<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><br><div><div>On Jan 5, 2010, at 12:49 PM, Damien Broderick wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div>On 1/5/2010 5:11 AM, Stefano Vaj wrote:<br><blockquote type="cite"><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#144FAE"><br></font></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">*If* organic brains actually do some quantum computing. Now, I still<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">have to see any human being solving a typical quantum computing<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">problem with a pencil and a piece of paper... ;-)<br></blockquote><br>I suppose it's possible that some autistic lightning calculators do that. </div></blockquote><div><br></div>But even the grandest of these lightning calculators are no match for a conventional non-quantum computer. I just calculated the first 707 digits of PI on my iMAC, it took exactly .000426 seconds, and my iMAC isn't even top of the line anymore, although it was for about 15 minutes. In 1873 the mathematician William Shanks died and had spent the last 20 years of his life doing the exact same calculation.</div><div><br></div><div>No that isn't correct, it isn't the exact same calculation; my iMac figured the correct numbers but poor Mr. Shanks made an error at digit 527, rendering all further digits and the final 5 years of his life worthless. Fortunately he never learned of his error, nobody did till 1958 when a computer spotted it. it takes my machine .000021 seconds to calculate 527 digits of PI. </div><div><div><br></div><blockquote type="cite"><div>I'm persuaded that some psi phenomena are real</div></blockquote><div><br></div>I know this will greatly surprise you but I don't entirely agree with you about that.</div><div><br></div><div> John K Clark<br><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div></div></body></html>