(PsychologyToday) Philosophical conundrum for visionaries. Skeptics of new technology often think: “Since I don’t understand it, how can it be good for anything?” Implicit in this attitude is the assumption that “I only see value in what I can understand”. For visionaries, just having the dream already has value. This discussion is written by Po Chi Wu, Ph.D., an Innovation Provocateur and Evangelist who teaches entrepreneurship at the School of Business and Management at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He is a co-author of of the book Agile Innovation and is a former venture capitalist and entrepreneur in Silicon Valley and in Asia.
There naturally is a requirement to create a new language around quantum computing that can accurately describe how QC works and what it can do. For example, a quantum computer is designed to work with “probability states,” which are, by definition, abstract concepts that cannot be detected by or mapped to specific physical states. Mst people have no feel for what these kind of abstract concepts mean in everyday life.
There is a paradox for visionary innovators here. The greater the vision, the more far-reaching, the farther it is from existing practical reality, so fewer people can or want to try to understand what it is and can be. So, visionaries mostly talk to each other, happily focusing on technical details in a newly invented language that only insiders can appreciate.
Wu develop the positive mindset needed for bold innovation? Young people, less burdened with legacy habits, can show the way forward.
Communications Paradox for Visionary Innovators Commercializing Quantum Technology
