Thread by @FrancesVidotto

Last week the #QISS conference qiss.uwo.ca brought ~100 in-person people at @WesternU!
@templeton_fdn @rotmanphilo @Perimeter @iqoqivienna @OISTedu @UniofOxford @igcpsu @univamu @ULBruxelles @SapienzaRoma @UCSanDiego @BardCollege @QuantinuumQC @HKUniversity @UNAM_MX

The conference brought together scientists in quantum gravity and quantum information, and philosophers working on the conceptual aspect of spacetime and the quantum. We opted for an innovative format: no lengthy talks but 2-hour discussions for each different question! #QISS

Before discussing each question, the sessions were opened by a few lightening talks of 15’ max that were meant to introduce the question and ignite the following discussion. The format worked out with the discussions touching on the talks’ topic and getting wider and wider! #QISS

1st question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "Are we going to see quantum geometry in the lab?"
The session igniters were: Marios Christodoulou, Lin-Qing Chen, Richard Howl, Pierre Martin-Dussaud.

1st question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "Are we going to see quantum geometry in the lab?"
The 2-hour discussion was magistrally conducted by Sougato Bose @UCLQuantum. How close are we to see the superposition of geometries in forthcoming experiments?

2nd question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "Is there an arrow of time in Quantum Phenomena?"
Session Igniters were: Lucien Hardy, Ognyan Oreshkov, Lee Smolin, Robert Spekkens. Is time direction perspectival, or is it intrinsic of fundamental processes?

2nd question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "Is there an arrow of time in Quantum Phenomena?"
Our own @rotmanphilo director Chris Smeenk conducted the discussion, physicists were amazed by his sharp introductory speech on the arrow of time!

3rd question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "How does the structure of spacetime impact quantum physics?"
Session Igniters were: Fabio Sciarrino, Alexander Smith, Doreen Fraser and Emily Adlam. Check out their lightening talks, this was a great session!

3rd question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "How does the structure of spacetime impact quantum physics?"
At this point last week I stopped tweeting because... it was yours truly moderating this discussion ;-)
What a variety of superinteresting topics!

4th question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "In which sense do quantum phenomena challenge objectivity?"
Session Igniters were: Andrea Di Biagio, Caslav Brukner, Richard Healey. Is quantum reality problematic? Is it rather about defining objectivity better?

4th question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "In which sense do quantum phenomena challenge objectivity?"
The discussion was conducted by the philosopher Michael Cuffaro, now at @LMU_MCMP and a @rotmanphilo alumnus. A lot of talking about Wigner's friends 👯‍♂️

5th question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "How can we use information in quantum gravity?"
Session Igniters were: Eugenio Bianchi, Rob Myers, Pablo Arrighi and Achim Kempf.
In which way quantum correlations make up the structure of spacetime?

5th question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "How can we use information in quantum gravity?"
Hal Haggard @BardCollege stepped in to conduct the discussion. So nice to see so many people participating in the discussion, especially the youngest ones!

6th and last question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "What are the available general quantum formalisms for gravity?"
Session Igniters were: @carlorovelli, Laurent Freidel, Adamantia Zampeli and Wolfgang Wieland.
Tons on the conceptual foundations of (L)QG!

6th question at the #QISS 2022 Conference: "What are the available general quantum formalisms for gravity?"
The last discussion was moderated by Daniele Oriti.
By this point of the conference it was so nice to see everybody contributing to the discussion!

A signature aspect of the #QISS conference was the large presence of graduate student - half of the in-person participants! For many of them this was the fist in-person conference after the two years of #COVID pandemic. It was great to see them involved in the discussions!

The #QISS conference gave the occasion for three different communities -quantum gravity, quantum information and the philosophy one- to meet and learn. This was of primary importance for the youngest one! For this reason we started the first day with a series of basic lectures.

The #QISS 2022 Conference started with an introductory lecture on
(Loop) Quantum Gravity
by Hal Haggard @BardCollege

Following the introduction on Quantum Gravity at the #QISS 2022 conference, Nick Huggett @thisisUIC delivered the lecture of the
Philosophy of Quantum Gravity

In the afternoon of the first day of the #QISS 2022 conference we had the introductory lecture on
#Quantum #Information
by Flaminia Giacomini @Perimeter

Following the introduction on Quantum Information at the #QISS 2022 conference, @WayneMyrvold @PhilWestern delivered the lecture of the
#Philosophy of #Quantum Information

Discussions continued at the @PineryProvPark on the last day of the #QISS 2022 Conference. We had a morning of group discussions and we enjoyed Nature in the afternoon. Some of the best discussions happened there, it was a great success!

I am so proud of the amazing work my students Yichen Luo, Mateo Pascual and Farshid Soltani did with organization of #QISS conference last day, joined by Andrea Di Biagio and Pierre Martin-Dussaud. A lot of creativity and ideas came out from the way discussions were devised.

Here there is the idea we payed out for the #QISS conference: participants we divided in groups and assigned 3 random words from quantum gravity, quantum informations and philosophy. Each group had to discuss the relation between them and present it to everybody using a poster 📜

On the last day of the #QISS conference there way also time for the participants to enjoy some truly Canadian experience and have fun together ;-) 🛶🍁🇨🇦

And to conclude the #QISS conference, we introduced our guests to the @WesternU campus ritual for the end of the week: having fun and beers at the Grad Club - some of us even successfully performed during the karaoke night 🎤

The public talk at the #QISS conference was delivered by Bob Coecke. Lot of questions from the audience about the relation between #language and (#quantum) reality.
(We will release a better footage of the lecture on the @rotmanphilo channel, stay tuned!)

https://twitter.com/coecke/status/1534535109889646593

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@threadreaderapp #unroll #QISS