From the paper you linked to "to perform an elementary logical operation in time delta t requires an average amount of energy E *h/2*delta t.". Think about it - you're deliberately changing the state of a machine. No matter what type of machine it is that will consume energy (work) that cannot be recovered at 100% efficiency. Otherwise you've created a perpetual motion machine.
You have quoted a quantum (not thermodynamic) limit. You can tell by the appearance of
Planks constant and non-appearance of temperature or Boltzmann constant.
This quantum limit restricts the maximum rate of computation based upon the total energy (not the dissipated energy) of the computer.
a computer that isn't subject to the laws of thermodynamics can be run without subject to the laws fo thermodynamics.
A reversible computer, in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, can be run without dissipating energy. Read.
Indeed, here's another novel argument from Bruce Schneier's book....
in regards to the strength of 256-bit encryption:
now, the annual energy output of our sun is about 121 * 10^41 ergs. this is enough to power about 2.7 * 10^56 single bit changes on our ideal computer; enough state changes to put a 187-bit counter through all its values. if we build a dyson sphere around the sun and captured all of its energy output for 32 years, without any loss, we should power a computer to count up to 2 ^ 192. of course, it wouldn't have the energy left over to perform any useful calculations with this counter.
That is an erroneous conclusion based upon the (incorrect) assumption that a small amount of energy (kT) must be dissipated for each elementary computational step. If the computation is carried out using a reversible (classical) computer, this is not the case. Thermodynamics does not place any such restriction on computation. On the other hand, quantum mechanics does place constraints on the speed of a classical computer.
For more fun see
Ultimate physical limits to computation by Seth Lloyd
Comparing NASA's $15.7 billion to the DOD $400 billion is the wrong comparison. Everything looks small compared to defence.
The budget for the National Institutes of Health is about 30 billion. They fund most of the basic biomedical research. Every university biology department in the US runs off this money.
The budget for the National Science Foundataion is about 6 billion. They fund most of the physical science and mathematical research in the US. They also pay for telescopes and most of the real space research.
In contrast NASA's budget gets us a pointless space station, a broken space shuttle and a few (very expensive) inter-planetary probes. (For example, Cassini cost 3 billion dollars!)
I guess this is what $9 million in legal fees gets you. Check out this part of the SCO letter.
The ABI Code identified above is part of the UNIX Derived Files and, as such, must carry USL / SCO copyright notices and may not be used in any GPL distribution, inasmuch as the affirmative consent of the copyright holder has not been obtained, and will not be obtained, for such a distribution under the GPL.
They seem to be under the impression that all code within a GPL distribution must be GPLed. But mixing code with the GPL does not require that the all of the code become GPLed. It mearly requires that all of the code be free (as in speach.) O look, all those headers are covered under the BSD license. (Not that their copyright claim sounds credible anyways.)
Rats.. This update seems to have broken mail..app.. As you can see,, when I compose a message,, every punctuation mark gets repeated!! And sometimes the text becomes unchangable until I restart the app.. I appear to be getting similar problems in other apps that use Apples text editing widget..
Why can''t I resiste updating my main work machine.. Bad user,, no biscuit. Anyone else getting this problem?
p.s., the spell check function no longer works either.. Argh
Look, I am as big an Apple fan boy as the next guy, but minor product updates on the front page of slashdot? I think Hemos has been hit by the Jobian Reality Distortion Field.
> Big labels will no longer be able to charge $18 for a
>Britney Spears CD with, at most, one listenable song on it.
Yes they will, because you can't (yet?) buy Britney from the Apple Music Store. Or The Beatles. There is alot of stuff to buy, but not everything. I suppose that the labels are holding back.
On a related note, has anyone actually managed to purchase a song yet? I can't get it to work.
Also, notice that the article was dated back in April. Any more recent publications on it, anyone?
04/11/2001 is the 4th of November, not the 11th of April. It's a British paper, and we write day/month/year. (Personally, I either spell out the month, or write 2001-11-04 to avoid this confusion.)
I think that this basic idea of a public moderation system for scientific papers, would work.
And it wouldn't be too hard to set up. All you would have to do is wrap xxx.lanl.gov with a system that provides discussion, moderation and meta-moderation. The hard part, collecting and archiving articles, has already been done.
The biggest problem, I think, would be getting enough people using the system to make it effective.
What about a something akin to a webring - but with posting, moderation, peer review - basically a distributed Slashdot! Could this be done?
In a word, no. Journals provide a permanant archive of the scientific liturature. I can walk into the nearest library and look up work done a century ago. In the kind of system you suggest papers could disapear at any moment.
Actually, the problem of storing and archiving large numbers of papers on the net has already been solved. See xxx.lanl.gov.
All we need now is some sort of moderation system.
Actually, that's a rather disturbing comparison, when you consider the amount of utter crap that gets modded up on discussion sites like these, and the amount of good content that gets ignored. Perhaps peer review isn't such a great idea after all...
You don't know how right you are. A lot of scientific literature is total crap.
Sure, peer review weeds sets a certain minimal standard, but much of
what is published is redundant, verbose, pointless, or just plain wrong.
Slashdot Mirror
You have quoted a quantum (not thermodynamic) limit. You can tell by the appearance of Planks constant and non-appearance of temperature or Boltzmann constant. This quantum limit restricts the maximum rate of computation based upon the total energy (not the dissipated energy) of the computer.
a computer that isn't subject to the laws of thermodynamics can be run without subject to the laws fo thermodynamics.
A reversible computer, in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics, can be run without dissipating energy. Read.
For more fun see Ultimate physical limits to computation by Seth Lloyd
Comparing NASA's $15.7 billion to the DOD $400 billion is the wrong comparison. Everything looks small compared to defence.
The budget for the National Institutes of Health is about 30 billion. They fund most of the basic biomedical research. Every university biology department in the US runs off this money.
The budget for the National Science Foundataion is about 6 billion. They fund most of the physical science and mathematical research in the US. They also pay for telescopes and most of the real space research.
In contrast NASA's budget gets us a pointless space station, a broken space shuttle and a few (very expensive) inter-planetary probes. (For example, Cassini cost 3 billion dollars!)
The ABI Code identified above is part of the UNIX Derived Files and, as such, must carry USL / SCO copyright notices and may not be used in any GPL distribution, inasmuch as the affirmative consent of the copyright holder has not been obtained, and will not be obtained, for such a distribution under the GPL.
They seem to be under the impression that all code within a GPL distribution must be GPLed. But mixing code with the GPL does not require that the all of the code become GPLed. It mearly requires that all of the code be free (as in speach.) O look, all those headers are covered under the BSD license. (Not that their copyright claim sounds credible anyways.)
Rats.. This update seems to have broken mail..app.. As you can see,, when I compose a message,, every punctuation mark gets repeated!! And sometimes the text becomes unchangable until I restart the app.. I appear to be getting similar problems in other apps that use Apples text editing widget..
Why can''t I resiste updating my main work machine.. Bad user,, no biscuit. Anyone else getting this problem?
p.s., the spell check function no longer works either.. Argh
Molecular assembler? Surely you mean Matter Compiler? Or emcee.
I can't be the only person to have read the Diamond Age.
No, no. You mean BSD is dying and Apple is beleaguered.
Rosalind Franklin was not overlooked by the Nobel committee. They never got the chance. She was dead. The rules do not allow posthumous awards.
Look, I am as big an Apple fan boy as the next guy, but minor product updates on the front page of slashdot? I think Hemos has been hit by the Jobian Reality Distortion Field.
What, you think CDs are lossless?
> Big labels will no longer be able to charge $18 for a
>Britney Spears CD with, at most, one listenable song on it.
Yes they will, because you can't (yet?) buy Britney from the Apple Music Store. Or The Beatles. There is alot of stuff to buy, but not everything. I suppose that the labels are holding back.
On a related note, has anyone actually managed to purchase a song yet? I can't get it to work.
My pet peeve is people who bitch about web standards, but then can't be bothered to follow those standards themselves.
Slashdot's html is not, and never has been, valid. This isn't rocket science. Its not hard. Stop playing sims, CmdTaco, and fix SlashCode!
04/11/2001 is the 4th of November, not the 11th of April. It's a British paper, and we write day/month/year. (Personally, I either spell out the month, or write 2001-11-04 to avoid this confusion.)
And it wouldn't be too hard to set up. All you would have to do is wrap xxx.lanl.gov with a system that provides discussion, moderation and meta-moderation. The hard part, collecting and archiving articles, has already been done.
The biggest problem, I think, would be getting enough people using the system to make it effective.
Sourceforge project anyone?
In a word, no. Journals provide a permanant archive of the scientific liturature. I can walk into the nearest library and look up work done a century ago. In the kind of system you suggest papers could disapear at any moment.
Actually, the problem of storing and archiving large numbers of papers on the net has already been solved. See xxx.lanl.gov. All we need now is some sort of moderation system.
G.
You don't know how right you are. A lot of scientific literature is total crap. Sure, peer review weeds sets a certain minimal standard, but much of what is published is redundant, verbose, pointless, or just plain wrong.