The Quantum Economy Podcast

Does Time Exist? | Sravan Kumar

The Quantum Economy Podcast

Show Notes

Time feels obvious to us. It flows from the past to the present and into the future. But in modern physics, time is anything but simple. In this episode of The Quantum Economy Podcast, Anders Indset speaks with theoretical physicist Dr. Sravan Kumar about one of the deepest mysteries in physics: the nature of time, black holes, and whether information can truly disappear from the universe. Dr. Kumar’s recent work revisits Einstein–Rosen bridges – structures often associated with wormholes – and proposes a new interpretation of how spacetime, quantum mechanics, and gravity might be connected. The conversation explores questions such as whether the universe could contain two arrows of time, how the black hole information paradox might be resolved, and what these ideas could mean for the future of physics. Dr. Sravan Kumar is a theoretical physicist whose research focuses on quantum gravity, black holes, and the early universe. His work explores how quantum mechanics and gravity may ultimately be unified to better understand the fundamental structure of reality. The discussion became a fascinating exploration at the intersection of physics, philosophy, and the deeper questions about the universe. Episode breakdown: 00:00 Introduction 01:54 Exploring the Nature of Time 06:49 Cultural Influences on Scientific Inquiry 11:51 The Journey into Quantum Gravity 16:29 Einstein-Rosen Bridges and Information Paradox 21:45 Two Arrows of Time and Information Preservation 26:37 The Emergence of Time and the Big Bang 31:13 Quantum Computing and Time Symmetry 46:10 Understanding Control in Quantum Systems 49:13 Simulating Quantum Gravity and Cosmic Phenomena 51:55 The Simulation Hypothesis and Its Implications 54:58 Exploring Information First Ontology 57:58 The Future of Quantum Computing and Society 01:02:09 Entanglement and Its Role in Space-Time 01:04:56 Consciousness and Quantum Mechanics 01:10:55 The Challenge of AI Hallucinations 01:18:59 Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration for Progress

About Sravan Kumar https://www.linkedin.com/in/k-sravan-kumar-a0b45b72/ A new understanding of Einstein–Rosen bridges: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-6382/ae3044 Other relevant detailed papers https://www.mdpi.com/2073-8994/17/1/29 https://academic.oup.com/ptep/article/2024/12/123E01/7911842 https://www.mdpi.com/2073-8994/17/7/1056 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2024/06/001 Schrodinger's expanding Universes paper first pointed about Universe with two arrows of time: https://www.cambridge.org/gb/universitypress/subjects/physics/cosmology-relativity-and-gravitation/expanding-universe?format=PB&isbn=9780521172172

About Anders Indset Anders Indset is the world’s leading business philosophers and the author of seven international bestsellers. With recent works such as Ex Machina – The God Experiment and The Singularity Paradox: Bridging the Gap Between Humanity and AI, his thought leadership has expanded far beyond economics and classical philosophy – earning him recognition from leading scientists and technologists, including prominent physicists. As the founder of tomorrowmensch, he invests in breakthrough science and technologies and convenes leading thinkers, investors, and entrepreneurs shaping the future. NEW BOOKThe Quantum Economy https://andersindset.com/shop/The-Quantum-Economy-p803754261

https://andersindset.com/ https://tomorrowmensch.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/andersindset/ https://www.instagram.com/andersindset http://x.com/andersindset

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Oct 20, 2026

Entanglement can't send a message faster than light. Stephanie Wehner, director of Europe's Quantum Internet Alliance, says it allows something stranger: two parties can coordinate faster than light without communicating at all. And she says secure communication alone is not the reason to build a quantum internet. Anders Indset sits down with Stephanie Wehner, professor at QuTech in Delft and director of the Quantum Internet Alliance, to ask what a quantum internet is and isn't, which hardware can carry it, when it will reach 500 kilometers, and why Europe, at the forefront today, could still lose the race. In this conversation, they explore: • Why a quantum internet doesn't need a quantum computer • Why networking needs long-lived qubits and an optical interface, and which hardware has both • NV centers vs trapped ions, and why only about 3% of an NV center's photons end up in the fiber • Why entanglement allows faster-than-light coordination but not faster-than-light communication • Whether robots, or humans with brain interfaces, could ever use entanglement • Whether we are just machines, and whether believing in a soul is wishful thinking • The roadmap: 500 km by 2030, and quantum-secure links already running in the Port of Rotterdam • Private quantum computing in the cloud, linked telescopes and other uses beyond security • Harvest now, decrypt later: how long do your secrets need to stay secret? • Why Europe is at the forefront but neck and neck with the US and China • Why Europe's quantum startups can't wait two more years for public money • Why Stephanie is working on a game and an art installation so kids grow up with quantum About Stephanie Wehner Stephanie is a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences, has won the Koerber European Science Prize and the KNAW Ammodo award, and co-founded QCRYPT, which has become the largest conference in quantum cryptography. She has written numerous scientific articles in both physics and computer science. From 2010 to 2014, her research group was located at the Centre for Quantum Technologies, National University of Singapore, where she was first Assistant and later Associate Professor. Previously, she was a postdoctoral scholar at the California Institute of Technology in the group of John Preskill. Earlier, she worked as a professional hacker in industry. LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stephanie-wehner-117774b3 QuTech - https://qutech.nl/person/stephanie-wehner/ Quantum Internet Alliance - https://quantuminternetalliance.org About The Quantum Economy Podcast A series exploring quantum theory, quantum tech, AI, and the evolution of intelligence, and how these forces redefine the economy, value creation, and the future of human systems. Learn more: https://thequantumeconomy.com Contact: [email protected] YouTube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnjrEO3TF1lUTutnqlfA3x88Rp0gVkOmD Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6pepc2PaCd06FHlf1pzDOg Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-quantum-economy-podcast/id1828917980 About Anders Indset Anders Indset is a business philosopher and author of seven international bestsellers, including The Singularity Paradox: Bridging the Gap Between Humanity and AI and Ex Machina – The God Experiment. As founder of tomorrowmensch, he invests in early-stage science and technology and convenes scientists, investors, and entrepreneurs working on what comes after the current paradigm. NEW BOOK: The Quantum Economy https://andersindset.com/shop/The-Quantum-Economy-p803754261 Website: https://andersindset.com tomorrowmensch: https://tomorrowmensch.com LinkedIn (personal): https://www.linkedin.com/in/andersindset/ LinkedIn (tomorrowmensch): https://www.linkedin.com/company/tomorrowmensch/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andersindset Substack: https://andersindset.substack.com/ X: http://x.com/andersindset Support & Share Subscribe for more conversations with the people shaping the quantum economy.

Oct 6, 2026

Q-Day was supposed to be 2035. Arm co-founder Hermann Hauser says it is now 2029 because the qubits needed to break RSA-2048 have fallen from a million to as few as 10,000, according to recent research from Google and Oratomic. If he is right, RSA-2048, which still protects much of the internet, has about three years left. Hauser co-founded Acorn Computers, where two engineers designed Arm's processor on almost no budget, and he now invests across several quantum modalities. Anders Indset sits down with Hermann Hauser, co-founder of Acorn Computers and Amadeus Capital Partners, at the Austrian Embassy in London to ask what the Arm story teaches about quantum, why Europe produces startups but loses them at scale, and how far computing, biology and physics can go before they run into the question of what a human being is. In this conversation, they explore: Why Q-Day moved from 2035 to 2029, and how the qubit estimate dropped from a million to 10,000-26,000 How two engineers with no money built the Arm processor, and why "less is more" put 350 billion chips in the world Which of the five qubit modalities could win, and why the measure of progress may shift to operations per second per dollar Where quantum advantage already exists, and how better error correction and AI-discovered algorithms could widen it Whether quantum computers will leave the data center for phones, drones and robots Why Europe has plenty of startups but loses its scale-ups, and what the Scale Up Europe Fund is meant to fix Why Hermann says Arm added $200 billion in three years, about what the German car industry took a century to build Why a pendulum can compute with no energy, and what the Landauer limit says about the cost of a bit Whether a brain can be simulated, and what Penrose's quantum-consciousness idea adds How Constructive Bio built virus-proof bacteria, and whether reality itself could be a simulation

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