Michael Nielsen’s switchin’ fields. I’m envious but also sad. Envious that he gets to do something totally cool and new, but sad that I won’t be randomly bumping into him at conferences where I try to explain to him some crazy idea I’m working on and then get to hear his wonderful laugh at my silly ideas. Oh yeah, and when am I ever going to get to use this joke again, huh?
On the more serious side of things, I myself often think about what I would do if I wasn’t working in quantum computing. Which always leads me to think about why I’m still in the field in the first place (history ain’t a good reason, in fact I’d say it is the worst reason of all.) There are mostly two or three things that really keep me in the field these days. One is that I really really really want to see a quantum computer built. And I think the current roadmap ain’t got nothing to do with how a large scale quantum computer will be built. I’ve always said that if I could see how some scheme for quantum computing would really work to build a large quantum computer I’d drop my theorists clothes and work towards building the damn thing. And I work today in the field because I’m naive enough to think that I might be able to contribute to the more radical ideas I think are needed for building a quantum computer.
The second thing which keeps me going these days is a personal quirk. When I first started working in quantum computing I was trying to solve NP-complete problems efficiently on a quantum computer. I was young and I was naive, yes. But I was also drawn to the promise of the power of quantum algorithms. And damnit I still want to come up with an algorithm for a quantum computer which is of some importance. Yep, I really really really want to at least break a public key cryptosystem!
Finally I would say that the other thing which keeps me in quantum computing these days is just to see what Scott Aaronson will do next. Actually what I really mean by this is I do think that quantum information science provides an interesting insight into computation and into physics. Quantum computing beyond the hype of a quantum computer. Quantum computing for its own intellectual sake of revealing more about our physical and computational universe. Quantum computing because (to channell Feynman’s ghost) our world is quantum damnit, and all these views of the interaction betwen physics and computer science which just go with classical computing are interesting but fundamentally lacking.
Of course all this thinking about what keeps me in the field of quantum computing or even in academia also is just my way of avoiding answering the question of what I would do if I wasn’t in the field. But that’s easy for me to answer I guess. I’d be at a computer startup (my original goal in life was to work at Apple, you know) or trying to get a job at someplace like D.E. Shaw where my friends who work there tell me exciting stories of interesting problems and silly sums of money which will let them do what they want in a few short years. Or maybe I’d be a lift operator at a ski resort 🙂
O brave new quantum world!