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Computers That Solve Problems Without Being On

Posted by michael on from the twilight-zone dept.

Iron Monkey writes: "Nature has this article about how quantum computers can theoretically solve problems without ever actually being turned on! Maybe California can use a few of these to solve their energy crisis - the ultimate in conservation."

5 of 144 comments (clear)

  1. Re:I really don't grok this at all. by Rob+Kaper · · Score: 5
    It's not so much that it picks a *right* answer out of all possible answers, but rather, the impossible states collapse and you are left with a quantum superposition of all the possible states. (Or, to try to put it more simply, those answers that cannot exist cease to exist, leaving only those answers that can exist.)

    They've tried that before, the answer was 42.

    But what was the question again?

  2. Just a thought... by HiQ · · Score: 5

    Does this machine run on software that doesn't have to be written?

  3. That's nothing new! by electricmonk · · Score: 5
    Hell, I was getting really jealous of my boss's new Porsche that he pulled up in today, so I just dropped an old computer out the 3rd story window onto it hood, without even plugging it it.

    Problem solved.


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    Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
  4. And that's why I hate reading things on "Nature" by CyberBlood · · Score: 5

    I swear, anything that is published through Nature has to be the most questionable of all things. Unfortunately, this argument is missing the most important part of quantum computing, the collapsing of the states into the final results. Without that you end up with unknown states, which you can guess the probabilities for all the possible outcomes, which in the end makes you do the whole thing by hand anyway. Trust me, I've got plenty of quantum particles making up my body and I am the master and doing a whole lotta nothing. By their logic, I should not have failed differential equations.

  5. Schrödinger's computer by Soft · · Score: 5

    Why, of course, it should be well-known that while nobody looks at a quantum computer, it can be on, off, or both, right?