Late last year there was an ominous series of reports which seeped into the various lubricious channels of internet tech media; whether this report was an accidental leak or a somewhat more contrived example of the moistest kind of media manipulation in order to drive up interest and the share-price of an ailing tech company, we can only speculate. From the many tech websites the same fevered phrase, worthy of Black Mesa and the scientific rhetoric of the understated apocalyptical disaster: an ‘unforeseen incident’.
The fact
that we are all still here and in no immediate danger of being attacked by jumping
head-crabs while taking the dog for a morning walk, and turning into a head-crab
zombie with clawed slashing arms and a maw of jagged teeth coming out of our
chest cavity by lunchtime, indicates that the worst scientific-disaster has
either been averted or just not happened yet.
Obviously, it’s hard to get serious or reliable information about
what might have taken place during NASA’s experiments with quantum computing, and why NASA reportedly shut down
their experiments with a D-Wave quantum computer at the
AMES research laboratory in California. Perhaps the most conservative report about the story, from Medium, states
that:
“…during
a recent test, the computer-generated results that were inconsistent with known
physical laws.”[1]
This sounds somewhat ambiguous and if you squint and have an
over-active imagination, just like I hope you do because I definitely do, then it
almost sounds like the quantum computer started operating on another level of
reality and managed to high-five God and had a chat with him and this freaked out
all the crazy bald-head boffins so they shut it down. On the other hand, since one
issue with quantum computing is that it is particularly ‘noisy’ it may be that
the quantum computer just started generating a load of old rubbish. Data and results
are easily corrupted due to the extremely sensitive nature of the quantum
state, and the fact that even inputting instructions, adds energy which temporarily
disrupts the quantum state which can only be maintained at extreme low
temperatures where atomic and vibrational activity is almost nill.
An apparent
source for all this appears to be an Indian tech writer called Gaurav Sharma
who writes for the Times Internet
group and also writes for Medium. He published an article for UdayIndia in December 2023 and an edited version
of this article appeared on a website called Techgig[2]
in February 2024
“The abrupt shutdown of NASA's quantum computing project was
triggered by an unforeseen incident during a routine test.”
This article also features its own example of a Shrödinger’s cat quantum
paradox since the article reports that the D-Wave computer both reportedly succeeded
and failed spectacularly at the same time:
“During the analysis of a complex simulation, the quantum
computer demonstrated unprecedented computational power, solving a previously
intractable problem. However, this remarkable achievement had an equally
alarming consequence: quantum computers began generating outputs that made no
sense and challenged conventional thinking.”
This is followed by a sudden hard swerve into the Twilight-Zone:
“Researchers and government officials were concerned that
the quantum computer might have connected with an extraterrestrial intelligence
or even entered an unknown realm of computation.”
I mean, it’s certainly possible. As I have tried to demonstrate, the quantum realm is the source of everything in the universe and is a kind of overworld God realm, but is it possible that quantum computers can meet and greet directly with God or hang with aliens exchanging top bants and dank memes in 4 dimensional chat-rooms?
