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Do you ever ask that ever so fragile question about technology?
I always do, and when I do it frustrates me, as I can never think straight when I ask it.
The question is – How?
How do they do it?
All of it!
For example, electronics, how do all these electronic components work themselves? A resistor has a certain density of carbon inside of it, and some how this carbon can produce and electronic resistance! An IC (integrated circuit) can contain around 1000 different components, those IC’s are only 1cm in length and width, some maybe a little bit larger.
But microelectronics is one of those things that rattle your brain.
A lot of you reading this may have looked at the inside of their computers, well, I bet you ask yourself the question? All those tiny, almost insignificant, components, They are all sitting there on a piece of PCB, working away some how making your PC work. They are all helping you play your favourite game, or helping you to type up a post for a forum, or surf the net.
When you think of them like that, they are not so insignificant any more are they?
Another form of a BIG ‘How?’ would be – Us, our bodies. When you build a robot, you will never get it right first time, you will try over and over again, tweaking every small insignificant bug on the robot. When we were made, apparently all of our bug we
‘Pre-tweaked’. All of the organs in our body have no small bugs in them that will enable us from ‘working’. Did you know that we have a layer or mucus around our stomach to stop hydrochloric acid from burning all of our other organs? If we didn’t have that mucus we wouldn’t work! Unlike making a robot, that small bug was already thought of and solved.
I think we take our technology for granted. I imagine you all kick your PC’s from time to time, because it has stalled again! Next time you are going to kick your PC, Don’t! Remember about all those small components, what they are achieving for you! You wouldn’t be reading this if it weren’t for them!
It is quite hard to write about thinking about the question, because it is hard enough to even trying to think about it alone!
When you really think about all this, the ‘How?’ question, could be the biggest question you have asked, or will be asked.
Think.
Badger_guy
I always do, and when I do it frustrates me, as I can never think straight when I ask it.
The question is – How?
How do they do it?
All of it!
For example, electronics, how do all these electronic components work themselves? A resistor has a certain density of carbon inside of it, and some how this carbon can produce and electronic resistance! An IC (integrated circuit) can contain around 1000 different components, those IC’s are only 1cm in length and width, some maybe a little bit larger.
But microelectronics is one of those things that rattle your brain.
A lot of you reading this may have looked at the inside of their computers, well, I bet you ask yourself the question? All those tiny, almost insignificant, components, They are all sitting there on a piece of PCB, working away some how making your PC work. They are all helping you play your favourite game, or helping you to type up a post for a forum, or surf the net.
When you think of them like that, they are not so insignificant any more are they?
Another form of a BIG ‘How?’ would be – Us, our bodies. When you build a robot, you will never get it right first time, you will try over and over again, tweaking every small insignificant bug on the robot. When we were made, apparently all of our bug we
‘Pre-tweaked’. All of the organs in our body have no small bugs in them that will enable us from ‘working’. Did you know that we have a layer or mucus around our stomach to stop hydrochloric acid from burning all of our other organs? If we didn’t have that mucus we wouldn’t work! Unlike making a robot, that small bug was already thought of and solved.
I think we take our technology for granted. I imagine you all kick your PC’s from time to time, because it has stalled again! Next time you are going to kick your PC, Don’t! Remember about all those small components, what they are achieving for you! You wouldn’t be reading this if it weren’t for them!
It is quite hard to write about thinking about the question, because it is hard enough to even trying to think about it alone!
When you really think about all this, the ‘How?’ question, could be the biggest question you have asked, or will be asked.
Think.
Badger_guy
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Er... but you asked loads of questions there.
The 'How' about the human body is answered by studying biology's many branches on the subject, I'd start with Evolution and work from there.
The 'How' about how a monitor works is that it depends on what type of monitor you've got, LCD screens and CRT screens all work in different ways. Most work by bombarding a screen with particles that leave imprints, others work by lighting certain areas of your screen with a combination of red, green and blue (the primary colours making up all others).
The 'How' about electronics inside your PC is based on the '0's and '1's type of communication that all these components use, I'd advise getting an old ZX81 computer and a few books on Machine Code and Better BASIC by Ian Stewart to get you started on that one if you really want to know about how computers really work.
If you want quick answers, type your search words into www.encarta.com or www.britannica.com, those are both good sites for reference resources. (Britannica is free, but some sections of Encarta you have to register for, so Britannica is slightly better in that respect).
The 'How' about the human body is answered by studying biology's many branches on the subject, I'd start with Evolution and work from there.
The 'How' about how a monitor works is that it depends on what type of monitor you've got, LCD screens and CRT screens all work in different ways. Most work by bombarding a screen with particles that leave imprints, others work by lighting certain areas of your screen with a combination of red, green and blue (the primary colours making up all others).
The 'How' about electronics inside your PC is based on the '0's and '1's type of communication that all these components use, I'd advise getting an old ZX81 computer and a few books on Machine Code and Better BASIC by Ian Stewart to get you started on that one if you really want to know about how computers really work.
If you want quick answers, type your search words into www.encarta.com or www.britannica.com, those are both good sites for reference resources. (Britannica is free, but some sections of Encarta you have to register for, so Britannica is slightly better in that respect).
Can you imagine a world without computers? How would that be?
For a few of us, we've lived with that reality. In 1969 the computer that sent a man to the moon was less powerful than a Sinclair ZX81, if you don't know what that is, then it's a very small computer that can't even do 1 millionth of what today's games consoles can do.
The computer that helped to send a man to the moon took up 3 large rooms in a large building, your games console, now millions of times more powerful, sits on a small table.
A few years before 1969, everything was recorded on paper, there was no such thing as electronic storage, and to have us conversing here as we are now would have taken an awful lot of stamps, envelopes and time.
The most exciting gameplay you could have got 40 years ago was a rivetting chess match, the most spectacular graphics you would have seen would have been an advertisement in your local newspaper, and the only exciting sounds apart from music would have been those produced by the BBC's radiophonic workshop.
Today, we have theories in mathematics so advanced, that only maybe 1 or 2 people in the world can actually understand them, and they need computers to help them do it.
If your car breaks down, 20 years ago you could have fixed it with a pair of tights or a paperclip or two, today you'd need a degree in electronic engineering.
So although computers have been a great help to us in both advancing our knowledge and aiding leisure time, the question of 'How?' is a very important one, and if you want to know the answers you should study the sciences as best you can.
Putting too much store by computers is a dangerous thing, if they vanished tomorrow, stock markets would collapse within hours, economies would flounder, companies would go bust, communications would cease for all intents and purposes and we'd be put back quite a few hundred years by it all.
So the more people that investigate the 'How?' side of things the better.
For a few of us, we've lived with that reality. In 1969 the computer that sent a man to the moon was less powerful than a Sinclair ZX81, if you don't know what that is, then it's a very small computer that can't even do 1 millionth of what today's games consoles can do.
The computer that helped to send a man to the moon took up 3 large rooms in a large building, your games console, now millions of times more powerful, sits on a small table.
A few years before 1969, everything was recorded on paper, there was no such thing as electronic storage, and to have us conversing here as we are now would have taken an awful lot of stamps, envelopes and time.
The most exciting gameplay you could have got 40 years ago was a rivetting chess match, the most spectacular graphics you would have seen would have been an advertisement in your local newspaper, and the only exciting sounds apart from music would have been those produced by the BBC's radiophonic workshop.
Today, we have theories in mathematics so advanced, that only maybe 1 or 2 people in the world can actually understand them, and they need computers to help them do it.
If your car breaks down, 20 years ago you could have fixed it with a pair of tights or a paperclip or two, today you'd need a degree in electronic engineering.
So although computers have been a great help to us in both advancing our knowledge and aiding leisure time, the question of 'How?' is a very important one, and if you want to know the answers you should study the sciences as best you can.
Putting too much store by computers is a dangerous thing, if they vanished tomorrow, stock markets would collapse within hours, economies would flounder, companies would go bust, communications would cease for all intents and purposes and we'd be put back quite a few hundred years by it all.
So the more people that investigate the 'How?' side of things the better.
NO one does!
I know a lot more than the average user of computers....
however I don't really care what all those lil tiny metallic things do in the PC motherboard...
As long as I know the basics: RAM opens prgrams and allows multimedia, Hard Disk Drive stores data, floppy drive stores data, modem allows communication, graphics card is needed for most graphics to appear on screen, sound card is needed for sounds, etc
however I don't really care what all those lil tiny metallic things do in the PC motherboard...
As long as I know the basics: RAM opens prgrams and allows multimedia, Hard Disk Drive stores data, floppy drive stores data, modem allows communication, graphics card is needed for most graphics to appear on screen, sound card is needed for sounds, etc
good! i was gettin worried there.
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