What Are Nature's "natural" Ways Of Computing?
Tommaso Toffoli · 2005
Today’s circuit elements are built out of physical materials, effectively characterized by macroscopic properties. To maintain the current rate ofprogress in miniaturization, we’ll eventually have to design compu ting elements based directly on microscopic physical effects. ln order best to exploit Nature’s potential for computation, we’ll have to ask a lot of questions before starting to give orders. What are Nature’s predispositions when it comes to computing? What types of computational processes are more naturally and directly supported by physics? What classes of computing tasks stand favored by Nature’s predispositions?