Why do people confuse AI with quantum computing and why should you care about them?

Most people think that artificial intelligence and quantum computing are essentially the same thing, a futuristic technology that gets hyped in headlines and delivers big gains on the stock market. It certainly does the latter part, but it would be a mistake to confuse these techniques otherwise.

Artificial intelligence is a software capability that learns from data to automate or assist in decisions, while quantum computing is hardware built on the principles of quantum physics, designed to process calculations that would take traditional computers thousands of years to solve.

What actually is artificial intelligence?

AI refers to algorithms, including machine learning, neural networks, and large language models (LLMs), that find patterns in big data to make predictions, classify information, or make recommendations based on those patterns.

This includes popular apps like ChatGPT, product recommendations, fraud alerts, and self-driving features that are widely available today. These systems run on traditional computers, using common hardware such as CPUs and GPUs.

What actually is quantum computing?

Instead of the 0s and 1s used in binary code, quantum computing relies on qubits (short for “quantum bits”), which can represent many possible states simultaneously. This theoretically allows quantum machines to process large numbers of possible solutions in parallel.

If this happens, these computers will be orders of magnitude more powerful for specific tasks than even the most advanced supercomputers, such as simulating complex molecules or searching huge search spaces. Meanwhile, with powerful quantum computers threatening to break existing encryption, computer scientists are already working on post-quantum encryption to ensure long-term data security.

Quantum devices are still limited and error-prone today. But the long-term potential is huge. In fact, quantum computers are making progress, with qubit processors now able to significantly outperform classical systems, but still at very narrow standard tasks. The promise is that quantum machines will eventually replace traditional computers, ushering in a new post-digital era.

Where the two meet

The intersection of quantum and artificial intelligence will likely take two parallel paths:

• The first is the eventual use of quantum hardware to speed up or augment some AI tasks, allowing models to consider much more options at once, search solution spaces faster, and adjust themselves more quickly.
• The second is to deploy existing AI methods to help build and control quantum systems, keeping these tiny machines stable, automatically adjusting settings, detecting glitches early, and generally helping devices run for longer periods.

Quantum acceleration of AI tasks could lead to potential breakthroughs in medicine, biotechnology, materials science, weather modeling, finance, and logistics. These possibilities may be speculative, but early proofs of the concept have been promising.

Artificial intelligence is already everywhere. You can chat with it in plain language, businesses use it to automate some everyday tasks, and consumers allow it to personalize their experiences for many things online. Quantum computing is less obvious, but could at least be transformative. It could one day achieve breakthroughs in medicine, materials, green energy, and ultra-secure encryption.