Google Attempts to Build Quantum Computer

Shdwrnr

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May 20, 2011
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Alcom1 said:
They call it a quantum computer, but that implies some rather untrue stuff. It's more like a quantum calculator, with some oddly specific buttons and an enter button that you can press once.
The ENIAC was a calculator too. I don't. Think anyone would argue that it wasn't a computer too.
 

Tamayo

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TheSYLOH said:
So if Google build a quantum computer, a huge chunk of online security goes out the window.
There are cryptosystems that do not rely on integer factoring or the discrete logarithm problem, which are the two most common trapdoor one-way functions in use these days and which are vulnerable to Shor's algorithm; check out lattice-based cryptography for one of them if you are interested.

Alcom1 said:
They call it a quantum computer, but that implies some rather untrue stuff. It's more like a quantum calculator, with some oddly specific buttons and an enter button that you can press once.
A quantum computer is a computer, because it can emulate a universal Turing machine, because any conventional circuit can be emulated by Hadamard gates. (With an arbitrarily small probability of getting the wrong answer if there is an answer, natch.)
 

Korolev

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Jul 4, 2008
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From what I've read, the D-wave style chip isn't a "true" quantum computer. Not being a physicist, the details of the technology go over my head, but I definitely remember computer scientists and physicists insisting that, while what D-wave achieved was valuable and interesting, it wasn't a proper quantum computer.

If Google just build on the system D-wave invented, then they aren't creating a real quantum computer either.
 

Aeshi

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Because if there's one thing Google needs, it's more power amirite?
 

Zombie_Fish

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Shdwrnr said:
The no-cloning rule is a hindrance in that it means we can't verify computation the way that people traditionally used to (i.e. run it a few dozen times and see what happens). This was worked around by quantum error correction [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_error_correction].

I kind of hope that quantum computing is possible, given that my University claims to have one [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/physics/research/quantum/qcloud/computer/] that you can run code on.
 

sthalik

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The jury's still up on whether D-Wave's better at what it does (that is, annealing) than a traditional computer. It hasn't been "proven" either way so check your facts.

Quantum computation allows for solving SOME problems with much better time complexity. Take into account quantum decoherence also.

Piece author, pelase check your facts.
 

james.sponge

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sorsa said:
I'm really amazed at what Google is spending their income on, namely things that can greatly benefit humanity in the long run. Hats off.
And eventually they will create true artificial intelligence and use it for marketing :D
 

srpilha

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I just want to sound silly and say that "Martinis has spent over ten years..." could well be substituted by "Martinis were spent over ten years..." just to better show us how much work it has been. :)
 

youji itami

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"Previously, Google began work back in 2009 with "quantum computing company" D-Wave Systems, whose claims of having made the first quantum computer have been proven illegitimate."


This is false, the statement from the linked article reads

"But independent tests published earlier this year found no evidence that D-Wave?s computer uses quantum physics to solve problems more efficiently than a conventional machine."


This does not say the D-wave's computer isn't a quantum computer, it says that the quantum computer is no faster than a normal computer which is true of everything if you compare a first generation of a new tech with late gen of an old tech.


While D-wave is now calling it's machine a quantum optimizer rather than a quantum computer you have to remember that by todays standards the first computers are less capable than a scientific calculator of today as well.
 

SonOfVoorhees

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Aug 3, 2011
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So Google is building Skynet? They also own a drone company and AI company. Future doesnt look good. ;-)
 

Terminal Blue

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Shdwrnr said:
The singularity is reached when we create a system that can iterate on itself; build a better version of itself without our input. The fastest computer in the universe won't bring the singularity to us with the proper software. That software, while getting closer all the time, is still a ways out.
I feel that's a rather narrow conception of the singularity.

If you were looking at a black hole from the outside, you would see literally a black spot in space but that's not the singularity. What you're seeing is the event horizon, the point beyond which no light can escape so no light makes it back to your eyes to tell you what the hole actually looks like. In the technological singularity metaphor, the event horizon is the point at which human beings begin augmenting intelligence to superhuman levels. That might not be a computer at all, it might be implants, or genetic engineering, or even drugs. That's not the singularity itself, but it's the point at which future technological development becomes completely unpredictable because it will be governed by intelligence greater than that of modern human beings. It's not the end of development, it's merely the point at which we can no longer guess what happens next.

But if the singularity is not the event horizon, then you have to expand the definition of the singularity to include all the gravitational effects around it. We're already enhancing the way we use human intelligence, and even if we're still reliant on human intelligence to build and operate the devices we create, it still enables things which people in history might have found impossible to imagine or predict.
 

Shdwrnr

Waka waka waka
May 20, 2011
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Zombie_Fish said:
Shdwrnr said:
The no-cloning rule is a hindrance in that it means we can't verify computation the way that people traditionally used to (i.e. run it a few dozen times and see what happens). This was worked around by quantum error correction [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_error_correction].

I kind of hope that quantum computing is possible, given that my University claims to have one [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/physics/research/quantum/qcloud/computer/] that you can run code on.
Thanks for that; I suppose entangling the qubits would act as a kind of correction so long as the noise doesn't propagate through the entangled pairs. I've also read that a group has been able to use the principles of quantum tunneling to determine the spin of a particle without actually measuring it thus leaving it in its superposition but that it's still not 100% accurate. I'm guessing that our early quantum computers will not necessarily be 100% accurate, just accurate enough to do what we need them to do.
 

Chungus

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Mar 25, 2012
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So first, Google is developing aircrafts, and now they aim to develop quantum computers. Whelp. I watched Jörmungand, Google. I know what you're planning... >_> Except they're not launching satalites, but that will come. Soon, Google will control the flow of information!

Serious reply: Pretty amazing, fairly scary implications for the future not withstanding.
 

Stupidity

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Sep 21, 2013
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Simply realizing that some lines shouldn't be crossed doesn't make you a Luddite
Indeed, it just makes you wrong.
Just because something challenges us existentially doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. It certainly doesn't mean we wont.
 

Evil Smurf

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Nov 11, 2011
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Yeah this is cool and all, but can it run Crysis?

I love the future!
 

Strazdas

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May 28, 2011
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sorsa said:
I'm really amazed at what Google is spending their income on, namely things that can greatly benefit humanity in the long run. Hats off.
erm, Skynet. No, really. Google rebooted in early spring for 50 minutes into Skynet version 1.0, blamed software bugs for downtime. Suddenly they are investing a lot of money on robotics, unmanned drones, quantum computers, self driving cars and building thier own island. Not suspiciuos at all.

Lagslayer said:
Vault101 said:
Yan007 said:
]If they find a way to make it work, we would have computers that are millions of times faster than what we have today.
and then you've got the singularity

as much as I hate to say it I find myself becoming more of a luddite in the face of the uncertainty of our future
Simply realizing that some lines shouldn't be crossed doesn't make you a Luddite.
thinking that there are lines that should not be crossed does.
 

Verlander

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Apr 22, 2010
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Another of those things that'll transform mankind on paper, but actually will just make it easier to make people spend their money. As well, worse things happen.
 

sthalik

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youji itami said:
This does not say the D-wave's computer isn't a quantum computer, it says that the quantum computer is no faster than a normal computer which is true of everything if you compare a first generation of a new tech with late gen of an old tech.
The issue here's whether annealing done by D-Wave hardware is fundamentally different than as done by classical algorithms.

That is, jury's still up whether the D-Wave machine's what D-Wave says it is.