Reddit reviews Quantum Computing Since Democritus
We found 19 Reddit comments about Quantum Computing Since Democritus. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
Used Book in Good Condition
Your post has too little context/content for anyone to give you particularly relevant or specific advice. You should list what you know already and what you’re trying to learn. I find it’s easiest to research a new subject when I have a concrete problem I’m trying to solve.
But anyway, I’m going to assume you studied up through single variable calculus and are reasonably motivated to put some effort in with your reading. Here are some books which you might enjoy, depending on your interests. All should be reasonably accessible (to, say, a sharp and motivated undergraduate), but they’ll all take some work:
(in no particular order)
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (wikipedia)
To Mock a Mockingbird (wikipedia)
Structure in Nature is a Strategy for Design
Geometry and the Imagination
Visual Group Theory (website)
The Little Schemer (website)
Visual Complex Analysis (website)
Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos (website)
Music, a Mathematical Offering (website)
QED
Mathematics and its History
The Nature and Growth of Modern Mathematics
Proofs from THE BOOK (wikipedia)
Concrete Mathematics (website, wikipedia)
The Symmetries of Things
Quantum Computing Since Democritus (website)
Solid Shape
On Numbers and Games (wikipedia)
Street-Fighting Mathematics (website)
But also, you’ll probably get more useful response somewhere else, e.g. /r/learnmath. (On /r/math you’re likely to attract downvotes with a question like this.)
You might enjoy:
https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/2mkmk0/a_compilation_of_useful_free_online_math_resources/
https://www.reddit.com/r/mathbooks/top/?sort=top&t=all
The author has also written a crazy but brilliant book based on a lecture course he gave in 2006, entitled "Quantum Computing since Democritus" http://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Computing-since-Democritus-Aaronson/dp/0521199565
Scott Aaronson would be the ultimate mindscape podcast guest for me. I am actually hopeful that this will happen at some point, knowing that Sean and Scott know each other personally.
For the uninitiated, Scott is a quantum computing researcher, accomplished author and blogger extraordinaire.
If you have never heard of him, read this interview and you will agree that he would make a great guest.
Textbook: http://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Computation-Information-Anniversary-Edition/dp/1107002176
YouTube: http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/quantum-computing-for-the-determined/
Free lecture notes: https://cs.uwaterloo.ca/%7Ewatrous/LectureNotes.html
More causal reading (but still difficult):http://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Computing-since-Democritus-Aaronson/dp/0521199565
The most complete/modern book on it is Arora and Barak (a free draft is available online, but I think the published version is more complete). However, depending on your background, it might be too dense to start with, in which case maybe try Papadimitriou's book (though I'm less familiar with it, so I'm not confident in this recommendation).
Aaronson's book is probably more entertaining than either of these, but I don't think it can actually be used to learn the subject.
> does anyone have some readings on quantum computation in general
There's Quantum Computing Since Democritus, by Scott Aaronson, who is the author of the pretty decent Shtetl-Optimized blog. Mostly, it's about the power of quantum computing relative to classical computing, from the computability and complexity standpoint.
The selection of accessible textbooks is not great. I agree with the existing suggestion to look at the relevant chapters of Sipser.
I think you should check out Quantum computing since Democritus by Scott Aaronson. He is a very entertaining writer, and this might be the closest thing to Road to Reality for CS. Scott's primary research expertise is in quantum computing, though the book covers a ton of other interesting CS-theory topics.
If you want a sneak preview of what's in the book, it grew out of the lecture notes that are posted here.
And here are some other popularizations that are probably less technical than QCSD:
Quantum Computing Since Democritus by Scott Aaronson.
A Friendly Introduction to Number Theory by Silverman.
Visual Complex Analysis by Needham.
În primul rând, citește asta.
Also asta
Besides /u/basandpurr's comment, the power of quantum computers is that they can factor quickly (via Shor's algorithm). If you don't base your encryption scheme on a factoring or discrete log problem (RSA is out), then you are not any more susceptible than on a classical computer. Additionally, it is entirely possible (some argue likely) that both of these problems are actually solvable in polynomial time on classical computers, we just aren't smart enough yet to know how to do them.
There's an excellent book called Quantum Computing Since Democritus that you should read to get a better understanding of where we're at. It's a very good read.
Read Aaronson's book first
Well, to be fair to him, he has moderated his tone in recent years. I bought and read his excellent book about QC a few years ago and learned a ton of stuff about QC and just general computer science(and a whole lot of scientific trivia).
I've also followed his blog sporadically. In his latest blogpost he's more nuanced, and even allows himself to take the pose of being a cautious supporter. That's not where he was just a few years ago. As people in the comment section pointed out, he used to joke that his laptop would beat QC and that Google should just pay him millions of dollars instead.
The reason why he's moderating is that he can see the writing on the wall. He's right to be skeptical(we all should be), but as I pointed out, all of his contentions are already laid out by Google in their paper. So what does he do in his blogpost, exactly, that is new?
D-Wave should be understood as an ASIC in QC. It's not a generalized QC, but rather optimised for specific tasks. Troyer explains this for laymen, here.
We're still some ways off a generalized QC, but the breakthroughs that D-Wave are doing will help pave the way for such a QC and this is the whole point of why NASA/Google are buying their stuff and working with them. Google also has a separate team doing more fundamental research work.
Thus, Scott's flippant "pay me millions for my laptop" kind of commentary have become faintly more sparse throughout these past few years to the point where he doesn't even attempt to do these jokes anymore, because the joke would be on him.
P.S. Re-reading my comment, I sound incredibly harsh on him. I respect the man, he's brilliant and his book on QC is awesome. But I am disappointed in how he has tried to avoid taking intellectual responsibility for his overt hostility in the past(which he has now moderated) and now tries to maintain he was always just a good-natured supporter who "tried to avoid hype". That's a deceptive and I don't like when people don't own up to their past positions, because they recognise they were wrong and the terrain shifted.
The good thing about quantum information is that it's mostly linear algebra, once you're past the quantization itself. The good thing though is that you don't have to understand that in order to understand QI.
There are books written about quantum computing specifically for non-physicists. Mind you, they are written for engineers and computer scientists instead and they're supposed to know more maths and physics than you as well. Still, you could pick up one of those, e.g. the one by Mosca, or even better the one by David Mermin.
There are also two very new popular-science books on the topic, one by Jonathan Dowling, Schrödinger's Killer App, and one by Scott Aaronson, Quantum computing since Democritus.
I highly recommend reading Quantum Computing Since Democritus to learn about BQP and other quantum computing stuff. Scott Aaronson has a gift for presenting technical topics in an entertaining way without getting sloppy like a lot of other pop-science writers.
Aaronson's book on quantum computing is quite good as well.
Yes, I read it before telling people what it was.
No, I don't want your reading list. I already have quantum computing since democritus to finish, quantum computing and information to re-read, and quantum machine learning to buy.
Who doesn't wonder about being wrong every day?
>Why are you using D-Wave as an adverb? It is a company name. English is my second language but I think it is more correct to say D-Wave's computers.
I was saying D-wave computer like I would say an Apple computer but I might be wrong I am not a massive speaker too.
>If you have the cojones to grapple with set theory foundations, this is the link:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Quantum-Computing-since-Democritus-Aaronson/dp/0521199565/
I will have a look.
I was more interested to understand why D-wave computer are not a threat to cryptocurrency.
I will send you a link if I find it.
Why are you using D-Wave as an adverb? It is a company name. English is my second language but I think it is more correct to say D-Wave's computers.
If you have the cojones to grapple with set theory foundations, this is the link:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Quantum-Computing-since-Democritus-Aaronson/dp/0521199565/
Ask for the name of the course textbook. Then just skim the table of contents, the first paragraph or so of the chapters (tip: the last chapter almost always has the cool, interesting stuff), and get the "big picture" of the course. Worry about the details when it comes time to take the class. Then enjoy your summer days off and don't forget to get a good tan.
Or you could read biographies of famous computer scientists/mathematicians (or those closely related): Alan Turing, Claude Shannon, John von Neumann, Richard Feynman (he's really a physicist, but wrote a famous 1982 paper on quantum computing). I'd also recommend Quantum Computing Since Democritus: https://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Computing-since-Democritus-Aaronson/dp/0521199565