A friend of mine is currently setting up his own super-computer (every geeks dream) an he's attempting to use many computers together in a cluster to speed up the individual process's of the virtual workstations that will be running on it.
So far their isn't much in the way of available software for this process, it's new teratory so it's going to require quite a bit of programming. I say new, but it's not, it's just guarded technology due to the implications to hardware manufacturing.
So we walked around a-bit smoking fags an drinking tea discussing how to do it.. The problem with getting moderate computers to process a single execution faster than their individual capabilities would allow is not knowing what happen's next Cos if you could determine what the next process would be before it was needed the process could be given to another machine to be nice an ready for when it was needed.
So for experimental purposes we're going to set up a standard virtual machine on the network an monitor all the traffic on the kernel, the purpose is to be able to break it down into 'packets' that could be interdependently run so when building a new kernel those packets can be processed by other machines.
The thing is truly 'interdependent packets' may well be rare and might not even be run, so packet dependancys an I/O will be needed to be logged. The idea being that the output from a process may determine what process is launched next, an if the process uses an undeterminable input like a keyboard to determine the output then the cluster would pre-work the _possible_ process's on redundant machines. Now that may well be a waist, but in the case of many virtual machines, those 'process packets' may be of use in other virtual machines doing similar chores.
In theory, an with tuning, its very possible to have some very fast virtual machines.
The reason for my post is that after discussing the plan i realized it's similarity to my own theory's on the super-unconscious an god-forms. If the individual machines of the cluster were seen as people in a light trance, devoting mental energy to the 'group' and the virtual machines running on the cluster were seen as gods or spirits then you have the first similarity; a group of lesser capable beings making higher beings formed from their optimized processing.
What sold it for me is when i realized that in the case of the computer most of the machines would be working on process's that would never happen, they would be thinking away in the case that they had a thought that was in alignment with a 'super virtual machine' It would be best optimized when all the individual machines where working on process's others were not. making a neesh for diversity; much like with organic life. Now assuming that the cluster computer technique can be tuned up well enough, it's quite possible for each individual machine on a network to have it's own 'super virtual machine' running incredibly faster than it would do otherwise, almost precognitive as it would be utilizing all the dormant processing of the other machines along with machines working on similar things. Similar to the way people find it easier to think things when people are sleeping and or on a similar train of thought.
I often used to get frustrated with the way thinking about something almost always means it's not going to happen, it was frustrating because my thoughts were always on the right subject but just missing a definable point. In electronics, a decisive logical operation is performed fundamentally with 3 points, it comes from one direction an according to another direction it continues to the last, or not. that's always two inputs an one output, transistors, love em. In quantum mechanics (as vagrant pointed out very well) their are three important pieces of information (speed position state) that can all be viewed only when one isn't.
Now i put it to you, if the analogy between cluster computing an the super-unconscious were to be taken a bit further you could say that the super virtual machines were like semi-personal gods working with the fabric of reality before it happens, using our ability to form possibility's in advance to enhance reality at the rate in-which it happens, we would otherwise be to slow to join in.
so it's important that people think the wrong things about the future most of the time, it's the diversity of our thoughts that contribute to building it. It's also important to only know a third of what you think, so that the 'process packets' can connect to where it _may_ be needed, when it's needed.
It always takes me age's to write anything an I've run out of brain power. I think I've lost the point i was trying to make, again, so if you think you know what i'm talking about please let me know.
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