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Physicists Store, Retrieve a "Squeezed Vacuum"
An anonymous reader sends us to the site of Science Magazine for news that will interest those who have followed experiments to slow and stop light. Research groups in Canada and Japan have succeeded separately in storing a special kind of vacuum — a "squeezed vacuum" — in a puff of gas and then retrieving it a split second later. Such experiments might lead to advances in quantum encryption. At the very least they will help to illuminate the boundary between quantum and classical realms.
That was always my thought.
In order to see position or speed of electrons of an atom we beam electrons into said atom, an swatch the scattered results. That is like determining where the earth is in it's orbit by flinging jupiter sized planets through the solar system and see what gets scattered where.
Quantum computing is basically worthless without traditional processors working along side it. Although there are many things quantum works exceedingly well for, the vast majority of tasks get no benefit from being on a quantum computer. There probably won't be a 400000x increase in the near future.
I can't help but be amused at the thought of how many people with undergraduate degrees in CS, having taken probably less than three college physics courses, are convinced they have any grasp of this phenomena; I have a BS in physics and it's way beyond my ken. But as for this line of reasoning, maybe a Douglas Adams quote is best, "Isn't it enough to see the garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too."