A luminous guide to how the radical new science of counterfactuals can reveal the full scope of our universe

There is a vast class of properties， which science has so far neglected， that relate not only to what is true - the actual - but to what could be true: the counterfactual。 This is the science of can and can't。

A pioneer in the field， Chiara Marletto explores the extraordinary promise that this revolutionary approach holds for confronting existing technological challenges， from delivering next-generation processors to designing AI。 But by contemplating the possible as well as the actual， Marletto goes deeper still， showing how counterfactuals can break down barriers to knowledge and form a more complete， abundant and rewarding picture of the universe itself。