Bits of ignorance are like viruses that are copied and spread by interaction.

By separating the function of adaptation from the function of maintaining the integrity of individual genes, sex allows much greater diversity while still keeping genes whole. Sex is not only fun, it is good engineering practice.

Programmed by quanta, physics gave rise first to chemistry and then to life; programmed by mutations and recombination, life gave rise to Shakespeare; programmed by experience and imagination, Shakespeare gave rise to Hamlet.

I would suggest, merely as a metaphor here, but also as the basis for a scientific program to investigate the computational capacity of the universe, that this is also a reasonable explanation for why the universe is complex.

In order to figure out how to make atoms compute, you have to learn how to speak their language and to understand how they process information under normal circumstances.

[With quantum computers] you can calculate how many bits are in the universe, how much energy it takes to flip them, how much energy exists, and use that to rule out lots of things about the universe's history. Anything that takes more bit flips couldn't have happened.

Meaning is like pornography, you know it when you see it.