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The CIA and Jeff Bezos Bet on Quantum Computing
- dyeje 14y agoStop reading after the second paragraph, quantum computing isn't some magic wand you wave at problems to make them disappear. It's simply a new way of approaching them, and it requires algorithms designed to take advantage of this new approach to computing to solve said problems.
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- andrewcooke 14y agoi'm curious why you dismiss it on this. won't the minimum in the "natural universe" be ~2.7K (the background temperature)? while they seem to be a few thousandths of a K from zero, if i understand the text right. your post was pretty strong / dismissive, so i'm wondering what your (presumably powerful) argument is. what other systems in the universe are "naturally" in a quantum ground state?
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- Permit 14y ago>Therefore, the statement suggests (with certainty) that there are no intelligent/scientific aliens capable of creating lower temperatures. I take issue with that interpretation. Yes I'm certain that is what the author is trying to convey. I suggest you re-read the article replacing the line that offended you with "This computer is kept in a very cold place". >In short, the statement is pompous, insulting and almost certainly incorrect. The evidence is on his side. You just derided the author for his level of certainty, then suggested he's almost certainly wrong because aliens might exist.
- mchouza 14y agoThere are some places in the "natural universe" that are colder than the CMB. That's because they aren't in equilibrium: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_zero#Very_low_temperatures http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_zero#Very_low_temperat...
- andrewcooke 14y agothanks, i was wondering if there was something like that, but couldn't imagine how it would work (i deleted my other answer earlier because it seemed to all be getting a bit unpleasant; i still think that sentence from the article is pretty inoffensive).
- sp332 14y agoThe black-body temperature of the background radiation of the universe is about 3K. That means achieving a lower temperature requires an active heat pump.
- conroe64 14y agoAlso, the link in the GP post that contains proof of a world government run by an artificially intelligent quantum computer has no place on Hacker News. Keep your awe inspiring, jaw dropping news with wide reaching social, moral, and technological implications to yourself!
- michael_nielsen 14y agoThey probably have a dilution refrigerator. It's a pretty standard piece of equipment, and can achieve millikelvin level temperatures, far lower than the 3 Kelvin microwave background. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilution_refrigerator http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilution_refrigerator There are other, more sophisticated methods of cooling, which can go even lower in temperature.
- Symmetry 14y agoBack when I was an undergrad at MIT I was a solder monkey for a group that used a dilution refrigerator with a very similar sort of setup, also trying to use current in niobium loops as qbits. However, IIRC we were only able to reach temperatures in the 100mK range, whereas the article claims this group is using temperatures less than 1mK. So I think they would probably have to be using something on top of the dilution refrigerator to get that low.
- fjorder 14y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_refrigeration http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_refrigeration Dilution refrigerators have their limits, especially when you're trying to cool a complex experiment with a lot of wires and fibers going into it (they all bring in heat). I've seen magnetic refrig units stuck inside of helium cryostats to give them the extra oomph to get such experiments down to millikelvin levels.
- Permit 14y ago>I doubt it. Everyone is pointing out that you're incorrect, but can I just ask why this particular line would have caused you to dismiss the whole article, even in the event you were right? It's such a pointless statement to get caught up on. This obviously isn't a research paper but there were some interesting ideas to us not familiar with the history of D-Wave. Why the dismissive attitude?
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- stcredzero 14y ago> I can't be incorrect. I just expressed an opinion. http://lesswrong.com/ http://lesswrong.com/
- mchouza 14y agoIt's not as stupid as it seems. Due to the cosmic microwave background, the equilibrium temperature far from other natural radiation sources is about 3K. But, as we don't know the temperatures in the whole universe and there are natural processes that can cool things below their equilibrium temperature, they should have said "... anywhere in the known natural universe".
- Bakkot 14y agoThose approaches are increasingly well-studied and a lot of them (Grover's algorithm, anyone?) look an awful lot like magic. (For people who don't want to look that up, Grover's algorithm does searches on unsorted databases in root-n time, that is, in fewer operations than would be required to inspect every element of the database.)
- jimwhitson 14y agoGrover's algorithm does indeed look rather like magic, but even better is the geometrical proof - WP's description looks good at a quick skim. In my (fairly limited) experience, this sort of geometrical thinking is the best way to understand quantum algorithms intuitively.
- sev 14y agoAlthough Grover's algorithm is extremely impressive...it's a probabilistic algorithm, which means that the result is not guaranteed, but very likely. And the likelihood can be increased by running the algorithm more than once.
- jessriedel 14y agoThe likelihood increases exponentially because each time you run the algorithm it's independent of the previous times. Even if it's only 75% sure, you only need to run it a few dozen times before it's more likely for there to be a hardware fault in your display giving you the wrong answer.
- jimwhitson 14y agoWould it be overly conspiratorial to suggest that the CIA and NSA are in fact interested in a large-scale implementation of Shor's algorithm? Perhaps I underestimate how much use intelligence agencies have for optimization...
- sp332 14y agoI would be worried if they weren't interested in Shor's algorithm. That's something that fits their mandate at least.
- jpdoctor 14y ago> Would it be overly conspiratorial to suggest that the CIA and NSA are in fact interested in a large-scale implementation of Shor's algorithm? The only thing conspiratorial is that it wasn't mentioned in the article. Hmmmm.
- nikic 14y agoContext: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shor%27s_algorithm
- wallawe 14y agoCan anyone provide an explanation of this in layman's terms? I took a look at wikipedia but am having a hard time wrapping my head around it..
- dyeje 14y agoA lot of public key cryptography methods used in the real world are based on the fact that factoring really big numbers is computationally unfeasible. Shor's algorithm makes it feasible, but it's a quantum algorithm that can't be run on a classical computer. Basically, alot of stuff won't be secure anymore when it's feasible to run Shor's algorithm.
- ams6110 14y agoBut would new forms of currently-infeasible encryption become possible at the same time? Many forms of encryption have fallen over the years as technology and mathematics have advanced; while at the same time better encryption methods have been developed.
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- cs702 14y agoThe societal impact of quantum computing would be immense -- the entire security infrastructure of the web would have to be rebuilt from the ground up. However, many experts -- including Scott Aaronson (who is mentioned in the article) -- have cast doubt on D-Wave's claims, because the company has not yet proved that its machines are producing results by exploiting quantum phenomena like particle entanglement and superposition. In other words, D-Wave's devices may very well be different, but still classical, computers. D-Wave's engineers acknowledge as much: they are quoted in the article stating that "they don't yet know for sure what's happening inside the chip." The fact that Bezos, a very smart guy, has invested in D-Wave, has changed my perception of the company from "these are likely crazy people making outrageous claims" to "maybe these guys are unto something." Exciting and a bit scary. Time will tell.
- cynicalkane 14y agoI don't think the quote they don't yet know for sure what's happening inside the chip means what you think it means. I think in context this is an attempt to describe how quantum algorithms work, where they need a nonobserved superposition to operate. They may well not understand their chips, but that's not supported by that quote in that context. You don't need to know the exact operations involved to solve an optimization problem with quantum computers (or for that matter with classical ones).
- dumb-dumb 14y ago"means what you think it means" Can we find some other way to convey this message without using that same tired old phrase over and over and over again? As soon as I see this phrase by brain automatically shuts down because it tells me the author lacks creativity. Are people who post to nerd forums really that deficient in English language skills? Or are they just hoplessly compelled to mimic the language used by others? "means what you think it means" is like some kind of lingusitic meme. Future posters: Let's be creative and devise another way to state this. This comment is not personal. It is just a randomexample of a phenomena. Many, many, many nerds use this phrase. I'm just tired of reading it. I can't be the only one. Next time you are tempted to type "doesn't mean what you think it means", please stop yourself. Write it some other way.
- ecolak 14y agoI don't think their big contract with Lockheed Martin should be a good indicator of actual quantum computing. What they built is probably optimized for some of the problems that Lockheed Martin is trying to solve...
- RK 14y agoI have heard from people familiar with the Lockheed project that the purchase was largely motivated by tax incentives. Something along the lines of a Canadian-American agreement, in which companies could claim 10x as much business expenses if they were making purchases of research equipment from Canadian suppliers. The implication was that Lockheed never had strong confidence in this technology, but had little to lose.
- SeanDav 14y agoQuantum computing and nuclear fusion power generation are probably 2 of the biggest problems to solve in order to make the next technological leap. If D-Wave comprehensively cracks Quantum computing I reckon Bezos may become the world's first Trillionaire.
- swalsh 14y agoIn the past, technology would provide efficiency to a problem, and a lot of times up root a job in the process. Which is okay, because a new job was created in the wake. Astute observers though might notice that the skill level has been increasing each time a job is transformed. This is okay when an evolution in technology is equivalent to a single lifetime, but as the evolution of technology speeds up the adaption becomes more difficult. I feel like we are seeing the effects of the last technological revolution today. As a software engineer, I get 4 emails a day from recruiters... but those with no technical skills are being unemployed in troves, and finding a job is near impossible. So my question. What happens when an assumed intelligence explosion disrupts, an already disrupted world? I absolutely don't believe there's anything we can (or should) do to slow technological progress... but its an interesting topic to see how it affects society. There seems to be a disconnect, technology evolves exponentially, and society evolves linearly.
- wallawe 14y agoDid anyone else catch the temperature miscalculation? > It is actually a cold gun: the structure is a chilly -259 °F (4 °Kelvin) at the wide end and a few thousandths of a degree above absolute zero at its tip... 4 degrees Kelvin is approx -452 Fahrenheit is approx -269 Celsius. Absolute zero is −459.67° F
- ars 14y ago4 Kelvin is probably the correct number since that's the temperature of liquid helium.
- fjorder 14y agoYou can go a bit lower than the temperature of liquid helium just as you can cool something to lower than the temperature of liquid water just by using evaporating water. However, 4 Kelvin is probably correct. The image they show appears to be of a cryostat that would almost certainly use helium as a cryogen. Such cryostats are realistically limited to around 2-3 Kelvin. They can go a bit lower when empty, but generally not if you stick a complex experiment with a lot of heat-conducting fibers and wires into them. 4K is probably warmer than they'd like for a quantum circuit, but getting their apparatus colder would require a much beefier cryostat or more exotic technologies like magnetic cooling built inside a helium cryostat. Such setups are capable of getting complex setups down to the hundreds of millikelvin, which is much nicer for this sort of work! As for writing a scientific article using Fahrenheit... Please don't do that. Just don't.
- ars 14y agoWell obviously you can go lower, but 4K is the boiling point of Liquid Helium, so it's the easiest temperature to hold it at. In the article they mention they chip itself is kept at millkelvin temperatures. And I disagree about using Fahrenheit - this is not a paper in a journal, it's a lay article. By all means use Fahrenheit if that's what your audience understands. Don't let pedantry get in the way of clarity. (Kelvin has some real meaning, but C vs F is totally arbitrary. One is the freezing point of water, the other is the lowest temperature you can get with a salt/ice mixture.)
- batgaijin 14y agoWhat happened with all of the posts from this guy mocking D-Wave?: http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=431 http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=431
- cing 14y ago"I hereby announce my retirement as Chief D-Wave Skeptic, a job that I never wanted in the first place." -http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=639 http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=639
- cing 14y agoOn a related note, D-wave is sure posting some interesting job opportunities: https://www.mitacs.ca/o/2012/07/cognition-and-creativity-frameworks-engineer-dwave-systems-inc https://www.mitacs.ca/o/2012/07/cognition-and-creativity-fra...
- perlpimp 14y agoNo one has explained exactly what kind of problems would Quantum computer could solve well. From few articles I've read it is not for all kinds of tasks a magic ax. if someone can expand on that, that would be great.
- jcr 14y ago> He (Arronson) and other critics say the company must still prove two things: that its qubits really can enter superpositions and become entangled, and that the chip delivers a significant "quantum speed-up" compared to a classical computer working on the same problem. I'm curious how one goes about "proving superposition"? If one does the most obvious thing, opening the box containing Schrodinger's cat to observer and hence prove state, then you've just lost the superposition. Anyhow, for those wondering about addressing the impacts of successful quantum computing on cryptography (i.e. security of most things, including your banking transactions on the web), you should check out the efforts of Dan J. Bernstein (DBJ) and friends on the "Post-Quantum Crypto" web site: http://pqcrypto.org/ http://pqcrypto.org/ Though research is still on-going, at present it seems some algorithms are resistant to quantum cryptanalysis. It might take a decade or two to retool all the systems using crypto vulnerable to quantum cryptanalysis (assuming someone succeeds in building a quantum computer), but at least it seems like there's hope.