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The field of quantum computing HAS to have incremental results, or else nobody will continue to fund it. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be presenting great o
by gaze 3y ago
The field of quantum computing HAS to have incremental results, or else nobody will continue to fund it. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be presenting great opportunities for incremental results. This doesn't invalidate the field, it just means that it's really hard to tell if you're going to see a pay-off. These things aren't really factored into the risks that investors think they're taking, so it's giving me a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach. I desperately want to see quantum computing work -- I've worked on it for 15 years now. From my vantage point, I see progress, but that's progress in making better qubits, better gates, better architectures, not solving problems. There's an error correction threshold, remember, and you start seeing real results when/if you cross it.
Anyhow, with all these huge beautiful dilution fridges with their fancy gold plating and all that, the expense of QC is a rounding error relative to AI. It's still high-risk/high-reward and has seen a level of investment that's commensurate with that.
Also, I don't know who all thinks that these physicists like myself are making beaucoup bucks working on QC. I make far less than a software engineer at grubhub or something, and have taken the opportunity cost of getting a PhD and all that.