10,382 research outputs found
Consensus using Asynchronous Failure Detectors
The FLP result shows that crash-tolerant consensus is impossible to solve in
asynchronous systems, and several solutions have been proposed for
crash-tolerant consensus under alternative (stronger) models. One popular
approach is to augment the asynchronous system with appropriate failure
detectors, which provide (potentially unreliable) information about process
crashes in the system, to circumvent the FLP impossibility.
In this paper, we demonstrate the exact mechanism by which (sufficiently
powerful) asynchronous failure detectors enable solving crash-tolerant
consensus. Our approach, which borrows arguments from the FLP impossibility
proof and the famous result from CHT, which shows that is a weakest
failure detector to solve consensus, also yields a natural proof to as
a weakest asynchronous failure detector to solve consensus. The use of I/O
automata theory in our approach enables us to model execution in a more
detailed fashion than CHT and also addresses the latent assumptions and
assertions in the original result in CHT
The quantum measurement problem and physical reality: a computation theoretic perspective
Is the universe computable? If yes, is it computationally a polynomial place?
In standard quantum mechanics, which permits infinite parallelism and the
infinitely precise specification of states, a negative answer to both questions
is not ruled out. On the other hand, empirical evidence suggests that
NP-complete problems are intractable in the physical world. Likewise,
computational problems known to be algorithmically uncomputable do not seem to
be computable by any physical means. We suggest that this close correspondence
between the efficiency and power of abstract algorithms on the one hand, and
physical computers on the other, finds a natural explanation if the universe is
assumed to be algorithmic; that is, that physical reality is the product of
discrete sub-physical information processing equivalent to the actions of a
probabilistic Turing machine. This assumption can be reconciled with the
observed exponentiality of quantum systems at microscopic scales, and the
consequent possibility of implementing Shor's quantum polynomial time algorithm
at that scale, provided the degree of superposition is intrinsically, finitely
upper-bounded. If this bound is associated with the quantum-classical divide
(the Heisenberg cut), a natural resolution to the quantum measurement problem
arises. From this viewpoint, macroscopic classicality is an evidence that the
universe is in BPP, and both questions raised above receive affirmative
answers. A recently proposed computational model of quantum measurement, which
relates the Heisenberg cut to the discreteness of Hilbert space, is briefly
discussed. A connection to quantum gravity is noted. Our results are compatible
with the philosophy that mathematical truths are independent of the laws of
physics.Comment: Talk presented at "Quantum Computing: Back Action 2006", IIT Kanpur,
India, March 200
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