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Date: Thu, 12 Jun 2014 12:16:08 +1000
Subject: Re: OT: This Swift thing
From: Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com>
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Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.python:73201

On Thu, Jun 12, 2014 at 12:08 PM, Steven D'Aprano
<steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> wrote:
> I'm just pointing out that our computational technology uses
> over a million times more energy than the theoretical minimum, and
> therefore there is a lot of room for efficiency gains without sacrificing
> computer power. I never imagined that such viewpoint would turn out to be
> so controversial.

The way I understand it, you're citing an extremely theoretical
minimum, in the same way that one can point out that we're a long way
from maximum entropy in a flash memory chip, so it ought to be
possible to pack a lot more data onto a USB stick. The laws of physics
tend to put boundaries that are ridiculously far from where we
actually work - I think most roads have speed limits that run a fairly
long way short of c.

ChrisA