DiscussMormonism.com

As we all know, when the Soviet Union successfully launched the first artificial satellite in October of 1957, it was treated as a wake-up call to the United States that the Soviets had taken the lead in the technological advancement race. The American public could easily understand how the Soviets ability to successfully place a satellite in Earth orbit meant they were on the way to a much more consequential development - that of being able to deliver a nuclear warhead via missile anywhere on the globe rather than needing to rely on bomber fleets. Losing to the Soviets again with the successful flight into space of cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, the nation was primed when President Kennedy issued his famous "moon shot" challenge in 1961 to go to the moon by the end of that decade. As we know from history (except for the conspiracy theorists out there), this explicit goal made public to the American people and understood for it's significance led the US to propel itself back to the front of technological leadership that we had found slipping away after the successes of the WWII era. The successes of this renewed focus and push made possible the prosperity and momentum that carried us through the end of the 20th and into the 21st Century.

Almost one year ago, in September 2017, the Chinese broadcast the first-ever Skype call made via quantum communication using a quantum communications satellite. This also corresponded with their unveiling of a dedicated quantum communications line between the major cities of Beijing and Shanghai.

https://www.insidescience.org/news/chin ... unications

The thing is, I don't remember this event. At all. I suspect it made the news and it's reasonable to suspect I heard it, too. I just don't recall the story or it's details. I checked the major news stories of the period and could see why. Hurricane Mariah had just devastated Puerto Rico the week before after Hurricane Irma threatened Florida and the national attention was largely focused in that direction. That month, we were reliving the 1950s as North Korea tested its most powerful nuclear weapon to date and the rhetoric between Trump and Kim had apocalypse written all over it with the "rocketman" tweet occurring this same week. Tom Price resigned as head of HHS director, the tax reform bill was big in the news, over 20 people died that day in Mumbai during a weather-related stampede, Saudi Arabia allowed women to drive and the Air Force Academy was dealing with racial slurs being written on dry erase boards. I remember all of those stories, too.

But I didn't find a single archived source where the quantum communications story made the top 5 of the week. This could be because the 29th was a Friday and most top 5 lists were largely set by then and weren't making room for a technological break through. Who knows.

What drew my attention to this almost a year later was an article I read this morning about the race to be first in developing quantum computers.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technolo ... ar-BBMJDG2

From that article:

Quantum computing has ushered in a new area of information technology. An international arms race to develop quantum computers has steadily grown more competitive and more critical.

China reached the early pole position by unveiling the world’s first quantum communication landline connecting Beijing with Shanghai like no two other cities in history. The first quantum encrypted Skype call was also made, that same day, by the Chinese. It was only possible because of the world’s first quantum satellite, known as Micius.

It’s clear that quantum technology promises to usher in a new era of computing. And other countries are already staking their claim, vying to be the nation that ultimately emerges as the world leader.

The article outlines major concerns with coming in as the first of the losers (2nd), not least of which is what it means for cybersecurity:

Beyond its image as a booster for communications, quantum computing also poses a very real threat to data protection with its proven ability to quickly crack most codes.

Only the lack of large scale quantum computers is holding back the ability to shred today’s encryption. And both criminals and nation-states are capturing as much encrypted data as they can now, with the expectation that quantum computers will eventually be able to crack current protections.

China and other nations are investing heavily in research and development for quantum computers as well as technology that could, theoretically, prevent hacking by quantum supercomputers. If the United States fails to develop a similarly strong quantum infrastructure, all of today’s protected data could be at risk.

This includes military data that would directly impact operational security (OPSEC), which is the critical communications in any military mission.

While OPSEC is one major potential vulnerability, other systems could be targeted. The financial and medical sectors come to mind. Both industries play pivotal roles in American life and have access to important data.

A sufficiently advanced quantum computer could theoretically decrypt and break into a mass of bank accounts or patient records in very little time.

It doesn't take a lot of imagination to see that the current threats to the US lie in our vulnerabilities in technology as countries like North Korea, National and rogue agents in Russia, cyberthieves and yes the Chinese run parallel with us already, doing real damage to corporations and apparently our democracy.

As the article portrays it, winning the race to develop quantum computers would determine who dominates the international playing field for the next several decades...or change the landscape completely.

So, where's our "We will go to the moon!" moment in this? According to the article:

Spending on technology across the board is projected to grow over the next few years as computing advances. The United States Department of Defense has requisitioned $899 million for computer science research. While this research focuses largely on quantum computing, the requested amount is only 0.000046% of the total gross domestic product (GDP).

Meanwhile, China is investing much more heavily in quantum computing. While their exact government spending is unknown, a new research laboratory costing approximately $10 billion was recently built in China for the express purpose of researching quantum technology.

The total amount being spent by the Chinese government dwarfs the investment by the United States, and that deficit does not appear to close over the next five to 10 years.

That sounds like the Chinese have made quantum computing their moon shot already. And if history rhymes rather than repeats, we face a choice of waking up and setting ambitious goals requiring dedicated resources and a public commitment. Or, we get to play the role of the other guys this time.

Or someone invents rogue self-learning A.I. and its Skynet time... Just kidding.

Man, I was just reading some stock market trading forums yesterday and there was an interesting discussion about A.I. basically cornering the market on speculation and trades. There was some concern about the Chinese not only getting ahead of everyone because of their massive investments into computing (I guess what you posted is what they were talking about, I dunno), but also manipulating world markets by identifying promising & performing companies before others can, shorting stocks, manipulating currencies, etc... All at a speed and magnitude that we've never seen before.

I have no idea what this means for the common man, though.

- Doc

It's difficult to imagine what the future holds. But I think we are paying far too little attention to China.

Consider contrasting our own position of constant political bickering while Xi Jinping has secured himself as an authoritarian leader with a clear vision for China, his China 2050 strategy.
https://thediplomat.com/2017/10/china-h ... -be-ready/

They don't just have a moon shot, they have a plan for world dominance that they are actively and enthusiastically pursuing.

You're right, who knows what that means for the average citizen. But globally, it suggests the end of the 21st Century could see China dominating the world stage in ways that make a shadow of US global superiority at the end of the 20th. It suggests that an authoritarian but non-ideological Nation-state could become the winner over Western Democracy which we envisioned as inevitably superior just a handful of years ago. It suggests that this coup could come without China having the most advanced military because reliance on force (and over-commitment of our resources to military spending) ends up being the next generation's Maginot Line, serving as an example of a great state's inability to foresee the world changing around them and thus being easily overcome at weak-points they had no idea were even vulnerable.

I don't know. I just think it's crazy that we don't really talk about it. We meaning the nation as a whole, the media and politicians specifically.

honorentheos wrote: it suggests the end of the 21st Century could see China dominating the world stage in ways that make a shadow of US global superiority at the end of the 20th. It suggests that an authoritarian but non-ideological Nation-state could become the winner over Western Democracy which we envisioned as inevitably superior just a handful of years ago. It suggests that this coup could come without China having the most advanced military because reliance on force (and over-commitment of our resources to military spending) ends up being the next generation's Maginot Line, serving as an example of a great state's inability to foresee the world changing around them and thus being easily overcome at weak-points they had no idea were even vulnerable.

This.

But don’t tell listeners of Rush and Hannity, or the misled crowds at Trump rallies, about this. They’re too busy chanting “Lock her up!” and kissing Russia’s ass to notice such things.

One thought this brings to mind is how big, ambitious ideas can serve to unite people around a common identity. And the more I read about the current struggles in the US, the more identity seems to be the weakness in western liberal democracy. It's not like Chinese identity is more homogenous than the US or without an internal history of discrimination that we fail to recognize because...well,...

But rallying around a grand vision, could the shared identity of being American become meaningful enough to be more important than the subdivisions we're stuck debating? I mean, we came to dominance as the last of the 19th Century empires collapsed which involved the dissolving of what was really an ill-gained unity through conquest and outside rule but none the less, we benefited because the sun could finally set on the British and Ottoman empires.

Years ago, Volkswagen made a car called the Quantum. So one one Saturday on Car Talk, some guy called up with his tale of woe with his Quantum and all of the auto shops he take visited.

I've forgotten if it was Tom or Ray, but one of the brothers said "Hey! Don't expect me to understand Quantum mechanics!"

This, too, is the most intelligent thing I can contribute on quantum computing. But if it works,it promises to make orders of magnitude changes.

While I share some of the concerns about the state of quantum computing in the West, as reflected in the articles referred to up thread, its not as if the west is asleep at the switch.

The CIA, IBM, Google and other companies and agencies (you can bet the NSA is deeply involved) here in the west are making good progress as well. As described in the articles, quantum computing is well suited for solving large optimization problems. It is being used now to help crunch massive amounts of interrelated data generated by the detectors at the LHC at CERN.

D-wave is a Canadian company that builds commercial quantum computing systems. Their have a successful 128 qubit processor, much of which is manufactured in Palo Alto, CA, and are now claiming a 2000 qubit processor. While there is some criticism that these processors are not optimal in terms of quantum computing capability, they are useful for optimization problems.

The gates in quantum computers are superconducting Josephson junctions, very similar to those that have been used in SQUID magnetometers for decades. The two possible states of these gates are implemented in quantum magnetism (N - S or up - down) and can be tuned to a state of quantum superposition (neither up nor down - sort of like Schrodinger's neither dead nor alive cat) to begin the computational cycle.

In order to maintain coherence for sufficient periods of time, the Josephson junctions must be cooled to near absolute zero. This means that the computer hardware is cooled by liquid helium and is therefore bulky because of the Dewar. During computation, the states of the gates are set and read out by microwave pulses. Compared to conventional digital computers the quantum computer processors use very little power indeed.

Quantum computers are accessed and controlled by conventional digital computers that serve essentially as I/O devices. Quantum computing can be accessible over the internet. IBM has built a relatively small quantum computer that is available to remote users as a demonstration of their capability and to help familiarize those interested with the way in which quantum computers can be programmed.

The practical applications of quantum computing implemented by the Chinese (mainly in encrypted communications) are low hanging fruit and will certainly be implemented in the West when it is economically viable to do so.

In the meantime, have a look at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yy6TV9Dntlw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S52rxZG-zi0

and maybe even try some some quantum computing for yourself.

Hi DrW.

Thanks for sharing a much more informed opinion on the subject and the additional resources. Your post reminds me that part of the competition goes beyond government v. government, and that this also involves private industry putting their resources to the task to be able to capitalize (literally) on successfully achieving the big breakthroughs.

I'm curious about your thoughts on the argument in the article that the Chinese are investing in this more heavily than is the West as demonstrated by the $10B commitment to a single facility compared to the $889M requested budget item?

honorentheos wrote:Hi DrW.

Thanks for sharing a much more informed opinion on the subject and the additional resources. Your post reminds me that part of the competition goes beyond government v. government, and that this also involves private industry putting their resources to the task to be able to capitalize (literally) on successfully achieving the big breakthroughs.

I'm curious about your thoughts on the argument in the article that the Chinese are investing in this more heavily than is the West as demonstrated by the $10B commitment to a single facility compared to the $889M requested budget item?

If it weren't for the anti-science attitude of the far right and their present undue influence in Washington, I would not be too concerned about the disparity. As it is, who knows?

The Chinese may well have a lot of catching up to do with the West in terms of design capability and foundry infrastructure. However, with their industrial espionage capability, and the dedication of capital at their disposal, I suppose they could theoretically leap ahead fairly rapidly.

Do I think the US and the West should invest more given China's claimed investment? Absolutely. Do I think it will necessarily lead to an eventual opsec or economic disaster for the West if we do not? The short answer is that I would tend to trust market forces.

Decades ago, many believed that supersonic air transport was the future of commercial aviation. Didn't work out economically. Next came the idea that larger aircraft would be more efficient. That was true until it wasn't. Witness the fate of the A 380. The answer in commercial aviation has been better, materials, better engines and smarter designs for conventional aircraft.

Quantum computing will have its place, but it is not likely to replace much of the conventional digital computer infrastructure that the world depends on today. IMHO, it will most likely become a valuable augmentation to the present infrastructure for specialized problems, some of which are presently intractable.

The main thing to remember is that quantum computing is not the best approach to most everyday computational problems. However, this technology is the best way, and in many cases the only way, to solve problems such as factoring of large numbers in math, encryption and code breaking, and real world optimization problems in routing, logistics, physical chemistry and many body problems in classical and quantum physics.

It seemed the articles authors biggest concern was a sort of sneakers scenario -

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0105435/

And given the current state of cybersecurity challenges, a nation state with the ability to crack any code, including military, would realistically have invented there 21at Century equivalent of the atomic bomb. Or so it seems.