[Cryptography] Has quantum cryptanalysis actually achieved anything?

[Kent Borg]

On 2/24/25 2:03 PM, Jon Callas wrote:
> (Cue the Bohr aphorism about how predictions are difficult, especially about the future.)

Actually, as humans, predicting the future is our superpower. We predict 
the future a lot. We depend on it. It is why 30-year mortgages are possible!

What is hard is predicting things we don't really understand. And what 
is *really* galling is not being better at predicting the future than 
are all our fellow humans. (I want to predict the stock market!)

-kb


P.S. Harder than predicting the future is predicting the *past*. ("If 
instead of A happening not-A had happened, then clearly foobar would 
have resulted.") Because the past isn't coming at us we can make asinine 
"would have happened" statements all we want, and as the past is 
politely receding it doesn't smack us in the face with a contradiction, 
No, not in the way the insensitive future does. Instead we get to assert 
that silly cliché "hindsight is 20/20" and we get to believe it. But 
'taint true.