N
Nico Coesel
Bernhard Kuemel said:
I'd go lo-tech. Etches in stainless steel for example. Maybe gold
plate them afterwards for an extra protective layer.
I'd go lo-tech. Etches in stainless steel for example. Maybe gold
plate them afterwards for an extra protective layer.
J
josephkk
Ummm. There are 3600 seconds in one hour, care to recheck that last
calculation?
?-)
J
josephkk
One more time, OP is talking about a sef-maintaining robot (better make
that a robot society).
?-)
B
Bernhard Kuemel
My computers POST can tell me if there's a memory, keyboard, floppy,
disk, etc error. What's infeasible about identifying defective parts and
replacing them? Sure there are limits, but we can try to find a solution
with reasonable chance for success.
Even humans can't solve all problems.
Bernhard
J
josephkk
Da nada. I spent much of my working time in the last 30+ years looking
for others slips and things. That amount of practice must produce some
little bit of skill.
?;-)
J
josephkk
That puts a really different spin on it. I wonder of OP has real "Silicon
Beach", "The Two Faces of Tomorrow", Dr. Asimov's Robot Series, or any
similar books.
?-)
J
josephkk
Wow. Is that from magnetic tape or paper tape?
?-)
A
Arno
You computer's POST cannot tell you if the POST itself is broken.
It has a table of specific checks (i.e. hardcoded ones), other
problems will not even be atempted to be diagnosed.
Depends on the intelligence and experience of the human involved.
But you are right, and I have been pointing oout that this
very project is very likely amont the problems humans cannot solve.
Arno
R
Rod Speed
Bet it does.
That didn't happen much at all in the previous 1000 years.
You don't see much of that with the previous 1000s of years.
R
Rod Speed
I don't agree. There is certainly more chance of an autonomous
robotic system lasting for 1000 years than trying to organise some
way of getting humans to maintain his cryogenic body storage
system over that length of time.
He did say that cost was no object.
That stuff doesn't matter if it can repair what breaks.
That's just plain wrong. There are plenty of
examples of species that have not evolved
at all over 1000 years and have survived fine.
No, most obviously with the static storage of data
using a sufficiently stable storage mechanism.
That has in fact lasted MUCH longer than 1000
years already with some of the ways of doing that.
That's just one way its handled that problem.
But hasn't even managed 100 years, let alone 1000.
Yes, that's a rather better example, but none of that was ever
designed to last for 1000 years and in fact we know it won't
because the satellites won't even stay there for that long even
if the electronics does work for that long, and we know it wont.
Adaption is just one approach.
Clearly an autonomous robot manufacturing facility can
just keep making more of what fails whenever it fails as
long as the raw materials are always available.
All approaches have their problems.
That's why we have engineers, to solve them.
That's just biological systems. Closed data storage systems work fine.
Doesn't happen with closed data storage systems.
And even if they don't, the satellite will eventually
return to earth and burn up in the process.
That's all irrelevant to whats possible on earth tho.
We know that there are plenty of examples of
stuff that's lasted a lot longer than 1000 years.
All irrelevant to whats feasible on earth.
That's just one way. Even just replacement
of what dies is another obvious approach.
No need to improve it.
It would be a hell of a lot safer to not even attempt
any improvements, just replace what dies.
Still a lot safer to just replace what dies.
In fact the rare earths arent actually rare at all.
But not if you just replace what breaks and have enough of the
raw materials included in the original that you have calculated
will be needed to replace what breaks and say have 10 times that
for safety.
But replacing what breaks isnt.
Its worked fine quite a few times in the past now.
J
Jeroen
I beg to differ! Somewhat different bugs, sure. Somewhat less buggy,
surely not!
Jeroen Belleman
J
josephkk
All but the last link broke due to word wrap. If you can't read headers i
am using Agent 6. One of the better respected news (and email) clients.
Carets "<>" ain't a perfect solution. Fortunately Jow Gwinn also placed
them on separate lines making using text selection reasonable easy. Using
copy and paste worked just fine.
?-)
A
Arno
edfair said:
No, not at all. Although that is a concern. More like,
"Your POST basically checks only if everything needed
to bring up is there and seems to be ok on a very superficial
test." I have had countless hardware problems, like memory
errors, defective USB ports, dying disks and POST (the long
version) told me nothing. I have had one RAM chip with a weak bit
that required 3 days of memtest86+ to be detected, but did show
up immediately in some calculations (unfortunately not localizable
to a specific machine as this was in a cluster with process
migration and the migration).
Or until 2 of 3 are broken, but agree in their output. At 1000
years, that is a real concern. 3 of 4 ,... will not really fix that
either, as a) more failures can occure while reparing is done, b)
these diversity approaches detect broken circurity only when
it is used (and what if the repairing requires operations never
used otherwise and turns out to be broken when it is desperately
needed) and c) software bugs are not covered, just hardware. Regarding
that assumption I refer to the excellent Ariane-5 failure report
(Biiig bada-BUMM! 800 Million Euros uninsured damage.), where
hardware redundancy was in place but software was assumed to
be perfect.
Arno
B
Bernhard Kuemel
I said: "Price is not a big issue, if necessary." I know it's gonna be
expensive and we certainly need custom designed parts, but a whole
semiconductor fab and developing radically new semiconductors are
probably beyond our limits.
Have the robots fetch a spare part from the storage and replace it.
Circuit boards, CPUs, connectors, cameras, motors, gears, galvanic
cells/membranes of the vanadium redox flow batteries, thermo couples,
etc. They need to be designed and arranged so the robots can replace them.
It's quite common that normal computer parts work 10 years. High
reliability parts probably last 50 years. Keep 100 spare parts of each
and they last 1000 years, if they don't deteriorate in storage.
Also robots are usually idle and only active when there's something to
replace. The power supply, LN2 generator and sensors are more active.
I wonder how reliable rails or overhead cranes that carry robots and
parts around are. If replacing rails or overhead crane beams is
necessary and unfeasible, the robots will probably drive with wheels.
Because we evolve. We update TV systems, switch from analog to digital
etc. My cryo store just needs to the same thing for a long time.
Initially there will be humans verifying how the cryo store does and
improve soft/firmware and probably some hardware, too, but there may
well be a point where they are no longer available. Then it shall
continue autonomously.
Yes. We need to consider very thoroughly every failure mode. And when
something unexpected happens, the cryo facility will call for help via
radio/internet. I even thought of serving live video of the facility so
it remains popular and people might call the cops if someone tries to
harm it. Volunteers could fix bugs or implement hard/software for not
considered failure modes.
J
Jasen Betts
so you're prepared to take the performance hit and use thermionics
instead? it's not like they're going to work after 1000 years either
(unless perhaps stored in a vacuum.) but the fab is simpler.
where are you going to get a cpu in 700 years time? the ones in the
store will be have diffused away.
the problem is that they do... keeping them on ice (or in liquid helium)
might help enough
build them from stainless steel and the tracks thick enough to withstand 1000
years traffic, perhaps have a few spare cranes parked at the end of
the track.
So in 1000 years the robots have sold their charges on ebay and are
playing online poker to buy electricity.
R
Rod Speed
edfair said:
Don’t need a comparison circuit, and it can be replicated anyway.
R
Rod Speed
Yeah, its nothing like evolution in fact.
The real problem is that computing is so complicated that
even with a system that never gets anything added at all,
you can never get rid of all bugs, most obviously with
those that are only seen in the most unusual situations.
And its just not possible to debug something
like the 2000 'bug' until it occurs either.
That's silly.
Yes, what people want to do keeps being invented.
Most obviously currently with air gestures with touch systems.
Because computing is so complex.
Yes, that's certainly true with new features.
That's just plain wrong. Quite a few of them upgrade to
get stuff that isnt in what they currently have, or is much
better done than in what they currently have. That's been
seen with USB and wifi alone.
No, just ****ed up some of the stuff done with Vista that XP doesn't have.
But can obviously be improved on.
Plenty can see good reasons to upgrade.
But Win7 is a lot better in a great raft of areas.
MS has not tried to kill it, just tried to encourage
people to upgrade. They would be stupid if they
did not given where their revenue comes from.
They already did with Win8.
Even if someone could do that, it proves nothing about
your original claim. Its just a fact of life with revenues.
We see the same thing with cars and almost everything else.
There is even still some product improvement
with stuff as basic as cutlery, for a reason.
Then you need to get out more.
Evolution drives the software industry because that's what produces revenue.
It even happens with stuff like Linux which doesn't have any revenue, for a
reason.
R
Rod Speed
Essentially because there are very few human systems that
have ever been organised to keep doing the same thing like
that for 1000 years when doing that requires quite a bit of
human effort to do.
Even the world's great religions can't be relied on to
keep going, a hell of a lot of them have in fact imploded
over time. Some in a lot less time than 1000 years.
Its just the nature of human activity.
Sure, but we have seen some other approaches to
preservation last fine for much longer than 1000 years.
Sure, but we have seen some other approaches to
preservation last fine for much longer than 1000 years.
Sure, but we have seen some other approaches
to sealing things do fine for well over 1000 years,
most obviously stuff sealed in glass.
There are plenty of examples of stuff that has done that.
There are examples of stuff that has done
that for much longer than that too, most
obviously with the pyramids.
Which is why its better to do without those if that's feasible.
But there are plenty more examples where attempting
to fix things worked fine. You don't have to have such an
unstable system where ****ing things up results in disaster.
Plenty of ancient churches and mosques etc have lasted
much longer than 1000 years with humans fixing things
that go wrong. The main problem is setting up a system
where the humans want to bother for more than 1000 years.
No maybe about it if its feasible.
Nothing is ever an unlimited cost system.
So it wasn't in fact an unlimited cost system at all.
That's clearly true of the world's great religions.
The same materials that were used to make it in the first place.
ALL you need is a situation where those are everywhere.
Its obviously possible to make more the
same way that the one that failed was made.
But we can still make more the same way the original was made
if we have enough of a clue to document how it was made.
That is in fact done with plenty of medieval stuff, even
when it was not documented how it was made then.
And that's all you need when you want to keep it going for 1000 years.
Or you can just work out what the failure rate is likely
to be, multiply that by 10, make that many and just
keep using the replacements from stock as they fail.
But you did not show that what evolution had happened over
that time was NECESSARY for the survival of that species.
So your claim that the system being discussed would have
to evolve to survive for 1000 years has blown up in your face
and covered you with black stuff very spectacularly indeed.
ALL we need is examples of species that have survived
fine for 1000 years without any evolution that had
anything to do with its survival to prove that your claim
that evolution is crucial to its survival is just plain wrong.
All that shows is that a lot of evolution happens.
NOT that its essential for survival over 1000 years.
It would be a hell of a lot more surprising if we had
not seen a massive amount of evolution given that
we ended up with something as sophisticated as
humans from what was once just pond slime.
We don't with data engraved on nickel plates.
That utterly mangles the real story.
And there is no reason why you have to push the envelope that
hard with something you want to last for 1000 years anyway.
Yes, but soft errors are easily avoided.
And just arent a problem with data engraved on nickel plates etc.
Just a lousy design. Doesn't happen with mine.
And again, doesn't happen with data engraved on nickel plates.
Again, just a system with a fault.
We know you can because even the egyptians did that.
Not if you store the data by engraving it on nickel plates.
The data the egyptians left behind.
And the data the egyptians left behind was around MUCH earlier than that.
There isn't, because technology improves
so dramatically in even just 100 years.
Yes, they egyptians clearly decided that they needed
that for various reasons and achieved that.
Because that approach makes sense.
Just use an approach known to last much longer
than that like storing the data by engraving it on
nickel plates that need no maintenance at all.
See above.
Corse it works. That's how plant and animal species
survive for MUCH longer times than 1000 years.
There are plenty of trees that last for more than 1000 years.
Typical is irrelevant. You'd obviously use very long
lived technology if you want it to survive 1000 years.
I'll go for engraved nickel plates so I don't even need to calculate
anything.
So all you need is say 2K spares.
So you have 2M and survive 1000 years fine.
So there is no problem.
No, you use more than one to design the system in the first place.
No, like the way the egyptians chose to store what data they
wanted to store, which lasted much longer than 1000 years fine.
Look at how the egyptians did theirs.
Irrelevant to how the egyptians did theirs.
Because the technology evolves so much over that time
that you don't care if they last longer than that, they are so
hopelessly obsolete that they are replaced for that reason.
We don't do it like that with stuff as
basic as books that we want to keep.
The stuff kept in egyptian pyramids.
The stuff kept in egyptian pyramids.
The egyptians didn't bother and theirs
survived for much longer than that.
It didn't with the machine the egyptians made, the pyramids.
It wasn't with the machine the egyptians made, the pyramids.
I'll look at the pyramids instead.
They aren't in fact at all difficult to obtain except with
a tiny subset that are potentially dangerous like uranium.
The egyptian pyramids.
U
upsidedown
Did you see the pictures of the Fukushima reactor control room ?
So 1970's
But generally, also in many other heavy industry sectors with the
actual industrial hardware being used for 50-200 years, you might
still keep over 30 years old sensors, actuators, field cables and I/O
cards, while upgrading higher level functions, such as control rooms,
to modern technology.
The geostationary satellite lifetime is limited by the amount of
station keeping fuel on board. The earth is not a perfect sphere and
hence, sooner or later, the satellite would be moving in a figure of
eight, as seen from earth.
If the figure is larger than the ground antenna beam width, active
satellite tracking is needed, which would be unacceptable for at least
home receiver antennas. For these reasons, the satellite position has
to be maintained within a degree or two in both E/W as well as N/S
direction, which requires station keeping fuel, ultimately determining
the usable life time of a geostationary satellite.
Since satellite transponders are simple "bent tubes", switching from
analog (FM) to DVB-S might have required some backoff in the TWT.
Going from DVB-S to DVB-S2 might require some further backoff, This of
course drops out some of the smallest receiving antennas.
The ana/digi switchover might require some higher power TWTs and/or
narrower satellite beams, otherwise the A/D change is not that
dramatic.
U
upsidedown
If we are using the evolutional model, several sites with different
technologies must be used.
Some of these sites are successful, some are not, but of course we do
not know in advance, which system will survive and which will fail.