Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!well!nagle
From: nagle@well.UUCP (John Nagle)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Building a brain
Summary: the hardware is here.
Keywords: hardware brain
Message-ID: <14079@well.UUCP>
Date: 12 Oct 89 16:37:44 GMT
Distribution: comp
Lines: 17


       Hans Moravec, in Mind Children, rates human brains at about 10^6 MIPS
and 10^15 bits of storage.  

       I have before me an ad for a single VMEbus board mounting eight 
M88200 processors running at 33MHz.  The manufacturer (Tadpole Technology)
claims 220 MIPS for this unit.

       So, to get the raw CPU power of a brain, we need about 5000 boards,
or 227 standard VME cages, or 76 racks, or about 150 linear feet of cabinetry.

       I've worked in mainframe installations bigger than that.

       If we knew how to solve the architecture problems, we could build
the hardware.  

						John Nagle