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Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

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Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#141

Post by bossyTeacher »

cwmma wrote: post #112
bossyTeacher wrote: post #104

Afaik we are a decade or two away from quantum supremacy. All the AI monks, forget that if AI is the future, quantum supremacy is the present. And whoever controls the present, decides the future. Rememeber, it is not about quantum general computing, it's about implementing the quantum computation of Shor's algorithm

but much like AI hype quantum hype is also way over played, yeah modern asymmetric encryption will be less secure, but even after you have quantum computers that can do Shor's algorithm it might be a while before there are quantum computers affordable enough for it to be an actual threat (i.e. it's not cheaper to just buy a zero day for the target's phone or something). But since we already have post quantum algorith…

I was mostly talking about state actors buying quantum computers that are just built to run that particular algorithm and using it to snoop on poorer countries who cannot afford such tech. Plus all countries will have plenty of systems that have not been quantum proofed. The moment when it becomes affordable to a state actor until most state actors have access to such tech is likely to be a long time especially since no one will admit to possess such tech. And unlike nuclear weapons, it is much harder to prove whether or not someone has one

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#142

Post by jerkstate »

FabHK wrote: post #100

So, "verifiable" here means "we ran it twice and got the same result"? > Quantum verifiability means the result can be repeated on our quantum computer — or any other of the same caliber — to get the same answer, confirming the result.

A key result here is the first demonstration of quantum supremacy; from TFA

> This is the first time in history that any quantum computer has successfully run a verifiable algorithm that surpasses the ability of supercomputers.

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#143

Post by amiga386 »

cma wrote: post #136
amiga386 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The text adventure guy, or the cartoonist who went batshit?

Aaronson isn't a cartoonist, it was an AI cartoon from ChatGPT that an antisemite sent Aaronson in the mail which he then seemingly maliciously misattributed to Woit making people assume Aaronson went batshit. https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=9098 Aaronson did work at OpenAI but not on image generation, maybe you could argue the OpenAI safety team he worked on should be involved here but I'm pretty sure image generation…

I think you're very, very confused.

> guywithahat [...] I'll be waiting for Scott Adams to tell me what to think about this

Scott Adams

Text adventure guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Adams_(game_designer)

Batshit cartoonist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Adams

(also, for fun, a cartoon by Scott Aaronson and Zack Weinersmith: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3)

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#144

Post by pred_ »

FabHK wrote: post #100

So, "verifiable" here means "we ran it twice and got the same result"? > Quantum verifiability means the result can be repeated on our quantum computer — or any other of the same caliber — to get the same answer, confirming the result.

Normally, where I come from anyway, verifiability would refer to the ability to prove to a classical skeptic that the quantum device did what it's supposed to, cf. e.g. Mahadev (https://arxiv.org/abs/1804.01082), Aaronson (https://arxiv.org/abs/2209.06930), in a strong, theoretical, sense. And that's indeed relevant in the context of proving advantage, as the earlier RCS experiments lacked that ability, so “demonstrating verifiable quantum advantage” would be quite the step forward. That doesn't appear to be what they did at all though. Indeed, the paper appears to barely touch on verifiability at all. And – unlike the press release – it doesn't claim to achieve advantage either; only to indicate “a viable path towards” it.

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#146

Post by tonetheman »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #6

Related papers The idea: Quantum Computation of Molecular Structure Using Data from Challenging-To-Classically-Simulate Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Experiments https://journals.aps.org/prxquantum/abstract/10.1103/PRXQuan... Verifying the result by another quantum computer (it hasn't been yet): Observation of constructive interference at the edge of quantum ergodicity https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09526-6

[dead]

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#147

Post by whatever1 »

jerkstate wrote: post #142
FabHK wrote: post #100

So, "verifiable" here means "we ran it twice and got the same result"? > Quantum verifiability means the result can be repeated on our quantum computer — or any other of the same caliber — to get the same answer, confirming the result.

A key result here is the first demonstration of quantum supremacy; from TFA > This is the first time in history that any quantum computer has successfully run a verifiable algorithm that surpasses the ability of supercomputers.

I think I have read that before?

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#148

Post by foota »

keeda wrote: post #95
AndrewStephens wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "These results ... indicate a viable path to practical quantum advantage" I'll add this to my list of useful phrases. Q: Hey AndrewStephens, you promised that task would be completed two days ago. Can you finish it today? A: Results indicate a viable path to success.

An MBA, an engineer and a quantum computing physicist check into a hotel. Middle of the night, a small fire starts up on their floor. The MBA wakes up, sees the fire, sees a fire extinguisher in the corner of the room, empties the fire extinguisher to put out the fire, then goes back to sleep. The engineer wakes up, sees the fire, sees the fire extinguisher, estimates the extent of the fire, determines the exact amou…

Meanwhile Schrodinger's cat sleeps peacefully in their carrier.

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#149

Post by ghurtado »

seydor wrote: post #138
elAhmo wrote: post #13

Definitely not a quantum expert, but I have a feeling that news like this have been happening for more than a decade, without anything usable.

It's great funding for physics research. I don't care if it's useless, it beats spending on politics and surveillance

There's also the fact that the road to useful is littered with useless, because how else would you make progress?

Re: Willow quantum chip demonstrates verifiable quantum advantage on hardware

#150

Post by [deleted] »

refulgentis wrote: post #140
fwip wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, it matters because it's a sign that it might not be particularly transferable as a method of computation. A wind tunnel is a great tool for solving aerodynamics and fluid flow problems, more efficiently than a typical computer. But we don't call it a wind-computer, because it's not a useful tool outside of that narrow domain. The promise of quantum computing is that it can solve useful problems outside the qua…

Good point, I guess that's why I find this comments section boring and not representative of the HN I've known for 16 years: there's a sort of half-remembering it wasn't powerful enough to do something plainly and obviously useful yesterday. Then, we ignore today, and launder that into a gish-gallop of free-association, torturing the meaning of words to shoehorn in the idea that all the science has it wrong and inter…

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