The Age of Quantum Supremacy

Written By: Gary C. Bizzo

Let's be candid.

I am not a genius, have no inside information and don't have influential friends feeding me high-tech solutions to common problems. However, people wonder why I have huge social media followings, know what the next big thing is and have opportunities thrust upon me. The simple answer is I love watching for disruptive technologies and I follow trends—have done so for years.It's not rocket science. I think you must be on top of what is happening around you and gather intelligence on what technology can change the world and what technology is simple taking up space like marijuana.I've watched the marijuana "technologies" reaping incredible rewards from the few who got in at the early stages. I've seen the rise of it from the outset, been recruited at the early stages to be involved and have passed up some pretty lucrative opportunities. Crazy. No, I can't smoke it, so I won't get involved in it.I love the former "out there" technology. You know, the technology from Jules Verne and Popular Science that gave us insight into technology rich world of the future. I figured quantum string theory was the next singularity before people understood what it proposed. Most scholars suggest that string theory is detrimental to the study of fundamental physics, but it's really about trying to develop a viable explanation for many phenomena.Quantum theory has become the dominant paradigm of high energy theoretical physics. So what does that have to do with the price of eggs? Everything!According to Jeff Brown, the chief editor of The Near Future Report, quantum computing will make encryption useless, will enable Artificial Intelligence to make autonomous driving real and will change the way health and disease is managed and treated; that's all! It's all possible because quantum theory enables computers to predict the evolution of data over time, providing for absurd calculations, communication and simulations.Quantum theory enables us to understand the field of nanotechnology, because quantum physics is the study of matter and energy at its most fundamental level. Nanotechnology is the understanding of subatomic structures where molecular machine systems are possible. Quantum theory enables machines to function unseen by the human eye. Anyone who has seen Star Trek surely understands the concept.Ok, so it all sounds way out there, however, the effects are closer than you think. Ray Kurzweil, futurist and member of the National Inventors Hall of Fame for technologies such as omni-font optical character recognition, believes in a point in technology when man and machine come together as a singularity. I've written about the last singularity to overtake man – the internet. Wikipedia calls a singularity, a hypothetical future point in time when technological growth becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, resulting in unfathomable changes to human civilization.So again, the question is: How does it affect my life? Quantum computing is closing the gap between normal encryption and military grade levels. A research team that included scientists from Google AI Quantum; NASA Ames Research Center; University of California, Santa Barbara; Oak Ridge National Laboratory; and other institutions in the U.S. and Europe, demonstrated in October 2019 that a quantum computer could outperform a classical computer at certain tasks. The IBM supercomputer SUMMIT, and Google's speedier counterpart, Sycamore, both shine in a manner showing quantum supremacy.That means that quantum computing can solve complex nuclear fusion reactor calculations that will bring fusion reactors to reality in five years. It means that genetic sequencing using AI can analyze millions of health records and images in seconds enabling DNA to be analyzed and modified as if it were a simple computer program . It's called the CRISPR treatment of DNA. A Chinese scientist used it to unethically create genetically modified babies last year. Western society won't be following that route anytime soon but scientists are currently using the technology to edit genomes and modify gene function. Consider using this treatment on the 7000+ diseases in the world that have no therapeutic approach but are based on DNA. Are you excited yet? Maybe a little scared?At the root of the discussions about quantum "treatments" and computing theory are the three levels, in increasing complexity, of game-changing intelligence coming from these computers that are right around the corner.
  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) enables the rise of autonomous driving cars. Tesla has run driverless cars (with some drivers asleep in the back seat) for over two million miles.
  • Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) enables a computer to conduct a conversation with a person over a variety of subjects.
  • Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) enables computers to synthesize answers to questions and problems from incongruous connections in data that people would miss.
  • In the past three years private industry has spent over US$170 billion in AI research. In the past 12 months, computers have been able to "infer" answers—meaning they can think!So, lets look at nanotechnology. Cells are nature's nanomachines. Nobel Prize winner Horst Störmer, PhD, Professor of physics at Columbia University, said that the nanoscale is more interesting than the atomic scale because the nanoscale is the first point where we can assemble something. It's not until we start putting particles together that we can make anything useful.Engineers are making circuit boards smaller using nanotech, surgeons are using nanomachines to fix intricate health problems and airplanes and cars are being made lighter with nanotube carbon technologies. How about wearing clothing impervious to dirt and UV rays, having scratch-resistant coating on cars or eyeglasses or using a process to manufacture antibacterial bandages using nanoparticles of silver that smothers harmful cells? All real, and all because of advances in nanotechnology.We have barely even scratched the surface on the uses of nanotechnology but expect it to be a major focus on energy in the next two years. Quantum computing will bring into strong focus 5G networks, DNA research into disease and perhaps even the elusive power of nuclear fusion and nanogenerators within the next five years.While humans continue to think linearly and on large scales, our quantum computers will be doing all the heavy lifting at nanoscale to enable us to think in multi-dimensions.Are we up for it?Related: Stop the Presses: Did China Blink?