> < So, is Columbus less important because the Vikings reached the Americas
> < before him? Or is it only important that most of the lasting effects
> < descend from Columbus?
Columbus is a superb analogy for this thread! Not that the results
necessarily match, but that MANY related issues are also present.
Columbus is the "canonical" discoverer, in spite of the Vikings, or even
the previously existing "colonists" who had been living there for a LONG
time ever since coming over the Bering straits?
Likewise, the Intel 4004 is the "canonical" first microprocessor, in
spite of other previous units that might or might not meet various
definitions.
> since I'm not a student of this general branch of history I can't comment
> . . .
> Better put, the vikings were here. Columbus told the world two things,
> it's not flat and there are great riches in the east. Somewhere in ther
> is the difference in those explorations goals.
Since FEW have ever heard anything about this other than TOTAL BS in school,
it bears looking at some of the distortions. What is taught in school is
even less accurate than would be a history of computers by MS, IBM,
Intel, or Apple. In line with the use of it as an analogy, it is useful
to look at how distorted it has become, and realize that the same thing
happens quite quickly in fields such as ours.
Commerce with the Indies (and the rest of the East) was well established,
but quite costly.
Columbus did NOT tell the world that it wasn't flat. By the time of
Columbus, that was well known and accepted by all educated people. The
only ones who still thought that it was flat are now paying dollars per
minute for telephone psychic readings. Although there were some fears of
dangers, sailing off the edge was NOT taken seriously as a possibility by
anybody with any education.
In fact, it was accepted that you COULD get to the Indies by going west;
it was just too far going that way. Even the diameter and circumference
of the earth had been reasonably accurately computed (showing that the
shortest route to the Indies was still to the east).
But Columbus had an inaccurate, wrong, crackpot theory that the earth was
about one third the size that had been calculated. Thus, he was convinced
that it WOULD be shorter going west. There are a lot of other issues
involved with his funding, etc.
He set off, and lo and behold, encountered land somewhere near to where
the Indies would have been if he had been right about his 1/3 size theory.
BTW, his very first recorded words about the existing inhabitants were:
"a good source for slaves".
> An aside to this is while Intel is currently the apparent successful
> leader en masse we still don't know how it will play over time yet to
> come. There have been near reversals in the past and it would only take
> the next design leap to change the current course. Also the industry is
> only 30 years old in a century where we are still developing fundemental
> technologies.
Perhaps I'm cynical, ...
But I maintain that what determines the course of the industry is NOT the
quality of the technology, but the marketing. How else do you explain
the successes of IBM, MS, etc.? Surely not due to their superior
quality?!?
> impact we have yet to see the next significant impactor. While we are
> going much faster, the way we compute is still logically similar to some
> very old machines.
And massive improvements in hardware performance have been necessary just
to compensate for progressively less efficient software.
--
Fred Cisin cisin_at_xenosoft.com
XenoSoft http://www.xenosoft.com
2210 Sixth St. (510) 644-9366
Berkeley, CA 94710-2219
Received on Sun Oct 11 1998 - 14:55:15 BST