Convergence: Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Computing

CHAPTER 12The Best Numbers Are in Sight. But Understanding?

Roald Hoffmann, Frank H. T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters, Emeritus, Cornell University; and Jean-Paul Malrieu, Director of Research, CNRS IRSAMC, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse

The chapter title voices our skepticism, and given that we are both in our 80s, it is easy to attribute it to our age and attendant creeping conservatism. But in a time of hyped enthusiasm for the New Jerusalem of IT, we thought there might be a place to question the systematic confidence voiced and eventually define a more balanced, if oblique, perspective.^{[1, 2, 3]}

Our response to what so-called artificial intelligence has done and will do to our lives is complicated. We want to rehearse with you the pretty obvious reasons why this is so and then go on to what really worries us. This is the attack—scientific, philosophical, and psychological—that artificial intelligence, augmented by quantum computing, might represent on a human jewel, the idea and processes of understanding.

Attitudes Toward Quantum Computing

It's hard (and would be strange) to be against quantum computing. Quantum computing is marvelous on several accounts. To those of us who devoted their lives to solving approximately the wave equation of quantum mechanics and connecting it to the very tangible world of chemistry, it's astounding to see superposition and entanglement turn into operational reality and precise numbers. We thought of those inherent quantum mechanical ...