China to Crack Supercomputer Top Ten List

jsse writes "ComputerWorld (Hong Kong) has an article about Chinese Academy of Sciences building a supercomputer which has been shown in benchmark tests to process up to 10 trillion floating-point operations per second (TFLOPS) and is expected to take a spot on the list of the world's ten most powerful supercomputers for the first time. The computer is a cluster of 2,560 Opteron 800 series processors from Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) contained in 640 nodes of four processors each. AMD has announced the project last year when the cluster was building."

Comments

Hrmm

[acehole]

So what happened to that dragon cpu chip they were working on?

Re:Hrmm

[Anonymous Coward]

they're saving that one to be #1

Re:Hrmm

[eean]

From what I remember, they weren't planning those to be really powerful.

Re:Hrmm

[WindBourne]

but just ask yourself why the much-hyped Dragon CPU isn't being used.

The dragon is meant to be used in the same space that that dragonball and other embedded chips are being used. China is not really interested in building a few number of chips but large numbers of cheap chips. Then they can build up the industry. Think that Japan did with automobiles back in the 50's, and 60's.

But if you really think that the dragon should be in super computer space, then I would ask why no super computers based on dragonball or other embeddeds?

Use?

[IANAL(BIAILS)]

I glanced through the article quickly and I see that it doesn't mention what use the computer will be put to. For some reason, I doubt it will be used to model climate change... bets they want to use the cycles to crunch some nuclear weapons simulations?

Re:Use?

[didiken]

Hmmm, I doubt the Super Computers at Lawrence Berkeley Labs won't do nuclear simulations either.

Re:Use?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

I don't believe the post to which you supplied said anything about the United States. Rather, it speculated that the new supercomputer would be used for nuclear weapons.

And I said, who are we (yes, not all Slashdotters are from the US, but most / many are in fact from the US) to tell China what to do with their supercomputer? Kettle, black, glass houses, and so forth...

Re:Use?

[mslinux]

It will be used to calculate, measure and to build mathematical models... like all super-computers. It's just a tool, what exactly they decide to calculate isn't important.

Math is agnostic, it doesn't care if one is attempting to measure the fallout radius of a hydrogen bomb or what percentage of the earth's surface is water.

"If you can measure what you speak of and express it by a number, you know something about your subject; but if you cannot, your knowledge is meager and unsatisfactory." --Kelvin

Re:Use?

[rayvd]

Huh? How the heck has history shown we're an untrustworthy keeper of these things? The fact that we used two to avert an extremely costly and bloody land invasion of the Japanese home island?

I don't seem to recall us using them on our own people or at the drop of a hat even when things turned for the worse in Vietnam.

I *do* recall the simple existence of them preventing war with the USSR and in the end, being partly responsible for the fall of that country when it couldn't keep up...

Sheesh...

Re:Use?

[tehanu]

The US does a lot of nuclear weapon simulations as well. So does France and any other country with nuclear weapon capability. I imagine the US is doing even more now as it is developing new types of mini-nukes which the government is seriously talking about deploying in conventional warfare. So if you want to cast stones...

Anyway, one idea is that the more computer simulations you do, the fewer real tests you have to do. So increased computer simulations may be beneficial for the minorities and rural Han Chinese living in the remote areas that they do the tests in. Of course it would be best to reduce development on nuclear weapons entirely but I don't see that happening in the present climate anytime soon. When even the leader of the free world is out there advocating the development of new nuclear weapons and uses loopholes in treaties to develop them, what exactly do you think the leaders of the paranoid and not-so-free world will do?

Re:Use?

[elvum]

Hello? Last time I checked, the UK, France, Russia, Pakistan, India and I think China itself all had nukes. Not to mention the Israelis (probably). There's no question of the US being the "sole keeper" of such weapons, even if it wanted to be.

Re:Use?

[nono79]

It's a common statement - and it's wrong. the ussr didn't collapse due to arms races

Re:Use?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

What you're gesturing about is Fort Dietrick where the Army's bio-weapons program isn't anymore.

Really. No more bio weapons at Fort Whatever? Sure, OK, I'll have to take your word for it. But the location is hardly the point. Call it Fort Secret Bio Lab, we still *are* in the business of developing bio weapons.

Re:Use?

[Anonymous Coward]

The US has had some 32(+) 'broken arrows' - or times that it has lost nuclear weaposn - literally, _LOST_.

The only other country this has happened to it Russia.

You are untrustworthy.

Re:Use?

[jsebrech]

Huh? How the heck has history shown we're an untrustworthy keeper of these things? The fact that we used two to avert an extremely costly and bloody land invasion of the Japanese home island?

The use of nuclear weapons on hiroshima and nagasaki was tactically unnecessary, it did not decide the war, it only speeded up the ending of it. Especially the second bomb was unnecessary, since the japanese had gotten the message after the first one.

They could have also dropped the bombs on low-populated areas, but instead they dropped it on civilian cities, knowing full well that the destruction and loss of human life would be massive. And they dropped them without warning, to make sure loss of civilian life would be maximized.

This massive civilian massacre was a constant factor in WWII-era allied campaigns. Japan and Germany saw constant nighttime firebombing in the later stages of the war, designed to kill as much civilians as possible to destroy enemy morale. Ofcourse, since the allied forces won, the history books were written in such a way as to obfuscate this fact.

I *do* recall the simple existence of them preventing war with the USSR and in the end, being partly responsible for the fall of that country when it couldn't keep up...

Exactly. What kept the cold war from becoming hot was the fact that both sides had nuclear weapons. That's the theory of nuclear detente: if everyone has them, no one can use them.

Re:Use?

[ctr2sprt]

Tu quoque. The fact that the US possesses and actively researches WMDs does not mean we can't criticize other countries who do. Even discounting different situations (dictatorship getting nukes vs. democracy getting nukes), at worst it only means that we are unable to live up to our own moral standards. It doesn't mean that our moral standards are invalid or that our criticisms are inappropriate.

Re:Use?

[mlyle]

The use of nuclear weapons on hiroshima and nagasaki was tactically unnecessary, it did not decide the war, it only speeded up the ending of it. Especially the second bomb was unnecessary, since the japanese had gotten the message after the first one.

Really? Allied projections for an island-by-island invasion of Japan involved literally millions of casualties of allied personnel and uninvolved civilians. And the Japanese military staged an unsuccessful coup rather than allow Hirohito to surrender after Nagasaki.

Re:Use?

[nmk]

Oh really. Have you ever heard the saying, practice before you fucking preach (ok, I added the fucking).

Re:Use?

[suyashs]

The Israelis have aprox. 88 nukes at their disposal.

Re:Use?

[Zork the Almighty]

They are probably using it for web-filtering :)

Re:Use?

[gnu-generation-one]

"And I said, who are we (yes, not all Slashdotters are from the US, but most / many are in fact from the US) to tell China what to do with their supercomputer? Kettle, black, glass houses, and so forth..."

And more interestingly, how many slashdotters are in America and using supercomputers at work to run nuclear weapons simulations?

Re:Use?

[gnu-generation-one]

"Really? Allied projections for an island-by-island invasion of Japan involved literally millions of casualties of allied personnel and uninvolved civilians."

It always comes down to two extremes, doesn't it? If you don't do what I want, you'll have to take the complete other extreme and look how evil that is...

Why not drop the a-bomb in the sea. You're saying if we don't nuke a major city, the only other alternative is to hide the a-bomb and fight with sticks?

Re:Use?

[danielobvt]

You forgot North Korea...

Re:Use?

[cynic10508]

Really. No more bio weapons at Fort Whatever? Sure, OK, I'll have to take your word for it. But the location is hardly the point. Call it Fort Secret Bio Lab, we still *are* in the business of developing bio weapons. The location is rather important to the point. Your argument is that the US is still in the business of making biological weapons. I don't deny this, but you have far from proven your assertion. By making your assertion of a bio-weapons program you have assumed the burden of proof. But your single piece of evidence, as pointed out, is erroneous. Therefore, this is nothing more than conjecture on par with any run of the mill conspiracy theorist.

Re:Use?

[KarmaMB84]

There was no guarantee that the bombs (and they only had a few at the time) would explode properly so demonstrating them would've been a bad idea.

Why don't I hear the same arguments about FIREBOMBING major cities?

Re:Use?

[advance512]

That's great.

Let's give all countries on Earth nuclear weapons.. obviously, all politicans and army generals are trust worthy. This way, we'll never ever use nukes!

Hell, even if a terrorist manages to get nuclear weapons by a hostile takeover BEFORE some rogue/insane army general/politician manages ot use the weapons - we're still dead.

The only way to make sure the non-usage of nuclear weapons is not have any nuclear weapons, anywhere.

Re:Use?

[mlyle]

Well, given that the Japanese military attempted to prevent a surrender at all costs after both Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and that the surrender tapes almost weren't successfully broadcast due to actions by the Japanese military police forces against the Imperial Guard, I think it's reasonable to question whether dropping a nuke in the sea would have accomplished much. Indeed, there was little reaction at all to the Hiroshima device, nor to the Potsdam declaration before that.

And there were only 3 atomic weapons at the time. (It's even likely, that had confusion from conventional bombing not permitted the second set of tapes to be ferried to the radio station, that the third bomb would have been dropped-- It was being ferried to the theatre at the time).

MacArthur estimated that 1.5-2M Japanese would fight to defend the islands; previous battles had cost about roughly one allied life per two Japanese soldiers encountered; so it is not really hard to imagine an alternative scenario when millions of people would be killed, as opposed to perhaps 150,000 total from the atomic bombings. (The best estimates are about 103,000 killed within several months of the bombing, and perhaps 1000 from radiation induced cancers and leukemia).

Yah, it really sucks. But the alternatives weren't very nice, either. Russia was about to begin meddling, too, and things could have gotten very messy.

Re:Use?

[rhuntley12]

But if everyone has them and two countries fight a bit, what's to stop the loosing side from saying fuck it?(Pakistan and India) Not to mention what would some of the dictators/bad leaders care if they are about to die and what not?

Re:Use?

[shis-ka-bob]

That estimate is complete bullshit. The Joint Chiefs of Staff estimated 38,000 causalities. The 'million' number was from revisionists wanting to justify Truman's decision.

We demanded 'unconditional' surrender. The Japanese had one condition: Let us keep our Emperor. We said no to that condition. After the Japanese had refused to surrender, Russia joined the Pacific war. We also decided that we were willing to allow the Emperor to remain as a 'figurehead'. If we had told the Japanese these two facts, they probably would have surrendered without the bombs. Even after we dropped the bombs, we accepted Japan's single condition in an 'unconditional surrender.' George Orwell must have been thinking about this sort of double speak when he wrote 1984 (in 1948).

Eisnehower said we didn't need to drop the bomb. McAuther said we didn't need the bomb. Both men were warriors who contemplated using atomic bombs under different conditions. But we did not need to use the bobms to end WWII. The decision to level two cities (that had not even been attacked previously, after thousands of sorties by B-29's) will be remembered as the US's blackest moment.

Re:Use?

[GreyWolf3000]

I think the parent meant that, logically speaking, the US being a hypocrite has no bearing on the severity of the threat of a non-democracy developing WMD's.

We can gripe about U.S. foreign policy all we want, but we 'Merkins being "pig-headed" doesn't save the world when some rogue nation decides to ruin things for the rest of us.

If we allow the hipocracies of the US government to affect our perceptions of global security, we would be as guilty as those who cause *past tense* our extinction.

Re:Use?

[DigiShaman]

And I said, who are we (yes, not all Slashdotters are from the US, but most / many are in fact from the US) to tell China what to do with their supercomputer? Kettle, black, glass houses, and so forth...

I agree. Thank God for MAD. They can build ten, thousand, million nuclear weapons and it wouldn't matter. Why? Because if they attacked us, we would turn China into a sheet of glass so massive it would reflect sunlight back to Earth and create global "cooling" OK...maybe not that bad, but you get the idea.

Re:Use?

[maximilln]

We demanded 'unconditional' surrender. The Japanese had one condition: Let us keep our Emperor. We said no to that condition

May you live long, have wealth, and many many happy and productive children.

This is the single most telling, truthful, disgusting, and horrific point in the consideration to drop the atomic bomb. A nation pleads for the preservation of the icon of its culture and they get nuked for it.

Even after we dropped the bombs, we accepted Japan's single condition in an 'unconditional surrender.'

I wasn't aware that the US had relented after dropping the bomb. It reminds me of trying to steal a lollipop from a child, beating the child to oblivion when they hold fast, and then ruffling their hair and letting them keep the lollipop when they're laying bloody on the ground. WTF?

Re:Use?

[evilviper]

I know I'm late to the discussion, but I really feel I should ring-in here...

it did not decide the war, it only speeded up the ending of it.

If the atomic bomb didn't decide the war, nothing did. And even if you want to continue to believe that, the undisputable fact is that ending the war saved a very large number of American soldiers' lives.

They could have also dropped the bombs on low-populated areas, but instead they dropped it on civilian cities, knowing full well that the destruction and loss of human life would be massive.

First of all, the Hiroshima bomb was not the world's introduction to the atomic weapon. There had been an atomic bomb detonated in the Nevada desert, so the Japanese knew full-well what was comming. Still, they did not say "maybe we should surrender before we get killed." It was more their own fault than anyone else's.

Second, WWII was not like our current military campaigns. Today we say that civilians should be spared because they are helpless victims, that are not involved with military regimes by choice. But in WWII, the public WAS the war machine. They were the ones building the weapons and machines, they were the ones supporting the millitary, they were the ones cheering-on the war as well. They were just as valid a target as any, I'm sorry to say.

Last, it's incredibly strange that the dropping of the atomic bomb is so scrutinized and critized, when more japanese civilians were killed with standard fire bombings, than were killed by the atomic bomb. There was already massive loss of life, and there was going to continue to be massive loss of life. The only thing the atomic bomb has going for it is that it's speeds everything up.

Would you prefer that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were fire-bombed for several more months? There would have been the same death-toll for Japanese civilians, and to make things worse there would have been a lot more American deaths added to that.

This massive civilian massacre was a constant factor in WWII-era allied campaigns.

Yes, but it wasn't some sneaky underhanded thing. Civilians were entirely fair-game. There were the ones supporting the military forces, as I already said.

Ofcourse, since the allied forces won, the history books were written in such a way as to obfuscate this fact.

They were? Strange, I didn't have any problem finding this out myself. I think it's just a case that you think it should be treated as if it was a massive criminial act, while it's just told at face-value instead... Like always, people complain the history books are biased and twisted when they don't show the bias and spin that you happen to want.

Exactly. What kept the cold war from becoming hot was the fact that both sides had nuclear weapons. That's the theory of nuclear detente: if everyone has them, no one can use them.

Actually, I believe the threat of first-strike lead to numerous very close-calls. It was the fact that they both posessed a huge number of atomic weapons that made both sides very nervos, and very nearly lead to the end of humanity in numerous different incidents.

If the USSR did not have them, I still don't believe the USA would have attacked them, because conventional retaliation would have been serious, and because the USA has simple never been an aggressor...

M.A.D. doesn't explain why the USA didn't use atomic bombs in other wars, where the USSR and China had no stake. An atomic bomb dropped on Afganistan wouldn't have lead to retaliation from either, but the USA still didn't decide to go that route. M.A.D. was what kept the cold war very warm.

While that is pretty fast...

[Digitus1337]

I think maybe we should hold off on asking it "why 42?"

Worlds fastest internet filter

[ReeferCpe]

This is probably the intended use :)

Re:Interesting

[acxr is wasted]

If they could just smooth over the human rights people

As you can see, this is nothing new for China.

But why on earth

[caston]

Would the Chinese need a computer capable of running Longhorn?

Oh well, More power to them!

Use?

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

Well, why should the United States be the sole keeper of Weapons of Mass Destruction? History has shown that we aren't exactly the most trustworthy of these things. Just exactly what do you suppose they are developing at Fort Mead? Vaccines to save the world?

Why 800's?

[CaptainPinko]

Why would they use 800s but then put them in nodes of 4 instead of just using 400's? I assume that 400's would be cheaper and easier to manufacture.

Re:Why 800's?

[bucky0]

Looking over here at pricewatch.com, there is no such thing as a 400. 8way systems are hard because of all the HT interconnects that are involved.

Re:Why 800's?

[JJJ_NL]

400 don't exist. There are only 1xx, 2xx and 8xx.

Re:Why 800's?

[Wesley Felter]

As others said, there are no Opteron 4xxs. Also, all Opterons are the same, so the cost to manufacture them is the same. This is why AMD was able to magically cut prices on the 8xxs by 43% recently.

Re:Why 800's?

[sundling]

That's not strictly true. The number of hypertransport link varies between series of processors. The number of hypertransport links determine how many CPU's it's connected to. These are direct connections, which is why for multiple processor systems, Xeons are considerably inferior. Even in the few places a Xeon system might beat a Opteron in a single processor system, the Xeon loses by with dual systems and is completely annihilated with even larger systems. Paul Sundling http://www.planatar.com

Re:Why 800's?

[Wesley Felter]

The number of enabled Hypertransport links varies, but they all have three on the die.

Saving You Time

[tirefire]

[Insert unecessary comparison between this and the G5 cluster at Virginia Tech].

i see...

[abscondment]

The computer's being created by Dawning Information Industry Co. (US Site).

According to their company profile,

Dawning is the unique Chinese high-tech company which can manufacture not only low end PC server worth $1,200 but also high end MPP system worth millions USD.

They seem to serve a lot of different customers, but I have a feeling the government will be making use of this baby.

Re:Interesting

[turgid]

Since when does "exceedingly liberal"==Communist?

I wonder what kneejerk reaction

[Anonymous Coward]

will happen from our politicians in the US. My understanding is that the new cluster being built at Oak Ridge is really intended to somewhat compete with the Earth Simulator cluster in Japan. Granted, I don't think it is intended to surpass it but still I just get the feeling that a lot of the supercomputer projects being supported by Congress are political in nature and not really scientific. Now that the Chinese will possibly enter the top 10, that should get the politicos all riled up.

Re:I wonder what kneejerk reaction

[aardvarkjoe]

Whether or not the reason for building a supercomputer was political, the use is scientific. I think that we can use as many political excuses as possible to fund science.

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

at least they are free of Warcrimes unlike the USA (no matter how much rummy bleats)

do you see how much damage the current administration has done ?, human rights violations by USA was 5 years ago unthinkable, now they are in the same club as those "communist" countries, nice company

the damage done to USA's credibility will take 100's of years to repair , look how long slavery took. you lost the terrorists won and what was a free country has become a facist theocracy that tortures, murders and treats humans with contempt
that my friends what is going to be written into history

w00t!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now the chinese can caluclate how many communists it really takes to screw in a lightbulb....

(my estimate is the entire chinese population, because if only one person screws it in, then that's just not sharing with others, is it?)

China to Crack Supercomputer Top Ten List

[c]

Man, I can't stand it when that list goes down from beeing hax0red...

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

Human rights issues seem less important than the resources a country has.

A superpower state is powerful enough to influence events throughout the world.

I think due to the redefinition of superpower as "United States as the world's only superpower", it probably refers to the ability to forcefully remove sovereignty and control resources, to conduct human rights abuses of its own with impunity. In other words, they are not answerable to anyone.

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

extreme liberalism would be libertarians, communist implies authoriatian.

Re:Interesting

[afidel]

China was never really communist, and they aren't even playing at it anymore. Witness the recent vote by the parliment to reinstate private property rights and which gives some basic human rights back to the people. China is already such a huge economic engine that it has raised world steel prices by between 50 and 100% since the beginning of this year. Other metals such as Zinc have seen nearly 200% rises! The scary part for the developed countries is that concievably China could grow at this rate for 100 years and still not have their entire population up to our current standard of living!

Re:Interesting

[turgid]

Thank you.

Re:Interesting

[turgid]

No. Communism is a form of dictatorship combined with extreme socialist economic policy. Now, liberalism implies liberty. Please look up liberal in a dictionary. An American one will do at a pinch if that's all you have.

In other unrelated news

[Anonymous Coward]

global warming has significantly increased

Re:Interesting

[neema]

"China was never really communist, and they aren't even playing at it anymore."

And this, to a large degree, where the Sino-Soviet split came from. While the Soviet Union claimed that it had already gotten past capitalism and was now working from socialism to communism, China never made this claim. Ideologically, they claimed that class struggle was to continue in China and that there would be a ruling class and an antagonistic serving class, which the Soviet Union claimed was impossible after revolution. This difference in ideologies allowed China to carry out a lot of "capitalist" reform by simply pointing out to their notion that, until the world-economy was a socialsit one, it was futile to try not to be capitalist in some senses.

Re:Interesting

[tehanu]

The best part is that in Australia, the "Liberal" party is the mainstream *conservative* ie. right-wing party. John Howard our PM, who is ideological and personal best buddies with your President Bush (eg. he just banned gay marriage) is the leader of the Liberal party. Which I think just blows the contention that liberal==left-wing.

USA?

[John Seminal]

Does anyone know what the list of top 10 is? I wonder how many of the top 10 supercomputers are in the USA, and how the Virginia Tech G4 cluster ranks.

Also, a side note. How much extra computing "power" is gained by adding an extra machine to a cluster? For example, I have about 7 or 8 pentiums (most are 166's, there is a 133 and a 200) sitting on the floor collecting dust. If I hooked them all up together, what would the usefulness be? Could I compile programs quicker? Would a cluster make a good web server, jps server? I know my PIII500 can drag with tomcat at times when crunching jsp.

I am glad china is investing money in technology. With all the people they have living there, they could become a major technolohy hub. Look at what Japan did in the 1980's with manufacturing. Imagine all the cheap(er) products we could have on the market. It all starts with R&D. Even the old "star wars" spending from the 1980's has proven useful in new products in ways not imagined back then.

Re:USA?

[imsabbel]

Look at top500.org
There is a new list comming the next few weeks.

Your 7-8 pentiums alone could do some useful stuff as a cluster. Not much, but a little. A compile farm COULD be possible (never done it, so i dont know, but if they have enough ram why not, as long as you have a better machine to do the linking/ect)

But adding them to an existing cluster of faster machines would slow the whole stuff down (more communication cost lowering the total efficiency more than outweights the computing power of the new nodes).

Re:USA?

[chamblah]

Does anyone know what the list of top 10 is?

Here is the current list of 500, last updated in November of '03.

Re:USA?

[foidulus]

Several errors in your post I would like to point out:
I wonder how many of the top 10 supercomputers are in the USA, and how the Virginia Tech G4 cluster ranks.
It's a G5 cluster first of all, and it ranks third(IIRC the biology department wants to use it)
Also, a side note. How much extra computing "power" is gained by adding an extra machine to a cluster? For example, I have about 7 or 8 pentiums (most are 166's, there is a 133 and a 200) sitting on the floor collecting dust. If I hooked them all up together, what would the usefulness be? Could I compile programs quicker? Would a cluster make a good web server, jps server? I know my PIII500 can drag with tomcat at times when crunching jsp.
That all depends on what you want to do, and what your communication speed is. If it takes more time to send the data off somewhere, have it computed by your slowest machine, then to have it sent back than it would just to compute it with your fastest machine, you lost time. For applications, you *could* compile faster(Apple has distributed builds with Rendezvous and XCode, they aren't the only ones who are doing it, but something to check out if you are interested). Also, certain applications distribute and scale well, other ones don't. That is probably why there will always be room for Cray and co.
Look at what Japan did in the 1980's with manufacturing.
Read up a little on the subject here Japan's manufacturing revolution began well before the 80's..

Re:USA?

[Dun Malg]

Also, a side note. How much extra computing "power" is gained by adding an extra machine to a cluster?

Depends on how big the cluster already is. Are you adding one machine to a cluster of 6, or a cluster of 600?

For example, I have about 7 or 8 pentiums (most are 166's, there is a 133 and a 200) sitting on the floor collecting dust. If I hooked them all up together, what would the usefulness be?

Practically none. Buy a single 2.4GHZ Celeron box off eBay for $200 and you'll get nore out of it.

Could I compile programs quicker?

No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear. Besides, it's not like you hook up 8 machines to a 10/100 switch, start up a few "cluster daemons", and end up with a single virtual machine. Clustering generally requires software customized for the specific class of task you wish to tackle.

Would a cluster make a good web server, jps server?

You can have multiple machines serving the same web content, but that's not really clustering, per se. That's just load balancing.

Re:USA?

[damiam]

No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear.

Compiling parallelizes quite well. See distcc and XCode/Rendezvous.

Re:USA?

[silas_moeckel]

There are a lot of types of clusters. You could put those 8 boxes together in a shared something cluster and make a set of webservers that not faster than any single box but is a lot more reliable. The TCO is all wrong for it you would be better off getting a couple modern PC's and making an active active cluster out of them as it will be cheaper to power and have a lot more ram. A simple shared nothing cluster can make compiling something big like a kernel faster than a single machine but again a single modern box with more memory will do it faster. Abotu the only thing a pile of pentiums is realy good for is IO bandwith as the PCi bus hasent gotten any better since then but thats only usefull if you need to do a lot of IO.

Re:USA?

[scrytch]

> Could I compile programs quicker? Would a cluster make a good web server, jps server? I know my PIII500 can drag with tomcat at times when crunching jsp.

You could compile the linux kernel in two seconds if you used distcc, but your game of quake would have average frame rates, and wouldn't take much advantage of the parallelism at all. Any individual program still has latency bottlenecks that don't parallelize. And since it's busy crunching numbers at top speed, it doesn't have great interactive response. Most supercomputers have desktop class machines front-ending them as terminals, but when you submit a job to them, it might take it a second or two to round-trip it, no matter how trivial. Supercomputers are still a lot more like mainframes than desktops.

Incidentally, tomcat's jsp is dreadful slow. Try jetty or resin instead.

Re:USA?

[sql*kitten]

Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear.

Linking is linear; you could compile C in as many parallel tasks as you have source files. Java compiles can be parellelized quite a bit too, particularly if your code makes heavy use of Class.forName(). I do this a lot, tho' quite gratuitously; I've got 4 CPUs so I use 'em, but with the size of projects I work on and the speed of even a single processor and a modern javac, it doesn't really make a vast amount of difference at the end of the day.

Re:USA?

[burns210]

The publicly posted LIST would be a good place to start. The Virginia Tech computer ranks third.

Re:USA?

[burns210]

"No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear. Besides, it's not like you hook up 8 machines to a 10/100 switch, start up a few "cluster daemons", and end up with a single virtual machine."

That, would be AWESOME, though.

"No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear."

Not that you are wrong, but Apple has a technology built into their development suite(which comes free with os X), that lets you use their rondevous networking technology to distributed compiling jobs across the LAN.

Re:USA?

[randombit]

No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear.

Compiling a single file is. But most software has more than one file, and you can compile different files on different machines. Check out distcc.

Of course, even using distcc, a single low-end Athlon will be 10x faster than all of those boxes combined, and use up a lot less electricity as well. So it's not exactly a useful excercise. Interesting, perhaps.

Re:USA?

[Dun Malg]

No. Clusters are only good for doing tasks that "parallelize". Compiling is too linear.

Compiling parallelizes quite well. See distcc and XCode/Rendezvous.

I stand corrected. I was thinking along the lines of parallelizing the compilation of a single module. I hadn't really considered compiling multiple parts being compiled and then linked-- duh. Still, he'd probably be better off compiling on a single 500mhz machine than splitting it up across several old 133 or 166mhz boxes, considering the likely difference in memory.

Re:USA?

[perlchild]

extra computing power is equivalent to about 90% of the computing power of the original machines, in terms of computing farms(if you're familiar with RAID technology, this is equivalent to RAID 0). Web serving requires a different kind of cluster, a high-availability cluster, where each machine is closer to RAID 5(or even RAID 1 in many cases), the use of the resources is completely different. Web service would also require shared storage, something which your pentiums aren't equipped to do(unless you have a very strange bunch of pentiums). Compute clusters like the top ten list basically are new machines, which calculate things. And only distributed programs(seti@home, distributed.net, etc...) match them currently in power, in fact, seti and the rest is mostly the application of grid technology, to an untrusted environment. Owning such a cluster makes it a trusted environment(you own all the machines and control which programs run, and can benchmark and fault detech to your heart's content).
But coming back to your pentiums, if you aren't selling cpu power now, you aren't likely to benefit much from setting up a compute cluster.

Re:Interesting

[john82]

China keeps showing more and more signs that it wants to be a big player in the world despite being communist. If they could just smooth over the human rights people (I suppose they should actually improve the human rights thing in general), they could very well become a very important figure in the world economy (not that they're not already).

China has the largest population on the planet with 1.3+ Billion people. The USA, including all states, protectorates, territories and New Jersey, is not quite 300 million (2000 census). That would make China four times the size in population. But you don't think they're very important.

News Flash: With only the most minor of exceptions, the governments of the world obviously don't care about China's human rights policies. Even the US, under the Clinton administration, gave in. Why? Because China already IS an economic power.

Do you stand in front of mountain and insist that it come to you? Think of economic power in terms of kinetic energy. KE = 0.5 * mass * velocity^2. Right now, China's economy doesn't have much velocity, but it sure as hell has mass. Let's apply that to the most fundamental priciple of economics: Supply and Demand. When demand rises while supply stays the same or goes down, price rises. China is untapped demand potential. That demand potential is unmatched. And as that demand changes from potential to realized, we'll all pay more ... for everything.

Re:Interesting

[dk.r*nger]

at least they are free of Warcrimes unlike the USA

Sure, why go to war when you have a billion of your own people to slaughter brutally?

There are no absolutes in this game, but you can't say that China is better than the US, just because they don't have a few very horrible incidents that are currently blown up in the media.

US is considered a resonable country, human rights wise. China is not even close to that yet. Yes, getting better, but it is still only 15 years ago the military opened fire on civilians in the centre of Beijing.

So, really, you need to take your anonymous self-rightious preaching elsewhere.

Ft. Meade vs. USAMRIID

[toxf]

I believe that you are referring to Ft. Meade, Maryland. Ft. Meade is the home of the NSA, and they are most certainly not developing weapons. Perhaps you meant USAMRIID (also in Maryland) - the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases.

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

The US doesn't want to annex its nearest neighbor by force or failing that, bomb them into submission.

Iraq.

The US isn't propping up Stalinist dictatorships that want nukes.

G. W. Bush already has nukes, and is working on taking all your freedoms. And how many "Stalinist dictatorships" has the U.S. put in power over the years? Castro? Sadam (sp?)?

The US has more than one political party.

Two is not much bigger than one. How different are they really? They are mostly the same except for a few distinguishing details. If a third party wanted to run, how long would it take for them to have a realistic shot?

The US doesn't arrest people in peaceful demonstrations and stick them in prison camps for 10 years at a time.

Prisoners from Afganistan. These are classified as "non-combatants" by the U.S. government. They are held with no trial, and are not POWs. And let's not forget about "free Kevin," held for (was it) 4 years without trial, and the only reason that he got out was because he agreed to a plea bargain imposed by the prosecutor.

The US doesn't think it owns Tibet.

Iraq.

The US doesn't tell the religious to register with the state or else.

Any of the government databases that track "undesirables"; members of the comunist party (or is that still illegal?), people of mid-east descent....

So much for the supercomputer export ban :P

[autopr0n]

I take it china's no longer on the list of countries we're not allowed to sell supercomputers too.

Re:So much for the supercomputer export ban :P

[Simon Lyngshede]

They aren't really buying a super computer, just a lot of "of the shelf" hardware.

I think The Register talked about this in an article regarding the new 8 cpu motherboards from Tyan, presumably that's what the chinese are going to use.

Re:So much for the supercomputer export ban :P

[CrystalChronicles]

It's 'OFF the shelf". And the gp poster said 'too' instead of 'to'. Nitpicky but this sort of thing annoys me.

Anyway back on topic, Tyan boards are manufactured in China so if they do use them, the export laws (if they still exist) do not apply.

Superpower /= human rights

[tehanu]

Human rights are not necessary to become a superpower. All superpowers have become superpowers because of force of arms and money eg. Athens (amongst the Greeks), the Romans, the Chinese in most of Asia's recorded history, the Spanish in their day, the British Empire, the USSR, the Ottoman Empire and the US are/were superpowers because at the height of their power they were extremely strong *militarily* and economically (though the two are linked). Sometimes human rights were developed, sometimes not. In some cases they were extremely hypocritical in the development of human rights ie. for our citizens, freedom, liberty etc. are important, for anyone else they can eat our boots. Once they started losing wars they started losing their superpower status, not when they started purges/proscriptions/inquisitions. If the US abolished democracy tomorrow, and developed into a theocratic rule and instituted purges/proscription/inquisition, it would still be a superpower due to its military and economic (actually maybe not economic - it is heavily in debt to the rest of the world which also somewhat underminds its military) power.

Re:MOD THE PARENT DOWN

[Anonymous Coward]

jewish people are successful because they've worked for it harder than you - not because of some sinister cabal.

You meant at JERUSALEM? Gaza? They surely are working harder than their American friends at Iraq.

Re:Interesting

[Dun Malg]

the damage done to USA's credibility will take 100's of years to repair

If only that were true. On the scale of bad things that people do to one another, the Abu Ghraib incidents are such small potatoes that, 10 years from now, you won't be able to find any significant number of people who'll cite the Abu Ghraib torture as even one of the top ten reasons they hate the US.

As for the UN, it's hard to take anything they say seriously when they selected Libya to chair the United Nations Commission on Human Rights...

Re:Interesting

[MendicantMonkey]

I think the parent was thinking "leftist" not liberal. Probably a byproduct of the screwed up politics here in the US.

The leftist Democrats have branded themselves liberals, and the right-wing Republicans call themselves conservative, though neither party seems interested in reducing government power anymore, so right-wing or liberal doesn't apply to either party.

Re:Interesting

[DNS-and-BIND]

Free of warcrimes? What?

*AHEM* Tibet *AHEM*.

You also might want to read up on the Chinese treatment of POWs during the Korean Conflict. Made the Iraqi prison look like a Sunday School.

Top 10 Summary

[thakadu]

The countries from top 10 are: 1. Japan 2. USA 3. USA 4. USA 5. USA 6. USA 7. USA 8. USA 9. USA 10. USA and the top 10 countries in the list with (highest rank) are: 1. Japan (1) 2. USA (2) 3. China (14) 4. France (15) 5. UK (16) 6. South Korea (22) 7. Canada (29) 8. Germany (31) 9. Netherlands (41) 10. New Zealand (44)

I call BS

[menem]

You are way off about the growth rate of china. China's current GDP per capita is 4700. US GDP per capita is 36300. Since China's economy is growing at 8% per year, if the growth rate didn't change, China would reach our standard of living in the year 2030! Of course, China's growth rate will slow down at some point. But, if you look at the history of other Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea, they had huge growth rates until they reached the GDP levels of other modern economies. In the year 2030, there will be 2 superpowers, the United States and China.

Re:I call BS

[gmhowell]

if the growth rate didn't change, China would reach our standard of living in the year 2030! Of course, China's growth rate will slow down at some point.

Economic growth doesn't necessarily have anything to do with standard of living. The per capita GDP might be the same as the US, but that doesn't mean that the average citizen will have an SUV, four televisions, etc.

Re:I call BS

[menem]

Huh? If the per capita GDP is the same as the united states, that means the country produces the same amount of goods as someone in the united states. These goods are going to be used by the citizens of China. While the goods purchased might be different, they will have the same amount of stuff available as someone in the united states. For example, maybe instead of SUV's, they might either drive smaller cars or take bullet trains. And I do expect that the average chinese family in 2030, if growth rates hold, will have just as many electronics as american families do today.

Re:I call BS

[gmhowell]

If the per capita GDP is the same as the united states, that means the country produces the same amount of goods as someone in the united states.

Right so far.

These goods are going to be used by the citizens of China.

Swing and a miss. Those goods can be shipped overseas. Those goods might be consumed by corporations in China. For example, a bulldozer will up the GDP of the country by a certain amount, but will not help the standard of living of the citizenry.

I'm certain that more Chinese will have smaller cars and mass transit. I'm certain that they'll have electronics. But not everything that leads to a rise in per capita GDP (which is a measure of the economic output of the entire country, divided by the number of citizens) is a consumer good that is used in that country.

Re:Interesting

[ameoba]

The whole liberal/conservative thing is kinda ambiguous, at least in relation to American politics.

Libertarians actually hold very right-wing/conservative views; the only way they get called liberals is because they don't think the government should get in the way of much of anything.

Re:Interesting

[Servo]

"exceedingly liberal" !=Communist

communist principles=="exceedingly liberal"

Yes, there is a problem with China and nukes.

[El Camino SS]

Contrary to your "arm the world is fine" statement, let me counter your argument with a little known fact.

China is not exactly run by the people of China, moreso than many other countries that do have nuclear capability.

History has shown that when a country is controlled by one person or an elite few, the distance to the sword in any situation is shortened.

Democracies generally promote peace with the "hell no you're not taking my son!" argument.

Think about it.

Re:Yes, there is a problem with China and nukes.

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

My point is, we are hardly the people to be preaching about non-proliferation. Our own bio / nuke programs continue to expand while we tell the world that they should give up these evil tools and embrace "world peace". Shouldn't we be leading by example? To me, it seems like just another example of the US saying that the rules don't apply to us.

Re:Yes, there is a problem with China and nukes.

[Archibald Buttle]

History has shown that when a country is controlled by one person or an elite few, the distance to the sword in any situation is shortened.

Ironically this gives an explaination of sorts as to why the USA and Britain were so keen to go to war in Iraq. Both countries have political systems dominated by the few, where the guy at the top has too much power.

This is better demonstrated for the Iraq war by the UK than the USA where the majority of the population was against the war and didn't buy the lies they were being fed by the government, yet Blair sent the army in to Iraq anyway.

Please.

[El Camino SS]

And I said, who are we (yes, not all Slashdotters are from the US, but most / many are in fact from the US) to tell China what to do with their supercomputer?
----


Yes. Trust them. They have such a good track record.

Kettle, black, glass houses, and so forth...


Tianemen square, bullets in protestors, missiles over Taiwan on election day, Falon Gong, and so forth...

Re:Please.

[imsabbel]

Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden, Vietnam, and so on. MUCH more dead....

Re:Please.

[El Camino SS]

Strangely, those were wars. Fighting totalitarian regimes in every example.

My examples were things that the Chinese government was doing to ITS OWN CITIZENS.

Get your facts straight.

Re:Please.

[LilGuy]

Even if you don't trust them, what are you gonna do huh? You can whine and throw a temper-tantrum, but there's no laws against a country owning a super-computer.

Its a troll because it is countering a troll.

[El Camino SS]

Standard Anti-American slashdot a-hole tactic.

I know this one...

[El Camino SS]

The dragon CPU was in the Internet Cafes, but alas, all of those got shut down.

LOL

[Kjella]

Seriously though, most countries don't have a very clean record, including China. Being involved in so many conflicts around the world, the US is hardly at the bottom of the barrel despite some incidents. What's really hurt the US is that they've been sanctimonious.

Being a thug and silently suppressing that is in many ways better than being a thug and claiming to be a saint. That's what hit the US full force. Compared to most countries of the world, the US is still a quite civilized one. But I don't think it'll ever regain the position as the "shining beacon of freedom and democracy" it once was.

Kjella

TERRIBLY INNACURRATE.

[El Camino SS]

In some other ways, seems like China has gone from exceedingly liberal (Communist) to more moderate, while the US is still that funny mix of liberal and right wing type of ideas.


Damn you America! Damn you and your mix of ideas!

Re:Interesting

[El Camino SS]

Since when does "exceedingly liberal"==Communist?


Since when we now strike first for peace.
Since when our oldest international ally (France) became our biggest enemy.
Since when disagreeing with your government makes you a traitor.
Since one old sarin gas shell becomes a nation killer... and proof of WMD.
And especially since the media has become "fair and balanced."

Or the short answer:

Since when does "exceedingly liberal"==Communist?

Oh, about since late November 2004.

Re:Pax Americana

[Dun Malg]

Because in a civilized society, the population grants the government a monopoly on the use of force. Extended to the planet, America seems the natural choice. Extending a governmental system with a judiciary, an executive and a legistlative branch to the planet, you end up with the World Court, the United States, and the UN.
The US is the world's police force, the US has most of the guns. From a practical standpoint, why NOT grant them the monopoly on force, since they've (typically) shown respect for liberty in the past. Name a country who has shown MORE respect for liberty, not in the "you should be free from being poor" sense, but in the true "you are free to do as you like, but eat what you kill" sense. It reminds me of that scene from the Life of Brian:

REG: All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
XERXES: Brought peace.

Stupid mods. Just because you disagree with the above quoted parent post doesn't mean you should mod it "troll".

Re:Interesting

[a whoabot]

True communism is actually the complete lack of state. Hence the name: the people live in a socially bound community. Stalinism may have confused this, because Stalin completely sidetracked the socialist project in what was essentially greed, and the movement towards communism in Russia regressed. Just because countries have been labelled communistic and were totalitarian, doesn't mean the concept of communism is actually dictatorial. As you may say, please look up communism in a dictionary, or better, an encyclopedia. Perhaps to illustrate, note that philosophies like Libertarian Socialism are communistic, but it would espouse that the socialist project should not use any state in its means towards communism.

"Liberty" is pretty much a goal of any political or economic philosophy, so it is completely meaningless. Communism promises liberty for the people in the form of total productive control and de-objectification/de-alienation, capitalism promises liberty for the people in the form of being able to claim what you work on or capitalize on, democracy promises liberty for the people in being able to choose the policies of the state, theocracy promises liberty for the people(the believers) in the form of transcendence, anarchy promises liberty for the people in the form of complete freedom within your own utility, etc.

Re:Interesting

[Dun Malg]

Libertarians actually hold very right-wing/conservative views;

Actually, I'd say Libertarians hold views on certain high-profile topics that are most commonly associated with right-wing conservatives (e.g. right to bear arms, the free market, and small government). The fact that right-wing conservatives don't actually stand for those things so much anymore and really just pay them lip-service occasinally is usually overlooked.

the only way they get called liberals is because they don't think the government should get in the way of much of anything.

Exactly. Opposing things like military intervention in foreign countries, having a standing army in the first place, and limiting immigration could all be considered "liberal". But most lefty-liberal types don't even oppose those things anymore, so those beliefs just get one labelled a "kook".

Is it really a chinese super computer?

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Is it really a chinese super computer? Its made from AMD chips.

Thats like saying "We built the fastest American sports car by putting 600 ferrari engines in a buick"

Re:Is it really a chinese super computer?

[gears5665]

Yeah....but all the chips were made at AMDs CHINA plant.

Re:Is it really a chinese super computer?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, just so you know, the silicon AMD uses comes from France (yes, all of it) and the Opterons are built (not assembled: built, from the ground up) in Germany. A lot of AMD's physical design work is done in Germany too.

Looks like they put those 600 ferrari engines in a BMW! ;)

Re:Is it really a chinese super computer?

[CrystalChronicles]

Why not? The #1 ranking supercomputer is Japanese and they don't make the chips used in it.

Re:Pax Americana

[Archibald Buttle]

On the surface you seem to make a good point here, but unfortunately since the US doesn't recognise the authority of the World Court or the UN the point isn't exactly valid, and I believe that is in part why you've been modded as a troll.

The Life of Brian quote would also be a good one if you could genuinely replace "Romans" with "Americans", but unfortunately history seems to indicate that you cannot. The USA hasn't exactly brought peace to Afghanistan, and it certainly hasn't yet to Iraq. It also failed to bring a genuine peace to Korea and Vietnam.

The Life of Brian quote works slightly better for the British Empire, but even then many would argue that the peace was illusory, as is witness by the fact that the peace that the British Empire brought to many countries in the middle east in the late 19th century and early 20th did not last.

And whilst the US has shown a respect for liberty in the past, that respect is now firmly in the past. Recent laws passed by the US government show no respect for the liberty of those that are not US citizens, and less respect for the liberty of its own citizens. This has been discussed at great length here before on Slashdot.

Re:Interesting

[daft_one]

Yeah, Australia's always got things wrong. I hear your toilet water doesn't even swirl the right way.

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

I see the mods have a sense of Funny.

Re: surface points

[Gothmolly]

This has been discussed at great length here before on Slashdot.
And therefore, it must be true? Talk about an ad hominem argument.

History seems to indicate that you cannot.
So it does, or it does not?

The US has been in Afghanistan for all of 3 years, and Iraq for one. Regarding Korea and Vietnam, define "genuine peace"?
Point me to an institution or country which has done a better job, and I'll consider conceding the point, based on the cogency and truth of your argument.

not true

[zogger]

Some spooks and US special forces and their allies, the "northern alliance" opium growers, killed 3,000 prisoners of war in afghanistan by locking them in almost air tight shipping containers and leaving them sit in the hot sun for days, then machine gunned whomever lived through it. It's on google, you can go find it yourself. There's some war crimes researchers investigating it now, digging up the mass graves, etc.

If you really look, you can find a long string of abuses by the US military going all the way back to the civil war, including all the outright genocide committed on the Indians here.

Their hands are just as dirty as anyone elses. Perhaps you have never heard the term "free fire zone"? Go find some actual nam combat vets and talk to them off the record, Hardly any of them WON'T have abuse/rape/torture stories. You might even see pictures, millions of them were taken and brought back to the US. Of course, in public or on the net on forums you won't read it much,because guys just don't freely admit to raping 12 year old girls or shooting prisoners or throwing them out of helicopters or dropping willie peter on tied up groups of prisoners,because they are all middle aged now with kids in colege and are local "respectable" business people and etc, but in meatspace if you talk to a lot of them,like I said, off the record, you'll hear some quite interesting stories. Combat and warzones are never john wayne-ish, that does not exist in real life. And it's the same with brit troops, french, russians, aussies, you name it. Warcrimes are NOT rare, or "confined to a few bad apples", and they never have been. There have been a lot of them committed in iraq so far, you'll just have to admit it, the evidence is overwhelming. The red cross already estimates the number of civilian deaths to be in the thousands, so I don't know how much has to occur before it's classed as a war crime.

As to china, if it was up to me, we would have never traded so much as a pair of chopsticks with those goons. They killed millions of their own people, they still run concentration camps, and the same political criminal gang is still in charge. I blame kissinger and nixon for starting the ball rolling on legitimizing that criminal empire, and I think it sucks we have outr economy tied to them, and that western profiteers in suits are bending over backwards to make that police state and military even more powerful. I will predict that within 10 years we will be at war with them, because at that time their population pressures and thirst for oil and more sources of other raw materials will force them to expand outwards, and we just might not be strong enough to stop them without annihilating the entire planet.

It sucks, I was against "normalization" with china without quid pro quos of them opening themselves up to normal freedoms and normal political process. All we have done is enrich china at the full expense of the US middle class, we traded cheap trinkets at walmart to build up the political party and war machine of a nation that has already killed more of it's own people then were killed in all of ww2. They are goons, I hope their people finally get hip and revolt against those goons.

And I hope we can eventually get rid of the democrat and republican parties inside this nation as well, two of the most corrupt organizations to ever have been created. We don't have any sort of "representative republic" unless you happen to be a billionaire internationalist. The vote is a joke,it's hijacked now, the appointed judges are all hand picked criminal gang members. The big time mass media is run by international profiteers aligned with the various war machines. they sit on each others boards of directors, slurping up the proofits, and the media helps keep people brainwashed. I mean, really, how can any honest journalist even use the term "detainee" without giggling? It's such a doublespeak farce.

No one in the US has anything righteous to be proud of any more, we suck as bad as any other bogus dictato

Re:not true

[iminplaya]

They are goons, I hope their people finally get hip and revolt against those goons...we suck as bad as any other bogus dictator run nation.

Man, you got that right. Ever heard of this?: We're at that awkward stage in our history where it's too late to fix things by voting, but it's still too early to just shoot the bastards. Can't remember where I saw that(in fact, I'm sure I posted it more than once before...to somebody...don't remember who. This drinking to forget thing is really working well.), but I do like it. I don't know. With the World Bank, Citicorp, IMF, whatever running the show, this whole talk about "nations ansd sovereignty" has been reduced to an act of mental masturbation.(this I did post before) Kinda why I ragged on people earlier about this whole thread being off topic. But since it grew so large, I figured, what the heck, I'll join in on the fun. After all, it is a favorite subject of mine.
On the matter of the original story, I wasn't real impressed. China buys a bunch of computers, cluster them all together. Now they have a fast computer. Ok, now what? Did anyone think they weren't capable of it? Are they going to make an animated movie called "Finding Hoffa"? Let me know when they do it in Barrow, Alaska. All those AMD's will melt the ice cap for sure.

Re:not true

[iminplaya]

My bad...I edited your post to make it look like you were talking about just the Americans leaving the subject of China completely out...Sorry 'bout that..I hope people will just read your post. Later

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

According to the historically delusional world view of China's rulers the whole world consists of mere vassal states to the great "middle kingdom". So if we're being truly logical not only is your peaceful and totally un-chinese neighbor Tibet owned, ruled and dominated by the chinese dictators, but America along with the rest of world is also the divine property of the chinese empire.

Chinese empire's claim over their existing neighbors like Tibet, and the dozens of already subjugated and assimilated "minority nationalities" is based on such historically perverse ideology which its "modern" communist party dictators have never really denounced and instead made it into a nationalist policy. Instead of waving your fist at others you should be trying to help the chinese people grow up and rid yourselves of those corrupt communist cronies and then pull your armies back into your own country so your neighbors could resume their lives in peace and dignity again.

Update on DARPA's petaflop efforts

[mpthompson]

For those interested this article from BusinessWeek has an update on DARPA's goal of funding the building of a petaflop (quadillions of calcuations a second) computer. This and other BusinessWeek articles indicate that while Asia may have the lead on the US now, the US will likely take back the leadership position by the end of the decade.

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

Give your land back to Indians first, then we can start talk about justice.

Tibet has been part of China because of all the historical events supporting it, not because of some claims.

As to communist, Chinese people have stopped talking about it long ago. Funny it's the Americans mentioning it time after time nowadays.

Communist?

[jte]

Most people familiar with it's true definition will tell you that China is communist in name only. Veiled capitalism with very strict government control is more like it.

Re:Interesting

[sql*kitten]

Which I think just blows the contention that liberal==left-wing

The US uses "liberal" to mean "permissive" or "progressive"; the rest of the world uses it to mean what Americans would call "classically liberal". In the Australian sense, "liberal" means personal freedom and minimum state intervention.

Re:Interesting

[Morky]

My country is not a "fascist theocracy". Our current president and his administration deserve all of the criticism they get, but we have a real democracy here, and our political culture is still intact. We will get rid of him. Even if by some disaster he is re-elected, he will be gone in four years, guaranteed. Just because our worst leader ever is in the White House, doesn't mean our country has collapsed. I think democracy is still an ideal, even if a few men currently in power have forgotten what it means.

And to say China is free of war crimes is absolutely uninformed. This is a country that executes political prisoners and then sells their organs on the open market. I think they will move beyond this type of behavior as they become more linked into the global community, but they have a lot of blood on their hands.

Re:Interesting

[iminplaya]

All governments are violating human rights everywhere. What does this have to do with the price of rice here? We're all the same basically. So leave it at that, and let's discuss computers, please. Now what I want to know is how many more turbines are they going to need to install at Three Gorges Dam to power this thing? I can see the lights going dim when they boot up.:-)

Re:Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

All imperialism is evil stemming from greed and everything possible should be done to undo its damage and stop such crimes against humanity taking place still today in modern age. It is mob rule. An immoral larger gang destroying and subjugating the less powerful or less war-minded. It's funny how many of you Chinese and especially your government always cry about the crimes of the Japanese invasion and general "western bullying" while systematically committing those crimes against your smaller neighbors. In fact your crimes are worse because you are totally destroying your neighbors and their culture which is something Japan wasn't even close to doing.The Chinese need to dump their NIH syndrome and import some modern logic to their international relations and diplomacy since there sure ain't any homegrown logic and sense to be found. Your "Tibet and its people are belong to us, always, just because" argument is as sad as it is pathetic.

And the Chinese have stopped talking about their homegrown communist party overlords long ago simply because they don't have what it takes to get rid of those criminals. Fifteen years ago tens of thousands of hopeful citizens tried to open a dialogue to change the dictatorship and your government and "liberation army" (the same that continues to occupy Tibet) mowed down the peaceful demonstrators with machine guns and tanks. That's reason and dialogue "Chinese style". Maybe your government taught you that those things never happened either? In any case the chinese population, as sorry as I feel for them, isn't any better than the Nazi german or imperial japanese populations because ultimately you allow these things to happen. Turns out that now the latest school books in Hong Kong also fail to tell the truth about the Tiananmen massacre so obviously there are now no "historical events supporting it", only "some claims", so it never happened, right? Just like the invasion of Tibet. It must be truly wonderful to live under the wise and enlightened rule of the communist party since one doesn't need to trouble one's brain with thinking or morals.

Re:Interesting

[MendicantMonkey]

Exactly. The double-speak here is so bad I can't even use the terms correctly in an explanation of the misuse of the terms. Either way, I have no love for socialist or federalist attitudes of either party.

Top 10 *Known*

[brunes69]

It would not suprise me in the lest to find out that the NSA always maintains a supercomputer al least 2x as fast as the fastest "publically" listed supercomputer.

Re:Top 10 *Known*

[Roydd McWilson]

Not to mention Google...

Re:Interesting

[pipingguy]

...the terrorists won and what was a free country has become a facist theocracy...

troll v.,n. To utter a posting on Usenet designed to attract predictable responses or flames. Derives from the phrase "trolling for newbies"; which in turn comes from mainstream "trolling";, a style of fishing in which one trails bait through a likely spot hoping for a bite.

The well-constructed troll is a post that induces lots of newbies and flamers to make themselves look even more clueless than they already do, while subtly conveying to the more savvy and experienced that it is in fact a deliberate troll.

If you don't fall for the joke, you get to be in on it.

More here

Is a cluster really a supercomputer ?

[MarkTina]

Does this system appear as one big computer running a single instance of an OS .. or is it just a bunch of independant PC's networked together ?

Re:Interesting

[Dun Malg]

There seems to be a mistake in your comment, let me correct it for you [i]If only that were true. On the scale of bad things that [/i]the US does to others[i], the Abu Ghraib incidents are such small potatoes that, 10 years from now, you won't be able to find any significant number of people who'll cite the Abu Ghraib torture as even one of the top ten reasons they hate the US.[/i]

No, that's not a mistake. Take a look around, man. Man's inhumanity to man is not the sole province of the US, nor is the US even a leading contender in the race. The fact that it happens all over the world with such dismal frequency is a major part of the reason Abu Ghraib will be nearly forgotten in 10 years.

Re:Interesting

[KarmaMB84]

I believe Peking was the traditional spelling for Beijing before they changed it. A lot of things used to be spelled different before the switch.

Warning Leaflets dropped over Japanese cities

[olafva]

You might like to read this. It's easy to look back, but perhaps 100x more difficult to make decisions at the time. Are you sure of what you say? How do you know?
NO ONE knew when/if the Japanese would surrender!

Re:Interesting

[geekee]

"Libertarians actually hold very right-wing/conservative views; the only way they get called liberals is because they don't think the government should get in the way of much of anything."

Wrong, liberals believe the govt. should control every aspect of your life. That's why liberals believe in welfare, social security, socialized health care, etc. Libertarians do believe in smaller govt., which is why they oppose the above social programs. Liberals, however, believe in big govt.

Re:Interesting

[geekee]

Communism is a misguided philsophy that believe the welfare of the collective is more important than basic rights of individuals, such as the right to own property.

Re:Interesting

[geekee]

" extreme liberalism would be libertarians, communist implies authoriatian."

No libertarianism is only socially liberal, i.e. they don't believe in laws that restrict individual rights. Libertarian's are economically conservative, believing in a small govt. whose only job is to make and enforce laws to protect individual rights. They believe in free trade. They don't believe in welfare, social security, antitrust laws, public utilities, or even public roads or schools.

Misguided

[menem]

GDP doesn't work that way. If a bulldozer is bought by a corporation to produce a product, the bulldozer is not counted in the GDP. Only the final product produced by the corporation is counted as part of the GDP. Also, if the chinese sell goods to other countries, they are trading with the country. They will get a nearly equivalent amount of goods back from the other country. The goods that are traded back to China will be used to increase their quality of life.

Re:Misguided

[menem]

Actually.. My understanding is that the final product is all that matters for GDP. As for how the actually calculate it, I am not sure if the count the bulldozer or not.. I just know that they don't double count goods when calculated GDP. For example, if iron is used to make a car, the GDP isn't the cost of the iron plus the cost of the car. It is only the cost of the car.

Re:Misguided

[gmhowell]

GDP doesn't work that way.

Yes. Yes it does.

From here:

Real GDP is defined as the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States

Not by capital owned by US companies.

Might I suggest some links suggested by this search?

These are the definitions that I've labored under since getting a degree in Economics about 10 years ago. If the definition of GDP has changed since then, I would appreciate a link to a citation. Oxford or University of Chicago preferred.

Re:Misguided

[gmhowell]

Oops. Didn't see this list before my somewhat condescending post with links. I now see where you arrived at your assumption. The bulldozer is a finished good, so it counts. Naturally, it only counts in the year in which it was made. So if a dozer is made in 2002, and is used to make houses in 2002, 2003, and 2004, the dozer applies to GDP in 2002 only.

Your points about getting back goods and services equal to those exported is a good one. But my main point is that this doesn't always get down to the level of the citizenry.

Re:Misguided

[menem]

My point was just that using GDP per capita is a valid rough comparison of the standard of living. It does have imperfections, but imperfections apply to every country. I've traveled to about 15 different countries, and there has been a very strong correlation between GDP and the standard of living.

Re:Interesting

[geekee]

"I think due to the redefinition of superpower as "United States as the world's only superpower", it probably refers to the ability to forcefully remove sovereignty and control resources, to conduct human rights abuses of its own with impunity. In other words, they are not answerable to anyone."

except US voters

Yeah, but...

[Kingstrum]

*Whose* benchmarks are they going to use? The last year or so, the PLA/Central Committee have been pushing their own CPU, their own WiFi standard, and more. So will they now create their own benchmarks, put themselves at the top of some "One-True-List", berate "that other list" as a puppet of Capitalist Pigs & Running Dog Lackeys, and brag about how fast the Great Firewall filters out "unsocial" and "counterproductive" dissident thought?

Or will they leave all that to the FCC & DoJ to "purify" our airwaves and Internet sources?

Can't have a free population looking at naughty bits and expressing "dissent" opinions...

"If you've run out of luck, it doesn't matter how long your penis is."
-- Juvenal

Re:Interesting

[nyseal]

I know; left wing=gay.

So what?

[gatkinso]

Nukes designed with slide rules can blast any country on the planet back to the Primordial Soup.

So what's the big deal if indeed this is the case?

Re:Interesting

[syylk]

Yes, getting better, but it is still only 15 years ago the military opened fire on civilians in the centre of Beijing.

As opposed to 15 or so days ago, when US military opened fire on civilians in a wedding ceremony in the center of Baghdad?

Nice to see that civilians aren't civilians, unless coming from the same country as the soldiers who fire on them.

Re:Interesting

[10am-bedtime]

but before you go read some numbers from a book, go to the store and look at the labels (numerical and/or non-numerical).

then, combine your experience w/ those numbers from the book, w/ the grandparent post, and the great-grandparent post.

claire wolf

[zogger]

is the name you are thinking of with the quotage. Maybe wolf is spelled with an e, spelling is NOT my forte.

I'm almost at the point of disagreeing with her, time-wise.

%^)

At least one guy REALLY doesn't agree with her, witness last nights home made tank rampage in colorado, where some guy just HAD IT and said enough and took on the local government who he thought had screwed him over. I don't CONDONE what he did, but around the nation people are getting wise to the universal "can't win" aspect of "anyone you" going up against big money in cahoots with "governmental authority". You are screwed before you even start most of the time. I'm amazed more people just don't go "ta heck with it".

Re:claire wolf

[iminplaya]

Except for the fact the poor guy killed himself, I found the event rather humorous, not his motives(he was mad as hell), just the event itself. The story indicated that he did try(and I believe successed) to avoid injuring others. An even crazier one was when a guy stole a tank from a nat'l guard armory and proceeded to smash every car in his path. The video is very famous, but I can't find it. One of those "Most shocking videos" things, I believe. Though I feel sorry for the owners, when he squashed the motorhome, I damn near busted a gut. He, too, didn't hurt anybody but himself, but he sure made a mess. You're right. I'm also very surprised more people don't go nuts, but then, with airplanes and cars being as inherently dangerous as they are, I'm also surprised that most of them don't end up in flames. I used to be an electro mechanic for an airline, and I had plenty of time near the end of the shift to watch these things take off and land. I would think that they just needed to get a little bit sideways and it would be all over. Especially the 747. The thing is a monster. It flies on PFM. We are a lucky bunch in many ways. I do think, however, that with the net, more people are going to become more aware of the utter hyprocrisy that we are living under, and more of them are going to react poorly to it. Which, unfortunately, will probably lead to more gov't crackdowns. Don't be too surprised when we might get our own "Tiananmen Square" event on this side of the pond. We've already had a couple of "mini" ones, like Kent State, and the bombing of the move headquarters in Philly, and maybe, depending on your POV, the branch davidians,(I know nothing of that. He may have been actually dangerous, only Mr. Janet Reno knows for sure) to name just a few. That is why I believe Gandhi's way of dealing with it is the only way. I would like(hate) to see how the gov't can crack down on "non-cooperation". Turning your back is so very effective. Just ask any kid who has been through the "silent treatment" by their "friends". Hell, just by boycotting cocaine, the gov't would have rescind the tax cut and most likely have to raise taxes, and Bush himself would be broke inside of six months But that's going to take damn near all of us to pull that off.

This is an outrage!

[DeVilla]

The members of the free world must act. We must dmonstrate that we are more prosperous and developed than this backward Communist threat. It is time for a new Cold War and we all must act if we are to beat back this Axis of Evil! I for one will gladly donate floor space in my basement and garage for the building of a super computer to help push their system off the top ten. I would also be willing to help in the development of a Quake client that would make good use of the resourses such a system could provide. Rise up free people of the world! Who's with me!

Re:Interesting

[cynic10508]

Since when does "exceedingly liberal"==Communist?

Since Communism is a revolutionary political ideology, it is to the left of liberalism.

we are on the internet

[zogger]

providing a web reference is the only acceptable way to make a point on an internet forum, so perhaps I was remiss in not providing a direct link. But, I really don't care in this instance, some times I have more to do than to go find something for someone. sometimes i do, sometimes I don't, that particular story was SO widespread I find it incredulous that anyone missed it or would doubt it. It's easy enough, and a lot of times I prefer - and think it's fairer-to just give people a reference and let them find and pick out their own links for research, rather than picking out my personal favorite link. I can't think of a fairer way to do it, if a search term turns up quite a few hits (as it will in this case), and as we do not have psychic mind melds yet, we are stuck with web references, so I invite you or anyone to use search engine of choice to look into the "massacre at mazar". There exists now overlapping coroboration of the incident, one of thousands in the US militaries history. I'm not singling out the US military, I know all other militaries/regimes do similar, but as I am an US citizen, I feel justified in criticising both our policies and my fellow citizens lack of knowledge and/or interest in warcrimes. In other words, I find the holier than thou meme to be extremly over rated and in most cases, utterly bogus. I just call 'em like I see 'em, sorry if that bursts anyone's bubble or "belief" system. There are plenty of political focused forums out there that are quite happy to delete and blackhole data points that don't "fit" their intended audiences belief systems. Several, all equally dishonest, but... quite popular. Perhaps you might be happier there?

In science, if you find evidence that proves without a doubt that a popular theorem is in error, then that makes that theorem invlaid. You have to accept it and move on. The theorem that the US is always "the good guys" and everyone else is always "the bad guys" is in total error, and it is what's called "a lie". It is just not true. And if I thought and believed and had hard evidence and proof that the US was always the good guy, well, I would say that, too. I am consistent. I don't pick and choose the data, the data just exists, and from the data you arrive at your conclusions, it's a simple enough concept to grasp, especially here on a site with a much higher than median IQ. We may disagree a lot, on a variety of subjects, but I don't think it's being very honest to actually deny *data*. Data is just neutral, it just "is", is all.

What would you call a cluster of Longhorns?

[shis-ka-bob]

Herd of Longhorns?

Sure! I've heard of Longhorns

No, no, no! A Longhorn herd

Don't be rediculous, Microsoft is writing Longhorn and Stallman is writing HURD, how could we ever have a Longhorn/Hurd? How would it be licensed? What would it run?

Perhaps mono really is a Communist plot!

I've seen that video.

[zogger]

Yes, tanks are pretty much bad news.

did you know that governator schwazenegger did the same thing when he was in the austrian army? he and his buddy snagged some tank and went barrelling through this town. they both got busted for it. I heard him on the TV telling the story once, forget which show now.

I use various equipment in my work, sometimes it's *quite large*. I can guarantee even just a medium sized crawler like a d-5 caterpillar is capable of some dang serious damage to most buildings. I'm surprised the guy didn't do more.

As to passive resistance...well, been doing this a long time,shoot, going on real close now 4 decades. I've taken all the gas and beatings and abuse from brain dead follow-any-order-given cops I'm ever gonna take. I've seen just too much of the system now, I don't think passive resistance will ever cut the mustard in the US. Even back in the racial civil rights days, by 64 we got the civil rights act, but it wasn't until 67-68 when all the just-returned black and poor white combat vets decided they weren't gonna take it anymore did we get any fundamental REAL change inside the US, including the end to the you-must-be-the - mans - slave called "the draft". It wasn't perfect, and it had flaws, but sometimes the only way to get a mules attention is the clue by four up 'longside the head.

I don't like it, but that's been my observations. Our entire nation was clearly founded on that same deal-eventually enough's enough,you run out of options, so you got to get down and dance.

Re:I've seen that video.

[iminplaya]

It wasn't perfect, and it had flaws, but sometimes the only way to get a mules attention is the clue by four up 'longside the head.

Absolutely. However, I think from the passive resistance(Gandhi in particular) point of view, they may have thought that life on earth isn't all there is, and if you have to keep on fighting to find some peace, then they would decide to forego life and accept the inevitable. I'm not sure my take on it is what they actually think, but maybe they're thinking "better luck next life.". These are personal feeling of mine, that's all. I can't picture myself constantly have to look over my shoulder, and I don't feel much better to have to hire someone else to do it for me. Especially considering the people being hired to do it. I've been told not to think about that way and just do what you can to bring personal peace, but I just can't get over it. Personal problem that only I can fix, I guess. You're right, though. You can only kick a dog for so long before he's going to bite back. That's perfectly natural and should be expected by those kicking the dog.

Re:Interesting

[netsharc]

I don't think you can get away with Abu Ghraib that easily. For one thing, it's another "evidence" for those who hate the US that it really is an evil country. People may forget about Abu Ghraib, but its effects -- the impression that these white guys with their guns and tanks are there to colonialize and turn the citizens into animals -- will remain there. And for sure the extremists will use these pictures in their propaganda to recruit impressionable minds, heck impressionable? Who won't be pissed off when they see their fellow brother in race/religion be humiliated by a person of another race/religion like that. So thanks Lynnie England/whoever it is at the top of the chain of corruption, you just made Al-Qaeda stronger.

Re:Interesting

[snarkasaurus]

Smooth over human rights abuses? Y'mean like jailing without trail, killing on general principle and stuff like that? One does not smooth over such things, one stops them dead and punishes the perpetrators thereof.

China is currently doing well in the Western markets because they essentially use slave labour to undercut prices in the civilized world. It is difficult to compete with a country who can pay assembly line workers a dollar a day and get away with it. That will cease as soon as those human rights abuses you mentioned are taken care of.

The USA is the world's only superpower because they are the only country in the world that still thinks the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Average Americans freely join the armed forces and go off to defend their own and other people's freedom. It doesn't hurt that their freedom gives them the world's largest economy either.

I should know, I'm a Canadian. Our country believes in letting the Americans protect us. We used to have the third largest Navy in the world (yeah we did, go look it up!) and now we have a handful of leaky sub hunting frigates with no helicopters to make them useful. And no sailors.

There is nothing "liberal" or moderate about the Chicom government. Anyone who thinks there is should check out the situation in Taiwan.

I'd sooner live in the worst dump on the worst crack infested street in Chicago than a fine hotel in Peking. It would be safer.

'Nuff said.

Re:Interesting

[nyseal]

Wow....that was a lot of words.

Re:Interesting

[nyseal]

Peace and dignity; now THERE'S a new one.

Re:Interesting

[LilGuy]

Funny you should mention propaganda. What makes you believe the channels you watch aren't spreading "American Propaganda"? Personally I don't give two flying fucks about what is going on in the war because I don't trust anything I see on the news. Perhaps some of it is legit reporting but who is to say?

Re:Interesting

[gordo3000]

actually, if you take certain political science classes(disclaimer: you could have learned differently), one of things you'll find out is that they have this nice little scale for determining where your beliefs stand. The range is extremely liberal(far left) to extremely conservative(far right). Actually, none of this applies to almost any politics you see in the US as almost everyone lies much closer to the center. On the far left, you have communism and on the far right you have fascism. Many groups misuse these name in this context but hey, who's to say the one context I've learned it in is somehow correct, but it is just as valid and probably where the user got the idea that far left means communist. Cheers, Sean

Davy Crockett portable Nukes

[DigiShaman]

There was a portable nuke available from 1961 to 1971. It was called the Davy Crockett and used the W54 warhead. The explosive yeild ranged from just 10 to 22 tons of TNT. We also had nuclear landmines as well.

I got all this information at this website. Check it out for more info.
http://www.brook.edu/dybdocroot/FP/projects /nucwco st/davyc.HTM

I doubt the US would be using these things again. The cleanup would be a bitch for civilian land occupation long after the war was over. In fact, the idea now is to you smart weapons vs dumb high explosive ones. Why carpet-bomb a city when you can drop a missle through an office window. A perfect sucessful example is the Iraq war (innocent casualty wise).

Re:Interesting

[reanjr]

superpower: n. inf. a nation whose military or arms strength is sufficient to eradicate human life.

Seriously though, a superpower a state with the ability to influence events or project power on a wide scale and often have satellites or colonies.

It is suggested that if the EU could become less fragmented, they could be a superpower, but none of the states seperately are really economically strong enough.

China, if it attained stronger nuclear capabilities could also be considered a superpower, not so much due to their strong economy (though it certainly isn't weak), but the size of their army.

USSR used to be one before their collaps (kind of like the EU)

India is another one in the same boat as China.

Japan, it is said could become one due to their very strong economy recent increased military funding.

Brazil is apparently strong enough economically and has but to develop nuclear arms (which they could do any time they wanted).

- source: wikipedia

Apparently my definition stands except I needed to add strong economy. A nation apparently cannot be considered a superpower until they have enough nuclear arms to wipe us all out. :)

Re:Interesting

[reanjr]

I've taken something a little like this, but it was done with a diamond:

Libertarian
X
X X
X X X
X X X X
Democrat X X X X X Republican
X X X X
X X X
X X
X
Facsist

So, on that scale (flipped 90 degrees ccw), it would seem Libertarians are the US's true "left" party, while those like National Socialists would be the "right". Republican and Democrat would both be center. (My answers put me in libertarian's corner). Seems like this would be a better scale for Americans.

Re:Interesting

[reanjr]

My apologies for clicking submit instead of Preview.

Should have spaces to make it like a diamond. Anyone know how to make slashcode space something? I assumed ECODE would do it...

Re:Interesting

[reanjr]

I don't know what Libertarians you've been talking to, but the ones who actually RUN for office and don't just espouse beliefs are still for public works and services (roads, schools, water,electricity) to a great extent. They just believe that if you untie electric companies' hands, they will provide a service better suited to their customers and not the government's edicts, for example. It may be true that they do not believe in these things on a Federal level (I've never spoken with a Federal candidate), but on state level, they do not want to tear down the system, they just want to get rid of government meddling.

equation...

[zlel]

hmm. let's say usa population is Pa... then chinese population Pc is abt 4Pa... then for

0.5 * Pa * Va^2 = 0.5 * 4 * Pa * Vc^2
Va = (4)^(0.5) * (Vc^2)^(0.5)
= 2Vc

which would conclude that usa would have to work twice as hard to stay ahead....

Re:Interesting

[ameoba]

The point I was making that on certain points, Libertarians get confused with liberals because their beliefs overlap.

A good example is decriminalization/legalization of drugs. The libertarians think that this should be done because the goverment has no right to to get involved in this and would better spend its time & money elsewhere. Hippy-dippy liberals think that drugs should be made legal 'cuz they want to smoke their pot.

Scantimonious prick

[Teahouse]

It was a joke. And if you look at my profile you'll find I'm anything but a Troll you prick.

Re:Interesting

[Eiki]

"The Nazis were about as far right as you can get"
Is that so? Try making the same statement with the official name for the Nazi party:
"The National Socialists were about as far right as you can get"

Or try this: "basically National Socialism and Marxism are the same". That was said by Hitler in 1941.

Actually, as the name implies, the N.S. ideology was a mix of lefty socialism and righty nationalism, as opposed to the internationalism advocated by other Marxists of the time (and quickly abandoned even by Stalin when he needed Russians to fight for "the Motherland"). It, was, therefore, profoundly illiberal, and reserved its greatest hatred for Anglo-American liberalism and commercialism. Also, the growth of the N.S. party was largely due to the efforts of left organizations in Germany and elsewhere; only, as in 1917 Russia, once the necessary revolutionary climate had been established, the nastiest, most brutal faction (Nazis in Germany, Bolsheviks in Russia) took control of the country. I highly recommend Hayek's _The Road to Serfdom_ as an introduction to this history.

But I tire of this label-slinging! Let us end meaningless talk of left and right (both of which offer us only self-contradictory and idiotic platforms) and dedicate ourselves instead to what is truly liberal: individual liberty, free enterprise, reason, and optimism.

Re:Interesting

[a whoabot]

Incorrect, uh, beyond your mere grammatical error(s), too.

According to Marx, and most "communist" theorists, the welfare of the "collective"(which I quote because it's an unprecedented term that you used) is not more important that the basic rights of individuals at all. They no doubt draw the fundamental rights differently, but not nearly in a radical way: merely reading the concept of property differently. They would say that their reading is more pragmatic, the capitalists would say there's is. Read both: doesn't look like you have read the communist theory, but still seem quite confident with being against it. I would suggest The Marx-Engels Reader published by Norton, edited by R.C. Tucker. After that and if you would like to learn a perspective from more modern theorists, I would suggest Reading Capital by Louis Althusser and, of course, picking up the full volumes of Capital(by Marx and Engels, of course), which the Tucker anthology doesn't include. Of course, Marxist influenced thought through the years to now is interminably prolific. Perhaps, though, of required mention is much of Frankfurt School: from Habermas and Marcuse, to the sort of "post"-Frankfurt of Guy Debord and the Situationist International, and, most-contemporarily, Douglas Kellner, who's book Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity I would suggest. Perhaps, if you're brave, or not, whatever, you could read Barthes, and also the nominal "Tel Quel" theorists, including Derrida and Foucault, which Barthes was a major influence of. And here I'll suggest Baudrillard, who I would argue as being important for, what can be seen as, going beyond Marxism in a time when this is an important consideration. If you want to read him, get your hands on the two overviews offered by Mike Gane, Baudrillard: Critical and Fatal Theory, and Baudrillard's Beastiary, from those, or, perhaps more effectively, with those, you can move into Baudrillard's writings.

Re:Interesting

[Truth_Quark]

"Traditional" probably only describes the Characters that have always been used.

"Peking" is the Wades-Giles rendering of the characters into the English Alphabet (Wades-Giles is still generally used in Taiwan I believe). Beijing has gone with Pinyin rendering, which spells it "Beijing".

Re:Interesting

[appleLaserWriter]

In some other ways, seems like China has gone from exceedingly liberal (Communist) to more moderate, while the US is still that funny mix of liberal and right wing type of ideas.

I think you are confusing "liberal" with some kind of local "Liberal" party. The PRC certainly was radical from the 40s on through to the end of the cultural revolution. Today the PRC is more liberal than they were previously - in the sense that they aren't as rigid with the rules as they once were.

An interesting example to consider is city residency permits. Previously, a child could only get a residency permit if the parents followed the 1-child-per-family policy. Without a residency permit, the child had no access to school or other social services. Ten years ago, that made the child socially nonexistent. Today you can "buy" your way into school, so the residency permits only impact the poor.

Parent post has brought up some interesting things, certainly worthy of discussion.

10 trillion, hmmm?

[loid_void]

There was also a plan afloat to group 10 billion 40 Gg iPods with 10 thousand songs each, creating a 10 trillion song library, however this project is on hold due to the rumors of a forthcoming 60 Gg iPod. The iPod mini has not been considered. Do the math.

Re:Interesting

[MendicantMonkey]

But I tire of this label-slinging! Let us end meaningless talk of left and right (both of which offer us only self-contradictory and idiotic platforms) and dedicate ourselves instead to what is truly liberal: individual liberty, free enterprise, reason, and optimism.

Thank you.