Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#1

Post by gauMah » Thu, Jan 24, 2019, 9:28 AM UTC

Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)
longnow.org

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#2

Post by dang » Thu, Jan 24, 2019, 6:56 PM UTC

Many previous threads, but not for a couple years.

https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Richard%20Feynman%20and%20the%...

(We changed the URL above from https://web.archive.org/web/20070228104914/http://www.kurzwe...)

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#3

Post by Abishek_Muthian » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 4:47 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #2

Many previous threads, but not for a couple years. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Richard%20Feynman%20and%20the%... (We changed the URL above from https://web.archive.org/web/20070228104914/http://www.kurzwe... )

I don't mind high quality content such as this being shared at regular intervals for the sake of new readers.

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#4

Post by gdubs » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 4:59 AM UTC

This is one of those ones I’ll stop and read every time it gets posted.

Bit of trivia: in the novel, “Jurassic Park”, the park’s supercomputer is a Cray, but Spielberg picked a Connection Machine for the movie because he thought it looked cooler.

Also, the artist Karl Sims did some outstanding work using the Connection Machine that was mind blowing for the time, and still pretty darn cool today. The computer itself was part of the art installation:

https://www.karlsims.com/genetic-images.html

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#5

Post by corysama » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 5:07 AM UTC

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #3

dang wrote: post #2

Many previous threads, but not for a couple years. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Richard%20Feynman%20and%20the%... (We changed the URL above from https://web.archive.org/web/20070228104914/http://www.kurzwe... )

I don't mind high quality content such as this being shared at regular intervals for the sake of new readers.

This one is totally worth bringing up once a year forever.

In general I’m a huge fan of the Long Now organization. What they do really is worth your time and attention. Go through the archives. You’ll find so much of what you wish TED could be.

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#6

Post by f2f » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 5:07 AM UTC

gdubs wrote: post #4

This is one of those ones I’ll stop and read every time it gets posted. Bit of trivia: in the novel, “Jurassic Park”, the park’s supercomputer is a Cray, but Spielberg picked a Connection Machine for the movie because he thought it looked cooler. Also, the artist Karl Sims did some outstanding work using the Connection Machine that was mind blowing for the time, and still pretty darn cool today. The computer itself w…

This is the fat-tree connection diagram for one of the cabinets of a CM-5. It was posted on a wall at one of the national labs in the US which had the pleasure of working with a CM-5 around the time War Games was in theatres. People still gushed about how nice that machine was to program 10-15 years later. SiCortex[1] tried to do something similar with their computers, unfortunately they failed and with them the last interesting connector architecture and the last interesting "supercomputer". even cray does linux now...

http://i.imgur.com/jHtf4QB.jpg

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SiCortex

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#7

Post by chj » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 5:31 AM UTC

Don't read to the end, it is heart breaking.

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#8

Post by themodelplumber » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 7:43 AM UTC

chj wrote: post #7

Don't read to the end, it is heart breaking.

It's not too bad if you have already read about Feynman's life and death. I liked the bits about telling and teaching.

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#9

Post by teddyh » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 8:08 AM UTC

gdubs wrote: post #4

This is one of those ones I’ll stop and read every time it gets posted. Bit of trivia: in the novel, “Jurassic Park”, the park’s supercomputer is a Cray, but Spielberg picked a Connection Machine for the movie because he thought it looked cooler. Also, the artist Karl Sims did some outstanding work using the Connection Machine that was mind blowing for the time, and still pretty darn cool today. The computer itself w…

> in the novel, “Jurassic Park”, the park’s supercomputer is a Cray, but Spielberg picked a Connection Machine for the movie

Not just a Connection Machine:

“You know anybody who can network eight Connection Machines and debug two million lines of code for what I bid for this job?”

— Dennis Nedry

Re: Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (1989)

#10

Post by dang » Fri, Jan 25, 2019, 8:26 AM UTC

Abishek_Muthian wrote: post #3

dang wrote: post #2

Many previous threads, but not for a couple years. https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Richard%20Feynman%20and%20the%... (We changed the URL above from https://web.archive.org/web/20070228104914/http://www.kurzwe... )

I don't mind high quality content such as this being shared at regular intervals for the sake of new readers.

Yes! The purpose of posting those links is to point new readers (and old ones!) at the earlier threads.

Just to be clear, if the repost was inappropriate we'd have marked it [dupe] above. The rules for that are at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html.