Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!aglew From: aglew@oberon.crhc.uiuc.edu (Andy Glew) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: Mercury delay lines Message-ID: Date: 10 Jul 90 20:07:45 GMT References: <3040@softway.oz> <2694@wrgate.WR.TEK.COM> <1990Jun7.210822.5230@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us> <2701@wrgate.WR.TEK.COM> <1317@m1.cs.man.ac.uk> <645274007.10856@minster.york.ac.uk> <11001@medusa.cs.purdue.edu> <31511@cup.portal.com> Sender: usenet@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (News) Organization: University of Illinois, Computer Systems Group Lines: 15 In-Reply-To: mmm@cup.portal.com's message of 7 Jul 90 17:29:07 GMT ..> Fluidic computers [Mark Robert Thorson] >Another unusual property is that it might exist in nature. A suitable >computing medium need only combine solid and liquid or gas states, >have a source of pressurized gas or liquid, an exhaust, and >some means for controlling the cutting of new channels. Magma recently >arrived from the earth's interior contains a lot of dissolved gas, >and at times combines the solid, liquid, and gas states. And indeed, >some examples of solidified lava contain many intricate channels, as >we might expect to find in material consumed by a wavefront fluidic >computer. Rocks are just slow people! -- Andy Glew, aglew@uiuc.edu