Possibly. Steel is commonly used because it is cheap and effective (for terrestrial use). For a space elevator, lighter is almost always better (think kevlar, teflon, strong plastics).
See the tether competition (another $2mil available from NASA) for where things are going (using materials containing nanotubes). The Spaceward guys are very positive about the effects this challenge are having on research.
I'm not saying the elevator is going to be built tomorrow, but it is doable. We will be a little late on providing sufficient lift capacity to launch all lawyers into the sun.
You don't build a straight cable, rather a tapered one (which is where I get the bubble gum comment). The current guys are shooting for ~8x increase in strength over today's strongest materials. That is due (largely, IIRC) to limitations in current lift systems (i.e. chemical) and maintenance requirements.
If we deployed gas core nuclear lift, everything changes.
You could build a space elevator out of bubble gum (although you'd probably need so much that it would screw with gravity). You want a light tether to reduce launch costs... (and there is a separate tether competition/reward).
The climber really is the hard part. You need power delivery, reception, and drive. Not to mention heat dissipation.
AMD couldn't get past 25% marketshare because their fabs were running at 100%. AMD could not, and never could have produced sufficient product to have a greater market share.
As a former Intel employee, and stock holder... I would rather see Intel keep their money. Especially considering Core 2 is not infringing on this patent.
We don't know why Intel settled. Most likely it was some combination of:
Bankrupting a University is Bad Publicity
Hard to win a jury case
May reveal implementation details (corporate secrets)
The problem is, you cannot process more instructions in less time without using more power. A 210% speed up will use at least 210% more power.
The rule of thumb in CPU design is 3 power for 1 performance - that is simple voltage/frequency scaling. If your architectural idea is worse than that, start over. Most teams today are using a 2 for 1 rule (1% perf will cost 2% power). That is why many-core (which promises 1 for 1) is so attractive to managers and non-technical people...
The point is, optimizing for performance per watt is the same as minimizing performance. Everything that adds performance costs power. Anything that reduces power with no effect on performance is going to get done in the high performance design...
How about a processor with 0 power consumption?
Of course, it is 0 performance...
Infinite performance per watt!
Performance per watt is a useless measure. People should use lowest power in a desired performance envelope. But that is not a single number you can use in a sound bite...
If the universe (really only our galaxy matters) is as old as we think, and organic chemistry is as prevalent as we can see, and evolution works the way we think it does, they should be here. The best place would be in the asteroid belt, either currently working, or with evident ruins.
Fermi isn't about detecting signals, it's about seeing the effects in system.
If there were any other intelligent species, they would of mined the asteroid belt by now. We should see the reflections off their solar panels, and other evidence of their handiwork... Even if they were extinct.
The parser is true open source (the reference compiler is free as in beer). gdc is the GPL project that uses that to interface to the gcc back end for generating code.
Phobos is free as in beer. Tango is true open source (IIRC).
I would prefer an intrinsic definition of life (based on what we are) rather than some extrinsic qualifications (what we can do).
As nerds, we value things like "mind" as the qualification. But, remember, the people making the laws do not value that.
They value popularity, and money.
It is much better to say any unique human organism should be granted human rights. That means embryos and any cells taken from early stage embryos (effectively a form of asexual reproduction, which covers twinning).
Slashdot Mirror
Joel is referring to closures. You can find them in D (compiled), Python (interpreted), or Tcl (obscure, but cool).
Possibly. Steel is commonly used because it is cheap and effective (for terrestrial use). For a space elevator, lighter is almost always better (think kevlar, teflon, strong plastics).
See the tether competition (another $2mil available from NASA) for where things are going (using materials containing nanotubes). The Spaceward guys are very positive about the effects this challenge are having on research.
I'm not saying the elevator is going to be built tomorrow, but it is doable. We will be a little late on providing sufficient lift capacity to launch all lawyers into the sun.
You don't build a straight cable, rather a tapered one (which is where I get the bubble gum comment). The current guys are shooting for ~8x increase in strength over today's strongest materials. That is due (largely, IIRC) to limitations in current lift systems (i.e. chemical) and maintenance requirements.
If we deployed gas core nuclear lift, everything changes.
You could build a space elevator out of bubble gum (although you'd probably need so much that it would screw with gravity). You want a light tether to reduce launch costs... (and there is a separate tether competition/reward).
The climber really is the hard part. You need power delivery, reception, and drive. Not to mention heat dissipation.
AMD couldn't get past 25% marketshare because their fabs were running at 100%. AMD could not, and never could have produced sufficient product to have a greater market share.
As a former Intel employee, and stock holder... I would rather see Intel keep their money. Especially considering Core 2 is not infringing on this patent.
We don't know why Intel settled. Most likely it was some combination of:
WARF: Hey Intel you owe us 400 quadrillion dollars for Sohi's work on Core 2.
Intel: What? We didn't use anything he talked about.
This came up last time.
Apparently they also don't like being called names!
The problem is, you cannot process more instructions in less time without using more power. A 210% speed up will use at least 210% more power.
The rule of thumb in CPU design is 3 power for 1 performance - that is simple voltage/frequency scaling. If your architectural idea is worse than that, start over. Most teams today are using a 2 for 1 rule (1% perf will cost 2% power). That is why many-core (which promises 1 for 1) is so attractive to managers and non-technical people...
Wow, relax people... troll? fail at math?
The point is, optimizing for performance per watt is the same as minimizing performance. Everything that adds performance costs power. Anything that reduces power with no effect on performance is going to get done in the high performance design...
How about a processor with 0 power consumption?
Of course, it is 0 performance...
Infinite performance per watt!
Performance per watt is a useless measure. People should use lowest power in a desired performance envelope. But that is not a single number you can use in a sound bite...
And Linux is the molecular assembler that builds products for you from air, dirt, and solar power! ;)
But people don't use it, "because it's icky"...
If we can't fathom were we'd be in a million years, imagine an alien race that achieved sentience a billion years ago. Unfathomable.
That assumes unlimited progress. On the contrary, evidence suggests we are very close to the limits of progress now.
Interstellar travel is by no means out of reach. We could send a probe to Alpha Centauri at a good fraction of light speed (maybe as high as .1).
At .1c, you can travel around the galaxy in a few million years (including stops for setting up bases).
Long time trumps long distance :)
I agree that SETI is probably a waste of time.
But Fermi is deeper than that.
Truly, "Where is everybody?"
If the universe (really only our galaxy matters) is as old as we think, and organic chemistry is as prevalent as we can see, and evolution works the way we think it does, they should be here. The best place would be in the asteroid belt, either currently working, or with evident ruins.
Fermi isn't about detecting signals, it's about seeing the effects in system.
If there were any other intelligent species, they would of mined the asteroid belt by now. We should see the reflections off their solar panels, and other evidence of their handiwork... Even if they were extinct.
Haha! Now Tcl wins the challenge:
puts "Hello, world!"
Int math:
(-2+1)/2 = -1/2 = -1
(-3+1)/2 = -2/2 = -1
The parser is true open source (the reference compiler is free as in beer). gdc is the GPL project that uses that to interface to the gcc back end for generating code.
Phobos is free as in beer. Tango is true open source (IIRC).
I agree, for the most part.
The thing that counts is performance
Of course the RISCs had higher performance - what really matters is installed base. x86 had it. That's the same reason we still have mainframes...
The robots should build automated workers to do their tasks for them!
I would prefer an intrinsic definition of life (based on what we are) rather than some extrinsic qualifications (what we can do).
As nerds, we value things like "mind" as the qualification. But, remember, the people making the laws do not value that.
They value popularity, and money.
It is much better to say any unique human organism should be granted human rights. That means embryos and any cells taken from early stage embryos (effectively a form of asexual reproduction, which covers twinning).
You must be new here.
The nanites don't eat it for energy, they eat it for structure.
It is highly unlikely humanity (or transhumans) can survive more than 1e15 years, nothing will survive more than 1e80 or so (proton decay).
Makes you think about where your hope is!