Years have been spent trying to crack life’s genetic code with high-powered computers. Now scientists are looking at things from the opposite angle, and are harnessing life itself to generate a new strain of computer devices. Read the full story at CNN.
Is Life the Key to new Technology?
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Thanks for the link to that story. Very interesting stuff. Sadly, the story is short on technical explanations. Got other links with more technical info?
Maybe science will do a little catching up to science fiction before I die… not that it will affect the computer industry. I expect the industry to stay the obnoxious backwards thing it is way beyond my time. (being terminally pessemistic helps… when things get better, you’re pleasently surprised).
It’s interesting that DNA is essentially binary (four bases, but they come in 2 pairs that are always matched).
Could just be hype though…
“It’s interesting that DNA is essentially binary (four bases, but they come in 2 pairs that are always matched).”
Not really. DNA alphabet is truly 2-bit (4 bases). The matching pairs of bases are on opposite strands of double-stranded DNA, and DNA sequence is read off only one strand at a time, so the orientation of the bases in the matching pair also matters (A:T pair is not the same as T:A information-wise). So the information IS 2-bit, but you need only one strand to get it all.
Anyone else feel mortified and sick about this? There’s as many positive applicable uses for this sort of technology as there are bad ones, and despite a billion good intentions – there’s always someone in power hellbent on a sick and gutwrenching idea…
Something like this, once matured into something much more capable and useful, would have to be approached with the utmost respect, understanding, and morality in it’s use. We’re talking about the most basic building blocks in life, computers that are made of the same stuff we are. While you yourself might not do anything demented and horrible with the technology, but what about those in power? The governments over the globe and the top-teir leaders of the corporate world.
*shrug* I don’t know about you, but that scares me. It’s been my experience that ‘he who can play god, will.’ The persuit of knowledge and understanding with a world of dreams and good intentions is always at the forefront of our quest to bring bigger and better things to this world… but at the heart of the beast there is always someone greedy and desperate for power who thinks they know what’s best for this world.
That’s me though, sounding ominous and foreboding. *shrug*
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Now here’s my two cents:P
Tic-Tac-Toe on enzymes!? Awesome!
Ahem;)
“Anyone else feel mortified and sick about this?”
Not really.
“We’re talking about the most basic building blocks in life, computers that are made of the same stuff we are.”
You’re reading too much into it. It’s chemistry, pure and simple. It’s not exactly something to get all riled up about.
“While you yourself might not do anything demented and horrible with the technology, but what about those in power?”
Absolutely no different than people in power using anything else to cause whatever havoc they would. The technology in the article will only make for more pwerful computers, not some horrendous boogie-man’s bomb. This technology is actually very simple in concept.
“*shrug* I don’t know about you, but that scares me.”
Yeah, I too am frightened by things I don’t fully understand, but after learning about those things, more often than not, I realize how silly and unjustified my fears were, as yours are in this case.
“‘he who can play god, will.'”
Damn I wish this argument would go away. You may believe that the great things we are doing are evil and unnatural, but that doesn’t make it so.
“The persuit of knowledge and understanding with a world of dreams and good intentions is always at the forefront of our quest to bring bigger and better things to this world…”
Yes the pursuit of knowledge is one of the reasons that we do the things we do. It’s silly to think that we would be protecting ourselves from (for example) terrorists by scaling back our research. By doing so, or by restricting access to information, you are only really crippling yourself, and those people in power that you’re so affraid of would definately be benefiting from your self-enforced ignorance.
“but at the heart of the beast there is always someone greedy and desperate for power who thinks they know what’s best for this world.”
Nothing personal, but it seems very much like you yourself would like nothing more than to have your ideas be govern what people do. That beast you speak of is a part of us all. The thing that sets you apart from those who are doing these things, is that they have a clue. Well, and a budget.
“That’s me though, sounding ominous and foreboding.”
It’s computer technology for crying out loud! Get over it!