Thermodynamics & Computing

The one thing I have always had problems with in my pursuit of computing power is... heat.

I used a Prime computer in the early 1980s; it needed air-conditioning to function well, and the whole room had less computing power than my old iBook. By 1986 I was using a Honeywell. That machine needed constant cooling, huge vents, and a dehumidifier. It was said that you couldn't get any work done over 290K, where the K stands for degrees Kelvin.

The problem seems to be that thinking is exothermic. Most of the energy consumed by my machines is emitted as waste heat. My friends tell me to use fans, coolants, all kinds of heat sinks. But that doesn't change the fundamental problem: heat has to be disposed of somewhere, and all those devices (which I've been using since 1980!) are just heat-transfer machines. They don't reduce the wastage, they just make you waste more energy elsewhere.

I suppose I could try to harness the heat flow to drive a turbine or something. But that would probably mean a loss of portability, and also a loss of convenience, elegance and simplicity. The coolness factor might go up a bit, but that doesn't reduce the heat.

Sigh. In such moments, I am drawn to the prophetic talent of William Shakespeare, who penned these lines, unforgettable since my schooldays:

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?

I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going,
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses
Or else worth all the rest; I see thee still...

Indeed, this is an apt description of life at the terminal end.