In a message dated 4/20/2005 9:36:24 AM Central Standard Time,
mhooper@digiscreen.ca writes:
> I'm doing up a presentation related to digital technology and I've been
> trying to find a way that a non-technical person can relate to the real-world
> changes. The normal things the geeks like to talk about like clock speeds
>etc.
> have almost no relation to the real world impact of the technology. For
> example, in 1940 your 20-30 hp car would happily do 50-60 mph on the highway,
>but
> the roads were smaller so you averaged 30 mph getting to work. Today over 50%
> of new cars have greater than 200 hp can get up to 80 mph in a few seconds
> and the road system is 5 times larger. However, traffic has reduced the
> average speed of getting to work to... 30 mph. Therefore some 65 years of
> technology and digital control has resulted in no effective difference.
>
>
I think more apropos is the fact that in spite the much more efficient
superhighway systems and more powerful cars our commute times have been
increasing
since the 40's.
Good luck
Dave
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