AKA Everything, and I Mean Everything Is a Computer
Can it run Doom is the modern day equivalent of Can I Eat It, or its salacious step-sibling Can I Fuck It, but like for robots not for people.
I was thinking maybe a way to explain is like this - what if you could make a 1998 Ford Taurus run Doom? Like, I don't know, the engine of the car itself, or some combination of engine and wheels or fan belt and air conditioning compressor, they somehow generate enough information to be used for computation, and we use that computation to run a computer game. And if that works, what if sunlight could run Doom?
That's what this is all about - the idea of a computer as having a microprocessor for a brain, or a little green circuitboard, it's outdated. We aren't even using brains anymore (
nope).
Anything that generates information can be a computer. That's it. Maybe another way of saying it is that anything that does anything can be a computer. "Heat rises" (computer). "Water flows downhill" (computer). *Exists* (computer). Traffic. Traffic computes for fs sake. Santa Fe Institute even had to make a new definition, so let's start with that:
What does it mean to compute? Framework maps hidden computations running inside natural dynamic systems
Feb 2026, phys.org
Compute (noun), that's it; simple - not reservoir or analog computing, just "compute" - also SFI:
"The issue is how to define, formally, a set of criteria for identifying what computation(s) a given, arbitrary dynamical system does, in order to give us insights into these computational systems found in nature"
They want to discriminate between "constructed" computers, which would include those found in phones and laptops, and those that are "non-constructed," natural systems that carry out computations but remain poorly understood. For example, a network of chemical reactions can be seen as a kind of non-constructed computer. The input to this system is the initial concentration of chemical reactants. The output is the concentration of the chemicals after the reaction stops.
via Santa Fe Institute and Complexity Science Hub in Vienna: David H Wolpert et al, What does it mean for a system to compute?, Journal of Physics: Complexity (2026). DOI: 10.1088/2632-072x/ae3af8
New digital state of matter could help build stable quantum computers
Dec 2025, phys.org
The Zuchongzhi 2.0 superconducting quantum processor was used to construct an exotic nonequilibrium topological material and test its protective properties.
Digital matter they call it. And who says this is a big deal like that? Paul Arnold for phys.org that's who -
"The work is a big deal because it shows that quantum computers can be used as reliable simulators to discover and test new stable forms of matter."
via University of Science and Technology of China: Haoran Qian et al, Programmable higher-order nonequilibrium topological phases on a superconducting quantum processor, Science (2025). DOI: 10.1126/science.adp6802
Active thermal metasurfaces amplify heat signatures by a factor of nine
Dec 2025, phys.org
This shell allowed the tiny object to fake the thermal signatures of an object nine times larger than itself.
via Taiyuan University of Technology: Yichao Liu et al, Active Thermal Metasurfaces Enable Superscattering of Thermal Signatures Across Arbitrary Shapes and Thermal Conductivities, Advanced Science (2025). DOI: 10.1002/advs.202519386
Tiny silicon structures compute with heat, achieving 99% accurate matrix multiplication
Jan 2026, phys.org
The flow and distribution of heat through a specially designed material forms the basis of the calculation. Then the output is represented by the power collected at the other end, which is a thermostat at a fixed temperature.
"Most of the time, when you are performing computations in an electronic device, heat is the waste product. But here, we've taken the opposite approach by using heat as a form of information itself."
(This is a form of analog computing, in which data are encoded and signals are processed using continuous values, rather than digital bits that are either 0s or 1s.)
via MIT's Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies: Caio Silva et al, Thermal analog computing: Application to matrix-vector multiplication with inverse-designed metastructures, Physical Review Applied (2025). DOI: 10.1103/5drp-hrx1.
Turning city traffic into a computer: Novel approach to AI could slash energy demands
Jan 2026, phys.org
"What if traffic could compute?"
This is called Harvested Reservoir Computing, and more specifically, Road Traffic Reservoir Computing: Prediction accuracy is not highest under free-flow or heavily congested conditions. Instead, it peaks just before congestion begins, at a critical, medium-density state where traffic dynamics are most diverse and informative. In this regime, the traffic system naturally processes incoming information, allowing accurate forecasts of future traffic states with minimal computational overhead.
The study suggests that social infrastructure such as roads can be reinterpreted as "large-scale, continuously operating computers."
"Computation does not have to be confined to silicon chips" (Makes you wonder why someone would want to build a billion dollar data center)
via Tohoku University Advanced Institute for Materials Research: Ryunosuke Fukuzaki et al, Harvested reservoir computing from road traffic dynamics, Scientific Reports (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-025-30016-2
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| Georgia Institute of Technology Low-cost Passive Ultrasound Tags for Non-invasive and Non-Intrusive Smart Home Sensing |
These penny-size ultrasonic tags ditch batteries and silently turn everyday objects into private smart home trackers
Apr 2026, phys.org
Activity Recognition: It's based on a flat washer with various cutouts along the outer edge to determines the frequency of the sound it makes when hit. They are small metal tags mounted on a cabinet or doorframe that signal when a door or drawer is opened, count reps in the gym, or even track bathroom use for elderly relatives. When a door is opened, etc., the tab strikes the metal disk, triggering a brief ultrasonic pulse imperceptible to human ears but detectable by a wearable device that logs the activity. They're battery-free, quiet, inherently private, and cost only a few cents each.
They did not use any complicated machine learning algorithms to detect the ultrasound signatures. Instead, they created an algorithm with simple, hard-coded rules. That approach means identifying signals requires little computational and electrical power.
"Hard coded" rules, that's another way of saying this. Or, "This has really been a collaboration between computing and engineering."
Georgia Institute of Technology: Yibo Fu et al, SoundOff: Low-cost Passive Ultrasound Tags for Non-invasive and Non-Intrusive Smart Home Sensing, Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies (2025).
Light-based Ising computer runs at room temperature and stays stable for hours
Feb 2026, phys.org
So Ising machine is another way to say photonic computer AND reservoir computing?
It's a powerful new kind of computing machine that uses light; the Ising model represents problems as interacting magnets with "spins" that point up or down and align when brought closer, the Ising searches for the lowest-energy state (optimization problem); simple yet powerful for solving problems with many interconnected binary (up/down or yes/no) choices.
Works at room temp.
via Queen's University Canada: Nayem Al-Kayed et al, Programmable 200 GOPS Hopfield-inspired photonic Ising machine, Nature (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09838-7
Quantum reservoir computing peaks at the edge of many-body chaos, study suggests
Feb 2026, phys.org
In recent years, some physicists and quantum engineers have been exploring the possibility of realizing a quantum equivalent of classical reservoir computing, known as quantum reservoir computing (QRC). These approaches enable the processing of temporal data. Reservoir computing systems perform best close to the boundary between stable and chaotic dynamics (i.e., the edge of chaos).
These scientists are looking for 'the edge' of many-body quantum chaos.
via University of Tokyo: Kaito Kobayashi et al, Edge of Many-Body Quantum Chaos in Quantum Reservoir Computing, Physical Review Letters (2026). DOI: 10.1103/j2qj-vwcl. On arXiv: DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2506.17547
Mechanical computers use springs and bolts to count, sort odd-even pushes and remember force
Apr 2026. phys.org
They are calling them simply "Mechanical Computers"
Many everyday materials retain some kind of memory of their past—for example, rubber can 'remember' how far it has been squeezed or stretched in the past. ... The research team used common materials, such as steel springs and bars, to create three mechanical computers. The first could count how many times it was pulled back and forth. A second distinguishes whether it has been pushed an odd or even number of times. The third can remember if a medium or large amount of force was applied.
Key findings from the research include:
- Mechanical computers can perform simple computations without a computer chip or power source.
- Mechanical computers are able to harvest their power from physical force, rather than electricity.
- Proof of design that mechanical computers could be a viable alternative to conventional computers in harsh settings - such as extreme temperatures or exposure to corrosive chemicals - when only simple computations are needed.
via St. Olaf College and Syracuse University: Joseph D. Paulsen, Mechanical hysterons with tunable interactions of general sign, Nature Communications (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-026-70913-2
Post Script
LEGO® SMART Play™ System - Official LEGO® Shop US
"Everything will be a computer" has now hit the shelves (circa Jan 2026). Granted this is not what we're seeing in the 'ubiquitous computing' scene, but it's what it represents, because it's a consumer product application of the idea, and you can't get more widespread average person consumer adoption than a LEGO brick.
