One of his claims is that trinary logic is "better" than binary because it uses another "natural" state of electricity: flow forwards, flow off, and flow backwards. He uses example power supplies of +3v, 0, and -3v.
However, this is *no different* than power supplies of 0, +3v, and +6v. Shifting your voltage reference does *not* change the power consumed.
Trinary also does not change your noise margins. Noise margins are a function of the actual circuit, and in an ideal world the noise margins on the high and low sides would be at half the representation voltage. 2.5 volts for 5-volt TTL logic, for example. 1.5 volts for 6-volt trinary logic, for example. See the noise margins decrease? You would have to increase the voltage range to 10 volts to maintain the noise margins. And therefore you would increase the power consumed. And power rises as the *square* of the voltage.
So let's see. Assuming your gates are feeding 1k resistors, binary logic would consume either 0mA (for a 0) or 25mA (for a 1). Assuming uniformly random distribution of bits, each bit would consume an average of 12.5mA.
For trinary, and maintaining the noise margins, a 0 would consume 0mA, a 1 would consume 25mA, and a 2 would consume 100mA. Average of 41.7mA. Since each "trit" conveys 3/2 as much information as a bit, the equivalent power consumption per bit for trinary logic is 27.8mA.
So trinary logic consumes more power per bit than binary logic.
Roger Penrose, in Shadows of the Mind, puts forth a presentation of a proof via Godel's incompleteness and Turing's halting problem that shows that human understanding and insight cannot be reduced to algorithmic form.
The Large Limits paper uses pretty much the same proof, but doesn't add Penrose's assertion that human thought can't be computable, and therefore algorithmic limitations don't apply.
The reason why I program open-source is that I have an itch that can't be scratched at reasonable cost, AND I have the talent to do something about it, AND I am inspired to do something about it. Without any one of those preconditions, I won't start a project.
Once these preconditions are satisfied, assuming I haven't already assigned myself to too many projects, I start an open-source project because I know that I will be able to attract like-minded people. They have the same itch, perhaps varying levels of talent, and the same inspiration. I would most likely not start a project if I knew it wouldn't attract others. The fact that I am sure others will join the project for the same reasons lets me know a priori that the project will have some success.
If the project can attract enough talent, the project can easily end up outclassing the commercial equivalent, because generally commercial projects are not worked on by people with inspiration. Their main motivation is the paycheck, or the experience, but almost never to scratch the itch, and almost never dreams of riches.
The people who work on an open-source project don't consider it work. Work is what you do because you have to. Work is what you do as little of to gain as much return as possible. Open-source programming is *play*. Thus, if I considered programming as work, I would never work on an open-source project. Thus, "programming as play" could be a pre-precondition.
Finally, even if I had the itch, the talent, and the inspiration, I most likely would not start a commercial project because that wouldn't "pay anything forwards". I can make an open-source project more successful by leveraging off of existing open-source projects, which I couldn't do (easily or ethically) with a commercial project. Thus, the fact that open-source exists is itself a pre-precondition.
Computer Science would be all about algorithmic entropy, Turing theory, quantum computing, reversability, information theory, artificial intelligence, and all that theory-side stuff which makes great researchers but poor developers.
Software Development would be all about languages, methodologies, OOP, OOA&D, design patterns, administration, databases, and all that practical-side stuff which makes great developers but poor researchers.
Then, if you're in one major and want to know a little about the other, you take a minor in the other.
I guess all that means my opinion is that in the CS curriculum that we have today, if you want to teach the fundamentals of computers, start with computer architecture. Then move to Java for the knowledge that will serve you well in industry.
Disclaimer: All this is MHO, and this might not be the right path for you. After 8 years in industry (an evil global corporation -- gotta pay for my Ferrari somehow) I found that code-whacking for industry isn't much fun. Sure, it used to be fun -- the thrill of bringing a project to life with your own ten fingers. Then something changed. All of a sudden I caught a "re-use" bug with a vengeance. I no longer felt that I should roll-my-own just because I didn't like the API of someone else's library. I started to lean towards the "buy" side of the buy-vs-build dichotomy. I can hear the groans now. Yes, I choose open source products if they exist rather than fatten corporate wallets. Well, once I stopped being a guy who would hide out in his cubicle and emerge when the job was done, I started looking at how the whole project was put together and managed. I learned about a whole other IT profession: "IT Project Management". Deals with scheduling, resources, budgets, and ordering people around:) Well, you can't order people around because project managers don't have that authority. Project managers shepherd a project to its conclusion (but not further -- that's the job of a program manager). Some would say "herd", since sometimes that's what it takes to get things in on time. Anyway, that's life after professional coding. Project managers typically (at least in established companies) make 2x-4x what a seasoned developer makes (just to satisfy the "but how much does it *pay*?" crowd). Of course, that's just by day. By night I'm an open-source Java coder:) No-one said I had to actually give up coding. --Robert Baruch www.linuxstart.com/~groovyjava
"There are stories and rumors that he was so convinced his successors would mess up Epcot that he planned to use cryogenics to have his body frozen. Then, company myth has it, he would return and wreak havoc on the corporatists drooling over his demise."
Reminds me of the Dr. Who episode "Paradise Towers", where a guy known only as "The Great Architect" built these gleaming tall towers in which were apartments, cinemas, shops, and all the conveniences of a big city. Dr. Who visits them, only to find that the towers have been turned into a kind of "Escape from New York" setting: there are gangs of teenagers roving around wreaking havoc, and the few crackpot tenants left alive live a strange, twisted existence. The pool on the roof is inimical to life. Machines eat the residents every so often.
In the end, it turns out that The Great Architect built the towers and then went into hiding after the towers became inhabited in order to wipe the inhabitants out because they were destroying his gleaming clean creation.
It's amusing to imagine that under the "Model City of Tommorow" lies Walt Disney -- The Great Architect -- frozen until he can utilize all the wonders of modern technology to subvert the rides, displays, and omnipresent gift shops to start killing people in gruesome, messy, technological ways.
The Teacup Ride will start demonstrating the miracle of centrifugal force, first hand. The cars on the GM Test Track will crash into each other and explode, while the robotic assemblers in the waiting room will start installing car parts into the patrons.
The engines on the spaceship that R2D2 and C3PO are working on in the Star Wars ride will suddenly belch fire. And the big AT&T ball will release itself and go gallavanting through the parking lots.
In the midst of all this havoc, the statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse on Main Street, USA, will suddenly start laughing.
Slashdot Mirror
One of his claims is that trinary logic is "better" than binary because it uses another "natural" state of electricity: flow forwards, flow off, and flow backwards. He uses example power supplies of +3v, 0, and -3v.
However, this is *no different* than power supplies of 0, +3v, and +6v. Shifting your voltage reference does *not* change the power consumed.
Trinary also does not change your noise margins. Noise margins are a function of the actual circuit, and in an ideal world the noise margins on the high and low sides would be at half the representation voltage. 2.5 volts for 5-volt TTL logic, for example. 1.5 volts for 6-volt trinary logic, for example. See the noise margins decrease? You would have to increase the voltage range to 10 volts to maintain the noise margins. And therefore you would increase the power consumed. And power rises as the *square* of the voltage.
So let's see. Assuming your gates are feeding 1k resistors, binary logic would consume either 0mA (for a 0) or 25mA (for a 1). Assuming uniformly random distribution of bits, each bit would consume an average of 12.5mA.
For trinary, and maintaining the noise margins, a 0 would consume 0mA, a 1 would consume 25mA, and a 2 would consume 100mA. Average of 41.7mA. Since each "trit" conveys 3/2 as much information as a bit, the equivalent power consumption per bit for trinary logic is 27.8mA.
So trinary logic consumes more power per bit than binary logic.
Bummer.
Roger Penrose, in Shadows of the Mind, puts forth a presentation of a proof via Godel's incompleteness and Turing's halting problem that shows that human understanding and insight cannot be reduced to algorithmic form.
The Large Limits paper uses pretty much the same proof, but doesn't add Penrose's assertion that human thought can't be computable, and therefore algorithmic limitations don't apply.
Once these preconditions are satisfied, assuming I haven't already assigned myself to too many projects, I start an open-source project because I know that I will be able to attract like-minded people. They have the same itch, perhaps varying levels of talent, and the same inspiration. I would most likely not start a project if I knew it wouldn't attract others. The fact that I am sure others will join the project for the same reasons lets me know a priori that the project will have some success.
If the project can attract enough talent, the project can easily end up outclassing the commercial equivalent, because generally commercial projects are not worked on by people with inspiration. Their main motivation is the paycheck, or the experience, but almost never to scratch the itch, and almost never dreams of riches.
The people who work on an open-source project don't consider it work. Work is what you do because you have to. Work is what you do as little of to gain as much return as possible. Open-source programming is *play*. Thus, if I considered programming as work, I would never work on an open-source project. Thus, "programming as play" could be a pre-precondition.
Finally, even if I had the itch, the talent, and the inspiration, I most likely would not start a commercial project because that wouldn't "pay anything forwards". I can make an open-source project more successful by leveraging off of existing open-source projects, which I couldn't do (easily or ethically) with a commercial project. Thus, the fact that open-source exists is itself a pre-precondition.
--Robert Baruch
Maybe we should have two curriculums.
Computer Science would be all about algorithmic entropy, Turing theory, quantum computing, reversability, information theory, artificial intelligence, and all that theory-side stuff which makes great researchers but poor developers.
Software Development would be all about languages, methodologies, OOP, OOA&D, design patterns, administration, databases, and all that practical-side stuff which makes great developers but poor researchers.
Then, if you're in one major and want to know a little about the other, you take a minor in the other.
I guess all that means my opinion is that in the CS curriculum that we have today, if you want to teach the fundamentals of computers, start with computer architecture. Then move to Java for the knowledge that will serve you well in industry.
I think Plug Power is providing GE with their units, but Plug Power is in deep doo-doo, according to this article:
http://www.fool.com/news/2000/plug000824.htm
Not quite sure why that didn't format properly. This message seems to be OK...
--Robert Baruch
Disclaimer: All this is MHO, and this might not be the right path for you. After 8 years in industry (an evil global corporation -- gotta pay for my Ferrari somehow) I found that code-whacking for industry isn't much fun. Sure, it used to be fun -- the thrill of bringing a project to life with your own ten fingers. Then something changed. All of a sudden I caught a "re-use" bug with a vengeance. I no longer felt that I should roll-my-own just because I didn't like the API of someone else's library. I started to lean towards the "buy" side of the buy-vs-build dichotomy. I can hear the groans now. Yes, I choose open source products if they exist rather than fatten corporate wallets. Well, once I stopped being a guy who would hide out in his cubicle and emerge when the job was done, I started looking at how the whole project was put together and managed. I learned about a whole other IT profession: "IT Project Management". Deals with scheduling, resources, budgets, and ordering people around :) Well, you can't order people around because project managers don't have that authority. Project managers shepherd a project to its conclusion (but not further -- that's the job of a program manager). Some would say "herd", since sometimes that's what it takes to get things in on time. Anyway, that's life after professional coding. Project managers typically (at least in established companies) make 2x-4x what a seasoned developer makes (just to satisfy the "but how much does it *pay*?" crowd). Of course, that's just by day. By night I'm an open-source Java coder :) No-one said I had to actually give up coding. --Robert Baruch www.linuxstart.com/~groovyjava
Reminds me of the Dr. Who episode "Paradise Towers", where a guy known only as "The Great Architect" built these gleaming tall towers in which were apartments, cinemas, shops, and all the conveniences of a big city. Dr. Who visits them, only to find that the towers have been turned into a kind of "Escape from New York" setting: there are gangs of teenagers roving around wreaking havoc, and the few crackpot tenants left alive live a strange, twisted existence. The pool on the roof is inimical to life. Machines eat the residents every so often.
In the end, it turns out that The Great Architect built the towers and then went into hiding after the towers became inhabited in order to wipe the inhabitants out because they were destroying his gleaming clean creation.
It's amusing to imagine that under the "Model City of Tommorow" lies Walt Disney -- The Great Architect -- frozen until he can utilize all the wonders of modern technology to subvert the rides, displays, and omnipresent gift shops to start killing people in gruesome, messy, technological ways.
The Teacup Ride will start demonstrating the miracle of centrifugal force, first hand. The cars on the GM Test Track will crash into each other and explode, while the robotic assemblers in the waiting room will start installing car parts into the patrons.
The engines on the spaceship that R2D2 and C3PO are working on in the Star Wars ride will suddenly belch fire. And the big AT&T ball will release itself and go gallavanting through the parking lots.
In the midst of all this havoc, the statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse on Main Street, USA, will suddenly start laughing.