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Comment Re:British slang (Score 1) 74

Apparently "boffin" is a British slang term for a scientist/engineer.

I recently watched a documentary on the British space program, and I recall someone saying something like "this project needs more engineers and fewer boffins". So "boffin" is specifically a scientist in an ivory tower, much like "egghead" in US slang.

Comment Re:"the most likely scenario is that it doesn't wo (Score 1) 74

29 is prime, and people don't usually talk about factoring primes because the factors are trivial.

I don't think Microsoft will let something as trivial as primality to get in the way of their quantum computing research. REAL men can roundhouse-kick any number into factors if they so desire.

"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." -- Bill Gates, The Road Ahead (1995)

Comment Re:Do not trust "quantum safe" encryption (Score 1) 35

Good points. I'm no expert in the field, but I've taken master's level courses in the relevant math and physics. I particularly remember my math professor saying that no encryption has been mathematically proven safe. We only know the current schemes are safe insofar as nobody has published an attack yet.

We do know how to break certain classical encryption schemes with hypothetical quantum computers. This clearly doesn't mean other schemes will stay quantum-unbreakable forever, because people keep inventing new algorithms. So "quantum safe" only applies in a very limited sense, until the day they are broken.

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