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Is there already evidence today (e.g. basic theoretical research or even prototypes) on what the next technolgy will be/could be that is superior to quantum computers?

Or have we reached the "pinnacle computing technology" with quantum computers and the only thing left to do is to build larger and larger (in terms of qubits) quantum computers with a more advanced architecture? If the latter is true, why is that?

If this is not the correct Stack Exchange site to ask this question, I apologize. In that case, please, point me to a better suited one.

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  • $\begingroup$ Speculative questions won't fit anywhere sorry. $\endgroup$
    – curiousdannii
    May 8, 2020 at 1:36
  • $\begingroup$ Thank you both for your input. I changed the title and revised the question. If the question still is too speculative let me know and I will delete it. $\endgroup$
    – Johannes Walter
    May 8, 2020 at 7:14
  • $\begingroup$ The closest site that I could think of to what you want would be Worldbuilding SE - I've spoken to one of the mods about this question and we agreed that this question as-is is a bit too much on the speculative side and not enough on the worldbuilding side, but it would admittedly be a better start than here if you can think of a way to adapt it to that site $\endgroup$
    – Mithrandir24601 ♦
    May 11, 2020 at 22:27

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The question is fine, but I think still a bit difficult to answer in a non-subjective way.

A cursory exploration on google will provide you with examples of papers proposing computing paradigms based on things such as effects of general relativity (gravitational waves) or string theory, and probably other similar examples.

I am not qualified enough in those subjects to assess the accuracy or seriousness of such proposals. However, what I think it's fair to say is that there is no alternative model of computation that is widely believed to be "better" than quantum computation (or better stated, no physical phenomenon that is widely believed to not being efficiently simulatable with a quantum computer). This is sometimes referred to as the physical Church-Turing thesis.

Does this mean that there is no such thing? No, it means that we have no clear and non-controversial evidence pointing in that direction (I use these qualifiers because I guess it could be argued that there are phenomena which are not well-described by our current physical theories -- cue merging of QM and general relativity etc. -- so there could be room for something more happening there, but we simply don't know for certain yet).

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