Quantum Supremacy: How Quantum Computers will Unlock the Mysteries of Science – and Address Humanity’s Biggest Challenges

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Kaku seems to think the solution to every problem is to give scientists another tool, while leaving the mass of humanity just as stupid as it has always been. So we end up like the juggling act of spinning multiple plates on rods, where the juggler has to run from one rod to the next to keep its plate spinning so it doesn't fall off and shatter. The problem with that approach is that most of humanity's problems have a large behavioral component. For example, you can't stop people from burning fossil fuels just by giving them some green energy. (See the book: The Burning Question: We Can't Burn Half the World's Oil, Coal, and Gas. So How Do We Quit?.) History shows that people almost never stop using an older source of energy when they get a new source. They just add the new source on top of the old sources, because more total energy means more total wealth. Man's first energy source was wood and it still is a major source today. The pattern repeated for hydro, coal, oil, gas, and nuclear. We added new sources to the mix and kept using the old sources. The problem with energy is simple to grasp: the amount of energy we currently consume determines the rate at which we can grow our energy consumption. We can carve out a few percent from current consumption and use it to build more energy infrastructure. So this is not a problem you can solve by increasing the supply of energy. Every increase in supply just increases the rate at which we can increase our demand. The only way to get ahead of this problem is to fundamentally change human psychology. People must come to put a strong value on not contributing personally to climate destruction. People must want to consume less energy than they can. People must stop saying "More" and start saying "Enough." One more name needs to be added to this esteemed list, that of Hugh Everett. For a long time, scientists argued about the wave theory and the idea that a wave collapsed into a single reality when measured. This was a huge problem to overcome until Everett proposed that maybe the wave doesn’t actually collapse; maybe all versions of the reality experienced by the wave exist simultaneously.

On December 23, 1971, President Richard Nixon signed into effect the National Cancer Act, declaring war on cancer – cancer won. The problem with cancer is that it comes from far Flow batteries might be interesting, perhaps for powering ships. But it's hard to imagine anything that beats fossil fuel from petroleum if we ignore external costs. And while Kaku hopes for technology to make renewable energy cheaper than fossil fuels (again, while we insist on ignoring the external costs of fossil fuels), he ignores the fact that a rising technological "tide" tends to raise all "boats." That is, the very same technological progress that makes renewable energy cheaper might also make fossil energy cheaper. After all, fossil energy is ultimately "free": it sits in the ground for the taking. All the cost is the technology we pay to extract it from the ground, along with the rents we pay to the people who claim to own the ground. In a similar way, technological progress did not eliminate slavery. Stealing labor is always cheaper than paying for it. To abolish slavery, we had to advance morally. We had to decide that labor theft is wrong even though it benefits the thief. As quite a few of the labor thieves thought it was right, we had to settle the issue with a bloody war. For quantum computers to work, a system has to be completely stable. Atoms are fragile and the least disturbance disrupts them. So quantum computers as they currently exist have to be framed in systems that keep them at absolute zero temperatures. A personal ’90s music overview that is far from definitive, but nevertheless instructive and often poignant. Kaku’s] lucid prose and thought process make abundant sense of this technological turning point.”— The New York Times Book Review

Now, you’re probably already wondering, How do I get my hands on one of these quantum computers? Why isn’t all technology already based on quantum computing? Well, the problem is that there’s one primary challenge, and it has to do with something called coherence. His understanding of these technologies with helpful examples and detail will give every reader a clearer picture of the future. If the description of the path integral formulation sounds familiar, that’s probably because we’ve already talked about how quantum computers can experience and analyze all possibilities simultaneously before choosing the best solution. Everything these scientists and inventors of the past created has led to the development of what we know as quantum science today. Kaku’s assessment of the potential impact goes a lot further: In his view, any problem that involves sifting through a multiverse worth of possibilities will become more solvable once the quantum revolution takes hold. Energy generation and storage, food production, climate modeling, disease treatment and genetic repair are all potential targets for quantum supremacy. Cancer isn’t a foreign invader; it’s created by our own healthy cells. Once we reach adulthood, some cells are programmed to die as others divide. In the case of cancer, healthy cells forget to die off and instead reproduce at an alarming rate.

Computer scientists might take issue with Kaku’s digital doomsaying — but there’s little doubt that quantum computers will transform the field as much as artificial intelligence is transforming it today. Among those artifacts was a strange hunk of bronze. It was clearly man-made but impossible to identify at the moment of its discovery. In fact, this piece of metal kept researchers confused for decades. In the 1970s, X-ray imaging was used to investigate the artifact, but it wasn’t until CT scans were published in 2006 that researchers started to recognize the implications of the device. Author: Because quantum computers will be much more powerful than classical computers, millions times faster. Me, after a long while: This has been quite interesting. But I would still like to understand how quantum computation--

In 1901, off the coast of a Greek island called Antikythera, researchers discovered the remains of a first-century trading ship. On that ship, they found Roman artifacts that they speculate were being sent as a gift to Julius Caesar. I found the book to be very informative, engaging, and accessible for anyone who is interested in learning about quantum computing. The author writes with clarity, enthusiasm, and humor, using analogies, examples, and anecdotes to illustrate complex ideas and concepts. He also provides references and suggestions for further reading for those who want to delve deeper into the topic. Thanks to all of these inventions and discoveries, we understand the pieces and processes needed to produce the energy that sustains life. But there are still many obstacles to overcome. Just like Haber’s crude process for nitrogen-fixing, many of our attempts at coming up with clean energy are actually sourced through unsustainable means, and our efforts at discovery are still done largely by trial and error. Kaku gives the reader a vague idea of how quantum computing works, or may work in its various immplementations. He doesn't give you any idea of how you might solve an actual problem (presumably because few people have the mathematical expertise to understand quantum computing on a useful level). Instead he mainly writes about a number of currently unsolved problems that might yield to quantum computers someday. I found the discussion interesting from a general scientific / futuristic perspective but little of it was "about" quantum computing per se.

Unfortunately, this is my least favorite Michio Kaku book. It was disappointing because he's one of my favorite authors, but I'll still be looking forward to his next. I'm no expert on quantum mechanics. I took the advice of other reviewers to read Scott Aaronson's review before starting. I have nothing to add to Aaronson's critique but I recommend it for perspective. That being said, I must admit there were moments where the complexity of the subject matter outpaced Kaku's explanatory prowess. This isn't so much a criticism of Kaku's writing as it is a testament to the sheer complexity of quantum mechanics. Even though Kaku takes great pains to simplify and explain, there are sections of the book that may require a second or third reading to fully comprehend. It's about what quantum computers "might" be able to do in the future if we can build sophisticated enough ones to solve practical problems that require far too much data for digital computers. But just two years later, the Quantum Innovation Institute in China claimed that their quantum computer was 100 trillion times faster than supercomputers. It ran on 113 qubits.He’s even hoping that next-generation computing will help him solve the mysteries of string theory and reveal the so-called Theory of Everything, which Kaku calls the God Equation. That hope is what led him to write “Quantum Supremacy” in the first place. I found some of this exciting but it was frustrating to know we don't really know if we'll ever solve these problems. I found it a little irritating how optimistic he is that we will suddenly create technology that will save us from climate change. To illustrate this idea, the analogy of Schrödinger’s cat was created. While the cat is in the box, the cat can be considered to be both dead, alive, and all states in between – until it’s observed. At that point, all the states of the cat collapse into the measurable one.