Posted on March 8, 2017
Wednesday, March 8th, 2017
I spent the morning studying the topic of quantum computing. I’ve heard the stories about these types of machines with references to D-Wave and Google, but I’ve never truly had a strong grip on what these computers really were. Thankfully, after a fair bit of research, I managed to find a useful video that broke down the fundamental processes.
[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGihGl0e0dg[/embedyt]
I would like to point out that this video is roughly an hour long, so if you don’t have the time necessary to go into the specifics, here is a quicker breakdown created by Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell.
[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhHMJCUmq28[/embedyt]
The general issue that I have with this technology is that everyone seems to think that these machines will fix the issue with Moore’s law. While these computers are significantly more complex, they really aren’t just faster computers. It’s like comparing a horse to an automobile. These machines are extremely complex (most requiring being run at near zero temperatures) and aren’t going to replace your modular computer any time soon. I don’t want to shoot myself in the foot and say that a household quantum computer will never come into reality. I can easily say that it’s likely that this won’t happen for a few decades.
Quantum computers simply don’t function like the regular modular computers that you use every day. They are able to compute some more complex processes and procedures, but they are more nuanced and require a higher level of functionality to perform their work. These machines aren’t cheap, and I honestly can’t understand why everyone is loosing their minds about them. While I understand that we can use them to work with problems that have never been answered, that still doesn’t mean that we can just simply switch to these to solve all of our problems. I can see these machines helping out in some niche areas, but I don’t see them doing more than that for the next few years (until we solve a few issues with size and complexity).
Quantum computers are a fantastic new invention that can seriously help us move forward, but until they become much cheaper to produce, there is a limit to what they can achieve.
On a lighter note, I also spent some time watching a few more educational videos. I’m seriously considering creating a dedicated section of my website to host links to them, but until then, I like the aspect of sharing them with each journal update. It allows me to time-stamp when I actually watched them, so it makes it easier to record the results of my advancement. I’ve been watching dozens of instructional videos, short films, documentaries, and short educational videos like these almost every day for the past few months now. I really feel like the impact from studying these topics is allowing me to become more educated in a quicker pace than before. I’m glad that I’ve stopped wasting so much time on the internet playing games and that I’ve started to use it as a tool to gain some intelligence.
Here is a list of what I watched recently:
The Pokémon Phenomenon: Crash Course Games #28
MMORPGs – Crash Course Games #12
Playstation and More Immersive Video Games: Crash Course Games #9
Microsoft and Connected Consoles: Crash Course Games #10
PC Gaming: Crash Course Games #20
What Happened Before History? Human Origins
The Ultimate Conspiracy Debunker
How The Stock Exchange Works (For Dummies)
