Wow. Awesome.
*doublepromote *quality science.....a potentially exponential computing advancement, great until it becomes sentient and murderous.

Next, can they tackle Entangled Quantum Particle computing and communication. If we go to Mars, it would be great to have instantaneous communication instead of a varying delay each way.

Double-Promoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued Wednesday, October 23rd, 2019 11:01pm PDT - doublepromote requested by newtboy.

Boosting this quality contribution up in the Hot Listing - declared quality by newtboy.

Much like nuclear fusion. Apparently it works but is it useful yet? Ever?

It'll be useful eventually, but I wouldn't bank on soon. My final project in college was related to quantum computing, which at the time (18 years ago) was effectively entirely theoretical. I've enjoyed seeing the steady, albeit slow, progress.

The areas where quantum computing will really shine are problems which involve a huge number of possible answers, but only one best or correct one. The traveling salesman problem is a classic of computer science, as you can scale it up in complexity to the point where any traditional computer will eventually choke on the sheer number of permutations to test. Great way to demonstrate the need for clever solutions and well-written algorithms vs brute force approaches. An adequately sophisticated quantum computer, however, will theoretically be able to solve the traveling salesman problem nearly instantly, regardless of the level of complexity / number of nodes to navigate. Because it just tests all possible answers simultaneously.

Have you by chance read Ender's Game? It's been a while for me, but I believe those books used this technique for interstellar communication, think it was called the Ansible.

I want technology that will allow 1G of acceleration constantly for about 3 days. That's all you need to get to Mars.

Spring Break in an electric dunebuggy on Olympic Mons.

Damn straight.

No, only saw the movie, but I have read many of Ursula K. Le Guin's books. She is the author credited with coining the word almost two decades before the first version of Ender's Game was written, and the idea of instantaneous communication in sci-fi is even older.

That would be great, but I would gladly settle for cheap travel to the moon on a pair of space elevators.
Strapping wings onto my arms and being able to fly like a bird in underground chambers always sounded like fun to me.

You just want to get to the Moon and Mars soon so you can begin building up Skull Crater. I'm on to you, pal.

That's Spider Skull Crater.....and SSSSSHHHHHH....it's a secret!

But can it run Crysis?

Now that's a genius answer. Lol

Thank you sir.

So it may not run Crysis but it will definitely improve the SimCity experience!

...Maybe? It would absolutely annihilate at something like chess, or Go. I have a hard time imaging a good use case for having it actually run a video game, but I'm guessing few people working on early traditional computers could've envisioned any of the delightful diversions we now take as a given. Probably when I'm 80 kids will be playing quantum Minecraft in a layered omniverse of worlds, where removing a block in one world has consequences in nearby dimensions, with chaos theory realistically modeled and incorporated.

Some complex tasks a QC would absolutely rock at however. Feed it a long list of employees, hours of availability, and coverage requirements, and it should spit out a 100% optimum schedule immediately. Air traffic controllers (particularly at large hub airports) would likely find it helpful in coordinating flight plans. Logistics for manufacturing, shipping, etc. The downside is that encryption will likely be utterly fucked for a while, as a quantum computer with a sufficient number of qubits could try all possible options at once. So it'll be interesting, but we're still 10+ years from any sort of commercial products, and they'll be like the computers of the 60s: huge and expensive, big iron for custom purposes. Or at least that's my semi-informed guess, I ain't no technoprophet.

Someone who really wants to get involved in bleeding-edge tech would do well to dive into this field. Writing the algorithms needed to run a task on a QC requires a completely different mindset than programming a traditional computer. I don't think people with years of experience with current programming methodologies would adapt well. At best they'd be nearly starting from scratch, at worst they'd have to work to un-learn what they already know.

Ive now been slightly obsessively reading and discussing quantum computers with friends (including a couple clever and informed ones) for two weeks and the theoretical possibility of one day feeding the traveling salesman to a QC is about the biggest real excitement that awaits us in the medium term (decades). Hence my Sim City comment. Seriously there is very little information and a lot of exaggeration in this video. I know great things are expected from QC I just dont believe 98% of whats in the vid has anything to do with anything.