On Mar 23, 2007, at 12:30 , William Stein wrote:
> > On 3/23/07, Bill Page <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> "In the end the calculation took about 77 hours on the >> supercomputer Sage." >> >> Would it be *that* embarrassing to admit that almost anyone >> with a high end "gaming" desktop computer could do this same >> calculation in about the same amount of time? Perhaps yes, >> given how much NSF money has gone into supporting super >> computer projects... > > (1) I agree that calling SAGE a supercomputer is technically > incorrect (and I > had nothing to do with it). > > (2) You are incorrect that somebody could have done the calculation > they did > with a high end "gaming" desktop. Sage.math is a $37K computer > (paid for > by the NSF) with 64GB RAM; it was *incredibly* hard for them to do the > calculation > using only 64GB RAM + swap, and even then they used many of the > cores to speed > up the computation. The work they did was extremely memory intensive. > >> For some reason this type of journalism and "science by press >> release" disturbs me. Am I alone in this reaction? > > I am disturbed by all science journalism as soon as I know anything > about the topic being discussed. Am I alone in this reaction? I've mentioned this before, but (a) you're not alone; and (b) the problem is not restricted to science journalism. My experience is that, when you know something about what is being reported, much of what you read is confused/misrepresented/wrong/malarky. I suppose one way to counteract this is to contact the journalist and educate him, but that's not necessarily going to get anywhere. Justin -- Justin C. Walker, Curmudgeon-At-Large, Director Institute for the Enhancement of the Director's Income -------- The path of least resistance: it's not just for electricity any more. -------- --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://sage.scipy.org/sage/ and http://modular.math.washington.edu/sage/ -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
