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> I don't understand this particular complaint. Quantum computing is inherently probabilistic, of course, but that's only because quantum mechanics is inherentl

> I don't understand this particular complaint. Quantum computing is inherently probabilistic, of course, but that's only because quantum mechanics is inherently probabilistic. The substrate of physical digital computers is analog and probabilistic too. We just put a threshold above which a logic signal is considered 1 and we give enough time for a state transition to be considered done. We also throw in the mix a large number of electrons so that it's very likely that the aggregate effect produces a definite answer. This is not all that unlike what we have to do with quantum computers. You just have to find a suitable threshold after which your desired answer is sufficiently likely to come out.

tromp 4y ago
But even under these conditions no team has been able to demonstrate a working implementation of Shor's algorithm that can factor arbitrary 6-bit prime products. Quoting from [1]: > In 2019 an attempt was made to factor the number {\displaystyle 35}{\displaystyle 35} using Shor's algorithm on an IBM Q System One, but the algorithm failed because of accumulating errors.[13] Though larger numbers have been factored by quantum computers using other algorithms,[14] these algorithms are similar to classical brute-force checking of factors, so unlike Shor's algorithm, they are not expected to ever perform better than classical factoring algorithms. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm#See_also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm#See_also