by Bootvis on 12/10/24, 4:34 PM with 458 comments
by nsxwolf on 12/10/24, 9:53 PM
by bradleyjg on 12/10/24, 11:44 PM
How about solving a problem someone that’s not a quantum researcher would care about. Give me traveling salesmen with n=10. Or factor a 10 digit number. Something.
Until then quantum computers are in the same category as commercial fusion. Long on “breakthroughs”, zero on results.
Look at cancer researchers for a nice contrast. The annual number of “breakthrough that could cure cancer!1!” announcements have dropped to near zero while steady, real progress is being made all the time.
by munchler on 12/10/24, 5:44 PM
by bambax on 12/10/24, 10:35 PM
I don't understand that part, can someone explain? There should be plenty of problems that take a long time to solve, but are trivial to verify? Like for example factoring extremely large numbers that are the product of a few very large primes? Maybe not on the order of 10^25 years, but still?
by joak on 12/10/24, 10:31 PM
Just vague ideas like: it could be useful for quantum simulations or optimisation or maybe ...
If tomorrow we have a full running quantum computing what would we run on it? We are in a vacuum.
The only hope is a breakthrough in quantum algorithms. Nothing in sight, not much progress on this side.
Oh yes, Zapata Computing, the best funded company in quantum algorithms just went under this year.
by ChrisArchitect on 12/10/24, 5:43 PM
Willow, Our Quantum Chip
by imranq on 12/10/24, 11:39 PM
by r33b33 on 12/11/24, 12:02 PM
I'll keep this short.
- Google’s Willow quantum chip significantly outpaces current supercomputers, solving tasks in minutes that would otherwise take billions of years.
- Hypothesis: Accelerating advancements in tech and AI could lead to quantum supremacy arriving sooner than the 2030s, contrary to expert predictions.
- Legacy banking systems, being centralized, could transition faster to post-quantum-safe encryption by freezing transfers, re-checking processes, and migrating to new protocols in a controlled manner.
- Decentralized cryptocurrencies face bigger challenges:Hard forks are difficult to coordinate across a decentralized network.
- Transitioning to quantum-safe algorithms could lead to longer transaction signatures and significantly higher fees, eroding trust in the system.
- If quantum computers compromise current cryptography, tangible assets (e.g., real estate, stock indices) may retain more value compared to digital assets like crypto.
Thoughts?
by machina_ex_deus on 12/10/24, 6:01 PM
Did Google's experiment encounter problems when trying to run RCS on the full 105 qubits device?
Before saying that the computation invoked parallel universes, first I'd like to see that the computation couldn't be explained by the state being encoded classically by the state of the particles in the system.
by aeternum on 12/10/24, 5:43 PM
This claim makes little sense. There are many problems that are much easier to verify than to solve. Why isn't that approach ever used to validate these quantum computing claims?
by urbandw311er on 12/11/24, 12:10 AM
I laughed at this. If I understood more than literally 2 words of that, then yes - no doubt I would ask about that.
by devit on 12/11/24, 12:21 AM
What's the largest number it can factor using Shor's algorithm? What's the largest hash it can compute a pre-image for using Grover's algorithm?
by dataflow on 12/10/24, 6:54 PM
Imagine a ball falling on the ground.
Simulating the O(10^23) atoms in each one with a classical computer would take (say) 10^23 times the amount of work of simulating a single atom. Depending on the level of detail, that could easily take, you know, many, many years...
We don't call the ball a supercomputer or a quantum computer just because it's so much more efficient than a classical computer here.
I presume that's because it can't do arbitrary computation this quickly, right?
So in what way are these quantum computers different? Can they do arbitrary computations?
by JKCalhoun on 12/10/24, 5:48 PM
by nuancebydefault on 12/11/24, 10:27 AM
Can anybody explain me why it is hard to find a problem that can be solved only by a basic quantum computer within a short timespan and can be easily verified by a normal computer? I thought there are so many algo's out there for which one direction is fast and the reverse takes ages.
by de6u99er on 12/11/24, 4:56 AM
by LikeBeans on 12/11/24, 8:46 AM
by victor22 on 12/11/24, 12:27 PM
They never talk about what this computer is actually doing.
by r33b33 on 12/11/24, 10:04 AM
No nuance, just yes or no.
by thrance on 12/11/24, 11:10 AM
QC companies are selling quantum AI and quantum finance and other hand wavy stuff. Yet, I don't see any algorithms that has a proven advantage in these domains over classical ones running on clusters of GPUs.
by 01HNNWZ0MV43FF on 12/10/24, 5:44 PM
I only wonder what it means for cryptography.
The letters "crypt" don't appear in the text.
by daft_pink on 12/10/24, 5:53 PM
by Jasondells on 12/11/24, 12:28 PM
The Google benchmark with random circuit sampling is fascinating from a theoretical perspective, but it’s hard to see how this translates into solving problems that matter outside the quantum research community.
The lack of practical applications is a glaring issue. Sure, it's cool that Willow can outperform Frontier on this obscure task, but where’s the real-world impact?
Cryptography, optimization, drug discovery—these are the kinds of problems quantum computing needs to beat if it’s going to justify the investment. Until that happens, it feels like we’re stuck in a cycle of overpromising and underdelivering, with flashy press releases but no tangible results.
And let’s talk about scalability. Even if Willow hits the error-correction frontier, the number of physical qubits needed to build a truly practical quantum computer seems astronomical. Millions of qubits just to factor a number?
It’s hard to see how this scales in a way that makes economic or scientific sense. Right now, it feels like quantum computing is a field for researchers who are okay with not seeing practical outcomes in their lifetimes.
Maybe I’m too cynical, but this smells like another example of tech marketing getting ahead of the science. Maybe we can admit that we’re still decades away from quantum computing having any real-world relevance?
by flkenosad on 12/10/24, 10:36 PM
by mupuff1234 on 12/10/24, 5:35 PM
by Sergii001 on 12/11/24, 8:03 AM
by partloyaldemon on 12/11/24, 2:42 AM
I definitely read this first pass and thought 'damn the CEO is hitting its own quantum supercomputer with bug reports'. that's cold. It just came out.
by krick on 12/11/24, 1:03 AM
The post reiterates some facts from the original statement, which are pretty vague for most, I believe. The only useful clarification is that simulation results are indeed unverifiable, lol (as some might have suspected, but still nice to have a definitive confirmation from somebody who is supposedly an expert on this).
Then it addresses the cringeworthy "Everettian multiverse" statement discussion. Granted, it indeed was one of the most discussed things on the previous thread, but I have honestly assumed that it's so obviously moot that one can simply ignore it. Everyone knows that at least one of top-3 threads on HN comments must be either a lame joke or some sort of bikeshedding argument.
And that's pretty much it. "This blogger said this usual generic words, that reporter asked for an interview, but I declined, also, kudos to Google team for amazing work, it's unclear if it's any good, but it surely isn't bad!" Uh, ok, thanks for the clarification, man.
I get it that this post was written in a hurry, but given all that "fish-handing" stuff and all these commenters in this very thread complaining about how they don't know the difference between "trapped-ion or neutral-atom" qubits (as if this distinction was the very essence of the post, which author paid much more attention to than to his responses to NYT journalists) it just doesn't deliver.
...So, what did I expect? Well, I didn't expect anything, but let's state the obvious. Google's benchmark was to produce some very specific (and unverifiable) random distribution (which, BTW, he kinda says, but waaay less clearly than it could have been said). Obviously, nobody cares about that. Everyone cares about when they will be able to run Shor's algorithm on Google's Chip, and factor primes and deprecate RSA into oblivion. Obviously. Some may wonder why it's not possible to do it on that Willow thing, others may suspect that it may have something to do with the fact they need a ton of "physical" qubits to emulate logical qubits because of error-correction. Also, it is widely advertised, that the very thing that is special about Willow is vastly better (and somehow "more promising to scale") error-correction. So, what people really want from a generous and skillful fisherman is obviously some critical, appropriately-speculative, ELI5-style analysis of the updated state of the art. What does Willow have, what does it need to become practical, what are some realistic projections on when we can get there. Where is all of that? Where is the fucking fish?!
by blast on 12/10/24, 5:44 PM
For 20 years I’ve been trying to teach the world how to fish in Hilbert space, but (sigh) I suppose I’ll just hand out some more fish.
by Ham121 on 12/11/24, 1:01 PM
by megamix on 12/11/24, 7:59 AM