Quantum ‘Jamming’ Could Help Unlock the Mysteries of Causality
Key takeaways
- For the past few decades, researchers have understood that quantum computers should eventually be able to crack the widely used codes that secure much of the digital world.
- At the same time, they’ve also devised ingenious ways to use the rules of quantum mechanics to keep communications secure.
- Let’s suppose that at some future date people realize that quantum mechanics is not the ultimate theory of nature.”
Why this matters: a development in AI with implications for how people work, create, and decide.
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For the past few decades, researchers have understood that quantum computers should eventually be able to crack the widely used codes that secure much of the digital world. To protect against this fate, they’ve spent years developing new codes that appear to be safe from future safecrackers armed with quantum computers.
At the same time, they’ve also devised ingenious ways to use the rules of quantum mechanics to keep communications secure. But quantum mechanics, just like the “classical” mechanics that preceded it, is just a theory of nature. What if it eventually gets superseded by a fuller theory, just as quantum mechanics supplanted Newtonian physics a century ago? Will these quantum communication techniques still be secure in a world where there’s an even more fundamental set of rules?