Just a Holy Crap! Post
IBM has devised a new Blue Gene supercomputer—the Blue Gene/P—that will be capable of processing more than 3 quadrillion operations a second, or 3 petaflops, a possible record. Blue Gene/P is designed to continuously operate at more than 1 petaflop in real-world situations.
UPDATE: Petaflop
Still not as versatile as a slide rule though!!
No kidding? You know how to read a slide rule? Have you taught K8 the Gr8? or somebody in your family? I have my Dad’s slide rule but never thought to ask him how to work it while he was alive.
Bloody hell. Although I’m fully a child of the 21st century at this point, I still think we rely too much on computers. Store clerks are no longer capable of reading a price tag, punching in a price, or making change without a computer to do it all for them. This can’t be good.
Making change: a lost art. If granddad can teach his kids/grandkids to read a slide rule, you should teach yours how to make change!
My mother taught me to make change and count it back when I was a Brownie selling Girl Scout cookies many, many moons ago. I have started teaching my eldest daughter as well because few things infuriate me more than when some teeny bopper with pink-streaked hair, running a register at Wal*Mart makes a not-even-convincing attempt to count my change back to me, then dumps it all into my hand, shrugs her shoulders and giggling says, “Heehee, like, I don’t know. Just here. Heehee.” GRRR.
I like computers just as much as the next person, but petaflops, cyclops or whatever, there’s much to be said for family dinners at the table, teaching your kid to climb a tree and how to count back change.
Well since parents sell the cookies now another opportunity lost.