The Quantum Pontiff
Theoretical Musings
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Dave Bacon is a theoretical ski bum who is also a pseudo professor. His research is on quantum computing, his scientific passions extend to everything in physics, mathematics, computer science and beyond, and his personal pleasures include making wine, playing poker, skiing, camping, and daydreaming (although not all of those at the same time.)
Nothing he says on this blog should be construed as having anything to do with his employer or his dog.
Recent Comments
- Neil B on So Long and Thanks For All the Fish!
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- evden eve nakliyat on Google Hella Cool
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Recent Posts
- So Long and Thanks For All the Fish!
- Dead Spins And The Dirty Ground
- Bacon Camp
- Best Paper at STOC
- Pr(Future Dave Bacons|Library Cuts) is Small
- De Took Er DataBs Jrbs!
- Google Hella Cool
- Portrait of a Reviewer as a Young Man
- Theory Matters Vision Nuggets
- What To Do With Scirate?
Other Information
Cows are well approximated by a sphere.
About
If you came to this about page you're probably here to learn the answer to the question which nearly everyone asks: "How do you quantize a Pope?" No? That wasn't your question? Okay, well maybe later I'll get around to talking about whether the Pope is a fermion or a boson. Until then you'll just have to read this much more boring "about page."
The Quantum Pontiff is a blog where some theoretical physicist who calls himself Dave Bacon pontifficates. Sometimes he makes sense, but often he seems like a raving loney. He has a particular fondness for anything to do with quantum theory, and saying silly things about the laws of the quantum world has been known to cause him to bash his head against his keyboard (which makes his neighbors rather concerned and causes funny bumps on his forehead.) Dave works in the field of quantum computing, which many computer scientists think of as physics and many physicists think of as computer science. Because his research area sits in between disciplines, he obtains an immense amount of pleasure watching the culture of physicists and computer scientists collide (Eat your heart out, C. P. Snow.) His sworn mortal enemy is Shtetl-Optimized which sucks for Dave because the Optimizer is a genius.
From September 2003 to October 2007, The Quantum Pontiff resided at this website, where the most commented upon post was, strangely enough, about Wayne Dyer. At one point in time the top hit for "pontiff" on google led to this website, allowing Dave to cross off from his list of things to do "Become more popular on the internet than the Pope." Now, however, wikipedia has gained the top spot and Dave has had to uncross out this entry on the Pope.
More information about Dave can be found at his academic webpage here or on his research groups homepage here. All of his academic papers are located here and all of his talks are located here. Here is a picture of Dave's dog.
