Chicken or the egg?

[P T]

Do you think it's more that
cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

Pete

 

[ToolPackinMama]

Do you think it's more that
cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

It seems like the hardware is always a bit ahead of the software, to me.

 

[David Maynard]

Do you think it's more that
cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

Pete

It's both, in a regenerative feedback loop: they 'anticipate' the 'future'
of each other.

 

[David Maynard]

Do you think it's more that
cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

Pete

Btw, the egg came first

 

[Raymond]

Hardware determines the possibilities,
software uses hardware to achieve them.
More like an engine/vehicle relationship than
chicken and egg!

 

[Ed Medlin]

Btw, the egg came first

Proof, David.......

Ed

 

[Mr Mucky]

Btw, the egg came first

Where did the egg come from? The chicken came 1st

 

[BP]

Where did the egg come from? The chicken came 1st

1) The chicken was a mutated form of [whatever bird preceded the chicken].
The egg was laid and the mutant was hatched. The egg came first. Evolution
theory.
2) God got tired of the [whatever bird preceded the chicken] and invented
the chicken. The chicken came first. Creationist theory.
This old, tired argument always comes down to which belief system you
personally choose: science or religion.

 

[David Besack]

Do you think it's more that

It seems like the hardware is always a bit ahead of the software, to me.

It has to be. You can't even develop software let alone sell it if it
will not run on any existing system.

 

[David Besack]

Btw, the egg came first

Where did the egg come from? The chicken came 1st

It came from something very much like a chicken, but not a chicken. I
assume he's basing his statement on one apsect of evolutionary
principle. At some point you have a bunch of pre-chickens running
around, and two of them, through chance, produce an offspring (egg) that
will grow up to be a chicken.

 

[JAD]

Birds were once aquatic lizards

eggs are the adaptive way of aquatics to reproduce. soft shell for
water----hard-shell >land adaptability. The egg is merely a cell that
has adaptability in its code.

Damn that sounded good....... LOL

Where did the egg come from? The chicken came 1st

1) The chicken was a mutated form of [whatever bird preceded the chicken].
The egg was laid and the mutant was hatched. The egg came first. Evolution
theory.
2) God got tired of the [whatever bird preceded the chicken] and invented
the chicken. The chicken came first. Creationist theory.
This old, tired argument always comes down to which belief system you
personally choose: science or religion.

 

[Ed]

It has to be. You can't even develop software let alone sell it if it
will not run on any existing system.

Sure you can, ever heard of simulators? ;p
Ed

 

[John Mann]

Btw, the egg came first

Not likely; let me elucidate:

The chicken and the egg finally got together to have mad wacky sex.
Much enjoyment was had.

Later on, while they were lying in bed, experiencing the afterglow and
a well deserved cigarette, the egg turned to the chicken and, in his
throaty Barry White voice, said "well, I guess dat answers *dat*
question, don't it, baby?"

 

[DJS0302]

Do you think it's more that

cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

Pete

It's whatever it takes to get people to spend more and more money. It's a
conspiracy.

 

[David Maynard]

Proof, David.......

Ed

Hehe. Sure.

Genetics tells is it's a 'chicken' if it has the right combination of genes
(what that may be).

Biology tells us that the genes in an egg are a combination from both
parents but not the same combination as either one: it's a 'new'
combination of genes.

Evolution tells us that at some point in time back in history there were no
chickens.

So we are faced with some point in time when there were no chickens and
then later there were.

The confluence of these scientific facts tells us that, what must be is,
two pre-chickens, 'proto-chickens' if you will, combined their genes in an
egg that, by the luck of evolution, had the right combination to be called
a set of chicken genes.

When the egg matured we finally had a chicken.

But the egg with the chicken genes, made by the non-chicken
'proto-chickens', came first.

 

[David Maynard]

It has to be. You can't even develop software let alone sell it if it
will not run on any existing system.

Not so. For example, long time ago there was a software weather prediction
package developed that, with the current computing power, could 'predict'
the weather about 1/10'th as fast as the weather actually transpired.

Now, you might not think that's very useful but it was useful in verifying
various weather prediction theories and the fact that your 'confirmation'
had already taken place was not particularly a problem, for that purpose.

However, it's intuitively obvious that more powerful computers would make
the package useful in another arena, actually PREdicting the weather and
the need for more powerful computers, based on seeing this software
package, was not lost on the designers.

The more generic case is Bob and Bill discussing a new software package
with Bill noting nothing available today is powerful enough to run it and
Bob retorting, "don't worry Bill, there will be by the time YOU get
finished with it."

 

[David Maynard]

Where did the egg come from? The chicken came 1st

See my post to Ed.

 

[David Maynard]

It came from something very much like a chicken, but not a chicken. I
assume he's basing his statement on one apsect of evolutionary
principle. At some point you have a bunch of pre-chickens running
around, and two of them, through chance, produce an offspring (egg) that
will grow up to be a chicken.

You presumed correctly

 

[David Maynard]

Not likely; let me elucidate:

The chicken and the egg finally got together to have mad wacky sex.
Much enjoyment was had.

Later on, while they were lying in bed, experiencing the afterglow and
a well deserved cigarette, the egg turned to the chicken and, in his
throaty Barry White voice, said "well, I guess dat answers *dat*
question, don't it, baby?"

Hehe.

 

[Phisherman]

Do you think it's more that
cutting edge hardware determines software development,
or do the latest greatest programs guide hardware design?

Pete

Nothing that I think, but hardware design is leaps and bounds ahead of
software. Moore's Law seems to be holding true.