Xref: utzoo sci.math:7173 comp.misc:6473 rec.humor:24226 Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!bellcore!att!mcdchg!ddsw1!corpane!sparks From: sparks@corpane.UUCP (John Sparks) Newsgroups: sci.math,comp.misc,rec.humor Subject: Trinary (was: Re: Base 3 computers? (was: Divide by three?)) Summary: Base 4 and more. Message-ID: <872@corpane.UUCP> Date: 30 Jun 89 19:39:40 GMT References: <6710021@hpcupt1.HP.COM> Organization: Corpane Industries Inc., Louisville, KY Lines: 45 <6250@sunray.UUCP> <626@hrc63.co.uk> Sender: Reply-To: sparks@corpane.UUCP (John Sparks) Followup-To: Distribution: Organization: Corpane Industries, Inc. Keywords: Magic In article <626@hrc63.co.uk> pj@hrc63.co.uk (Mr P Johnson "Baddow") writes: > > >Nearest I ever heard of to this was in Heinlein's "The Number of the Beast", >where there was a computer which used trinary. In a throw-away line, one >character deduced that it must use three phase power. > >Ever since I read that I have been trying to figure out how it could work. Tis very simple: Binary computers have 2 states: 1 (true, yes, on) and 0 (false, no, off) Trinary would add a third state: -1 , the "Maybe" state. This would give computers the power of indecision, just like humans. We could expand this to make a 4 state computer with the oscillating "Sometimes" state. Or we could just go all out and base our computers on the "magic 8 ball", then we would have such states as "Better not tell you now" and so on. -- John Sparks | {rutgers|uunet}!ukma!corpane!sparks | D.I.S.K. 24hrs 1200bps ||||||||||||||| sparks@corpane.UUCP | 502/968-5401 thru -5406 Don't take life too seriously. You'll never get out of it alive. -- John Sparks | {rutgers|uunet}!ukma!corpane!sparks | D.I.S.K. 24hrs 1200bps ||||||||||||||| sparks@corpane.UUCP | 502/968-5401 thru -5406 Don't take life too seriously. You'll never get out of it alive.