[MD] Quantum computing

[Case]

[Magnus]
Come on. There are lots and lots of very serious research going on in the AI
area, and you dismiss it all just because you disagree with one's premises?

[Case]
It is my understanding that while much research in AI continues in
universities the hottest areas in the commercial world are in computer
gaming. Getting an AI to play by the same rules as a player and to adjust
its style of play to the moves of its opponents is a pretty daunting task.

[Magnus]
First of all, you need to understand what it means to handle data
"dynamically". It's not just to handle data randomly and produce a slightly
different result every time, it's to let DQ interfere. In quantum terms,
it's to let quantum effects interfere, to let each calculation (or quality
event) be led by quantum rules. To let an artificial machine be governed by
the same quantum rules that governs nature itself, entanglement,
non-locality, Bose-Einstein condensates etc., will let that machine tap into
the same source of DQ that has governed evolution for eons, and that can't
be bad.

[Case]
Quantum computing is a bit new to me but I am having trouble seeing how
allowing interference of any sort into the calculations can produce a happy
result. If I am look for a solution to a problem in cryptography how is
evolution going to help? On the one hand it is suggested that qbits will
allow much faster calculations and on the other that the processing power
stems from quantum effects. Are these quantum effects resulting in raw speed
or in better Quality answers?

>From what I could find about the demo you mentioned it looked promising but
there are skeptics and I don't suppose I will be looking at super-cooled
chips on my desktop anytime soon. But then I would never have though I would
have a dual core processor on my desktop by now either so who knows. 

I wonder sometimes how appropriate computer metaphors are when thinking of
biological systems. Truly they are useful but how far can we push them. We
have been quick to seize the latest in technology and apply it to our
understanding of biological processes. In the early days of telephony the
brain could be seen as a complicated switching system, the brain is a
thinking machine etc. 

Much of the cognitive sciences proceeds from the notion the brain is a
sophisticated computer running programs. But this metaphor can break down
when pushed. A program is an algorithm, a series of sequential steps. I am
not sure what organisms do is at all sequentially. Computers operate in
discrete steps or clock cycles I don't think organisms work this way.
Certainly computer metaphors are useful but it is easy to overlook the
limitations. 

What modern efforts in AI are doing is attempting to simulate in algorithmic
form what brains do organically. So far it seems to me that the value of
this accrues mainly from the effort involved in thinking this through. That
is we know the brain does pattern recognition; how can we construct an
algorithm to recognize patterns. Digitally this requires a brute force
approach.

When you suggest that the brain maybe a quantum computer, how so? Aren't
these attempts at quantum computing still handling binary information?
Aren't they still going to be handling information in discrete steps? I am
not sure how quantum effects would apply to a nervous system. It is my
understanding that quantum effect disappear above the level of complex
molecules. Are you suggesting that macro level information is somehow
processed at the level of protein synthesis?