From my last two blog posts on Hawking radiation and the conservation of quantum information, it’s clear that we have a major problem on our hands—the information paradox. We know that black holes decay over unimaginable timescales, seemingly erasing quantum information in the process. But we also know that quantum information has to be conserved. Theoretically, at least, we have to be able to trace particles back through their quantum histories. If black holes were entirely stable, then we could consider this condition met. While the information in a black hole would be inaccessible, it wouldn’t be destroyed. But if…
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Have you ever thought about what happens to all the information you delete from your computer’s hard drive? You might be surprised to discover that deleted files aren’t actually erased. Even when you delete a file from your computer’s trash folder, your computer holds onto the file while erasing the file name and its listing in any directories. The file itself remains on your hard drive, functionally irretrievable (without special software) until it is overwritten when the hard drive needs that data space. At that point, your data is actually irretrievable. That portion of the hard drive’s disk space has…
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