Google says it accessed parallel universes with its new supercomputer
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Google's quantum computing breakthrough on Monday has left the physicist who heads the project a believer in 'the idea that we live in a multiverse.'. 'Willow,' the tech giant's new quantum chip, succeeded in solving a computational problem so complex it would have taken today's best super-computers an estimated 10 septillion years to solve it — vastly more than the age of our entire universe.
![[Google Quantum AI's Hartmut Neven (left) and Anthony Megrant (right) examine a cryostat refrigerator for cooling quantum computing chips at Google's Quantum AI lab in Santa Barbara, November 25, 2024. Neven argued that Willow's success could prove the 'multiverse' theory]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/15/17/92987963-14190325-Google_Quantum_AI_s_Hartmut_Neven_left_and_Anthony_Megrant_right-a-2_1734284893294.jpg)
But Google said its new quantum computer solved the puzzle 'in under five minutes.'. Calling Willow's performance 'astonishing,' the leader and founder of Google Quantum AI team, physicist Hartmut Neven, said its high-speed result 'lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes.'.
![[A cryostat refrigerator for cooling quantum computing chips is displayed at Google's Quantum AI lab in Santa Barbara, California]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/15/17/92987961-14190325-A_cryostat_refrigerator_for_cooling_quantum_computing_chips_is_d-a-3_1734284893495.jpg)
Neven credited Oxford University physicist David Deutsch for proposing the theory that the successful development of quantum computing would, in effect, affirm the 'many worlds interpretation' of quantum mechanics and the existence of a multiverse. Starting in the 1970s, Deutsch, in fact, had walked backwards into becoming a pioneer in the field of quantum computing, less out of interest in the technology itself, than his desire to test the multiverse theory.
![[According to Google, Willow can run 105 'qubits' - the basic unit of information in quantum computing - which is more than its Sycamore chip that had 70 qubits (pictured)]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/12/15/17/72787925-14190325-According_to_Google_Willow_can_run_105_qubits_the_basic_unit_of_-a-1_1734284893053.jpg)
Astrophysicist turned science writer Ethan Siegel blasted Google over the claim, accusing them of 'conflating unrelated concepts, which Neven also ought to know.'. 'Neven has conflated the notion of a quantum mechanical Hilbert space, which is an infinite-dimensional mathematical space where quantum mechanical wavefunctions "live," with the notion of parallel universes and a multiverse,' Siegel argued Friday.
