Bootstrap ancestry
in [UK Mac]
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From: Justin C on 19 Jun 2010 13:04 In article <1jkccm4.e9jku21v9uwpsN%adrian(a)poppyrecords.invalid.invalid>, Adrian Tuddenham wrote: > Justin C <justin.1006(a)purestblue.com> wrote: > >> In article <883cceFgicU1(a)mid.individual.net>, Chris Ridd wrote: >> > What sort of blind alleys would we avoid? >> >> Copper telephone lines to each house - we'd put fibre optic in from the >> outset! > > ...and when the mains fails during an emergency situation...? Oh, you really are a glass-half-empty kinda guy, aren't you?! Justin. -- Justin C, by the sea.
From: Pd on 19 Jun 2010 13:20 jim <jim(a)magrathea.plus.com> wrote: > Rowland McDonnell <real-address-in-sig(a)flur.bltigibbet.invalid> wrote: > > > "Every program has a branching and converging bootstrap ancestry." > > I've written code without any ancestry at all. > > I doubt that. Not unless you've developed your own CPU from first > principles. > > > > In some cases: machine code, hand-compiled, and entered via bloody > > binary switches into a very simple single-board Z80 computer I threw > > together once. I've done even that. > > Z80, eh? Which owes it's instruction set to the Intel 8080. > Which was derived from the 8008. > Which was derived from the 4004. Quite. Unless you're actually soldering together a bunch of logic gates to do the arithmetic, there is always some IC programming you're basing your code on. -- Pd
From: D.M. Procida on 19 Jun 2010 13:20 Ben Shimmin <bas(a)llamaselector.com> wrote: > > Suppose that we lost all our technology, right down to our hammers and > > nails, and had to start again with stone hand-tools (but still had our > > knowledge, language, writing and so on). How long would it take to get > > back where we are now, in technological terms? Would we even take the > > same route? > > If you haven't read Samuel Butler's _Erewhon_, I think you should, as > you would very much enjoy it. I have, though not for a few years. But while I can remember all kinds of things about it - what particularly stands out for me is the description of treatment for the criminals and punishment for the sick - I can't remember anything about technology. But since we're on the subject of technology, I also remember your mentioning reading Erewhon as an ebook, and thinking it sounded compared to my old paperback copy. Daniele
From: Ben Shimmin on 19 Jun 2010 13:32 D.M. Procida <real-not-anti-spam-address(a)apple-juice.co.uk>: > Ben Shimmin <bas(a)llamaselector.com> wrote: [...] >> If you haven't read Samuel Butler's _Erewhon_, I think you should, as >> you would very much enjoy it. > > I have, though not for a few years. But while I can remember all kinds > of things about it - what particularly stands out for me is the > description of treatment for the criminals and punishment for the sick - > I can't remember anything about technology. > > But since we're on the subject of technology, I also remember your > mentioning reading Erewhon as an ebook, and thinking it sounded compared > to my old paperback copy. You can read the three chapters about the machines online here: <URL:http://www.hoboes.com/FireBlade/Fiction/Butler/Erewhon/erewhon23/> The gist is that the machines developed consciousness by means of Darwinian Selection... which is a fascinating idea, explored a century or so later by James Cameron in his Terminator films (with more explosions and Austrians). b. -- <bas(a)bas.me.uk> <URL:http://bas.me.uk/> `Zombies are defined by behavior and can be "explained" by many handy shortcuts: the supernatural, radiation, a virus, space visitors, secret weapons, a Harvard education and so on.' -- Roger Ebert
From: D.M. Procida on 19 Jun 2010 13:55
Ben Shimmin <bas(a)llamaselector.com> wrote: > > But since we're on the subject of technology, I also remember your > > mentioning reading Erewhon as an ebook, and thinking it sounded compared > > to my old paperback copy. I lost an adjective up there: thinking it sounded quite unsatisfactory. > You can read the three chapters about the machines online here: > > <URL:http://www.hoboes.com/FireBlade/Fiction/Butler/Erewhon/erewhon23/> > > The gist is that the machines developed consciousness by means of > Darwinian Selection... which is a fascinating idea, explored a century > or so later by James Cameron in his Terminator films (with more > explosions and Austrians). I must do my reading cycle of utopian fiction again. Now I want to read Erehon, but it has to join the queue. Art Garfunkel read in in March 2000. Daniele |