All posts by Rand Simberg

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Moore’s Law Marches On

According to Reuters, Intel has achieved a huge breakthrough in transistor density and speed. They call it “terahertz” technology (hint, the current technology might be similarly dubbed “gigahertz” technology–“tera” is a thousand times faster…). Apparently, it solves two of the problems that have been facing designers as they attempt to put ever more transistors on a chip–power consumption (how to run your desktop supercomputer without your own personal power plant) and heat generation/rejection (how to dump all that power into your supercomputer without having a China Syndrome in your home office).

Going by history, many of the most interesting potential applications for this are probably unpredictable, but some of the mundane guesses are real-time voice/face recognition, and total computer communication via speech/listening (“Look, Ma! No keyboard or mouse!”). It will also make it easier to both crack encryption, and to create more uncrackable ciphers.

I can also imagine much more realistic computer graphics and virtual-reality gaming. Moreover, with the development of cheaper full-body VR suits (and I do mean full body), I imagine that virtual sex will also be a killer app…

Uncategorized

Moore’s Law Marches On

According to Reuters, Intel has achieved a huge breakthrough in transistor density and speed. They call it “terahertz” technology (hint, the current technology might be similarly dubbed “gigahertz” technology–“tera” is a thousand times faster…). Apparently, it solves two of the problems that have been facing designers as they attempt to put ever more transistors on a chip–power consumption (how to run your desktop supercomputer without your own personal power plant) and heat generation/rejection (how to dump all that power into your supercomputer without having a China Syndrome in your home office).

Going by history, many of the most interesting potential applications for this are probably unpredictable, but some of the mundane guesses are real-time voice/face recognition, and total computer communication via speech/listening (“Look, Ma! No keyboard or mouse!”). It will also make it easier to both crack encryption, and to create more uncrackable ciphers.

I can also imagine much more realistic computer graphics and virtual-reality gaming. Moreover, with the development of cheaper full-body VR suits (and I do mean full body), I imagine that virtual sex will also be a killer app…

Political Commentary

Elite Continuing To Make Themselves Irrelevant

John Leo has a nice little piece this morning on the continued glum and frustration of the chatterati, as all of the multi-culti, anti-freedom values they’ve been pushing for decades are being rejected by the American people in the wake of the September attacks.

The big picture is galling, too. Leading roles on the national stage haven’t been played by the thinking elite but by the semi-disdained non-chatterers who act physically in the real world: the military, the police, firefighters, agents of the CIA. And the values of the non-chatterers — heroism, patriotism, self-sacrifice — are on the rise. Crowds aren’t lining the streets and holding up “Thank you, chatterers” signs as pundits and professors drive by…

…None of the elite’s wartime moves have worked. The effort to avoid U.S. retaliation for Sept. 11 by calling in the United Nations was a non-starter. The attempt to demonize the “racial profiling” of Muslims at airports fell flat, rejected by huge majorities, including a large majority of blacks. The left’s mind-boggling attempt to turn the anti-globalization crusade into a ’60s-style “campaign against war and racism” also collapsed. Even more amazing was the refusal of the feminist movement to support any show of force against the Taliban. Let’s see, who shall we support? America or fanatics who deny all rights to women and whip them on the street if they walk too noisily? Hmmm. Too close to call.

Uncategorized

Do They Want Us To Be Stupid?

California State Senator Ray Haynes has a nice little rant today on the (deliberate?) refusal of our public school system to educate people on basic economics and government. He’s basically correct, though he left out a few concepts, and there are probably many people who would testify that the marginal utility of Krispy Kreme doughnuts never goes negative…

Kudos.

Media Criticism

Quagmire Is Back In Vogue

Time to resurrect the Quagmire Watch. Murkiness is out, after a brief rein, and quagmire is back in. The only catch is that even a journalist isn’t dumb enough to apply it to Afghanistan anymore. So they simply change the venue, to Iraq where, according to the handwringers at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution the mother of all quagmires awaits us. (And while we’re at it, hats off to Saddam, the father of the mother of all cliches…).

War Commentary

Bellicose Airline Passengers

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, there’s a guy named Don Detrich who’s mad as hell and isn’t going to take it any more. He’s started an organization called the Flight Watch Hijacking Resistance League. Hmmm, doesn’t make for a very pronounceable acronym…

They offer passenger training, and are lobbying for legislation (H.R.3150-Secure Transportation for America Act of 2001) to provide liability protection for passengers who assist in thwarting hijacking attempts. Apparently, the airlines have mixed feelings about this, but I’d like to see more of it. I think I’ll bookmark this site.

War Commentary

So Much For “Massive Civilian Casualties”

The Telegraph has an article on how impressed Kabul inhabitants are with the precision of the US bombing.

So accurate were the hits on the Antonov transport planes that only the aircrafts’ tails, wings and some of the cockpits were left. Their fuselages had disappeared. The official supervising the runway repair, Farid Ahmad, was impressed by the Americans’ work. He said it certainly outclassed the efforts of the warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who destroyed much of the city and the airport 10 years ago.

“I have been through the Russians,” he said. “I have seen Hekmatyar in action and the Northern Alliance. This is just incredible. The Americans appear to have been 98 per cent accurate.

“Hekmatyar tried for six years to destroy the TV signal on Television Mountain. The Americans managed it straight away.”

It’s a little surreal reading some of the descriptions by people as though they’re scoring a game, but to the degree that judges of such things exist, given what they’ve been through in the past quarter century between the Soviets and the various civil wars, the residents of Kabul and Afghanistan at large have to be the best-qualified people on the planet to issue points.

War Commentary

So Much For “Massive Civilian Casualties”

The Telegraph has an article on how impressed Kabul inhabitants are with the precision of the US bombing.

So accurate were the hits on the Antonov transport planes that only the aircrafts’ tails, wings and some of the cockpits were left. Their fuselages had disappeared. The official supervising the runway repair, Farid Ahmad, was impressed by the Americans’ work. He said it certainly outclassed the efforts of the warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who destroyed much of the city and the airport 10 years ago.

“I have been through the Russians,” he said. “I have seen Hekmatyar in action and the Northern Alliance. This is just incredible. The Americans appear to have been 98 per cent accurate.

“Hekmatyar tried for six years to destroy the TV signal on Television Mountain. The Americans managed it straight away.”

It’s a little surreal reading some of the descriptions by people as though they’re scoring a game, but to the degree that judges of such things exist, given what they’ve been through in the past quarter century between the Soviets and the various civil wars, the residents of Kabul and Afghanistan at large have to be the best-qualified people on the planet to issue points.