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Is the Universe its own Largest Computer?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the where-are-the-mice dept.

missingmatterboy writes: "If the universe is simply a giant calculating machine, how big is it? Seth Lloyd, who two years ago worked out the theoretical maximum possible power a laptop computer could posess, has now "estimated how much information the Universe can contain, and how many calculations it has performed since the Big Bang." His conclusion: you'd need about 10^90 bits, with something like 10^120 manipulations of those bits, to express the universe since time began."

11 of 610 comments (clear)

  1. The ultimate compressed file then is... by A+nonymous+Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...42!

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    Infuriate left and right
  2. Okay, so what OS? by LinuxDeckard · · Score: 5, Funny

    I guess the fact we don't have weekly big-bangs indicates the universe doesn't run a certain OS out of Redmond :)

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    UNIX *is* user-friendly. Its just more selective on who its friends are. --Scott Adams
    1. Re:Okay, so what OS? by moody834 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Depends on whether or not you consider the daytime sky a blue screen or not.

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      /* * We did not get what we need .. we cannot sleep ..
  3. Well... by Have+Blue · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...if the universe has performed 10^120 operations and it's about 20 billion years old, it's running at about 4*10^90 gigahertz. Imagine a Beowulf cluster of those!

    1. Re:Well... by schwatoo · · Score: 4, Funny

      By Wednesday those guys over at HardOCP will get it water-cooled and overclocked to 4*10^95 gigahertz...

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      I have trouble with passwords among other things.
  4. With a Machine like that... by E1ven · · Score: 5, Funny

    With calculating power like that, you /might/ be able to run Doom III at the highest settigs ;)

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    Colin Davis
  5. Does this mean ... by iaamoac · · Score: 5, Funny
    1. ...the expansion of the universe is similar to never de-allocating memory?

    2. ...the rapid expansion phase at the beginning was someone trying to overclock the universe?

    3. ...the big crunch comes when MS figures out how to write software for the univsersal computer?

    4. ... the CPU manufacturers are right around the corner to making a computer more powerful than universe.

    5. ...all the weird stuff at the quantum scale is caused by dereferencing a NULL pointer.

    Iaamoac

  6. How many rules has cricket? by panurge · · Score: 4, Funny
    It is coincidental. This may need some explaining to some people, but the clue is all over HHG. 42 is the number of rules of the game of cricket, which as the HHG makes clear is the most important thing in the Universe (Krikkit the planet, Brockian Ultra-Cricket...you get the picture.)

    Cricket is a simplified version of baseball in which there are only two bases, but to confuse you the pitchers periodically change direction. Also, the bats are bigger because cricket players are fuelled by beer, and their coordination isn't so hot.

    Relevance? well, this thread is about big numbers. And I think it was the Hungarian humorist George Mikes who said that the English, lacking a religion, invented cricket to give themselves an idea of eternity.

    No, I confess, completely off topic.

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    Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
  7. Re:Moore or less... by gosand · · Score: 5, Funny
    According to Moore's law, the typical desktop computer should be able to simulate the universe in less than 600 years. (18 months per double; 10^120 =~= 2^399; 1.5 years * 399 = 598.5 years)

    Hmm, wonder what it will be able to calculate in 601 years...

    Actually, in 600 years, there will 600 more years worth of calculations to do. Including the simulation in question. Ouch, that hurt.

    --

    My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.

  8. I wonder... by CleverNickName · · Score: 4, Funny

    How many of us read this headline and thought, "YEAH! FORTY-TWO BABY!!! +5 Funny Karma, here I come! WOO!!!"

    >click

    D'oh.

  9. Re:Human Free Will by tuck182 · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's a good thing that the Universe wasn't written in C++. Otherwise, our friends would be able to access our private members.