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Interesting that electricity has been useful in bringing about things Voltaire championed such as freedom of speech, and abolition of (slave) labor. However I think you meant Volta the inventor of the battery. Also QC seems to suffer from the opposite of lack of imagination about what it might be good for.

> Voltaire

I suspect you mean Volta[0], tho I did wonder if Voltaire[1] worked with electricity :)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_Volta

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voltaire

... and when Becher was experimenting with phlogiston, no-one knew where that would lead.

Lol at comparing demonstrable advanced technology like quantum computing to phlogiston.

Anyway, experiments to prove/disprove phlogiston lead directly to our understanding of combustion and discovery of oxygen...

I think you rather miss the point, when electricity was postulated, no-one would know where it would lead, I point out that the same is true for phlogiston; one changed the world and the other went nowhere. My point is that just because something has so-far not been shown to be useful does not imply that it will eventually change the world.