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I wish an editor would step in: (1) limit the use of 'exponentially faster', simply for the grating repetition. The phrase is used 5 times in the article. (2
by JackFr 8y ago
I wish an editor would step in:
(1) limit the use of 'exponentially faster', simply for the grating repetition. The phrase is used 5 times in the article.
(2) In an article that is about time complexity of algorithms, be precise about terms like 'exponentially faster'.
(3) In an article that is about quantum computing, don't use 'quantum' in its colloquial sense of 'significant'. That is 'quantum' in quantum computing is different than quantum in 'quantum increase'. The latter is a suspect usage, but potentially defensible as colloquial; mixing the two in the same paragraph reads poorly.
- jessriedel 8y agoWhere does it say "quantum increase" in the article? "Quantum speedup" does appear, but this has a specific technical meaning and it is not being used in the colloquial sense. It means that there is an efficient quantum algorithm for solving the computational task but no efficient classical one.
- HelloNurse 8y agoI consider this the colloquial sense: the speedup (or, more generically, the "increase" of throughput, quality, or other performance indicators) obtained by using quantum computers. Unlike the irreducibly mathematical and very narrow concept of "exponential increase", which could be plausibly misunderstood, a quantum speedup (or increase) can be correctly abstracted to the trivial pattern of doing things in a different way which performs better, without really needing to understand the problem and the solution; it's very surprising to hear the term misused to mean "really big". How could it happen?