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2019-09-23 Science & Technology
Research paper claims Google has achieved 'quantum supremacy' - a milestone in computing after their quantum processor performed a 'calculation in three minutes and 20 seconds that would take a state-of-the-art supercomputer 10,000 years'
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Posted by Skidmark 2019-09-23 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11129 views ]  Top

#1 This is big. Many threads running simultaineously across numerous processors. You can program a major military land, air and sea invasion of unmanned drones of all types now managed by a quantum computer.

The first military that does this will have a significant impact over the rest of mankind.

Posted by Varmint Splat1454 2019-09-23 02:58||   2019-09-23 02:58|| Front Page Top

#2 Call me when a quantum computer can print "Hello World."
Posted by Varmint Poodle5779 2019-09-23 03:54||   2019-09-23 03:54|| Front Page Top

#3 Since one way of looking at Entangled quantum computers (DISCLAIMER - ENTANGLED was not mentioned in the article) is that they are rapidly spinning off alternate universes that exist to provide answers - if they did it, this has massive implications for working AI and knowledge bases.

Does that mean if we play MMRPG, we might get stuck in the MMRPG world? Or perhaps provide us with alternative worlds for us to go to after we die?
Posted by Seeking Cure For Ignorance 2019-09-23 06:45||   2019-09-23 06:45|| Front Page Top

#4 Cool, so what is the final digit of pi?
Posted by Procopius2k 2019-09-23 07:22||   2019-09-23 07:22|| Front Page Top

#5 The original aticle has been removed - any questions?
Posted by g(r)omgoru PB 2019-09-23 07:47||   2019-09-23 07:47|| Front Page Top

#6 Call me when a quantum computer can print "Hello World."

Heh. But given that it is a quantum computer, shouldn't that be "Hello Many Worlds"?
Posted by SteveS 2019-09-23 10:13||   2019-09-23 10:13|| Front Page Top

#7 Wouldn't Heisenberg laugh and say "As soon as you look at the answer it changes?"
Posted by M. Murcek 2019-09-23 10:33||   2019-09-23 10:33|| Front Page Top

#8 The first military that does this will have a significant impact over the rest of mankind.

The original a[r]ticle has been removed - any questions?

US officials are reportedly trying to block an 8,000-mile Google and Facebook-backed undersea cable to China on national-security grounds
Posted by Skidmark 2019-09-23 11:33||   2019-09-23 11:33|| Front Page Top

#9 Is it self-aware yet?
Posted by Abu Uluque 2019-09-23 12:04||   2019-09-23 12:04|| Front Page Top

#10 ...well, if Google is doing it, it will never become self aware. Woke maybe, but not self aware.
Posted by Procopius2k 2019-09-23 13:29||   2019-09-23 13:29|| Front Page Top

#11 Call me when...

Saddam said the same thing and then a Tomahawk launohed from the Mediteranean found it's way to the front door of his Palace on its own with great precision.
Posted by Varmint Splat1454 2019-09-23 14:00||   2019-09-23 14:00|| Front Page Top

#12 Cool, so what is the final digit of pi?

42.
Posted by Skidmark 2019-09-23 14:04||   2019-09-23 14:04|| Front Page Top

#13 A security camera can send an image of you to a quantum computer, id you via facial recognition and send your gps coord to a hell fire on a reaper above which will send me a vid of your demise in real time via a quantum computer mission server.

"Hello World!!"
Posted by Varmint Splat1454 2019-09-23 14:18||   2019-09-23 14:18|| Front Page Top

#14 I shall call my multi-threaded quantum mission server "Varmint Splat"...
Posted by Varmint Splat1454 2019-09-23 14:24||   2019-09-23 14:24|| Front Page Top

#15 Code name Skynet.
Posted by ruprecht 2019-09-23 14:28||   2019-09-23 14:28|| Front Page Top

#16 I attended a seminar recently about this, and defence related research with quantum computing. Apparently it won't ever be able to think for shit, but if ever achieved it should make fire-and-forget systems, fly-by-wire and target recognition and acquisition, interception systems exceptionally deadly.
The guy droning on was tiresome so I asked my niece - who I find exceptionally brighter than the aging Nobel contender, for a primer. This is what I learned.

The most practicable quantum computing device is proposed to be a mono-silicate (ceramic ) matrix suspended in super-cooled gas, with boron nanotubes running up and down through the matrix carrying the signals that should actuate the calculations, the whole business of computing. The electrons traveling in the nano tubes are supposed to be in a stable, coherent superposition state. Meaning their spun state (up/down) would be registered independent of what it really is, as both until needed. I think they were close to establishing that the state cannot be held coherent for long enough to get accuracy enough for a computation. Even for 2+2 level stuff. Then something changed in July. They invited scientists from all over to see and evaluate some new stuff.

All the wizards had managed so far is to get the hardware to run signals as single particles up and down itself, and register the binary states in massive memory racks. There's no software for it yet, no IO routines. It's basically an experiment into 'whether such a thing can compute'. I wouldn't call it supremacy. They've just reached one milestone in the race before other, not so excitable PR whores.

IBM's got its own 'Q' thingy and they say it's reached a similar stage, only more modular (they don't like to start from scratch) and instead of electrons they use photons, and is decentralized, spread over several terminals. They have a rudimentary interaction system going and it can print "hello world" and connect to their intranet. Of course not by itself. The japs have their own 'quantum neural network research' which borrows concepts from quantum superposition to neural networks and applies a simulation of data running in concurrent streams. They're not even close.

The closest anyone has come is a swiss couple (I forget the name), who was just refused a grant by MIT and others because Musk raised the spectre of quantum robot killer drones or something.

I'm all for an AI powered judiciary. If we can't elect the bastards, we should at least hold the switch. And an encrypted voting system that lets the citizenry announce their intent and leaning from a set of choices, a millions strong jury. The AI could then collate every vote and arrive at the best verdict. No bias, no doddering egotists, no sharts in the courthouses.
Posted by Dron66046 2019-09-23 15:23||   2019-09-23 15:23|| Front Page Top

#17 I'm all for an AI powered judiciary.

Scary. The only thing scarier is revival - by the same means - of direct democracy.
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2019-09-23 15:30||   2019-09-23 15:30|| Front Page Top

#18 Klaatu barada nikto!
Posted by swksvolFF 2019-09-23 16:38||   2019-09-23 16:38|| Front Page Top

#19 42

I always believed that there was something fundamentally wrong irrational about the universe
Posted by Procopius2k 2019-09-23 18:59||   2019-09-23 18:59|| Front Page Top

#20 Vogon poetry?
Posted by European Conservative 2019-09-23 19:09||   2019-09-23 19:09|| Front Page Top

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