Mark Sachs ([info]ksleet) wrote,
@ 2007-02-19 16:51:00
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Current mood:workin' in a coal mine
Current music:The Roc Project/Tina Arena - Never (Past Tense)
Entry tags:science

I, for one, welcome our new quantum overlords.
Quantum computing demo announcement.

Even I know that a new method for solving NP-complete problems is a big deal. The demo was several days ago, so looks like this fortunately didn't lead to a hard-takeoff AI singularity or anything like that... as far as we know. Keep an eye out for D-Wave employees wearing heads-up displays in the shower and fumbling their usage of the first person singular pronoun.

There's a lot more info on that blog, including photographs of the quantum computer.


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Duuuuuuuuude!
[info]nullcast
2007-02-20 02:32 am UTC (link)
I saw a link to that on Slashdot or somewhere, but I didn't realize it actually solved NP complete problems (I skipped enough of my "Theory of Computing" class that I barely understand more than NP complete means very long time for large data sets). Now the question is, does anyone remember if prime factorization counts as an NP complete problem? If so then this could be a very dangerous little device.

(Reply to this) (Thread)
Re: Duuuuuuuuude!
[info]solarbird
2007-02-20 02:49 am UTC (link)
The difficulty isn't solving NP-complete problems; the difficulty is in solving them in deterministic time. There are all kinds of ways to solve various NP-complete problems if you don't care how long it takes. ^_^

One of the applications people talk about for a deterministic linear(!) NP-complete problem solver would be exactly the thing you're talking about, and for exactly the reasons you're not talking about too.

(Reply to this) (Parent)
Re: Duuuuuuuuude!
(Anonymous)
2007-03-06 01:27 pm UTC (link)
No, factoring is not an NP-complete problem. Also, DWaves computer doesn't factor. It allegedly can provide up to a square root speed-up on NP-complete problems, but this is not sufficient to make them tractable for very large data sets (unlike factoring).

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(Anonymous)
2007-02-20 02:42 am UTC (link)
Um ... no singularity quite yet. And NP is apparently still safe too.

http://scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=204

The link goes to a pretty authoritative deconstruction of the D-Wave hype.

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[info]electroweak
2007-02-20 03:35 am UTC (link)
If there ever is a hard-takeoff singularity, your first notification of it will be when your front lawn rings the doorbell and asks you to turn on the outside faucets because it's thirsty and the weather-modification hardware is still assembling itself on the roof.

Mow lightly.

(Reply to this)


[info]eyemage
2007-02-20 03:43 am UTC (link)
what i want to see is a picture of it hooked up to a really strong pot of tea.

(Reply to this)


(Anonymous)
2007-02-20 03:52 am UTC (link)
What I want to see is one of these at a local computer store...For a reasonable price.

...I'm not asking too much, am I? - Narf

(Reply to this)

TANJ
[info]kgbooklog
2007-02-20 08:39 pm UTC (link)
How come you guys didn't get any WCCA nominations? Sure, you won't win the Science Fiction category so long as people keep putting Girl Genius there, but you should've had a shot at Long Form at least.

(Those of you who don't have patience for the online ceremony can see my text+links summary.)

(Reply to this) (Thread)
Re: TANJ
[info]ksleet
2007-02-20 09:25 pm UTC (link)
Eh... I dunno. Honestly the WCCA feels too much like a Webcomics In-Crowd Thing to me, plus it's always so disorganized.

(Reply to this) (Parent)
Re: TANJ
[info]electroweak
2007-02-21 04:32 am UTC (link)
In order to answer your question, I would have to know how one even gets nominated for that thing. I've never actually paid attention. :)

(Reply to this) (Parent)

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