how long you
think Google will
be able to deploy a quantum
computer into our data center?
MICHIO KAKU: Well, as you know,
Moore's Law is slowing down.
Moore's Law is the reason
why we're here today.
If it wasn't for Moore's Law,
there would be no Google.
But it is slowing down.
And it's bumping up against
the quantum principle.
Right now, your Pentium chip
has a layer about 20 or so atoms
across at minimum.
In another 10 or so years,
if you just extrapolate,
it'll be five atoms across.
When you hit five atoms
across, all hell breaks loose.
The Heisenberg Uncertainty
Principle takes over.
You don't know where
the electron is anymore.
You get leakage.
And you get heat generation,
so much that you could
for an egg on a microchip.
Moore's Law is
already slowing down.
You can talk to any
physicists, we're
beginning to hit
the quantum limit.
So we have to go beyond silicon.
In other words, Silicon
Valley could eventually
become a rust belt, like
the Rust Belt of Pittsburgh.
Eventually, yes, Silicon Valley
could become a rust belt,
and we had to go to
the post silicon era.
We have to go to
photonic transistors,
molecular transistors, protein
transistors, DNA transistors,
atomic transistors,
photonic transistors.
We physicists are looking
at all sorts of alternatives
to silicon.
But there's a catch.
None of them are ready
yet for prime time.
I will put my money on molecular
transistors, like graphene.
We can make a transistor out
of a single atom of carbon.
That's pretty good.
But we cannot machine it.
We cannot mass produce it.
We cannot engineer it.
It's a technical problem.
Quantum computers are
even worse because
of the de-coherence problem.
I was in Moscow just
a few months ago.
I actually met with Medvedev
and the leader of Alibaba.
And yeah, everyone's working
on quantum computers.
The Russians are, the Chinese
are, we are, of course.
But there's a
problem, de-coherence.
Every time someone
sneezes in a block away,
the coherence of your
quantum system disintegrates.
So I'm not saying
we can't do it.
I'm saying it's
probably decades away.
The turning point is 50 qubits.
If you hit 50 qubits--
quantum bits-- then you
could surpass any known
digital turing machine.
But how do you go
beyond that yet?
We don't know because of
the de-coherence problem.
I have friends upon--
I have friends working on this.
This is a multi-billion
dollar question.
There's going to be
a new Silicon Valley.
A new Silicon Valley emerging
from all this, probably
a quantum valley, and
it's up for grabs.
Nobody knows what's
going to replace silicon.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: Hi, Professor.
I wanted to ask a general
question about projecting
or predicting into the future.
So, generally, when sci-fi
writers or futurists
try to predict into
the future, they'll
look at the state of
technology or the cutting
edge around them, or in
the last couple of years,
and they'll try to
extrapolate forward.
We've already seen that,
like back in the '60s,
people were predicting that
by now we'd have flying cars,
and hoverboards, and we'd
be vacationing on the moon.
And instead, we're sending
cat pictures across the world.
So, when you're predicting
out into the future, how do
you-- how do you account for
that kind of uncertainty?
How do you have confidence
in your predictions?
MICHIO KAKU: Well,
first of all, people
forget that when they
look at flying cars,
that was a creation
of cartoonists.
Most people's understanding of
the future comes from cartoons.
I'm a physicist,
not a cartoonist.
We knew that flying cars would
be hard to do, but possible.
In fact, I was just
in Dubai last month,
and we are going to
have flying cars.
Dubai is already
in the final stages
of signing contracts for
a fleet of flying cars.
So yes, flying cars are coming,
but hoverboards are not.
Hoverboards would violate
the Quantum Principle.
We do not have anti-magnetism,
because the anti particle
or the photon is the
photon, therefore
there's no such thing
as anti-magnetism,
or even anti-gravity,
that Michael J Fox can use
to scoot across a wooden floor.
And so, we're not going
to have hoverboards,
but we will have flying cars.
Now, I'm a physicist.
When I try to
project the future,
first I look at Moore's Law.
So I see where we might be
in the coming decades, OK.
And I realize that yes,
artificial intelligence is
coming, but we're
going to hit a brick
wall at a certain point,
or perhaps a problem
when Moore's Law is
eventually sealed off
and robots are not going to
become arbitrarily intelligent.
But I'm a physicist.
I realize that with
ingenuity we could make them
smarter and smarter.
For example, right now, our most
advanced robot, or one of them,
is ASIMO.
You've probably seen him on TV.
It's like a little
boy who can run, walk,
climb up stairs, dance.
And I interviewed the creator
of ASIMO for BBC television.
And I asked him, how smart
is the world's smartest
robot, your robot, ASIMO?
And he was very frank.
He said that ASIMO has the
intelligence of a cockroach--
a retarded cockroach-- a
lobotomized retarded cockroach.
But I could see that, yeah,
you could extrapolate.
Eventually, they'll be
as smart as a mouse,
then as smart as a rat,
then as smart as a rabbit,
then as smart as a dog and
cat, and then maybe as smart
as a monkey.
Now, at that point,
like in science fiction,
I think they could be dangerous.
I think Elon Musk is right,
but in another 100 years.
Because monkeys are self-aware.
They know they're monkeys.
They're potentially dangerous.
But dogs, dogs are confused.
Dogs think that we are a dog.
We're the top dog and that's
why they slobber all over us.
They haven't quite
figured it out yet,
that we're not really dogs.
But monkeys, they
have self-awareness.
So how long will it take
before we get robots
with self-awareness?
I think maybe by the
end of the century.
At that point, I think we
should put a chip in their brain
to shut them off if they
have murderous thoughts.
But again, going to the next
century, the 22nd century now,
robots will become
self-aware and they'll
remove the chip in their brain.
Then what do we do when there
are no more fail-safe systems?
At that point, I think we
only have one alternative.
In a 22nd century, I think
we should merge with them.
Why not become super
man or a super woman?
Why not rule the universe by
merging with our creations?
That's not going to
happen anytime soon,
but I'm just simply
projecting Moore's Law,
projecting known physics
into the next 200 years.
AUDIENCE: OK, thank
you very much.
AUDIENCE: Thank
you, Professor Kaku.
And I have to say that
I'm a big fan of you,
and I've read many of
your previous books,
and looking forward
to reading this one.
And based on-- based on
my previous readings,
you believe that humans
have a very bright future.
With the advancement
of technology,
we'll gradually conquer the
solar system, and Milky Way,
and beyond.
But there is the other
stream of theories
like, they are
really pessimistic
on the human future.
Like, for example, the
giant filter theory,
and the great filter theory.
Basically, they say that any
advanced civilizations will--
as they develop,
will sooner or later
encounter some
very big obstacles.
They call it filters.
And be it like meteorites,
or the nuclear war,
or the advanced of the double
edged sword, the technology.
So what's your take on this?
Can we humans really
avoid this to happen?
MICHIO KAKU: Can
we humans do what?
Do you understand?
SPEAKER: Yeah, so I
think the question--
and correct me if
I get it wrong--
but I think it's about that you
have a really optimistic view
of the future.
But there are parties who don't
have such an optimistic view,
that believe that we'll succumb
to some great catastrophe.
Is that kind of the gist of it?
AUDIENCE: The great
filter theory.
They say we will become--
MICHIO KAKU: OK, well, let's
take a look at the long view.
I'm a physicist.
And we like to quantify things--
dangers, as well as progress--
on the basis of two things--
information and energy.
That's how we
parametrize the future.
When you parametrize the
future in terms of energy,
we rank civilizations by type
one, and type two, type three.
A type one civilization
is planetary.
They control the weather.
They control the oceans,
volcanoes, earthquakes.
Planetary civilization
controls planetary energy.
Eventually, they exhaust
the power of planet
and begin to play with stars.
They create Dyson spheres.
They play with-- they
colonize our solar system.
That's type two.
For example, "Star Trek"--
"Star Trek" would be a
typical type two civilization.
Then there's type three.
Type three is galactic.
They roam the
galactic space lane.
They play with black holes.
And "Star Wars" would
be a typical type three
civilization.
And then, by the way, I was
giving this talk in London
once, and a little
boy comes up to me--
10-year-old boy-- and the boy
says, Professor, you're wrong.
You're totally wrong,
there's type four.
And I was kind of tempted to
say to the kid, shut up, kid.
I was polite.
I said, look, there are
planets, stars, and galaxies.
That's all there are.
There's no type four.
And he insisted no,
Professor, there's type four--
the power of the continuum.
Now who's a "Star
Trek" fan here?
What is the only type
four civilization
on network television?
The Q.
That energy is dark energy.
There is an energy source
even bigger than galactic.
Dark energy is the
energy of the Big Bang.
It's the
anti-gravitational force
that's creating the
expanding universe.
So then the question is, where
are we on this scale of energy?
Are we type one, that
play with the weather?
Are we type two,
that play with stars?
Are we type three, that
play with black holes?
No, we're type zero.
We get our energy
from dead plants.
But we can calculate when
we will become type one.
And the answer is, in 100 years.
Around 2,100, we will
become planetary.
Now, we see that everywhere.
What is the internet?
The internet is the first
type one telephone system.
The first type one technology
to fall into the 21st century.
That is what the internet is.
What language will the type
one civilization speak?
Well, already on the internet,
English and Mandarin Chinese
are the two-- number one,
number two languages.
We see the beginning of a type
one economy with the European
Union.
We see the beginning
of a type one sports
with soccer and the Olympics.
We see the beginning
of a type one
fashion with Chanel and Gucci.
We see the beginning of a
type one culture spreading
throughout the planet.
But as you pointed out, there
are dangerous things facing us.
A type two civilization
is immortal.
Nothing known to science can
kill a type two civilization.
Asteroids could be deflected.
The weather can be altered
so global warming is not
a problem.
Type two civilizations
are immortal.
The danger is type
zero to type one.
That is the most dangerous
transition of all,
because we have all this
sectarianism, fundamentalism,
racism, whatever
coming from the swamp.
We just emerged from the swamp.
And we're reaching for type one.
Every time I read
the newspaper, I
see the birth pangs of
a type one civilization.
All the headlines, all
the controversies, I see
are the birth pangs of the birth
of a planetary civilization.
And it's not guaranteed
we're going to make it.
I think we will, but
there's no guarantee.
AUDIENCE: Thank
you, very inspiring.
AUDIENCE: Hi, Professor.
Thanks for coming
to talk to us today.
There's a book series called,
"The Three Body Problem,"
that I'm not sure
you're familiar with.
It basically presents
humanity's first encounter
with extraterrestrials.
And sort of the
intergalactic diplomacy
that the book sort of advocates
for is this preemptive strike.
It says that the only way
to stay safe in our universe
is, as soon as we identify
other intelligent life,
you have to destroy
it right away.
I was wondering if you
would agree with that,
and how you would
recommend we navigate
these intergalactic
relationships, potentially
in the future?
MICHIO KAKU: Well, if you're
walking down a country road
and you bump into an anthill,
do you go down to the ants
and say, I bring you trinkets?
I bring your beads.
I give you nuclear energy.
Take me to your ant Queen.
Or do you have this
politically incorrect urge
to step on a few of them?
And then the ants, do they have
the idea that they can launch
a pre-emptive strike
against humans by flinging
their weapons-- little
kernels of rice--
at us?
So, like I said, if they can
reach us from outer space,
they're probably type two, or
more than likely, type three.
At that point, they already
have mastered starships.
Type three, you can
access the Planck energy.
The Planck energy is
the energy of which
space and time become unstable.
In other words,
wormholes become possible
for a type three civilization.
You take out a
calculator and calculate.
Growing at 3% per year--
a modest growth in energy--
how long before we
become type three?
In 100 years, we'll be type one.
In a few thousand years,
we'll be type two.
In about 100,000 years,
we'll be type three.
And 100,000 years is nothing,
nothing on a cosmic scale.
By the time you're type
three, you have access
to the Planck energy.
Space and time become unstable.
Bubbles begin to form.
You can heat up space so
that bubbles begin to form.
These bubbles are gateways,
gateways to other universes.
And you're going to
have a preemptive strike
against these people?
I don't think so.
Now, are they going
to be dangerous?
Well, I think we
have not too much
to fear from them,
because what do they want?
Do they want to
plunder our resources?
There are lots of dead
planets out there,
like Mars, that they
can plunder at will.
So, I think that there's
really no reason for them
to plunder the earth,
because there's
plenty of uninhabited
planets out there to plunder.
And for the most part, what
do we have to offer them?
If you're going to
a forest and you
meet the deer and the squirrels,
do you talk to the squirrels?
Initially, yeah.
Good boy.
Yes, you talk to the squirrels.
But then you lose
interest because they
don't talk back to you.
And even if they did
talk back to you,
do they have a preemtive strike
by throwing acorns at you?
So I think that on that
scale, if they can reach us
from another star, they're
already type two, or more
than likely, type three.
AUDIENCE: Thank you, very much.
AUDIENCE: Do you think we
will ever leave Earth forever?
MICHIO KAKU: I
think at some point,
we may have to leave
the Earth forever.
In five billion years,
the sun will expand.
The mountains will melt.
The oceans will boil.
The sky will be on fire and we
will have the last nice day.
We have to.
Five billion years from now--
it's the law of physics.
Physics is a death warrant
for intelligent life.
And in fact, 99.9% of
all lifeforms go extinct.
How do we prove that?
Just dig right under your feet.
Right under your
feet are the bones,
the bones of 99.9% of all
species that have ever
existed on the planet Earth.
Extinction is the norm for life.
We forget that.
Extinction is the norm.
We have a brain.
We can control our destiny,
but most animals cannot.
And so we forget the fact
that extinction is the norm.
So it's not a
question of if, it's
a question of when we
leave the planet Earth.
There's no choice.
It's the law of physics.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
SPEAKER: Thank you all
so much for coming.
That's the end of our talk.
And we are just so grateful
to have had you here.
Thank you, so much.
MICHIO KAKU: OK, my pleasure.
[APPLAUSE]
