Information processing, whereby we convert or construct a representation of information from other information, has now become an essential component to our current world and the future of our society. These conversions and construction can be viewed as a thermodynamic process in the sense that energy is used and overall system entropy increases as part of this processing. This puts a real limit on the amount of information processing which could be done using just the resources of Earth and its Solar System. Has anyone calculated the max possible information processing that could be accomplished using just resources on Earth and its Solar System? What assumptions are made and what is the expected amount of processing that could be done?
$\begingroup$$\endgroup$
2
- 1$\begingroup$I guess one could calculate some very loose bounds using Landauer's principle along with estimates of available energy within the solar system.$\endgroup$– paulinaCommentedNov 24, 2024 at 15:54
- $\begingroup$You might find this article relevant journals.aps.org/rmp/abstract/10.1103/RevModPhys.51.447 (along with exercise 5.1 from James Sethna's textbook on Stat Mech, available from his website)$\endgroup$– TLDRCommentedNov 24, 2024 at 15:55
Add a comment |
1 Answer
$\begingroup$$\endgroup$
The first problem is with distinguishing computation from any other physical activity. We can distinguish the purpose for which man-made data processing machines are intended and operated, but in an objective sense there is nothing that physically distinguishes computation from non-computation.
Information processing ... has now become an essential component to our current world and the future of our society.
Actually it's very unclear that anything has changed, since it has always occurred, and it is unclear whether the "essential" amount, as distinct from whatever amount is actually done, has increased.
Has anyone calculated the max possible information processing that could be accomplished using just resources on Earth and its Solar System?
It wouldn't be possible to expend all the possible useful energy local to our solar system whilst maintaining reasonable assumptions of a closed system. You'd also potentially be raising cosmological questions about how stored energy forms and regenerates.
You'd also have to hypothesise mechanisms by which the processing is done and continues to be done. For example, if you released the amount of energy stored in the Sun in a short time, you would be suggesting astronomical upheavals in the existing physical arrangement of things, like a nuclear bomb but of the scale that the gods themselves use against one another. Would the potential constraints or limitations of your machinery (and the need to maintain its integrity) have to be factored, or is it just assumed that there would be an effectively magical mechanism by which all possible physical activity is triggered everywhere at once?
Most man-made computers can be driven considerably faster than their normal design speed, but they also then quickly fuse or melt, halting their workings.
I suspect ultimately so many arbitrary assumptions or shortcuts end up being made, that the question would have to become one of science fiction.
