For those who are eagerly awaiting the return of Christ in glory, the admonition articulated in Matthew 24:42 has always been of paramount importance. Not only are we counseled to remain ever vigilant, but the intellectual boundaries within which we may abide in our expectation are also carefully delineated, for it is here that Christ most firmly establishes his mandate that we profess a radical agnosticism regarding the time-tables of sacred history. Nonetheless, since the days of the Church Fathers there (...) have been some who, for a variety of reasons, have sought to arrive at a more certain — or at least more refined — understanding of the timing of the Parousia, most often through a combination of exegesis and numerology. To a certain degree, Christian of Stavelot's comments on Matthew 24:42 must be considered among these attempts. (shrink)

Tasked with the challenge to build better and better computers, quantum computing and classical computing face the same conundrum: the success of classical computing systems. Small quantum computing systems have been demonstrated, and intermediate-scale systems are on the horizon, capable of calculating numeric results or simulating physical systems far beyond what humans can do by hand. However, to be commercially viable, they must surpass what our wildly successful, highly advanced classical computers can already do. At the same time, those classical (...) computers continue to advance, but those advances are now constrained by thermodynamics, and will soon be limited by the discrete nature of atomic matter and ultimately quantum effects. Technological advances benefit both quantum and classical machinery, altering the competitive landscape. Can we build quantum computing systems that out-compute classical systems capable of some \(10^{30}\) logic gates per month? This article will discuss the interplay in these competing and cooperating technological trends. (shrink)