Re: Conservation of Energy

Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Oct 2, 10:10 am, Jerry Avins <j...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
You confound the energy of computation with the energy content of a
signal. When that signal is represented by a series of numbers, the
opportunities for intricate self-deception are greatly increased.

I do not see energy content of a signal, because it is relative. I
could show a picture on paper of a signal with nice axes, very high
frequency components, bunched up, making the paper almost black with
ink, and ask, "Is this a high-energy signal or low-energy?" One might
say, "Looks like high-energy."

Then I would reveal that the highest peak of the graph is a millionth
of a billionth of an attovolt.

I would ask again, "Is this a high-energy signal?". Some might then
say, "Well, no...its value is so low, it's almost non-existant."

Then I would say, "By the way, I have ADC whose positive rail is at a
millionth of a billionth of an attovolt. I have sampled this signal
very quickly. Here's are my samples."

The samples would be in my digital computer, at using entire range of
floating-point values.

These floating point values, in their digital form, would be
indistinguishable from samples made of a 5V-peak signal.

This why it is meaningless to talk about the absolute energy of a
signal.

It only exists relative to some other signal, and if you want to move
into the physical world, you cannot simply look at the mathmatical
representation of the the signal, but at its physical manifestation.

[I could slow down a 4.3 GHz CPU clock to 1 cycle per 18 months, and
get the processing power required to process an "ultra-high-energy"
signal so close to zero that it is close to zero.].

What then is the energy of the signal? It is meaningless without
context.

We agree then?

Jerry
--
Engineering is the art of making what you want from things you can get.
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