Armen Sarkissian Delivers Lecture at Holon Institute of Technology

During a working visit to the State of Israel, the President of the Republic of Armenia, Armen Sarkissian, visited the Holon Institute of Technology, one of Israel's leading educational institutions.

President Sarkissian met with the university's administration and then delivered a lecture on the topic of "Geopolitical Realities in the Age of Artificial Intelligence." The university's president, Edward Yakubov, noted that it was a great honor to host the President of Armenia and specifically stated, "Many pages of history are tragic for the Armenian and Jewish peoples. We mourn and remember all those millions of lives lost during the Holocaust and Genocide: we will always remember these tragic pages of history. We greatly appreciate your visit to Israel to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau alongside leaders from 41 other countries. Armenia has chosen the path of modernism and democracy. Education and science play a major and decisive role in leading a country toward a better future. For 50 years, we have been sculpting our future here, working closely with industrial society and developing our academic ties with many countries worldwide. I am convinced this is an important step toward furthering relations and cooperation between our university and yours, as well as your educational institutions."

Expressing gratitude for the invitation, President Sarkissian remarked, "Our peoples have many commonalities. We are both ancient nations, both have been displaced from our homelands, and both have fought to preserve our countries, cultures, and identities. We have both lost our statehood hundreds of years ago and regained it; we have both undergone great human tragedies. The Armenian Genocide of 1915 took 1.5 million Armenian lives, destroying the Armenian community in the Ottoman Empire. As a result, a large diaspora has formed. My visit to Israel aims to pay tribute to the memory of the victims of the Holocaust on behalf of myself and my people. Our two peoples have proven that life is stronger than death. There cannot be a thought of death when we talk about ourselves; we should speak of life."

He added, "One of my goals in visiting is to create a bridge between Armenian and Israeli scholars. This connection was very strong in the Soviet era. The theoretical physics school of the Soviet Union was the leading one in the world. We are proud of this fact, as it provided us with great scientists. Many Armenian and Jewish scientists worked in Moscow, Leningrad, and Armenia during the Soviet Union. In the 1970s, the restrictions against Jewish students seeking admission to universities were strict, and they would come to Armenia. After our independence, we somewhat lost that connection; many of those of Jewish descent who were in Armenia came to Israel. I am here today to try to declare a new page, a new beginning for our scientific communities. But before doing that, let’s consider what research we might conduct in the future. To think about the future and our place in it, one must imagine what the world will look like 5, 10, or 20 years from now. If we look back to the 1950s, the world's population was about 2 to 2.5 billion and was growing a few percent annually. But since the 1950s, it has grown at an accelerated pace. Today we live in a world where 10 billion or more people coexist. When we look at mathematics, physics, science, and technology, everything seems fine, but so many uncertainties and questions persist regarding how the world will develop, how politicians will make the right decisions, the situation in the Middle East, inter-ethnic confrontations, how the economy will grow, and so on. There are more questions than answers, and classical answers no longer work. Confusion exists everywhere. But where does all of this come from?

Looking back 100 or 150 years, when the world was governed by classical mechanics, physicists began finding phenomena they could not explain, and nearly the same situation prevailed. Many phenomena existed that scientific giants could not explain, and there was great confusion about what would happen with scientific technology. What then happened? Geniuses were born—Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg. To explain this phenomenon, you must change your approach, your logic, your philosophy. The moment you change that, everything can be explained. But that is entirely different when you know quantum mechanics, where everything works with probability logic. For example, when you want to move from point A to point B, there are formulas that can explain it, but in quantum mechanics, everything is absolutely different. In quantum mechanics, you need to change yourself completely—your philosophy, your thinking, your logic, the mathematics you use—because quantum mechanics uses an entirely different math from classical. The moment you change yourself and your perceptions, everything becomes possible. What we discovered almost 100 years ago was phenomenal. It was phenomenal not only for scientific studies but also for technologies. Everything we have today and what we will have 10 or 20 years from now is owed to the giants of quantum mechanics. Space flight, nuclear energy discovery, the phones we all have have changed our lives. What are phones? A means of communication. Imagine our life without a phone. Many of you do not even remember a time when life existed without one. Our children and grandchildren will live in an absolutely different world and will ask us how we survived without a phone. Humans cannot live without communication. Our first connection to the world is formed through our mothers, as she feeds us, teaches us, and serves as a means of connection and communication with the world. My two-year-old grandchild has two lives—a normal physical life and a virtual life. They potentially learn more from the virtual life. It is distinctly different from material life because the speed of communication has become the speed of life. We are becoming individuals whose speed of communication is the speed of life.

This new world is different. When I look at us, human beings, I think we are like elementary particles and we are becoming quantum objects. This world is transforming into a place where we are the quantum particles of the greater world and can communicate uniquely. If we want to understand what this new world will be like, what future our industry, economy, business, and politics will have, we must start changing our mindset, philosophy, logic, and viewpoints. Go back 20, 50 years and tell someone that two boys without relevant degrees from university created something in their grandfather's garage and became multimillionaires. People would not believe you. This is the new world. Every young person living in Moscow, Yerevan, New York, or here is thinking about starting a startup because they believe in the power of ideas and that in this new world, they can succeed. This world is different in every aspect.

How is classical politics governed? It is governed in the following way: there are ideas, ideologists, right, left, liberals, and people create political parties. The latter partake in elections, forming a government. Previously accountability to the public occurred from election to election, or politicians conveyed their messages through radio or television. However, now there are "Facebooks," "Twitters," through which politicians can communicate with the public every day. The ongoing political processes also have quantum behavior. I can provide many examples from around the world where a small event triggers a chain reaction. Consider how entertainment and politics have become intertwined. Politics has always been part of entertainment, and politicians have used entertainment mediums since ancient times. Let us remember the gladiators. However, the situation is different now; politics and entertainment have merged. There are many satirists who become politicians. And there are also many politicians who present themselves as comedians. As this process is interactive, it is becoming increasingly engaging. It is one thing when you come home and watch "Game of Thrones" and another when you write live comments on social media to the producers of the series. You become a partner. You feel better about yourself, and your opinion matters. When a large number of people write comments about a certain political situation, that already has a significant impact on politicians. Here we are dealing with integration.

Now, turning to science. It is becoming increasingly impossible to study and develop "pure science" because industry and science have come very close. Industry dictates what should be done. In some ways, I believe we are entering a new Renaissance. Because individuals today are powerful and have become quantum, thus your actions are intertwined. You connect your research, your learning process. That research is very close to industry. At the end of the day, you connect all this to other areas of your life—art, music. You start to live individually in the way that the prominent people of the Renaissance did. For instance, Leonardo da Vinci was not only a painter and sculptor but also a great scientist, an engineer. Therefore, you are entering a Renaissance period. I hope you will all enjoy your lives. I would like to return here in 50 years and see what is happening.

Today, many things in the world are quite different—including the form of your education. Today's generation can communicate with gadgets before even entering school without knowing the alphabet. How should we educate this generation, keep them in school for 10 or 12 years forcing them to sit 45 minutes in each class while there's so much information available? The information they receive is exceptional. We must rethink how to educate our children. They are children from the future. They know where they are running. Now we have a problem teaching children who have received so much information how to use it, how to be innovative and derive something useful from it, instead of making them sit for 10 or 12 years in classrooms. I believe every child, every young individual has some talent. And the greatest mission of the educational system should be to discover that talent. One has a talent for creating chairs, another for music. The educational system should help each one find their talent and support them from a quantum perspective. Never do things that do not resonate with your heart. Besides love, family, and parents, this life’s most precious thing is time. It is absolute value. Therefore, never waste your time; find yourself.

I am also here to invite you to Armenia. It is indeed a beautiful country. We do not have oil; however, we are fortunate to have water. We have 5-6 times more water than we actually use. We have things to learn from you as you manage your country’s water resources better than we do. There are things we can learn from you, and we also have something to teach you. Let’s discover all of this. And it would be very good if we could discover one another not just on a virtual platform by visiting Google and searching for information about Armenia.

We live in a world where millions of questions have no answers. This is a new world—the world of data. Everyone speaks about those small countries that are successful because they have ports. The important and powerful ocean of the future will be the ocean of data. And I want to make Armenia an international port in the ocean of data, information, science, and technology. This is my dream. And I am here to propose to those who have many sailors, captains, and ordinary marine specialists in this ocean to work together to do something that might be beneficial for you, for us, and for the world.

What is the value of an idea? Does it have commercial value? Can the "market of ideas" be regulated? The ability to create something new is crucial. Each of you should strive to become your field's Richard Feynman—finding beauty through simplicity in complexity. Everything is changing very quickly in this new world. Innovation happens swiftly, and we must adapt to both success and failure. Many qualities are required to cultivate within yourself in order to be successful in the 21st century. The 21st century is the era of artificial intelligence and quantum life. A hundred years ago, great thinkers discovered that nature is not classical but quantum. I am here to say that, as their humble student, I not only agree with them but feel that we, too, as a part of nature, are no longer classical, but quantum. And you stand at the gates of this new quantum world. It is wonderful and intriguing for you to find your way and try to understand this quantum world.