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Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

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Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#21

Post by radicalbyte »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #9

It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves. You can work backwards from "Semiconductor fabrication", which (I guess) would look something like: Microfabrication > Computation > Manufacturing > Electrical Engineering > Chemical Engineering > Metalworking > Power generation > Basic tools As to how long this would take, that feels very speculative. Did anyone print a copy of Wikipedia…

> It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves.

That's a big assumption. The modern world was built in easily accessible fossil fuels. We've used basically all of the easily accessible oil and a lot of the easily accessible coal.

Without an easily accessible surplus it's hard to go from agriculture to modern society.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#22

Post by weinzierl »

Not a CPU, but we made a complete and working SAW filter at university. We did everything from design to coating the wafers, lithography to ultimately bonding, housing and testing. I still have the thing somewhere.

Of course we depended on some machines, raw materials and especially a mono crystalline silicon wafer.

I think it is notable, that we did not really depend on an existing computer. Of course a SAW filter is simple, but the 6502 was still made with a similar technique. So if the material science is up to par again a microprocessor is a smaller step than one might think.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#23

Post by _trampeltier »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #9

It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves. You can work backwards from "Semiconductor fabrication", which (I guess) would look something like: Microfabrication > Computation > Manufacturing > Electrical Engineering > Chemical Engineering > Metalworking > Power generation > Basic tools As to how long this would take, that feels very speculative. Did anyone print a copy of Wikipedia…

It's not the same. Now a lot of raw materials are hard to reach and deep down in the ground, since the we took all the easy stuff already.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#27

Post by ajuc »

radicalbyte wrote: post #21
LeoPanthera wrote: post #9

It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves. You can work backwards from "Semiconductor fabrication", which (I guess) would look something like: Microfabrication > Computation > Manufacturing > Electrical Engineering > Chemical Engineering > Metalworking > Power generation > Basic tools As to how long this would take, that feels very speculative. Did anyone print a copy of Wikipedia…

> It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves. That's a big assumption. The modern world was built in easily accessible fossil fuels. We've used basically all of the easily accessible oil and a lot of the easily accessible coal. Without an easily accessible surplus it's hard to go from agriculture to modern society.

We also dug out millions of tons of useful materials out of ground, purified them and concentrated them in cities and along roads etc. We cleared forests on most of continents to let people do farming there.

In Eastern Europe at least the biggest limit on farming and state-building in early middle ages was clearing the forest for farming. It was the biggest energy expanditure for people there, and it took hundreds of years to get to a state in which most of the land is available for agriculture. If the apocalypse was quickly over - we'd get to continue from that point without spending all that energy again. If it takes 50 years or more - most of Europe would be one huge forest again.

Depending on the kind of apocalypse all you'd need to do might just be to scavange for usable solar panels/wind turbines/car batteries and starting agriculture in the places that are still available.

Or you'd need to start from scratch, but then we're talking centuries.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#28

Post by Ringz »

mrweasel wrote: post #14
LeoPanthera wrote: post #9

It would obviously be possible, since we have CPUs now but once lived in caves. You can work backwards from "Semiconductor fabrication", which (I guess) would look something like: Microfabrication > Computation > Manufacturing > Electrical Engineering > Chemical Engineering > Metalworking > Power generation > Basic tools As to how long this would take, that feels very speculative. Did anyone print a copy of Wikipedia…

> Did anyone print a copy of Wikipedia? Yes, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Print_Wikipedia

„The bound paper volumes, each running 700 pages, represented a fraction of the 7,473 total volumes necessary to render the encyclopedia's extant text on that date.“

So, there are some missing volumes. And they don't print the pictures.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#29

Post by Tade0 »

The first amplifying vacuum tube was patented in 1908 and you could produce a crude computer from that, even if terribly inefficient.

I imagine civilisation would wind back to around the 18th century, because we would understand things like fertilizers, calculus and how to make steel, but could not immediately use that knowledge to produce steam trains, bicycles or saxophones.

So, assuming an accelerated pace of development thanks to some of this knowledge surviving I'd say 50 years give or take.

Re: Ask HN: In the event of an apocalypse, how long until we could produce CPUs?

#30

Post by huevosabio »

I love this question. A similar question is, assume all knowing oracle, so no research required just execution. How long until we build the CPU?

There's a long and deep infrastructure dependency that needs to exist that would take a long time for all-knowing hunter gatherers to get in place.

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