4 ms·
> Regular modern computers process functions in a binary fashion, carrying out tasks that use fragments of data that are only ever a 1 or 0. Quantum computers u
by miguelmurca 5y ago
> Regular modern computers process functions in a binary fashion, carrying out tasks that use fragments of data that are only ever a 1 or 0. Quantum computers use subatomic particles to perform calculations at far greater speeds than existing supercomputers, and data can be both a 1 and 0 at the same time.
twitch
(this is very wrong)
- notRobot 5y agoCan someone please ELI5 a better explanation?
- Aardwolf 5y agoThis recent link posted on hacker news explains it quite well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27439839 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27439839 "What makes quantum computing so hard to explain?"
- kvathupo 5y agoA classical bit is either 0 or 1. A qubit is a complex unit vector, wherein the classical states of 0 and 1 correspond to antipodal points on the unit sphere painted by the range of possible qubits.
- bradleykingz 5y agoHardly an ELI5
- kvathupo 5y agoPerhaps some things (thankfully for our employment prospects) can't be explained to a 5 year old ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I'd imagine the following Google image [1] is sufficiently understandable to a child: the two dots are bits while the sphere is a qubit. [1] - http://langsrv.astro.cf.ac.uk/research/research_SQDFWM/Blochsphere.PNG http://langsrv.astro.cf.ac.uk/research/research_SQDFWM/Bloch...
- semi-extrinsic 5y agoThis of course does not cover everything, but I'll try. Quantum computers store data as states that are either 0 or 1 when you measure them, but before measurement they are in a superposition of these two. Quantum computers are initialized in a ground state, and are programmed by slowly modifying the system such that the new ground state is the solution to the problem you care about. Then you do the measurements and the state collapses to the solution you want. There are certain specific problems where evolving and collapsing the system in this way is demonstrably faster than the best classical computer algorithms we have today.
- Mandatum 5y agoWait, is this like ML models but instead of generating the models by repeating inputs to get a “best guess” engine, you put in the intended outcome and it.. Magically has an engine?
- semi-extrinsic 5y agoMaybe the closest analog is: imagine if you have that type of magic hydrophobic sand that doesn't get wet, like you can buy for kids. So you have a sandbox with this, and initially there is a big circular valley in the middle of the sandbox that is filled with water. Then you can slowly move the sand around, making different hills and valleys, and the water will follow the sand always in the minimum energy configuration, until the shape of the lakes in that terrain represent the solution to whatever problem you care about. Then you take a photo and measure exactly the distances, angles, areas etc. With this analogy you get some feeling for what manipulating the ground state means, and why you need to do so slowly, and also that this is not a tool that will solve all types of problems.
- Mandatum 5y agoThis shit blows my fucking mind.
- valbaca 5y agoSo do quantum computers give better implementations of languages like Prolog? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prolog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prolog