[MD] Quantum computing

[ian glendinning]

Ham, and Magnus,

It's easy to scoff at Ray Kurzweil's exaggerated hype, but it's also
easy to miss the point. (And what's wrong with clouds ?) Anyway ...

You asked Ham
"Is Pirsig's philosophy built on cybernetic information?"

Well yes it is, kind of.. Look at his life story. As well as
motorcycles and barbecue sculptures, Pirsig documented manuals for
early computing and control devices. recognising the "value in the
machine". (I also suspect you are using a narrow idea of cybernetics.)

Anyway there are two important points.

Magnus makes a distinction between the "Digital" nature of most
current commercial computing - (though I could point out that 31 years
ago I was programming pilot interactions with simulated flight using
analogue computers - they don't make 'em like that anymore) - and the
"Qubital" nature of the (physical) quantum computer.

Personally, I don't think that's the main distinction affecting
whether computers will ever be living and intelligent / conscious -
that's about scale and complexity - even digital computers "could" be
intelligent, if arranged to genuinely evolve life and intelligence.

(Ask Douglas Adams' white mice; the earth / cosmos is just a great big
physical computer in which these things have evolved.)

Another important thing about quantum computing is not the computers,
they are just more physical devices. The interesting thing (to anyone
with an open mind) is that quantum information throws into question
the foundations of quantum physics' Copenhagen interpretations, and a
lot more it seems.

That old object-observer interaction stuff seems to be a very
misleading analogy to represent Heisenberg's apparent uncertainty. The
Qubit (the quantum of undecided information) is becoming much more
credible, and underlies any material reality. It is perilously close
to the dynamic interactions of quality being more fundamental than
subjects and objects. BUT ...

Like all bleeding edge stuff, new-agers and well intentioned ignorami,
can hijack the metaphors before they have matured, but I suggest you
do not dismiss this stuff out of hand. (Josephson does a good line in
the distinction between scepticism and scoffing - this nobel-proze
winner's web-site is worth a read.)

There are serious multi-million dollar venture capitalists behind
quantum computing, so the "new-age" tag is pretty ignorant.

Ian