Physics Is (NP-)Hard 212
An anonymous reader writes "New research at the boundary of physics and computer science shows that determining the dynamical equations of a system from observations of its behavior is NP-hard. From the abstract: 'The behavior of any physical system is governed by its underlying dynamical equations. Much of physics is concerned with discovering these dynamical equations and understanding their consequences. In this work, we show that, remarkably, identifying the underlying dynamical equation from any amount of experimental data, however precise, is a provably computationally hard problem (it is NP-hard), both for classical and quantum mechanical systems.'"
No problem (Score:5, Funny)
I am NP-smart
Well no wonder I failed physics (Score:5, Funny)
I always thought it was hard, but that takes it to another level
NP (Score:2, Funny)
No Problem hard? I would have thought it would be harder...
Re:No problem (Score:5, Funny)
Ow, my brain (Score:5, Funny)
It seems it is nearly NP-Hard to understand the concept of "NP-Hard". Thanks to Wikipedia I now understand that I don't fully understand this.
I should think that turning observations into accurate equations is hampered by never knowing if you have enough of the correct observations to determine the correct equation.
Hmm... (Score:5, Funny)
So these scientists were studying the science of physics itself, at some higher abstract level.
Does that mean this research is metaphysics?
Re:NP (Score:2, Funny)
Obligitory http://xkcd.com/37/ [xkcd.com]
Re:Schrodinger's Cat Fight? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:NP (Score:2, Funny)
I don't know what the fuss is about: P=NP, where N=1.