<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">On Sun, Oct 19, 2025 at 9:23 PM Keith Henson <<a href="mailto:hkeithhenson@gmail.com">hkeithhenson@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</span></div></div><div class="gmail_quote gmail_quote_container"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr"><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><font size="4"><i><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span>Current-day<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>computers don't help that much in deciding how far out from the star<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>you want to place a data center.</i></font></blockquote><div><br></div><b><font size="4" face="tahoma, sans-serif">Why not?  Current-day computers, even gargantuan multi-billion dollar data centers, work just fine, and yet just one small Blackwell chip<span class="gmail_default" style="">, </span>which has an area of only<span class="gmail_default" style=""> 750mm^2, </span>uses <span class="gmail_default" style="">12</span>00 watts of electricity. Granted an extensive cooling system <span class="gmail_default" style="">is</span> needed<span class="gmail_default" style="">,</span> but if you build it at <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">E</span>arth's distance from the sun then no matter what you do you're not going to consume more than 1360 watts of electricity<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>per square meter<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></span><span class="gmail_default" style="">, and that is <u>1333 times larger</u> than a Blackwell chip</span>.<span class="gmail_default" style=""> </span>And remember, today's technology is as lousy as it's ever going to be.</font></b></div><div class="gmail_quote gmail_quote_container"><br></div><div class="gmail_quote gmail_quote_container"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"> <font size="4" face="georgia, serif"><i style=""> <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span>Whatever is blocking light at Tabby's Star is<span class="gmail_default" style=""> </span>1.5 light seconds in diameter.</i></font><br></blockquote><div><br></div><div><font size="4" face="tahoma, sans-serif"><b>That can't be right.<span class="gmail_default" style=""> The sun has a diameter of about 5 light </span>seconds<span class="gmail_default" style="">, and the diameter of </span>Tabby's Star <span class="gmail_default" style="">is 1.58 times that of the sun. </span></b></font></div><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></div></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><font size="4"><i><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span>If you care about communicating with other uploads without too much<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>delay, then you want to be as close to neighbors as you can. </i></font></blockquote><div><br></div><div><font size="4" face="tahoma, sans-serif"><b>If you're worried about that then you want to make your<span class="gmail_default" style=""> Dyson sphere or swarm as small as possible. </span> </b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="tahoma, sans-serif"><b><br></b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="tahoma, sans-serif"><span class="gmail_default" style=""><b>John K Clark</b></span><br></font></div><div><br></div><div> </div><div><br></div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><br>
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