

Moore's Second Law - stcredzero
http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?MooresSecondLaw

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stcredzero
People often forget this part of what Gordon Moore said. Perhaps the final
barrier will not be technological, but economic in nature? (Reminds me of
issues with access to space.)

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swombat
I find that hard to swallow. We live in a world where things get cheaper with
time. I'm sure the cost in some kind of absolute wealth measure increases very
fast. But by this measure, a single one of today's factories would be
completely unaffordable to humans a hundred years ago, but today we generate
more wealth (in that absolute measure) in one day than we did in a year back
then.

I'm sure the cost of these advanced factories is unfathomable to us today, but
in X years, in proportion to the wealth available to build them, I believe
they will be affordable.

As a final nail in the coffin, this assumes that our manufacturing processes
remain more or less the same. What about, for example, nanomanufacturing? The
promise of wide-spread nanomanufacturing is that _anyone_ will be able to
build cpus in their backyard...

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stcredzero
I meant specifically for lithography and silicon. You've forgotten the precise
wording of the _first_ part of Moore's law, I see.

