Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything

Bland recycled pop-sci drivel about a bunch of unrelated topics, none of which have anything whatsoever to do with quantum computers, the purported subject of the book. Kaku starts with an unnecessary of the ancient precursors of modern computers, from the ancient Greeks to Babbage & Lovelace and Godel & Turing. But Von Neumann is only mentioned once in passing, in the section introducing quantum mechanics, and not in the context of computer architecture. Claude Shannon and information theory don't merit even that.

We do get a single chapter about quantum computers, but it reads like a compilation of press releases by Google, IBM, D-Wave, et al. There is no attempt to explain how they actually work, or what makes them so revolutionary. show more There's a bit of enthusiastic hand waving about qubits and superposition, but he spends a lot more time on marginally related topics like Everett's Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics than on quantum computers.

The rest of the book flits from topic to topic, presented quick overviews of everything from nuclear fusion, protein folding, climate change, exoplanets, and string theory. At the end of each section is one or two sentences stating the hope that in the future quantum computers may be able to further our progress, without any details as to how that would happen.

Also missing is any thought given to potential downsides or misuse of the technology. Kaku mentions that quantum computers will render current encryption techniques obsolete, and demonstrates how powerful it is. But if a technology can be used to quickly identify new pathogens and develop vaccines overnight, they likely can also be used by terrorists and rogue states to create biological weapons. If they can simulate what happens in the interior of stars and model plasma reactions in fusion reactors, they can also be used to develop bombs. As with AI (or any new advanced technology for that matter), it's important to understand all of the ramifications in order to ensure a safe and productive integration into society, lest it be abused and cause harm. show less

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Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum Computer Revolution Will Change Everything by Michio Kaku is an accessible, and probably too optimistic look, at how quantum computing could solve many humanities problems. Mr. Kaku is an educator, futurist, and theoretical physicist.

The main argument the author makes in this book is that the age of silicon is over, and qubits (quantum bits) will change our lives. The reason is that this will allow computers to process data at much faster speeds (what would take hundreds of years will take seconds) and solve problems so complex it would otherwise take multiple lifetimes to do so.

In Quantum Supremacy, Michio Kaku argues that these show more supercomputers will be able to simulate nature. This will allow us to “crack the code” of everything from astrophysics to biology.

While I don’t trust optimists, I enjoyed the vision in this book. I still think we have immense issues before we get to where he suggests, not the least of it is how we’re going to power these machines, as well as other technical limitations on quantum computing and the fact that we really don’t fully understand it.

I did think the book oversimplified many things, and while I certainly don’t think I’m in any position to correct Dr. Kaku I would have liked to have less topics, but more in-depth explanations.

While repetitive, every chapter ends with a section on how quantum computing will solve the discussed issues, I found the book immensely interesting and thought provoking. I like the future Dr. Kaku predicts and am excited about the technological aspects of it. However, this is by no means a technically accurate explanation of quantum computing, or a rigorous study of technology. But it is an excellent way to get a larger picture of this exciting technology, and why it matters in an easy to digest narrative. show less

Hope he's right, but the words "might" and "may" do a WHOLE LOT of heavy lifting here. Would like something a bit more in-depth, this just scratches the surface.

Disclaimer: If you want to know exactly how quantum computers work, this is not that book.

The author here provides a high-level understanding of Quantum Mechanics and the application of Quantum Computers to potentially solve the problems we're having.

It also talks about the challenges faced by even the most powerful digital computers we have and how QCs can advance us to the next level.

Of course, things look rosy at this level (Oh and Quantum Computers will find a cure for ALS and allow us to predict weather accurately and give us clean energy through better designs for fission reactors and find out if aliens exist and this and that..). But yea, the truth is that we'll need to see what issues come up when we actually start implementing show more those.

Overall, I enjoyed the book as it talked about the breadth of impact it can have on our living. How much would it actually impact.. only time will tell. show less

It would not be entirely fair to let a just-completed reading of Hertog's meaty _On the Origin of Time_ lead one to say that physicist Kaku's book consists of shallow froth. True, he does seem to have pitched it at the level of readers who know little or nothing about science, accordingly allowing too much imprecision to infect the section on computer science and quantum theory. (E.g., he sloppily equates the superposition and uncertainty principles.) But in the later sections, where his style is occasionally more reportorial, he usefully surveys possible application areas for future quantum computers. Examples include Alzheimer's disease, AI, antibiotics, batteries, black holes, cancer, cosmology, fusion power, global warming, human show more aging, immunotherapy, nitrogen fixing, origin of life, photosynthesis, proteins, stars, viruses, and weather. But how likely is it that the machines will really contribute to all these areas and many others? show less

According to this book quantum computers will solve every problem humans have created for themselves. The author’s generalizations are too broad to treat this work as anything but an index for further inquiry when he’s not engaged in wild speculation.

Really poorly done. Basically just describes every major scientific problem we look to solve and says maybe a quantum computer can solve that.