Lazaridis speaks on the power of ideas

The visionary philanthropist who founded the Institute for Quantum Computing delivered the Plenary Lecture at a major scientific conference in Vancouver.

Speaking at the world's largest scientific gathering, Mike Lazaridis celebrated the power of imagination, creativity and fearless exploration of the unknown.

"The truly revolutionary stuff — that's being done by the trailblazers," Lazaridis told a packed audience of thousands gathered in Vancouver for the Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

"Trailblazers sometimes get lost, but that's what happens when you explore uncharted territory," Lazaridis said. "The other thing trailblazers do: they discover things that are utterly new."

Lazaridis, the visionary whose philanthropy launched the Institute for Quantum Computing and Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, delivered the AAAS Plenary Lecture Friday at the Vancouver Convention Centre.

He spoke about the curiosity that inspired him in high school to disassemble and tinker with electronic gadgetry.  He explained how that same curiosity led him to attend extracurricular physics discussions while a student at the University of Waterloo, sparking his abiding interest in relativity and quantum mechanics.

"Reading about quantum entanglement was like reading a manual that had fallen from the future," he said.

Back then, years before the invention of the BlackBerry, Lazaridis wondered if he "just might have a part in the coming quantum information age."

His vision of supporting cutting-edge science led Lazaridis to found Perimeter Institute just over a decade ago and the Institute for Quantum Computing shortly thereafter.

"Perimeter Institute and IQC are already considered leading institutions worldwide," he said. "We need this type of blue-sky research that will lead to developments we can't even imagine."

He closed his talk by imploring all the scientists and policymakers at AAAS to remember that the most groundbreaking discoveries of the past 100 years were made by thinkers who had boundless curiosity and unfettered intellectual freedom.

"We must remember how powerful the combination of curiosity and imagination truly is."