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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology with

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Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello everyone,

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Speaker 1: welcome to tech Stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and

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Speaker 1: I am an editor at how stuff works dot com.

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Speaker 1: Sitting across from me, or maybe he's not, or maybe

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Speaker 1: all of the above, the senior writer, Jonathan Strickland, Darling,

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Speaker 1: you've got to let me know should I stay or

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Speaker 1: should I go? Excellent? Thank you. So today we wanted

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Speaker 1: to tackle an incredibly complex subject, which is a quantum computers.

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Speaker 1: We've talked a little bit about quantum computers in previous podcasts,

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Speaker 1: but we haven't really dedicated a full episode to it,

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Speaker 1: and part of that is because it scares us. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and you'll probably see why as soon as we get

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Speaker 1: further into the discussion today. Yeah. The the the potential

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Speaker 1: for quantum computers is phenomenal. Yes, it potentially could be

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Speaker 1: a true breakthrough in computing for certain applications. But the

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Speaker 1: actually describing what a quantum computer does and how it

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Speaker 1: works is a pretty herculean task for for the layman.

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Speaker 1: And this is where Chris and I both say, neither

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Speaker 1: of us are quantum physicists. We are not experts in

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Speaker 1: quantum mechanics by any stretch of the imagination. Although I

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Speaker 1: do know that they used to work on VW midsize

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Speaker 1: sedans in the eighties. It wasn't mid sized sedans, it

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Speaker 1: was quantum size sedans. Yeah, because it doesn't work on

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Speaker 1: the classical system. Um, we're gonna get into that. Actually. See,

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Speaker 1: to really understand how a quantum computer works, you have

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Speaker 1: to know a little bit about quantum mechanics. And this

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Speaker 1: is a crazy kind of world for those of us

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Speaker 1: who are accustomed to things working on the classical level.

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Speaker 1: So for to kind of ease into this. For me,

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Speaker 1: physics was an easy class in general. I was able

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Speaker 1: to grasp the concepts of physics pretty quickly. And the

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Speaker 1: reason I uh I give to that is because I

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Speaker 1: am a fairly observant person, and physics really was just

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Speaker 1: a way of explaining why the things I see work

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Speaker 1: the way they work. Yeah, I I didn't split off

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Speaker 1: on that vector very easily myself. Um, you know, I

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Speaker 1: think I think my interests in high school when I

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Speaker 1: took physics were not where they where they would have

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Speaker 1: been now, maybe I should go back through it. Well,

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Speaker 1: physics though, ultimately, I mean once you get past the

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Speaker 1: equations and the formulas, once you get past that, that barrier,

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Speaker 1: that mathematical barrier that exists for some of us. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I know there are math whizz is out there that

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Speaker 1: they they see mathematics as a beautiful expression of the universe,

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Speaker 1: which is phenomenal to me. It's just that doesn't come

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Speaker 1: naturally to me. However, the concepts behind it made perfect

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Speaker 1: sense to me because it described the world I live in. Right,

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Speaker 1: So so I'm like, well, of course, you know, the

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Speaker 1: deceleration from gravity makes sense because of this. I mean

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Speaker 1: I I can observe that and and draw conclusions from

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Speaker 1: and in fact, that's where physics comes from. It are

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Speaker 1: these observations of the universe, trying to make uh, explanations

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Speaker 1: for those observations, and predictions based on those observations, and

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Speaker 1: testing that out over time to make sure that they

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Speaker 1: are relevant and and accurate. Right, I mean, that's that

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Speaker 1: was the basis of that science. Well, right, I mean

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Speaker 1: it's easy for you to you know, shove a book

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Speaker 1: off the table and watch it hit the floor and

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Speaker 1: be able to explain that because that's something that you

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Speaker 1: can see, but quantum mechanics is not something that you

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Speaker 1: can see exactly. Quantum mechanics deals with elements that are

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Speaker 1: on the atomic or subatomic scale, So we're talking about

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Speaker 1: things that are so tiny that it is very difficult

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Speaker 1: to observe them in any classical sense. You can, you

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Speaker 1: can observe some quantum effects using a classical system, but

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Speaker 1: there are complications that will get into in a second.

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Speaker 1: But on the quantum level, things behave in a really weird,

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Speaker 1: funky way. And we don't fully understand all of the

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Speaker 1: the aspects of quantum mechanics. And when I say we,

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Speaker 1: I'm talking about super yeah, super smart people who make

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Speaker 1: it their livelihood to study and try to understand quantum mechanics.

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Speaker 1: We know bits and pieces. We don't know if there

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Speaker 1: is an overall system that everything fits neatly into place.

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Speaker 1: We we hope there is, so that we can explain everything,

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Speaker 1: but we can't know that yet. We just don't have.

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Speaker 1: You know, it's kind of like you've been given, uh,

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Speaker 1: five or six little tiny, tiny pieces of a puzzle

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Speaker 1: and you can't really be sure that they're all belonging

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Speaker 1: to the same picture. And you're trying to put the

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Speaker 1: picture together just based on those little tiny pieces, right right, Well,

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Speaker 1: and the analogy holds for classical computers. It's hard to

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Speaker 1: think of computers as being classical, but in this sense

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Speaker 1: classical computers versus quantum computers because um, when you talk

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Speaker 1: about the computers that we use every day, laptops, desktops,

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Speaker 1: other kinds of computers, we're talking about things that are

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Speaker 1: fairly standard. Now. I mean, we use materials like, uh,

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Speaker 1: silicon and mercury and lead and glass and all sorts

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Speaker 1: of other things that we are pretty familiar with. We

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Speaker 1: know how the properties work. Now we have the semiconductors

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Speaker 1: and transistors. You know, these things are are pretty common.

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Speaker 1: I mean can basically you know, computer science as far

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Speaker 1: as the hardware and software goes. And this also does

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Speaker 1: apply to programming. We'll get into that in a few minutes.

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Speaker 1: But um, you know, the the things are fairly standard

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Speaker 1: to the point where you know, the layman is pretty

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Speaker 1: familiar with the guts of a computer. But quantum computers

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Speaker 1: use materials that we don't use in classical computers at all.

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Speaker 1: And not only that, but in a system that is

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Speaker 1: really complex to the sense in the sense that you

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Speaker 1: have to you have to isolate the computing elements from

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Speaker 1: the overall system, because if you don't, the computer breaks down. Um.

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Speaker 1: But to understand that, we need to talk about some

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Speaker 1: of the the features of the quantum mechanics world. One

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Speaker 1: of those is the wave particle duality concept, which is

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Speaker 1: that certain elements, certain things behave as both a wave

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Speaker 1: and a particle. And the classic experiment to demonstrate this

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Speaker 1: is called the double slit experiment. Now, this is an

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Speaker 1: experiment where you have a thin sheet of material and

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Speaker 1: in that thin sheet of material you cut two vertical

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Speaker 1: slits that are close together, all right, and then behind

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Speaker 1: the thin sheet of material you've got a a wall,

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Speaker 1: essentially a target. You start to fire particles at this

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Speaker 1: sheet of material it has these two slits, and detect

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Speaker 1: where they hit on the on the target. Now, if

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Speaker 1: you were to shine light at this at this double

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Speaker 1: slitted material, you would observe on the other side, uh,

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Speaker 1: some some little bands of light where the lights passing

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Speaker 1: through the slits, and the bands would have little dark

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Speaker 1: sections between them or within them even which would show

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Speaker 1: where the waves of light are interfering with one another.

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Speaker 1: All right, So so you see the interference pattern from light,

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Speaker 1: And that's because light behaves, at least in part like

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Speaker 1: a wave. It can also behave as a particle, but

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Speaker 1: we'll get into that. So that's the wave behavior of

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Speaker 1: of light. You see that those inference patterns um. Now

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Speaker 1: let's say instead of light, you're firing electrons at these

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Speaker 1: double slits. Now, presumably you've got something on that wall

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Speaker 1: that's going to detect where the electron hits. After as

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Speaker 1: an individual shot of an electron going through those double slits,

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Speaker 1: you'll just see that it appears on one specific spot,

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Speaker 1: all right, So you're like, oh, well, here's where the

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Speaker 1: electron landed. Uh. After you've done repeated shots of electrons

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Speaker 1: through those double slits over and over and over again.

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Speaker 1: The interesting thing is when you look at the accumulation

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Speaker 1: of those spots, they're going to fall within that same

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Speaker 1: sort of uh pattern as the light did when the

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Speaker 1: wave forms were interfering with one another. So you're gonna

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Speaker 1: see those dark bands appear, showing that somehow the electron

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Speaker 1: is behaving both as a particle in a wave, meaning

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Speaker 1: that every time you fire an electron at that double

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Speaker 1: slit of material, the electron is somehow passing through each

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Speaker 1: of those slits, because it's only if there's an interference

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Speaker 1: that those bands are going to appear. Otherwise you wouldn't

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Speaker 1: expect to see the bands, like the dark bands within

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Speaker 1: the collision area. You wouldn't expect to see those appear

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Speaker 1: at all. Otherwise it would just be a continuous line

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Speaker 1: within wherever the double slits would allow the electron to hit.

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Speaker 1: That means that somehow the electron is in two places

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Speaker 1: at one time, and it's only you know, it's doing

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Speaker 1: that while it's moving through, but by the time it hits,

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Speaker 1: when you look at it, it's clear that it's it

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Speaker 1: had to be in one space because there's only one

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Speaker 1: impact point per electron. Now, this is insane to someone

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Speaker 1: who's looking at this on the classical level. How how

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Speaker 1: can something be in two places at the same time

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Speaker 1: and yet ultimately be in one place at the end

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Speaker 1: of it. That would be a good time to pause

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Speaker 1: the podcast and take some headache reliever medicine. Yeah, because

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Speaker 1: it's gonna get weirder from here on out, all right. So,

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Speaker 1: there were people who had been there's some people who

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Speaker 1: had some problems with this idea of of the wave

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Speaker 1: particle duality. Of this this idea of not just that

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Speaker 1: something can behave as both wave and a particle, but

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Speaker 1: that it could somehow be in two places at one time.

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Speaker 1: Einstein had some issues with this um and created some

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Speaker 1: thought experiments. But there's an UH and and and then

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Speaker 1: there were There's a related concept, at least related within

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Speaker 1: quantum mechanics called entanglement, which is this is also pretty complex,

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Speaker 1: but the ideas essentially is that let's say you've got

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Speaker 1: a particle and it has a certain number of states

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Speaker 1: it can exist in. In other words, there's some sort

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Speaker 1: of feature or behavior this particle can have or not have,

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Speaker 1: and that that one way of describing this particle. Now

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Speaker 1: we'll go with electrons and say that this electron could

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Speaker 1: have one of two different spins, so it could be

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Speaker 1: spinning up or it could be spinning down. Now UH.

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Speaker 1: Within quantum mechanics, another, yet another UH concept is called superposition.

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Speaker 1: Superposition describes a system's ability to to occupy multiple states

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Speaker 1: at one time, like there's no way to determine until

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Speaker 1: you measure it which state it's in, So therefore it's

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Speaker 1: in all of those states at the same time. And

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Speaker 1: the best part is if you observe this, you will

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Speaker 1: affect what's actually happening. Yes, it it goes through decoherence.

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Speaker 1: It decoheres, which means that the quantum state collapses and

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Speaker 1: it becomes a classic system, not a quantum system, at

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Speaker 1: least to the observer, which means that, so you have

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Speaker 1: this electron that could be either spinning up or spinning down.

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Speaker 1: From a quantum level, we would say it's doing both

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Speaker 1: at the same time, which is because it's a Superposition's

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Speaker 1: a superposition right Mathematically, if we were to describe the system,

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Speaker 1: we would have to say it's doing both because we

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Speaker 1: cannot determine at this time which one it is um

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Speaker 1: and it behaves as if it's doing both in multiple experiments.

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Speaker 1: So entanglement means that you could have another particle interact

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Speaker 1: with that first one, and then its behavior is dependent

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Speaker 1: there or their behaviors are dependent upon each other. So

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Speaker 1: in the classic sense of the electron spinning up, you

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Speaker 1: might have a second electron that you introduce into this system,

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Speaker 1: and it's always going to spin down if the other

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Speaker 1: one spinning up, and vice versa. Now again, if you

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Speaker 1: haven't measured it yet, you cannot be certain which what

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Speaker 1: electrons are doing what So both electrons are acting in superposition.

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Speaker 1: They're both spinning up and down. There, that's what they're doing.

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Speaker 1: They're spinning up and down. And it's only when you

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Speaker 1: measure one that you determine that that the system collapses

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Speaker 1: and you see, all right, it's spinning up. Well, by

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Speaker 1: knowing that that spent that electron is spinning up, you

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Speaker 1: then know the other electron, which has entangled with the

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Speaker 1: first one, is spinning down and you don't have to

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Speaker 1: mess with it. You're want to measure it. If you

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Speaker 1: do measure it, you realize it's spinning down. So you've

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Speaker 1: already determined the measurement by measuring the first one. Uh.

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Speaker 1: Now this Einstein also had a big problem with because

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Speaker 1: entanglement is uh there are certain types of entanglement that

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Speaker 1: are have non locality. So locality is talking about how

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Speaker 1: close these things are to one another. If you have

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Speaker 1: a system that where you've got entangled particles that are

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Speaker 1: non local, it means that it doesn't matter how far

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Speaker 1: so that if you measure one, you know the other one.

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Speaker 1: This in theory gives us the ability to communicate over

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Speaker 1: huge distances. Um, if we're able to manipulate this in

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Speaker 1: such a way so that uh, the information, like you know,

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Speaker 1: the information that exists in another location, no matter how

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Speaker 1: far away it is, Like even if it's on the

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Speaker 1: other side of the universe, you instantly know the state

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Speaker 1: of that particle. That means that you the information has

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Speaker 1: traveled faster than the speed of light. That's the problem

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Speaker 1: Einstein had, because nothing travels faster than the speed of light,

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Speaker 1: except possibly information. So if I've got a system here

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Speaker 1: on Earth, and there's another system across the universe, perhaps

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Speaker 1: set to a Beatles tune, uh felt that one coming.

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Speaker 1: I can, I can, and and my system is entangled

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Speaker 1: with that system. By by observing and measuring my system,

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Speaker 1: I now know the state of the other system across

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Speaker 1: the universe without having to be there to measure it.

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Speaker 1: And and this is again kind of crazy for anyone

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Speaker 1: who's thinking up from a classical point of view, because

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Speaker 1: it's that's just not the way stuff appears to work

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Speaker 1: to us on the macro level. Now, I wish I

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Speaker 1: had remembered my pain reliever medication. I do, However, I

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Speaker 1: hope to avoid any imperial entanglements. Nice, thank you, thank

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Speaker 1: you made the Kessel running twelve post sex. It's fast

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Speaker 1: enough for you, old man. Um. So yeah, so quantum

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Speaker 1: computers rely on this idea on on multiple ideas, superpositions

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Speaker 1: and entanglement in particular, and uh and just another aside.

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Speaker 1: I know we've done a lot of prep works here

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Speaker 1: in the sides, but it's it is really important to

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Speaker 1: kind of get that that information about quantum mechanics across um.

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Speaker 1: You may have heard of a thought experiment called Schrodinger's cat,

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Speaker 1: and Chris actually alluded to it earlier in the podcast.

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Speaker 1: Schrodinger's Cat was and uh, well, Schroedinger was using this

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Speaker 1: as a thought experiment to kind of show the absurdity

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Speaker 1: of the quantum world compared to the classical world um.

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Speaker 1: And it wasn't necessarily to ever state that such an

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Speaker 1: experiment is should be carried out, but rather just that

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Speaker 1: it shows how how how insane to us this world is.

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Speaker 1: Troanjer's thought experiment is this. You've got a steel box.

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Speaker 1: You put a cat in the steel box. The steel

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Speaker 1: box also has a Geiger counter which has some nuclear material,

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Speaker 1: some radioactive material in it. That's undergoing radioactive decay um

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Speaker 1: and within an hour and atom of this material within

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Speaker 1: the Geiger counter may or may not decay into another element.

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Speaker 1: All right, so you've got you've got uh this this uh,

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Speaker 1: this uncertainty here. You don't know whether or not that

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Speaker 1: adam is going to decay within an hour. The guy

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Speaker 1: your counter is hooked up to a system where if

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Speaker 1: it detects that an adom has decayed, it will break

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Speaker 1: some glass and some acid will be released into the box,

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Speaker 1: which will kill the cat. You seal the box and

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Speaker 1: you wait an hour, so you don't know if the

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Speaker 1: atom has decayed within that hour. Now, based upon the

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Speaker 1: the traditional interpretation of quantum mechanics and this idea of superposition,

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Speaker 1: you would say that the cat before you open the

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Speaker 1: box to observe it, is both alive and dead. It

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Speaker 1: has to exist in both states at the same time.

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Speaker 1: And only by opening the box and observing it will

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Speaker 1: this quantum state collapse. It'll decohere and you will see

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Speaker 1: definitively whether the cat is alive or dead. Now, there

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Speaker 1: are a lot of philosophical objections to this. Not not

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's all thought experiment anyway, right, It's not

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Speaker 1: like people are actually gonna do this, but philosophical in

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Speaker 1: the sense of, wait a minute, So from the cat's perspective,

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Speaker 1: it's going to know whether or not it was dead. Well,

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Speaker 1: if it's dead, it doesn't know anything. If it's alive,

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Speaker 1: then it knows it didn't die. So the point being

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Speaker 1: that how can you say it is both alive or

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Speaker 1: dead because it's going to have no memory of such

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Speaker 1: a being in such a state. Others have said that.

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Speaker 1: Another objection is that, well, we talk about measuring a system,

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Speaker 1: and that's what causes it to collapse. Some people would

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Speaker 1: argue that it that opening up the box isn't necessary

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Speaker 1: for that system to be measured. The Geiger counter inside

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Speaker 1: the system is already a measuring device and is measuring

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Speaker 1: part of that system, and just by measuring part of

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Speaker 1: the system, it deco hears and becomes a classical system,

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Speaker 1: so that the cat, the cat's life or death is

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Speaker 1: not It's never a superposition thing in the first place.

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Speaker 1: But this is one of those thought experiments that is

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Speaker 1: meant to kind of make people think about this and

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Speaker 1: try and figure out, all, right, well, how do we

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Speaker 1: resolve this problem of our description of how the universe

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Speaker 1: works and we don't have all the answers yet. There

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Speaker 1: are a lot of different interpretations two quantum mechanics, and

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Speaker 1: they some of them are fairly contradictory to one another.

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Speaker 1: And you've got adherence to multiple different approaches and we

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Speaker 1: don't have the full solution yet. This finally brings us

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Speaker 1: to quantum computers. So here's another crazy thing about innovation.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes we find out that something really cool happens when

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Speaker 1: we do a certain action and we don't really know

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Speaker 1: the mechanism behind it, but we go ahead and build

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Speaker 1: stuff anyway. Yeah, a lot of sometimes great things happen

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Speaker 1: because of this. Sometimes bombs happen because of this. But

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Speaker 1: quantum computers almost fits into that realm because we don't have,

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Speaker 1: like I said, a full understanding of quantum mechanics. But

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Speaker 1: the idea behind the quantum computer is that you create

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Speaker 1: some sort of system that uses sub atomic particles that

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Speaker 1: have a particular feature, Like I was talking with the

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Speaker 1: electron spin. That could be an example. It's not the

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Speaker 1: only one, but it is an example of this. And

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Speaker 1: you know that because of superposition, the electrons spin is

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Speaker 1: all every every type of spin that it can be. Well,

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Speaker 1: if you translate this into the classical computer system, which

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Speaker 1: relies on bits. And if you've listened to our Logic

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Speaker 1: Gates episode, we talked a lot about this. There are

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Speaker 1: two states a bit can be in orffe yeah, or

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Speaker 1: one or zero. Yes, exactly, because you said on or off,

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Speaker 1: I was going to confuse everybody. Yes, or true or false.

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Speaker 1: That would be the other way of looking at it, right.

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Speaker 1: It can't be both true and false, right, right, So yeah,

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Speaker 1: an individual bit is either going to be true or false,

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Speaker 1: one or zero, on or off in a classical classical computer. Now,

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Speaker 1: quantum computers use something called cubits. They're also great for

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Speaker 1: measuring an arc. Actually, cub i t. The cub it

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Speaker 1: in a quantum bit is a qub it, which is

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Speaker 1: a little orange guy who hops up and down pyramids.

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Speaker 1: Uh no, wait, that's cue Bert. So cube bit is

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Speaker 1: a is is the fundamental element of information within a

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Speaker 1: quantum computer system, and unlike a regular classical computer bit,

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Speaker 1: a cubit is able to be a zero or a one,

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Speaker 1: or any value of zero or one or all of them,

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Speaker 1: or all of the values of zero or one. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's not confusing. It exists in superposition, and so if

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Speaker 1: you have two cubits together, then you've got all the

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Speaker 1: different combinations of zero and one that two bits would have.

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Speaker 1: H three cubits, you've got all the different combinations of

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Speaker 1: zero and one that three bits would have. So exponentially

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Speaker 1: it becomes a more powerful computer for certain computing problems.

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Speaker 1: Haircut two. Yeah. So you you keep on adding more

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Speaker 1: and more cubits, You've just created an incredibly powerful theoretical computer.

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Speaker 1: And there have been some some advances in creating computers

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Speaker 1: that use cubit technology. Uh, although we still have a

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Speaker 1: lot of ground to cover in order to really make

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Speaker 1: one that is um, that is practical. Yes, as a

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Speaker 1: matter of fact, you listed some of those I believe

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Speaker 1: that I I might have there. Well, there is a

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Speaker 1: list in the article how quantum computers work on the website.

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Speaker 1: Kevin Vonsa and I both worked on this article, and

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Speaker 1: it's yeah, it's there have been several the first being

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Speaker 1: back in where am I t researchers and Lost Alamos

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Speaker 1: researchers were able to create a single cube it across

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Speaker 1: three nuclear spins in a molecule of or in in molecules,

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Speaker 1: I should say, of a liquid solution of of alanine,

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Speaker 1: which is an amino acid. Yeah, this is what I

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Speaker 1: was talking about before. We're not using the traditional materials,

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Speaker 1: the silicon and metals that we use to manipulate information

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Speaker 1: in a classical computer. This this kind of computer is

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Speaker 1: going to require a brand new style of physical architecture. Yes,

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Speaker 1: And remember when I mentioned about superposition and entanglement and decoherents.

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Speaker 1: That's the reason why you have to be able to

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Speaker 1: isolate the actual computing element from the system it's end,

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Speaker 1: because if it comes into contact with the system, it's

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Speaker 1: and you you have that problem of decoherens and quantum collapse,

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Speaker 1: or you have a problem of entanglement where the system

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Speaker 1: is getting entangled with the actual environment it's in and

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Speaker 1: it's no longer able to do what you needed to do. Uh.

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Speaker 1: These are real problems and it's it's there's no easy

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Speaker 1: way to describe the solution to it. And there are

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Speaker 1: a lot of different approaches that that scientists are are

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Speaker 1: taking to try and create quantum computers, including a creating

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Speaker 1: quantum computers that operate at a temperature close to absolute zero, yes,

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Speaker 1: which is very very cold absolute zero by the way,

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Speaker 1: In case you do not know that is the point

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Speaker 1: where you have no molecular movement whatsoever. Uh, And even

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Speaker 1: deep space usually be is a few uh kelvin over

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Speaker 1: absolute zero because it's it's not easy to create a

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Speaker 1: system where every single molecule in that system is is

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Speaker 1: completely motionless. Yeah, that's that's one of the troubles here

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Speaker 1: is that this is not something that's easy to achieve,

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Speaker 1: no or cheap. It's really expensive that too. So what

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Speaker 1: kind of problems could a quantum computer solve. Let's say

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Speaker 1: that we've created a quantum computer and it exists with

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Speaker 1: these cubits that can have any sort of value of zero, one,

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Speaker 1: or all of those values all at the same time.

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Speaker 1: What would you use that for? Well, you wouldn't use

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Speaker 1: it to play doom. No. One of the advantages of

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Speaker 1: quantum computers is that the superposition of the cubits would theoretically,

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Speaker 1: assuming that you know, we get to the point where

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Speaker 1: we can have a fully operational um. Yes, uh, fully

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Speaker 1: operational quantum computer. You you could theoretically. Now we talked

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Speaker 1: about parallel processors before, we're talking infinite parallelism um, which

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Speaker 1: means that you could crunch a massive amount of data

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Speaker 1: and no time flat The thing is. You're right, you

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Speaker 1: could use it for something like do but that would

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Speaker 1: be like trying to cut open a grape with a chainsaw. Oh,

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Speaker 1: you might as well just use a regular computer, because

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Speaker 1: it's not gonna do that. It's not gonna it's not

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Speaker 1: good for doing um, simple computing problems. It's not gonna

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Speaker 1: do those any faster than a classical computer. Not really.

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Speaker 1: It's it's meant for doing very specific types of computer problems.

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Speaker 1: For example, factoring large prime numbers, which is the basis

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Speaker 1: of a lot of cryptography out there. Not all cryptography,

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Speaker 1: but a lot of it. So when you encrypt files, uh,

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Speaker 1: one of the methods of encryption involves taking a large

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Speaker 1: prime number. And when I say large, I'm talking hundreds

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Speaker 1: of digits long. All right. You take this incredibly long

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Speaker 1: prime number. Then you take another prime number of approximately

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Speaker 1: the same number of digits, but a different one. So

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Speaker 1: you've got two different, really really really large prime numbers.

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Speaker 1: You multiply the two together. You get a product. Yes,

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Speaker 1: you give that product to someone else. If they have

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Speaker 1: one of those two large prime numbers, they've got the

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Speaker 1: key to figuring out the other large prime number. And

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Speaker 1: then you can use that to encrypt information. But if

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Speaker 1: they do not have the key, if they do not

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Speaker 1: have one of those two large prime numbers, they have

429
00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:19,920
Speaker 1: to figure out, all right, what two prime numbers were

430
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:23,160
Speaker 1: multiplied to create this product. And when you're talking about

431
00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 1: a number that large, breaking that down, breaking that encryption

432
00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:32,240
Speaker 1: can take years or centuries with a classical computer, because

433
00:27:32,240 --> 00:27:34,199
Speaker 1: the classical computer what's going to do is it's going

434
00:27:34,240 --> 00:27:37,760
Speaker 1: to start finding the factors for that particular product, and

435
00:27:37,760 --> 00:27:39,920
Speaker 1: then it has to determine which ones are prime numbers

436
00:27:39,920 --> 00:27:42,800
Speaker 1: and which ones arn't. So I might start with, all right,

437
00:27:43,520 --> 00:27:47,320
Speaker 1: is it divisible why two? Yes? So is the other

438
00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:51,840
Speaker 1: number a prime number? No? Alright? Is it divisible by three? Yes?

439
00:27:52,359 --> 00:27:54,159
Speaker 1: All right? Is the other number of prime number? No?

440
00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:56,600
Speaker 1: All right? Is a divisible wy four? Weight? That doesn't

441
00:27:56,640 --> 00:27:59,199
Speaker 1: matter because four is not a prime number. So I

442
00:27:59,200 --> 00:28:01,399
Speaker 1: mean no, no, it would have to figure That's what

443
00:28:01,440 --> 00:28:03,760
Speaker 1: the classical computer would have to do. It goes bit

444
00:28:03,800 --> 00:28:06,159
Speaker 1: by bit by bit. Now I was just imagining the

445
00:28:06,160 --> 00:28:11,320
Speaker 1: computer argument. No are you idiots? I thought I had it,

446
00:28:11,480 --> 00:28:13,760
Speaker 1: and then it turns out four is not a prime number.

447
00:28:14,480 --> 00:28:17,400
Speaker 1: Oh sorry, I see these things in my I see

448
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:21,639
Speaker 1: this in my head. Yeah, anyway. Yeah, so yeah, has

449
00:28:21,680 --> 00:28:23,679
Speaker 1: to go through the entire series. Right, And and if

450
00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:27,000
Speaker 1: you're talking about parallel program or parallel computing, Uh, if

451
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:30,200
Speaker 1: you have a computer that has a multi core processor, well,

452
00:28:30,240 --> 00:28:32,360
Speaker 1: each core of that processor may be able to work

453
00:28:32,440 --> 00:28:35,280
Speaker 1: on a part of a problem similar to this and

454
00:28:35,320 --> 00:28:38,400
Speaker 1: thus solve it in less time. But when we're talking

455
00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:42,480
Speaker 1: about these large prime numbers in this encryption technique, even

456
00:28:42,520 --> 00:28:45,200
Speaker 1: a multi core processor would take centuries to solve it.

457
00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:47,480
Speaker 1: It's not it's not fast enough to really reduce that

458
00:28:47,520 --> 00:28:49,600
Speaker 1: time to a practical limit. Yeah, a lot of our

459
00:28:49,640 --> 00:28:53,200
Speaker 1: our computers today use quad core processes, and that's great

460
00:28:53,280 --> 00:28:56,160
Speaker 1: for doing all kinds of everyday stuff, but working on

461
00:28:56,160 --> 00:28:59,720
Speaker 1: a problem of that magnitude just doesn't and it would

462
00:28:59,760 --> 00:29:01,240
Speaker 1: take a well, it's still gonna take a long time.

463
00:29:01,240 --> 00:29:04,280
Speaker 1: We're gonna get to I'm sure eight and sixteen core processors,

464
00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:07,480
Speaker 1: but still, and even if you create a grid computing

465
00:29:07,520 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 1: network where you have uh, you are you are leveraging

466
00:29:12,160 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 1: the processing power of multiple computers, each computer with multiple processors,

467
00:29:16,880 --> 00:29:20,400
Speaker 1: Even then it's taking it's gonna take ages to solve

468
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:24,920
Speaker 1: this problem. But using a quantum computer with enough cubits

469
00:29:24,960 --> 00:29:28,480
Speaker 1: where where it has enough cubits for all the different inputs. UM.

470
00:29:28,520 --> 00:29:32,400
Speaker 1: It can then run this sort of problem where since

471
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:35,520
Speaker 1: all the cupids are are in superposition uh and it

472
00:29:35,560 --> 00:29:38,920
Speaker 1: can run all all the different potential solutions in parallel

473
00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:41,680
Speaker 1: and come back with a solution in seconds where it

474
00:29:41,760 --> 00:29:45,480
Speaker 1: might take centuries for a classical computer system. UH. There

475
00:29:45,480 --> 00:29:49,240
Speaker 1: are a few problems with this, the first being that

476
00:29:49,760 --> 00:29:53,400
Speaker 1: UM as soon as you observe the system, you have

477
00:29:53,560 --> 00:29:57,080
Speaker 1: broken down that it decoheres and you and it becomes

478
00:29:57,080 --> 00:29:59,760
Speaker 1: a classical computer. So you just turned your quantum computer

479
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:03,320
Speaker 1: into a classical computer and this is not reversible. Oops.

480
00:30:04,080 --> 00:30:07,840
Speaker 1: Also the other problem being that the solutions that a

481
00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:14,200
Speaker 1: quantum computer represents are given in terms of probability, not

482
00:30:14,360 --> 00:30:17,680
Speaker 1: in terms of certainty. So in other words, you're going

483
00:30:17,760 --> 00:30:24,520
Speaker 1: to receive a series of solutions and you'll essentially know

484
00:30:24,640 --> 00:30:26,920
Speaker 1: which one it has the most probability of being the

485
00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:33,320
Speaker 1: correct solution, but it may take multiple calculations to UH

486
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:38,160
Speaker 1: two make that probability feel like that like that's the

487
00:30:38,160 --> 00:30:41,680
Speaker 1: answer you want to go with UM And and even so,

488
00:30:42,640 --> 00:30:46,120
Speaker 1: there's still some problems that a quantum computer just may

489
00:30:46,200 --> 00:30:49,680
Speaker 1: or may not be good at solving and there's added

490
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:53,880
Speaker 1: complexity here. If you remember back to our logic Gates

491
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:58,320
Speaker 1: episode just a few weeks ago, we were talking about

492
00:30:58,400 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 1: certain how how logic can classical computers flows in a

493
00:31:02,040 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 1: certain direction, and there are some logical operations that cannot

494
00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:10,320
Speaker 1: be reversed. Here here's here's part of the problem. In

495
00:31:10,440 --> 00:31:15,360
Speaker 1: quantum computers, all operations have to be reversed. I mean

496
00:31:15,560 --> 00:31:18,120
Speaker 1: they have to be reversible. So some of the logical

497
00:31:18,160 --> 00:31:22,080
Speaker 1: operations used in classical computing just don't operate the same

498
00:31:22,120 --> 00:31:26,120
Speaker 1: way with quantum logic. And in addition to this, the

499
00:31:26,120 --> 00:31:31,160
Speaker 1: superposition of the cubits also requires a different style of programming.

500
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:33,480
Speaker 1: You have to be able to write programs in a

501
00:31:33,520 --> 00:31:37,840
Speaker 1: completely different way quantum algorithms using quantum algorithms, and that

502
00:31:37,880 --> 00:31:43,640
Speaker 1: means again you can't play doom on it. So which

503
00:31:43,640 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 1: is still is a huge bummer to be big doom

504
00:31:46,040 --> 00:31:48,920
Speaker 1: fans well know that. But if you if you back

505
00:31:48,960 --> 00:31:51,560
Speaker 1: off of this, we're looking at the big picture here

506
00:31:51,560 --> 00:31:56,280
Speaker 1: and not you know, the quantum picture quantum computers since

507
00:31:56,480 --> 00:31:59,600
Speaker 1: since they use such a different way of computing and

508
00:32:00,320 --> 00:32:04,520
Speaker 1: it's a different physical architecture, it's a different intellectual architecture

509
00:32:04,560 --> 00:32:08,760
Speaker 1: and programming. That means you have to completely reinvent the

510
00:32:08,760 --> 00:32:14,160
Speaker 1: way you compute, and it's not an inexpensive way to

511
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:20,000
Speaker 1: re engineer the computer either. So although people are building

512
00:32:20,080 --> 00:32:23,760
Speaker 1: quantum computers, it is unlikely that we're going to see

513
00:32:23,760 --> 00:32:27,680
Speaker 1: them on our desktops and our laptops. It's not even

514
00:32:28,120 --> 00:32:30,280
Speaker 1: It may even be years before we see one that

515
00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 1: is truly capable of of doing the things that we

516
00:32:33,960 --> 00:32:37,600
Speaker 1: suspect quantum computers are capable of doing. Um and and

517
00:32:38,480 --> 00:32:41,320
Speaker 1: the kinds of problems that quantum computers can tackle are

518
00:32:41,440 --> 00:32:45,880
Speaker 1: generally called b q P problems, which stands for bounded

519
00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:52,280
Speaker 1: error quantum polynomial time problems. Yeah uh, and so they

520
00:32:53,720 --> 00:32:55,520
Speaker 1: that's those are the ones that those are the type

521
00:32:55,520 --> 00:32:59,000
Speaker 1: of problems that quantum computers we think would be ideal

522
00:32:59,120 --> 00:33:01,840
Speaker 1: for solving. But of course not all problems fall into

523
00:33:01,920 --> 00:33:06,160
Speaker 1: that category. There's another kind of problem that may or

524
00:33:06,240 --> 00:33:09,080
Speaker 1: may not be at all connected to b q P

525
00:33:09,080 --> 00:33:14,080
Speaker 1: problems called MP complete problems. And I'm not gonna get

526
00:33:14,080 --> 00:33:16,120
Speaker 1: into too much detail here because we're gonna have to

527
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,959
Speaker 1: really dive into complex computer science in order to explain it.

528
00:33:20,000 --> 00:33:24,160
Speaker 1: But um, but in general, there some people have proposed

529
00:33:24,160 --> 00:33:27,720
Speaker 1: that quantum computers could possibly solve NP complete problems. And

530
00:33:27,720 --> 00:33:30,040
Speaker 1: there are other people who completely disagree and say, no,

531
00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:34,160
Speaker 1: MP complete problems fall outside the realm of what a

532
00:33:34,200 --> 00:33:38,000
Speaker 1: quantum computer could could attack. I'll just give you an

533
00:33:38,040 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 1: example of an MP complete problem. And again this is

534
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:44,840
Speaker 1: just an example, not a This isn't like the end

535
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:48,640
Speaker 1: all be all, Okay, it's uh. This is called this

536
00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:53,720
Speaker 1: is an MP hard problem. Uh, the traveling salesman problem. Mhmm.

537
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:56,240
Speaker 1: Have you heard about this one. I've had a problem

538
00:33:56,280 --> 00:33:58,840
Speaker 1: with some traveling salesman before. Well, this is a little

539
00:33:58,840 --> 00:34:02,479
Speaker 1: bit different than that, the so that you've heard about that.

540
00:34:03,440 --> 00:34:05,360
Speaker 1: I guess everybody read about that in the paper. You

541
00:34:05,400 --> 00:34:08,440
Speaker 1: know you eventually you're gonna if you listen hard enough.

542
00:34:08,560 --> 00:34:11,399
Speaker 1: I just don't tamper with my ankle bracelet, and everything's okay. Now,

543
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:13,160
Speaker 1: Really I should say that the this is an MP

544
00:34:13,360 --> 00:34:17,319
Speaker 1: hard problem, uh, not necessarily an MP complete problem, because

545
00:34:17,320 --> 00:34:18,640
Speaker 1: I want to say that before we have all our

546
00:34:18,680 --> 00:34:22,160
Speaker 1: math mathematicians right in, but I wanna you know, again,

547
00:34:22,200 --> 00:34:24,439
Speaker 1: this is one of those things where we know a lot,

548
00:34:24,560 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 1: but we don't know all the intricacies, all the connections

549
00:34:27,560 --> 00:34:30,160
Speaker 1: between these types of math problems to be able to

550
00:34:30,200 --> 00:34:33,200
Speaker 1: say definitively what is and is not solvable by a

551
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:37,719
Speaker 1: quantum computer. But it's a The traveling salesman problem is

552
00:34:37,760 --> 00:34:41,719
Speaker 1: a sort of an optimization problem. Right. So we say

553
00:34:41,719 --> 00:34:44,680
Speaker 1: that you are a traveling salesman. You have a list

554
00:34:44,719 --> 00:34:47,920
Speaker 1: of cities that you need to visit on your route

555
00:34:47,960 --> 00:34:51,439
Speaker 1: to to make sales. And it's your job to try

556
00:34:51,440 --> 00:34:55,480
Speaker 1: and determine the fastest or the shortest route to take

557
00:34:55,840 --> 00:34:59,680
Speaker 1: where you don't uh retrace your steps at all among

558
00:34:59,760 --> 00:35:03,480
Speaker 1: the those cities. And then every time you add another

559
00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:07,000
Speaker 1: city to that list, you have just made the problem

560
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:11,800
Speaker 1: much more complex. And it's determining, all right, well, there

561
00:35:11,840 --> 00:35:15,880
Speaker 1: are in number of possible routes for me to take,

562
00:35:16,000 --> 00:35:18,120
Speaker 1: and only one of them is going to result in

563
00:35:18,160 --> 00:35:22,359
Speaker 1: the shortest distance between two spaces. But then you add

564
00:35:22,360 --> 00:35:24,439
Speaker 1: another city, all right, well, now it's in plus one,

565
00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:27,279
Speaker 1: in plus two, and in in plus three. And that's the

566
00:35:27,320 --> 00:35:30,719
Speaker 1: sort of problem that could maybe be solved by a

567
00:35:30,800 --> 00:35:35,040
Speaker 1: quantum computer. It's it's hard to determine. I mean, it's

568
00:35:35,160 --> 00:35:37,680
Speaker 1: again whether or not it falls into that realm of

569
00:35:37,719 --> 00:35:41,320
Speaker 1: b QP. But that's sort of the that's an example

570
00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:45,000
Speaker 1: of a problem that may not be solvable by quantum computers.

571
00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:48,600
Speaker 1: We've seen quantum computers actually tackle problems like Pseudoku puzzles.

572
00:35:49,640 --> 00:35:53,080
Speaker 1: So there are some, uh of these sort of parallel

573
00:35:53,080 --> 00:35:56,080
Speaker 1: problems that we know quantum computers could tackle. We just

574
00:35:56,160 --> 00:36:03,799
Speaker 1: don't know the full extent of it. It's complicated, man. Well,

575
00:36:03,840 --> 00:36:06,360
Speaker 1: it is interesting to think that they have they have

576
00:36:06,440 --> 00:36:09,560
Speaker 1: been able to build some quantum computers, even to the

577
00:36:09,560 --> 00:36:12,800
Speaker 1: point where they're they're operating on a que bite which

578
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:18,440
Speaker 1: is eight que bits um. You know, I'm I'm fascinated

579
00:36:18,520 --> 00:36:23,719
Speaker 1: by this, but it is pretty amazing stuff. I mean,

580
00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:28,120
Speaker 1: it's it's really not simple even for maybe even probably

581
00:36:28,160 --> 00:36:31,840
Speaker 1: because I am so immersed in the world of classical computing,

582
00:36:32,200 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 1: you know, I've done programming and some of the immersed

583
00:36:35,120 --> 00:36:38,759
Speaker 1: in the classical world period. Yeah, yeah, and I think

584
00:36:39,040 --> 00:36:42,880
Speaker 1: of it's hard for me to imagine something existing in

585
00:36:42,920 --> 00:36:47,520
Speaker 1: more than one state at the same time. So, um, here,

586
00:36:47,760 --> 00:36:51,160
Speaker 1: I I was gonna say, in doing my story, say

587
00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:53,520
Speaker 1: and doing my research, I read an article called an

588
00:36:53,560 --> 00:36:57,720
Speaker 1: Introduction to Quantum Computing for non Physicists by Eleanor Reefal

589
00:36:57,800 --> 00:37:02,080
Speaker 1: and wolf GETG. Pollock. Um I beg to differ with

590
00:37:02,120 --> 00:37:05,279
Speaker 1: the non physicist part, but it still was it still

591
00:37:05,320 --> 00:37:07,239
Speaker 1: was a good read, and they broke down a lot

592
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 1: of things, but they really got into it, and I

593
00:37:09,080 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 1: would uh suggest that if you're really interested in reading that.

594
00:37:11,719 --> 00:37:14,759
Speaker 1: In addition to the article on how stuff works dot com,

595
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:18,520
Speaker 1: how quantum computers work, and we have other interesting quantum

596
00:37:18,640 --> 00:37:20,799
Speaker 1: articles on the site, the big one being the one

597
00:37:20,840 --> 00:37:23,480
Speaker 1: that the one that's a favorite of our general manager

598
00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:27,480
Speaker 1: is quantum suicide. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know how many

599
00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:30,480
Speaker 1: times has Connell mentioned quantum suicide. I don't know, but

600
00:37:30,520 --> 00:37:31,920
Speaker 1: it's well, it's a favorite of a lot of our

601
00:37:31,960 --> 00:37:35,960
Speaker 1: fans too. It's indicative, it's indicative of a deeper psychological issue,

602
00:37:35,960 --> 00:37:42,160
Speaker 1: I think. And that concludes this final episode text stuff.

603
00:37:42,600 --> 00:37:46,640
Speaker 1: I don't know this, Connell, so listen, hey conal uh So, anyway, guys,

604
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:50,640
Speaker 1: that wraps up our discussion of quantum computers and again

605
00:37:50,520 --> 00:37:55,359
Speaker 1: the applications for this maybe a complete revolution of how

606
00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:59,319
Speaker 1: we do cryptography. For example, because if quantum computers are

607
00:37:59,320 --> 00:38:04,480
Speaker 1: capable of breaking down those those um those large factor numbers,

608
00:38:04,800 --> 00:38:07,600
Speaker 1: then clearly that would no longer be a safe way

609
00:38:08,000 --> 00:38:11,319
Speaker 1: to encrypt information. And again, it's not the only way

610
00:38:11,320 --> 00:38:13,160
Speaker 1: to encrypt information, but it would just mean that we'd

611
00:38:13,160 --> 00:38:15,279
Speaker 1: have to move away from that and adopt something else

612
00:38:15,320 --> 00:38:17,440
Speaker 1: that quantum computers might not be so good at doing

613
00:38:18,160 --> 00:38:22,680
Speaker 1: um calling missnomials polynomial nice and on that theorem. We

614
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:25,640
Speaker 1: are going to conclude this episode. If you guys want

615
00:38:25,719 --> 00:38:28,319
Speaker 1: us to tackle a subject, maybe something that's you know,

616
00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:32,840
Speaker 1: less fuzzy and scary and spooky, or Einstein would call

617
00:38:32,880 --> 00:38:35,200
Speaker 1: it spooky. He called it spooky action. That was the

618
00:38:35,200 --> 00:38:39,400
Speaker 1: whole entanglement thing. Um. Einstein was pretty awesome. Yeah, If

619
00:38:39,400 --> 00:38:42,440
Speaker 1: you guys want us to tackle a similar subject, or

620
00:38:42,480 --> 00:38:44,680
Speaker 1: there's just something totally different you think that we should

621
00:38:44,680 --> 00:38:47,400
Speaker 1: talk about, let us know. Drop us an email. Our

622
00:38:47,440 --> 00:38:50,760
Speaker 1: address is text stuff at how stuff Works dot com,

623
00:38:50,880 --> 00:38:53,600
Speaker 1: or let us know on Facebook or Twitter that handle

624
00:38:53,680 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: there is Text Stuff h s W. Chris and I

625
00:38:57,560 --> 00:39:02,480
Speaker 1: will talk to you again really soon. Be sure to

626
00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:05,360
Speaker 1: check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future.

627
00:39:05,680 --> 00:39:08,000
Speaker 1: Join How Stuff Work staff as we explore the most

628
00:39:08,000 --> 00:39:12,839
Speaker 1: promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. The House Stuff Works

629
00:39:12,840 --> 00:39:20,919
Speaker 1: iPhone app has arrived. Download it today on iTunes. Brought

630
00:39:20,960 --> 00:39:24,160
Speaker 1: to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera it's ready.

631
00:39:24,320 --> 00:39:24,719
Speaker 1: Are you