Physicist reacts to Cleo and MKBHD quantum video (fAQ podcast)

It’s rare to find a high-quality, accessible explanation of quantum computers, but the recent video on IBM’s quantum computer by Cleo Abram and Marques Brownlee took us by pleasant surprise.

In this special fAQ podcast episode, Tai-Danae Bradley and Adam Green sit down with physicist Stefan Leichenauer to capture his reaction. The verdict: thumbs up!

Chapters:
0:00 Intro
1:20 remarks on Cleo and MKBHD’s strong opening
2:16 the car vs. boat analogy
5:04 remarks on IBM’s quantum computer
7:34 uncommonly good explanation of bits and qubits
12:37 Marques’ insightful question
12:54 the pond analogy
15:54 final takeaway

Bios:
Stefan Leichenauer is the VP of Engineering at SandboxAQ. He earned a PhD in physics from UC Berkeley in 2011 and has a research background in string theory.

Adam Green is the Head of Science Education at SandboxAQ. He earned a PhD in ecology and evolutionary biology from the University of Rochester in 2011 and was previously the Director of US Academic Content at Khan Academy before joining Sandbox.

Tai-Danae Bradley is a research mathematician at SandboxAQ. She earned a PhD in mathematics from the CUNY Graduate Center in 2020 and is creator of the mathematics blog, Math3ma, and a former cohost of PBS Infinite Series.

[CleoAbram]

Thank you all so much for watching and for taking the time to react and give more detail! It's rare to find such a thoughtful, expert, and kind reaction video. I really appreciate it.

[MisterR]

Whoo! Glad to see Stefan back. I also loved the animations in Cleo's video explaining qubits and illustrating how quantum computers work

[gavidhariwal]

Yo! I like these reaction videos! Can y'all do more of such reaction vids (maybe Tai-Danae reacting to expert/amateur Math explainer vids)?

PS: I wonder what would make Stefan go: WOAHHH! I mean I see the excitement in his commentary of Cleo's video but don't really see the spark in his eyes (resting Physicist face maybe?) 😝

[goldnutter]

NEVER want to hear "both at the same time" or "two places at once" ! good stuff.
Maybe SUPERPOSITION should be renamed to "no position yet this reality doesn't have infinite resources"

Also, entanglement has nothing to do with communication, just bit state. Two entangled bits now must act as two halves of one new structure. A fundamental property/optimization of this reality is uncertainty, manipulating them into the entangled states puts them into a new equilibrium acting as these halves.

Qubit parity is obviously really hard, but personally I think there will be a lot more redundancy needed for significant scaling. Millions of qubits ? probably don't bet the farm, complexity is.. complex.