10-30-2019, 06:44 PM
(10-29-2019, 06:16 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: ** 29-Oct-2019 World View: Exponential increases in computing power
(10-28-2019, 10:16 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: > While I agree with the "fast enough computer" theory, I don't
> necessarily agree with the idea that we'll get computers fast
> enough and efficient enough.
> Here's the issue: for decades, Moore's law was driven by reduction
> in processor size. Unfortunately, within the past decade, that
> reduction reached a physical limit as circuits on the chips shrank
> to the point that inductance effects between adjacent "wires"
> became limiting.
> At this point, Moore's law is being driven by parallelism instead
> of more powerful processors: having larger numbers of the same old
> processors running in parallel. That can still result in ever more
> powerful computers - but they will also be ever larger and consume
> ever more energy. That limits their usefulness in certain
> applications, in particular mobile applications.
> In 2050, the best artists may well be computers which fill
> buildings. We may still be traveling around town in Uber and Lyft
> vehicles driven by human beings, however.
Nobody believes this. You're saying that progress in computer
technology, which has been proceeding exponentially for decades, is
now stone cold dead.
Not at all. Let me try putting it in different words, since those didn't work for you.
Moore's law is a law about computing power and costs. It is not a law about computing power and size. Sometimes the computing power will come in the form of machines that sit on desktops. Sometimes it will come in the form of machines that fill rooms.
In the current phase, which is likely to extend to 2030 at least, the machines get bigger as the cost of computing power goes down. That will change if and when the trend jumps to a different technology, as it may have several times in the past, but the next such jump is more likely around 2050 than 2030.
There's also no guarantee that the next jump will go to smaller rather than larger machines. It may turn out that quantum computing can be done much more efficiently in space with large volumes of hard vacuum, and we'll have huge quantum computers in orbit which we access over a wireless internet equivalent, as just one possibility. They will by that time be much smarter than human beings, but they may not be able to walk around on Earth.
