DNA Computers?!?!?!

[Soundscape Studios.]

Did anybody hear about this development? I read in one of the industry mags that they figured out a way to make computers out of human DNA. :eek: These are supposed to be WAY beyond anything they can do with today's microprocessors. Sounds damn spooky to me!! Any info?

[Chip McDonald]

There's a number of new technologies that are looming "quite soon" in our future that are going to be revolutionary. The following 4 fields are going to explode in the next 5 years or so: nanotech biotech quantum engineering artificial intelligence What's curious is that it would seem all 4 are "maturing" concurrently - *remarkably congruently*. Enough so that we're going to be perfectly distracted by the dangers, some EXTREME, presented by each because of each other. There's a number of different ways we're going to see a massive jump in computing power in the next 5 years that's going to outscale Moore's Law. There's the DNA angle, various quantum angles, substrate advances, circuit topology advances.... It's almost like we're fated to have "near infinite computing power" in 10 years or so. It's *going to happen*, and it's going to change the world. In other words... no one is going to be complaining about not enough DSP power 10 years from now. On the other hand, we may be merely autonomic vassals of the Newly Created Sentient Overlords , but hey, we'll be able to get 500 tracks of 98 bit/248 khz files to run on the desktop and still squash the life out of all them simultaneously with a Perfectly Accurate Replication plug-in of an ancient and primitive Fairchild compressor... and it STILL won't sound as good as tape! Hopefully we silly humans will still be around 25 years from now, or at least be recognizable as "human". Probably not, once all of this hits a certain event horizon of practicalness. Am I joking?

[Soundscape Studios.]

As scary as it may seem, I for one, do not subscribe to the "apocolypse" vision that alot of people think of when they hear this kind of stuff. Just because the computers of the future would have endless storage capacity, greater speed etc.., what does that have do do with our threatened existence as we know it? My question is - how does DNA and organic elements contribute to an electronic circuit?

[Uh Clem]

Thank God we have computers to help us figure out how to do all this fancy stuff! :eek:

[big K]

I know the theory behind quatum computers, ... in binany we have ones and zero's: on or off. there or not there, how ever you wish to look at it .... then you take all the binany bits and put them in a row, this is a number, a bunch of numbers and do math. with a quatum computer you can set an electron to spin to the right or left. (one or zero) .. but then you can al so make it spin up or down, (and also in the third demintion as well) ... so we now have 6 stares of being rather then 2.... also you don't need to run them in a line, you can make a matrix of electrons or even a 3d latice of them... what they start to mean I have no idea.. guess thats why its still in the reasearch stage... but cool non the less.

[Dylan]

This guy I know has made some excellent predictions about computers. To hear a few of them click [url=http://www.lowb.org/alan/frink/audio/Frink-Frinkiac_7.wav]here[/url] ;) .

[KenElevenShadows]

As long as the computers aren't made with Rosie O'Donnell's DNA, I'm okay with it.

[Soundscape Studios.]

[quote]Originally posted by Ken/Eleven Shadows: [b]As long as the computers aren't made with Rosie O'Donnell's DNA, I'm okay with it.[/b][/quote]How about Britney ??? :eek: :eek: :eek:

[Chip McDonald]

[quote]Originally posted by soundscapestudios: [b]what does that have do do with our threatened existence as we know it? My question is - how does DNA and organic elements contribute to an electronic circuit?[/b][/quote]Because inevitably we'll push it to a state of a.i., in which case eventually technology's capacity will outstrip ours, at which point it's a very big question mark. We have built in stresses that contribute to our perception of "emotions", and likewise "morality"; that may or may not be there. More than likely not. Additionally, given such a circumstance, things are likely to escalate extremely fast in a such a way that we may not even understand what's going on; again a big question mark. You make chips that scale up the chemical processes of DNA to allow for I/O by creating physical structures that respond somewhat like nerve cells in the nose/tongue responds to different chemical stimuli. Or, the "outcome" of a logical process applied to a DNA processor is designed such that it creates a specific sequence to act as a "header" for the resultant information, and you create a batch process for analyzing the results like we already do in automated bulk-process DNA sequencers. Not as fast as the first method, though. I suppose you could also design it so that the DNA wraps physically in such a way that a certain geometric shape "fits" a reactant process that is electro-chemical in nature, which then translates to an I/O device similar to the first solution presented above. There's another more elegant solution I'm forgetting right now, though.... uhg....

[surfjunkie]

[quote]Originally posted by Chip McDonald, 03-07-2002: [b] In other words... no one is going to be complaining about not enough DSP power 10 years from now. [/b][/quote] [quote]Originally posted by Chip McDonald: 04-07-2011: [b]Topic: I went to Limbz-R-Us today... you may have read my post on [url=http://www.rehabtech.org.uk/pdgtsglv.jpg]my recent arm injury and replacement[/url] , well i've been having some problems with my sweep picking. i only got the thing at Limbz because of their generous service contract, that and the Burger King inside has those great new french fries that [i]actually have no fat[/i]. so at the help desk, the stupid droid couldn't find my file in the computer. i asked him if he was programmed to use that bio-mac, i don't think he got it . by the end of our conversation, he was literally stuck in a loop, saying "the plasma level at station 47 is dangerously low" over and over. the fact that this particular unit was using the newly-popular "George W" voice plug-in made things... well, you've read my past posts on that. anyway- long story short, i ended up having to order one, and it took until the next day to show up. well, at least no one will be complaining about Linkin Park 10 years from now. [/b][/quote]seriously though Chip, if you want to talk a bit more about the future of tech, i'll read every word. maybe a new thread? i promise i won't make any jokes.

[Dan South]

AI is alive and well - in control systems, networks, transportation systems, voice recognition systems, even your Palm Pilot. Many of the worlds subway systems are controlled by AI systems. But to assume that AI is the beginning of some malevolent life force is just silly. It's simply another computing technique - programs that improve themselves by recognizing patterns in the data that they deal with instead of having a fixed way to do things (that always has to be upgraded by human programmers). Remember the HAL 9000 from "2001: A Space Odyssey"? Well, we ALL use computers, now. Many of us have computers in our homes, our offices, our phones, our cars, our washing machines. Think about it. Would all of this gagetry not have been frightening to someone from generations past? Yet, I don't recall hearing of any cases of homicide by crazed microprocessors. So perhaps new technologies (like foreigners) won't really be that scary once you get to know them. Biological computing systems are not only about increased performance. Some systems will use evolutionary principles to arrive at better ways of accomplishing objectives. A bunch of programs will compete to try to do a task faster and more reliably. The programs are able to mutate as needed. Programs that fall behind are eliminated from the system. The eventual output could be algorithms (ways of solving problems) that human engineers could not have imagined, but the process takes time to develop. One practical musical application of evolutionary computing may be DSP functions like pitch shifting or amplifier modelling. An evolutionary stew of processes all aimed at the same objective may possibly arrive at a better way of handling these tasks than human-engineered solutions. Other applications may include the analysis and treatment of complex diseases like AIDS and Alzheimer's. Believe me, we are [b]still[/b] going to want better performance ten and twenty years down the road. And another thing, there will be LOTS of people making uninspired music no matter [b]how much[/b] computing power they're afforded. Creative excellence will always be in scarce supply.

[Chip McDonald]

[quote]Originally posted by Dan South: [b]But to assume that AI is the beginning of some malevolent life force is just silly. [/b][/quote]I bet you've had some silly Kurzweil keyboards, Dan? (now what do I mean by that....? ) (Hey, thanks again for the Nord; just used it a few days ago to put a string bass sound on a bit, and used the keyboard/midi out to trigger my SR16 to do some live-tracked drum stuff on a demo, since that works better than the pads on the drum machine (forget I wrote all of that, Lee....)