shminux comments on For FAI: Is "Molecular Nanotechnology" putting our best foot forward? - Less Wrong

48 Post author: leplen 22 June 2013 04:44AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (117)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: shminux 25 June 2013 10:27:25PM *  3 points [-]

unless the FAI has very powerful quantum computers.

Why do you expect this to help? What nanotech computations would a "very powerful quantum computer" accomplish so much faster than a classical computer? Or do you mean something like an "analog" quantum computer, also known as a "quantum simulator", which solves the Schrodinger equation by simulating the Hamiltonian and its evolution, rather than the "ordinary" digital quantum computer, which speeds up numerical algorithms?

Comment author: pcm 26 June 2013 04:42:39PM 1 point [-]

Anything that makes the Schrodinger equation tractable would make me much less confident of my analysis.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 26 June 2013 04:46:10PM 5 points [-]

How did natural selection solve this problem without quantum computers or even intelligence, and why can't an AI exploit the same regularity even faster?

Comment author: pcm 26 June 2013 05:13:57PM 2 points [-]

Natural selection used trial and error. An AI would do that faster and with fewer errors.

Comment author: shminux 26 June 2013 05:20:23PM 0 points [-]

Offhand, I would expect analog quantum simulators to come before digital quantum computers, given how they are already naturally everywhere, anyway, just not in a well-controlled way. Sort of like birds were a living proof that "heavier-than-air flying machines" are possible. This year-old Nature review seems to show a number of promising directions.