Quantum Schmantum
May 25, 2020
What happens when the miasmatic hyperbole about artificial intelligence begins to wane? Another revolutionary, game changing, paradigm shifting technology will arise. Maybe the heiress to AI hoo-hah is waiting in the wings, ready to rush on stage?
One candidate is quantum computing. A couple of years ago, a conference organizer told me, “I’m all in on quantum computing. It’s the next technology revolution.”
My reaction was, “Yeah, okay.”
I noted Intel’s announcement of its horse collar or horse baloney breakthrough. I noted Google’s quantum supremacy PR push. I noted innovations like the value of photons in controlling a quantum interaction.
Got it. Careers are being made. Grants are being obtained. And venture firms are using other people’s money to make the quantum revolution arrive sooner rather than later. “Later” in hyperbole land is rarely defined.
I was interested in a paper by Gil Kalai, whose nominal professional relationship is with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The title? “The Argument against Quantum Computers, the Quantum Laws of Nature, and Google’s Supremacy Claim.”
The write up explains some caveats with the technology packing with anticipation to grab the spotlight from artificial intelligence. The paper is quite interesting. Sure, it includes equations, which are conversation killers at a newly reopened beach front bar on the Jersey Shore. There’s also postulates and reasonably easy-to-follow arguments. So read the paper already.
Here’s the conclusion:
I expect that the most important application will eventually be the understanding of the impossibility of quantum error-correction and quantum computation. Overall, the debate over quantum computing is a fascinating one, and I can see a clear silver lining: major advances in human ability to simulate quantum physics and quantum chemistry are expected to emerge if quantum computational supremacy can be demonstrated and quantum computers can be built, but also if quantum computational supremacy cannot be demonstrated and quantum computers cannot be built. Some of the insights and methods characteristic of the area of quantum computation might be useful for classical computation of realistic quantum systems – which is, apparently, what nature does.
This is a good news, bad news conclusion. The research is a journey. The destination may be surprising. So hype on.
Stephen E Arnold, May 25, 2020
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