By solve should have said "efficiently solve". They haven't even tried to show that this approach scales up to larger boards, or that they can efficiently solve an NP-complete problem. Solving one 9x9 sudoku (like we all do when we play it) doesn't mean that we can efficiently solve NP-complete problems.
There are several things to note about the announcement. First, the emphasis was on selling that this computer can solve NP-Complete problems, something that it is, to say the least, not right. An adiabatic quantum computer, such as the one they claim they had, cannot "solve" NP-complete problems. It can at most give a quadratic improvement, at most. They didn't even showed that the did this. Solving a particular instance of an NP-complete problem (such as the 9x9 sudoku) does NOT mean that you can solve an NP-comp problem. Either they lied, or there were intenionally using language that was not very precise to give the wrong impression. So the things that they said they can do cannot be done.
What did they do? Nobody knows. They were very careful to evade the important question: what did they actually accomplish? They never mentioned qubit decoherence times, fidelity, nothing. These are things they can claim without compromising the trade secrets. They gave a lot of emphasis to saying that the computer is part a classical computer, and part a quantum computer, something that nobody really cares about. What is important is to spell out exactly what was the part of the problem the quantum computer solved.
The CTO has a blog, and he sounds very competent in it. I'm guessing that he just had a lot or pressure from the investors to show *something*. It was just a big show to get some Venture Capitals. Pretty graphics and tech demos are cool for getting fans for videogame consoles and getting VC only, not so much as to make scientific claims.
I'm a huge fan of Cryptonomicon, but if you are interested in the real-life counterpart to it, check out Battle of Wits: The Complete Story of Codebreaking in World War II. Quite technical, but at the same time, action packed (the one and only Ian Fleming is in it!!!), it describes the cryptographic efforts during the war and how they redefined what we now think of Intelligence. It is a must read. Im pretty sure that Stephenson read this book and that is how he came up with the idea for Cryptonomicon.
Have you ever played Tetris Attack? I still play this 1996 (I love my SNES) jewel that most people haven't ever heard off. The game is incredibly addictive, in particular against a human opponent. It has a lot of depth; solid, real depth without random stuff to keep it interesting. In fact, I feel it is better than Tetris is some ways, as it is very challenging, with a faster pace and less frustrating (you can't just make a horrible mistake that ruins everything). Seriously, check it out. Nintendo should rerelease this game for the new consoles, or for DS (no Pokemon Puzzle Crap, just Tetris Attack please).
He appeared in the Cartoon Network Microseries. He is a Cyborg that leads the Droid Army. He was able to fight using up to 3 (yes 3, even with his feet) Lightsabers killing many Jedis in the process.
-Probably, after the Flood, the Tower of Babel took place. God put them into
different language groups. They spread out. Those that spoke French went one
way. Those that spoke German went a different way. Those that spoke Spanish
went a different way.
-I have an IQ of about 160, I taught science for about fifteen years.
-These continents are not lily pads floating around in a bath tub, folks.
They are connected. The Earth has a solid crust to it.
The Nuclear Posture Review [...] noted that the nation's nuclear infrastructure had atrophied since the end of the cold war
Well duh, wasn't that the whole point of the end of the cold war? Nuclear disarment?
Re:Building the Death Star (from Clerks)
on
Star Wars TV Show
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· Score: 1
Just imagine a Wookie dancing to:
My love for you is like Mack Truck. Berserker!
Would you like some making fuck?. Berserker!
My love for you is ticking clock. Berserker!
Would you like to suck my cock? Berserker!
Well, I'm from a spanish-speaking country, and my parents had a Nova when I was growing up. ALL the kids in my neighborhood made fun of me because my parents had the car that doesn't go. I remember the chanting:
Ender's Game battle school. The gang tension inside battle school. Minigames with their computers. Battles. As you progress, you gain command of other students and maybe even your own army. And then the obvious Bug-war expansion.
1) promote space travel, and 2) Lower cost to orbit by any means necessary.
This is all very nice and important, and applied. But by doing that, things like the Hubble wouldn't have never been built. Applied science is easy to sell. Basic science on the other hand give a country an edge that is very hard to quantify in dollars and cents, but that it spills over to applied science.
We've had too many years of wonderfully smart people trying to sell super-colliders to lawyers -- we should have learned something by now.
The Superconducting Super Collider was canned for political reasons. The congress wanted to crack down on something for budget reasons, and there were 2 big targets: the International Space Station or the SSC. Remeber how each of these projects are a tiny amount of the goverments budgets. They needed to make an example out of one of them to "show" that they were serious about the budget. They cracked on the SSC because it was less "interesting" to the public, even though it was more important scientifically. They were going to look, among other things, for the Higgs Boson. It would have attracted thousands of scientists from around the world.
Then the same politicians crippled the Space Station by putting it in an orbit that would let them cooperate with Russia, but made it useless for its original purpose. They broke the Space Station for a public show of how happy things are politically with Russia.
I disagree, we haven't had years of smart people selling super-colliders.
Basic science is hard to grasp for the general public. What is its application? Who knows? But, the point is that to build new technologies, a good strating point is to understand nature a bit better. Don't forget the basic science, without it the rest wont work itself out.
Keep on reading. I think you will find that in The Confusion the action and intrigue take a first plane, and the story actually starts to move in a direction. I didn't like Quicksilver too much, for the same reasons you mention, but I'm glad I read it because The Confusion was very fun to read. I can't wait for The System of the World.
Slashdot Mirror
By solve should have said "efficiently solve". They haven't even tried to show that this approach scales up to larger boards, or that they can efficiently solve an NP-complete problem. Solving one 9x9 sudoku (like we all do when we play it) doesn't mean that we can efficiently solve NP-complete problems.
There are several things to note about the announcement. First, the emphasis was on selling that this computer can solve NP-Complete problems, something that it is, to say the least, not right. An adiabatic quantum computer, such as the one they claim they had, cannot "solve" NP-complete problems. It can at most give a quadratic improvement, at most. They didn't even showed that the did this. Solving a particular instance of an NP-complete problem (such as the 9x9 sudoku) does NOT mean that you can solve an NP-comp problem. Either they lied, or there were intenionally using language that was not very precise to give the wrong impression. So the things that they said they can do cannot be done.
What did they do? Nobody knows. They were very careful to evade the important question: what did they actually accomplish? They never mentioned qubit decoherence times, fidelity, nothing. These are things they can claim without compromising the trade secrets. They gave a lot of emphasis to saying that the computer is part a classical computer, and part a quantum computer, something that nobody really cares about. What is important is to spell out exactly what was the part of the problem the quantum computer solved.
The CTO has a blog, and he sounds very competent in it. I'm guessing that he just had a lot or pressure from the investors to show *something*. It was just a big show to get some Venture Capitals. Pretty graphics and tech demos are cool for getting fans for videogame consoles and getting VC only, not so much as to make scientific claims.
I'm a huge fan of Cryptonomicon, but if you are interested in the real-life counterpart to it, check out Battle of Wits: The Complete Story of Codebreaking in World War II. Quite technical, but at the same time, action packed (the one and only Ian Fleming is in it!!!), it describes the cryptographic efforts during the war and how they redefined what we now think of Intelligence. It is a must read. Im pretty sure that Stephenson read this book and that is how he came up with the idea for Cryptonomicon.
... a MMOG.
Maybe it is time to move out of your parents' house.
Have you ever played Tetris Attack? I still play this 1996 (I love my SNES) jewel that most people haven't ever heard off. The game is incredibly addictive, in particular against a human opponent. It has a lot of depth; solid, real depth without random stuff to keep it interesting. In fact, I feel it is better than Tetris is some ways, as it is very challenging, with a faster pace and less frustrating (you can't just make a horrible mistake that ruins everything). Seriously, check it out. Nintendo should rerelease this game for the new consoles, or for DS (no Pokemon Puzzle Crap, just Tetris Attack please).
on-topic.
He appeared in the Cartoon Network Microseries. He is a Cyborg that leads the Droid Army. He was able to fight using up to 3 (yes 3, even with his feet) Lightsabers killing many Jedis in the process.
Marge:
Homer: Don't mind if I do!
Thanksgiving is religious. It is when the Pilgrims had a feast to thank God.
Yes. Ender's Game was good. Speaker of the Dead was... different. Ender's Shadow was good. Everything else is crap.
The title announced will be: Indiana Jones: Beaters of a Dead Horse
So it is true what some researchers say: students ARE slave labor. Poor guy!
One big question: is intelligent design Christian creationism repackaged as weak science?
One short answer: Yes
Seriously, or maybe not, check out Kent Hovind's comments on creationism, VERY funny Christian extremist.
Some of my favorites:
-Probably, after the Flood, the Tower of Babel took place. God put them into different language groups. They spread out. Those that spoke French went one way. Those that spoke German went a different way. Those that spoke Spanish went a different way.-I have an IQ of about 160, I taught science for about fifteen years.
-These continents are not lily pads floating around in a bath tub, folks. They are connected. The Earth has a solid crust to it.
Well duh, wasn't that the whole point of the end of the cold war? Nuclear disarment?
My love for you is like Mack Truck. Berserker! Would you like some making fuck?. Berserker! My love for you is ticking clock. Berserker! Would you like to suck my cock? Berserker!
Toasty!
welcome our new Diebold Sucks overlord.
"No va! No vaaaa!"
To what I would reply:
"Si vaaa! Si vaaaa!"
So SkyNet runs on BSD?
This is all very nice and important, and applied. But by doing that, things like the Hubble wouldn't have never been built. Applied science is easy to sell. Basic science on the other hand give a country an edge that is very hard to quantify in dollars and cents, but that it spills over to applied science.
The Superconducting Super Collider was canned for political reasons. The congress wanted to crack down on something for budget reasons, and there were 2 big targets: the International Space Station or the SSC. Remeber how each of these projects are a tiny amount of the goverments budgets. They needed to make an example out of one of them to "show" that they were serious about the budget. They cracked on the SSC because it was less "interesting" to the public, even though it was more important scientifically. They were going to look, among other things, for the Higgs Boson. It would have attracted thousands of scientists from around the world.
Then the same politicians crippled the Space Station by putting it in an orbit that would let them cooperate with Russia, but made it useless for its original purpose. They broke the Space Station for a public show of how happy things are politically with Russia.
I disagree, we haven't had years of smart people selling super-colliders.
Basic science is hard to grasp for the general public. What is its application? Who knows? But, the point is that to build new technologies, a good strating point is to understand nature a bit better. Don't forget the basic science, without it the rest wont work itself out.
Keep on reading. I think you will find that in The Confusion the action and intrigue take a first plane, and the story actually starts to move in a direction. I didn't like Quicksilver too much, for the same reasons you mention, but I'm glad I read it because The Confusion was very fun to read. I can't wait for The System of the World.
Send ALL the lawyers into space ... spacesuits not required.And the telephone sanitizers too!