[extropy-chat] flash crowd super computer

Damien Broderick thespike at satx.rr.com
Mon Feb 23 18:51:28 UTC 2004


Well, gee, eh?

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/23/technology/23SUPE.html?th=&pagewanted=print&position=

< There are already many Internet-connected virtual supercomputers, like 
the SETI at home project, which uses the spare computing cycles on the 
personal computers of volunteers to hunt for signs of alien civilizations. 
Several universities have shown that it is possible to hook hundreds of 
off-the-shelf personal computers together to create supercomputers. But 
until now no one has tried to build an instant supercomputer in one place.

"It struck me as being something of a 60's idea," said Dennis Allison, a 
founder of Dr. Dobbs, a Silicon Valley magazine for computer programmers. 
"This could easily be an idea from one of William Gibson's science-fiction 
novels, where everyone gathers in Grand Central station to save the world 
by plugging their machines into the Net." >

Actually, it could be an idea from a Dam Clemmensen post to this forum, 
cited in THE SPIKE seven years ago--except that Dan's approach to a home 
brew singularity-grade AI *didn't* require all the machines to be 
physically `in one place', which is a bizarrely 1940s' idea. But hey.

Damien Broderick






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