Author: Vincent Diepeveen
Date: 06:12:59 10/03/01
Go up one level in this thread
On October 02, 2001 at 04:54:13, Bruce Moreland wrote: >On October 01, 2001 at 00:36:48, Robert Hyatt wrote: > >>On September 30, 2001 at 14:47:21, Bruce Moreland wrote: >> >>>On September 29, 2001 at 14:54:03, Robert Hyatt wrote: >>> >>>>On September 29, 2001 at 10:41:37, Miguel A. Ballicora wrote: >>> >>>>>Super-linear speedups are "probably" impossible but so far I did not see that >>>>>they are "provably" impossible. I would settle with "They are believed to be >>>>>impossible". >>>>> >>>>>Regards, >>>>>Miguel >>>> >>>> >>>>They simply _are_ impossible. Unless you believe in perpetual >>>>motion, infinite compression, a fire that will burn forever, etc. >>> >>>Take a human who can move a 200-pound box, but only by scraping it along the >>>ground. Compute the time it takes him to move 10 such boxes 100 yards. >>> >>>Assume that two humans can move a 200-pound box more easily. Can they move a >>>200-pound box more than twice as fast as one human? Would this violate laws >>>against perpetual motion? Of course not. It is perfectly valid to consider >>>working in parallel rather than working serially. The mechanics of the task >>>might change, resulting in much increased efficiency -- they can lift the box >>>off the ground. >> >> >>I think that after you think about this example, you will see the flaw. >>Lifting the box off the ground takes _more_ effort. So the two people are >>doing _more_ work in a given period of time than two people pushing two boxes >>at the same time. The ancient Egyptions found that dragging was better than >>lifting. :) >> >> >> >>> >>>Two workers cooperating to perform a task, do not *have* to go less than or >>>equal to the speed of two workers, each of whom does exactly half of a task that >>>can be fairly divided in two. >>> >>>There exists the opportunity for synergy. >>> >>>The argument that the above violates the prohibition against perpetual motion is >>>fallacious. >>> >>>bruce >> >> >>Not after you think about it. If two people work and each of them moves 5 >>blocks, then they do no more work than the 1 person did moving 10. But they >>did it in twice the time. If they _lift_ the block _and_ move it, they are >>doing _more_ work per unit of time. They should have moved the blocks >>faster one at a time, but they were taking it easy... >> >> A computer can't do that. > >You can't possibly be arguing that there is nothing that N (N>1) people can't do >in less than 1/N the time that it takes one person. > >I was trying to find an obvious example. If you don't like that one, I'm sure >there is another one. > >bruce Obvious example is killermoves. It improves branching factor too.
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