It has Alivec, using the IBM name: VMX. Same thing though. What the other guy said about it lacking instruction reordering is true though. It also lacks cache locking instructions (that the Xenon has) due to it being a single core. It would be plenty fast enough on its own as long as one optimized for reduced branching though. And, of course, there are those SPEs - which are silly fast as long as you have a parallel single precision FP problem, easily vectorized. Like HD video editing, for example!:)
That a computer is no more than a pocket calculator with a memory to store what buttons one would have pushed, the results from that calculation, and branching instructions to deal with special cases. Everything else is just window dressing.
Yeah. We have a bunch of folks with G5s too, and nobody here wants to run Mathematica or Matlab through an emulation layer. We'll be supporting PPC in the lab for at least another two or three years. Hell, one of our professors just took delivery on a quad G5 last week. He didn't buy it to run Word. If Apple wants they have an opportunity to support both PPC and x86 permanently. The only reason for this is if they think it's worth the money. I'm just speculating that Cell would be appropriate for one of their target markets. Is it worth it? Dunno.
The G5 may lag in integer performance, but it's still very competetive for vector and FP. Where I work there are plenty of folks who prefer a dual G5 over a PC for Mathematica and Matlab compute due to their reliance on FP tasks. Though dual opterons running Linux are begining to make inroads here too.
I had a NeXT slab on my desk back in the early '90s. Loved it. And certainly Intel is where Apple is migrating toward for their general purpose users and the scientific imaging community. The only market I think Cell is worth considering would be for the film/video sector - and only because of its silly single precision FP and vector capabilities. It's about using the right technology for the job. And as you point out, Intel just doesn't have the performance for good HD editing yet.
Yeah, I agree, A Cell based workstation would be terrible for Word and Excel. However, for editing HDTV the Cell processor has significant advantages over every other general purpose processor. Since Apple has targeted the film/video workstation market it would seem to make sense that they consider the Cell for that application. *shrug*
It doesn't surprise me that it still competes with Intel's latest offering. I wonder if it makes sense for Apple to continue supporting both x86 and PPC platforms long term. I'm sure Intel will -- in time -- crush the G5 in performance. But if Apple wants to dominate the HDTV editing workstation market, Cell looks like the most appropriate processor for that task. Are fat binaries really so obnoxious as to prevent permanent multi-arch support over the long term?
Yeah. I guess you're right. 'Cause it's not like I've ever seen a ridiculous political position before! *cough!*
---
Snark aside, I'm sure you're aware that many of these claims and positions exist as political and legal interference and do not -- really -- represent the beliefs of those running the anti-windfarm movement. So sure. You'll find nonscientific claims used to frighten and confuse the public on the issue. And when you try to "educate" the public their public response will be a "counter-education" plan that will be much better funded. One reason why the term "education" has lost all meaning in the US. I'm sick of the fucking term in any context other than academic.
Yup. I read it and I stand by what I wrote. The point was about the use of the term "education" as a means to convince others of a political position. Right or wrong is not the issue.
"[...]the citizens in upstate NY still need some education in the safety of alternative energy."
Uhhh, ok... so, I'm all for wind farming. It's cheap and competitive and safe. The NIMBYers (including those in my home state of Massachusetts) need to start considering their alternatives WRT coal, gas, and nuclear. Which would *you* prefer nearby, and how much do you want to pay for electricity? But when I read the term "education" used in this context, it just drives me up the wall. It's as if by being "educated" I would -- of course -- agree with the proposition at hand. IOW: The reframe of using the term "education" in the context of whatever agenda happens to be yours has now become cliché. *shrug*
Uhhh, there's a minor difference between refusing to hire a felon and summary execution for property crimes. However, for the sake of argument - whether a $5K or $20K property crime - both seem pretty serious to me. It's not like the guy was an underage kid - he's an adult with serious responsibilities in the organization. His betrayal is not just to his former employer, it is also to the industry and society at large. As an adult he should be prepared to accept responsibility for his actions. JMO...
Millot trespassed on private property, damaged said property, and now is trying to claim the damage wasn't bad enough to warrant a hefty sentence. He's already admitted to committing the actual crime. Whatever you want to say about the competence of IBM, IMO the individual in question deserves what he gets. Or, better put, doesn't deserve another job in the industry again.
Fair point. While I doubt gravity on the moon is sustainable for human life (in our form), there is no research which proves this point. The best one can say is that long term studies of humans in zero G environments don't look promising. And then there's the solar radiation issue to contend with. BTW: I'm not opposed to human space flight, I was originally responding to the notion that we ship prisoners off to the moon for mining. But - whatever. Fine counterpoint.
Re:The moon, tis a harsh mistress
on
Return to the Moon
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I disagree on both counts. While it's true that the current mars rovers are vastly limited in functionality compared to a human, a few technical generations of rovers will likely meet the threshold necessary to mine. And while a human being (even inside a bulky suit) may continue to have a dexterity advantage over remote technology for decades to come, success is measured not by total flexibility but simply by meeting the challenges of mining.
As for the ethical challenges: I think you're understating this issue. As I wrote previously, the moon is a low G environment unsuited to long term survival. Without radical biotechnology advances people who stay will simply atrophy away. So on the one hand is a high to certain risk of permanent physical damage to those who go (never mind radiation damage). This is not the same as parachuting or bungee jumping as those sporting activities are reasonably safe and well regulated. No prisoners are paid slave wages and/or time off their sentences to engage in those activities.
And to argue that it is unethical to prevent prisoners from mining on the moon due to the risks as a violation of their rights - well, that is laughable. Or at least worth a chuckle. *cough!*
Austronauts -- even prisoners -- must be safely shot in space, travel and land on the moon, be maintained in a survivable environment, and then shot back into space to return to earth. Robots can be sent to the moon in parts, will function in a wider range of environments, and can be disposed of on the moon. Which of the two is both the most ethical and cheapest?
One might argue there is a fundamental difference between having prisoners (willingly) stamp out license plates vs. shipping them off to the moon in a low G environment. The long term consequences of living on the moon would almost certainly be damaging to their health. IMO: building a moon base for people is folly. Send robots.
Re:The moon, tis a harsh mistress
on
Return to the Moon
·
· Score: 1, Insightful
Why not just send up the thousands of criminals filling our penal system?
Because that's forced prison slave labor, and is the kind of human rights violation we rail against the Chinese for doing. Never mind other historical examples (including the US's). Though with an ethos accepting torture and imprisonment without fair trial becoming the norm, who knows? Maybe your dream will come true....
"It's people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They're making our food out of people. Next thing they'll be breeding us like cattle for food. You've gotta tell them. You've gotta tell them!"
"There is a strong human tendency to despise anyone who has something that you cannot get, and which we keep in check only by collectively believing in the notion that anyone can achieve anything if they really try. If we made that notion -- fallacious as it may be -- completely implausible, we'd really be in trouble."
Interesting point, though in counterargument there have been plenty of societies which value strict social class hierarchies over class fluidity, from India, China, and Europe. One might argue that the supposed classless ideal of the US is an aberration and not the norm. I don't argue that social status is irrelevant to human (or primate) behavior, just that the power to limit social division seems to rarely gain hold among the general population. And when it does, it's hold throughout society is tenuous at best.
I think the most serious problem with Lanier's logic is that in arguing for the 'antigora' he uses utopic examples of capitalism and technology that ignore the difference between necessary goods and value added products. In his discussion of Walmart as a semigora, for example, he states:
"[...]a person making a marginal income at the periphery of one of the Antigoras can survive, because the efficiencies make survival cheap. It's 2025 in Cambodia, for instance, and you only make the equivalent of a buck a day, without health insurance, but the local Wal-Mart is cheaper every day and you can get a robot-designed robot to cut out your cancer for a quarter, so who cares?"
And as for a Luddite revolution:
"The super-rich who own the Antigoras become so fabulously wealthy that in the context of changing biomedical and other technologies they effectively become a new species. Perhaps they become the immortals, or they merge with their machines. Unlike the Wells story, though, the lumpenproletariat do not revolt because their cost of living has retreated faster than their wages. From their local perspective they are doing better and better, even as the gap between them and the rich is growing at an accelerating rate."
So robots build vast volumes of cheap goods and thus the value of a dollar relative to the cost of goods declines to the point where even the poor can afford automated health care. Or new computers, or HDTVs, and other technology. Except it ignores the stagnant and high cost of necessary goods: energy, food and shelter being the most obvious examples. Even assuming automated food production - robots ploughing the fields - there is only so much land. Maybe building housing will be cheap with robots, but we'll still need to heat or cool it depending on the climate. Providing these basic necessities cannot be automated away because they rely on fixed and limited resources. The best we can do increase the efficiency of utilization, or find a radical and unknown new method for creation.
But - unlike slashdot conventional wisdom in this forum - I thought the essay was well written and highly contemplative. A good read. Thanks Jaron!
Sigh. I guess you're right. The undergrad *would* know death was coming before being blown out the windtunnel. Then... *SPLAT!* Oh well, just another undergrad.
At mach 6 at least it would be a *very* fast death. Doubtful that the undergrad would feel a thing, he'd be blender juice before he knew it. OTOH: getting caught in a commercial meat grinder might be slow enough not only to notice, but to scream in agony as his legs are turned to hamburger.
Slashdot Mirror
It has Alivec, using the IBM name: VMX. Same thing though. What the other guy said about it lacking instruction reordering is true though. It also lacks cache locking instructions (that the Xenon has) due to it being a single core. It would be plenty fast enough on its own as long as one optimized for reduced branching though. And, of course, there are those SPEs - which are silly fast as long as you have a parallel single precision FP problem, easily vectorized. Like HD video editing, for example! :)
That a computer is no more than a pocket calculator with a memory to store what buttons one would have pushed, the results from that calculation, and branching instructions to deal with special cases. Everything else is just window dressing.
Yeah. We have a bunch of folks with G5s too, and nobody here wants to run Mathematica or Matlab through an emulation layer. We'll be supporting PPC in the lab for at least another two or three years. Hell, one of our professors just took delivery on a quad G5 last week. He didn't buy it to run Word. If Apple wants they have an opportunity to support both PPC and x86 permanently. The only reason for this is if they think it's worth the money. I'm just speculating that Cell would be appropriate for one of their target markets. Is it worth it? Dunno.
The G5 may lag in integer performance, but it's still very competetive for vector and FP. Where I work there are plenty of folks who prefer a dual G5 over a PC for Mathematica and Matlab compute due to their reliance on FP tasks. Though dual opterons running Linux are begining to make inroads here too.
I had a NeXT slab on my desk back in the early '90s. Loved it. And certainly Intel is where Apple is migrating toward for their general purpose users and the scientific imaging community. The only market I think Cell is worth considering would be for the film/video sector - and only because of its silly single precision FP and vector capabilities. It's about using the right technology for the job. And as you point out, Intel just doesn't have the performance for good HD editing yet.
Yeah, I agree, A Cell based workstation would be terrible for Word and Excel. However, for editing HDTV the Cell processor has significant advantages over every other general purpose processor. Since Apple has targeted the film/video workstation market it would seem to make sense that they consider the Cell for that application. *shrug*
It doesn't surprise me that it still competes with Intel's latest offering. I wonder if it makes sense for Apple to continue supporting both x86 and PPC platforms long term. I'm sure Intel will -- in time -- crush the G5 in performance. But if Apple wants to dominate the HDTV editing workstation market, Cell looks like the most appropriate processor for that task. Are fat binaries really so obnoxious as to prevent permanent multi-arch support over the long term?
Yeah. I guess you're right. 'Cause it's not like I've ever seen a ridiculous political position before! *cough!*
---
Snark aside, I'm sure you're aware that many of these claims and positions exist as political and legal interference and do not -- really -- represent the beliefs of those running the anti-windfarm movement. So sure. You'll find nonscientific claims used to frighten and confuse the public on the issue. And when you try to "educate" the public their public response will be a "counter-education" plan that will be much better funded. One reason why the term "education" has lost all meaning in the US. I'm sick of the fucking term in any context other than academic.
Yup. I read it and I stand by what I wrote. The point was about the use of the term "education" as a means to convince others of a political position. Right or wrong is not the issue.
"[...]the citizens in upstate NY still need some education in the safety of alternative energy."
Uhhh, ok... so, I'm all for wind farming. It's cheap and competitive and safe. The NIMBYers (including those in my home state of Massachusetts) need to start considering their alternatives WRT coal, gas, and nuclear. Which would *you* prefer nearby, and how much do you want to pay for electricity? But when I read the term "education" used in this context, it just drives me up the wall. It's as if by being "educated" I would -- of course -- agree with the proposition at hand. IOW: The reframe of using the term "education" in the context of whatever agenda happens to be yours has now become cliché. *shrug*
Uhhh, there's a minor difference between refusing to hire a felon and summary execution for property crimes. However, for the sake of argument - whether a $5K or $20K property crime - both seem pretty serious to me. It's not like the guy was an underage kid - he's an adult with serious responsibilities in the organization. His betrayal is not just to his former employer, it is also to the industry and society at large. As an adult he should be prepared to accept responsibility for his actions. JMO...
Millot trespassed on private property, damaged said property, and now is trying to claim the damage wasn't bad enough to warrant a hefty sentence. He's already admitted to committing the actual crime. Whatever you want to say about the competence of IBM, IMO the individual in question deserves what he gets. Or, better put, doesn't deserve another job in the industry again.
Fair point. While I doubt gravity on the moon is sustainable for human life (in our form), there is no research which proves this point. The best one can say is that long term studies of humans in zero G environments don't look promising. And then there's the solar radiation issue to contend with. BTW: I'm not opposed to human space flight, I was originally responding to the notion that we ship prisoners off to the moon for mining. But - whatever. Fine counterpoint.
I disagree on both counts. While it's true that the current mars rovers are vastly limited in functionality compared to a human, a few technical generations of rovers will likely meet the threshold necessary to mine. And while a human being (even inside a bulky suit) may continue to have a dexterity advantage over remote technology for decades to come, success is measured not by total flexibility but simply by meeting the challenges of mining.
As for the ethical challenges: I think you're understating this issue. As I wrote previously, the moon is a low G environment unsuited to long term survival. Without radical biotechnology advances people who stay will simply atrophy away. So on the one hand is a high to certain risk of permanent physical damage to those who go (never mind radiation damage). This is not the same as parachuting or bungee jumping as those sporting activities are reasonably safe and well regulated. No prisoners are paid slave wages and/or time off their sentences to engage in those activities.
And to argue that it is unethical to prevent prisoners from mining on the moon due to the risks as a violation of their rights - well, that is laughable. Or at least worth a chuckle. *cough!*
Austronauts -- even prisoners -- must be safely shot in space, travel and land on the moon, be maintained in a survivable environment, and then shot back into space to return to earth. Robots can be sent to the moon in parts, will function in a wider range of environments, and can be disposed of on the moon. Which of the two is both the most ethical and cheapest?
One might argue there is a fundamental difference between having prisoners (willingly) stamp out license plates vs. shipping them off to the moon in a low G environment. The long term consequences of living on the moon would almost certainly be damaging to their health. IMO: building a moon base for people is folly. Send robots.
Why not just send up the thousands of criminals filling our penal system?
Because that's forced prison slave labor, and is the kind of human rights violation we rail against the Chinese for doing. Never mind other historical examples (including the US's). Though with an ethos accepting torture and imprisonment without fair trial becoming the norm, who knows? Maybe your dream will come true....
"It's people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They're making our food out of people. Next thing they'll be breeding us like cattle for food. You've gotta tell them. You've gotta tell them!"
Interesting point, though in counterargument there have been plenty of societies which value strict social class hierarchies over class fluidity, from India, China, and Europe. One might argue that the supposed classless ideal of the US is an aberration and not the norm. I don't argue that social status is irrelevant to human (or primate) behavior, just that the power to limit social division seems to rarely gain hold among the general population. And when it does, it's hold throughout society is tenuous at best.
Thanks for the well thought out comment BTW,
--M
And as for a Luddite revolution:
So robots build vast volumes of cheap goods and thus the value of a dollar relative to the cost of goods declines to the point where even the poor can afford automated health care. Or new computers, or HDTVs, and other technology. Except it ignores the stagnant and high cost of necessary goods: energy, food and shelter being the most obvious examples. Even assuming automated food production - robots ploughing the fields - there is only so much land. Maybe building housing will be cheap with robots, but we'll still need to heat or cool it depending on the climate. Providing these basic necessities cannot be automated away because they rely on fixed and limited resources. The best we can do increase the efficiency of utilization, or find a radical and unknown new method for creation.
But - unlike slashdot conventional wisdom in this forum - I thought the essay was well written and highly contemplative. A good read. Thanks Jaron!
Yeah. Back then, "it" looked like this. Just sitting on that thing... YEAOCH!!!!!!!
Sigh. I guess you're right. The undergrad *would* know death was coming before being blown out the windtunnel. Then... *SPLAT!* Oh well, just another undergrad.
Hmmmm... hamburger...
No. CowboyNeal ignites the atmosphere in an entire different manner... ...I've heard. *cough!*
Death by stoning might be appropriate. I mean -- after all -- he IS a spammer!