OT: Extended theory of evolution....

[Anthony William Sloman]

Today\'s Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences has an interesting paper

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/119/6/e2120037119.full.pdf

I\'m fairly sure that I don\'t understand all that much of it, but what I can understand strikes me as impressive.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[Don Y]

On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:

\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons that
defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures of these
balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is the
essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science. Everyone
nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the ability to reproduce,
until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male
and female—are alive but either one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The
Seven Pillars of Life

<https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/>

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 09/02/22 19:40, Don Y wrote:

On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons that
defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures of these
balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is the
essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science. Everyone
nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the ability to reproduce,
until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male
and female—are alive but either one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The
Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

And, of course, aphids do reproduce asexually to the extent
that some aphids are born pregnant.

Then there\'s Diploscapter Pachys, which hasn’t had sex in roughly
18 million years, when it parted from its parent species by
exclusively practicing asexual reproduction.

 

[bitrex]

On 2/9/2022 3:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:

On 09/02/2022 01:19, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
Today\'s Proceedings of the (US) National Academy of Sciences has an
interesting paper

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/119/6/e2120037119.full.pdf

I\'m fairly sure that I don\'t understand all that much of it, but what
I can understand strikes me as impressive.

I\'m absolutely sure that I don\'t understand any of it. But in the
introduction, it mentions NASA\'s definition of life. This was new to me,
but on searching for further information I came across an interesting
page at
https://www.sfu.ca/colloquium/PDC_Top/OoL/whatislife/Vikingmission.html>.
The creation date of that page doesn\'t appear, but it\'s obviously after
NASA first stated their definition. What amused me was the final
paragraph (which predates the NASA definition), and perhaps shows the
sort of pitfalls this area provides even for \"experts\":

\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the
scientific elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme
alive? Is a virus alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching
promising balloons that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally
conclusive punctures of these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The
ability to reproduce—that is the essential characteristic of life,” said
one statesman of science. Everyone nodded in agreement that the
essential of a life was the ability to reproduce, until one small voice
was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are
alive but either one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven
Pillars of Life
(NB the link at the end of that ends up at a 404. More info in the wiki
at <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seven_Pillars_of_Life>)

And defining what the terms \"race\" and \"gender\" mean in an absolute way
face similar ontological problems to coming up with an unambiguous
definition of the term \"life.\"

 

[bitrex]

On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:

On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the
scientific elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme
alive? Is a virus alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of
launching promising balloons that defined life in a sentence, followed
by equally conclusive punctures of these balloons, a solution seemed
at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is the essential
characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science. Everyone
nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the ability to
reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead.
Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either one alone is dead.”
- Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter of
great importance to humans. But Nature doesn\'t care at all what things \"is.\"

 

[Don Y]

On 2/9/2022 2:05 PM, bitrex wrote:

On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons
that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures of
these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is
the essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science.
Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the ability to
reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead. Two
rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either one alone is dead.” - Daniel
E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter of great
importance to humans.

It\'s of \"great importance\" to folks who have very rigid notions of
\"how things should be\". But, to many (and increasingly more), it\'s
just a <shrug>

> But Nature doesn\'t care at all what things \"is.\"

 

[Don Y]

On 2/9/2022 1:02 PM, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 09/02/22 19:40, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons
that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures of
these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is
the essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science.
Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the ability to
reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit is dead. Two
rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either one alone is dead.” - Daniel
E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

And, of course, aphids do reproduce asexually to the extent
that some aphids are born pregnant.

Then there\'s Diploscapter Pachys, which hasn’t had sex in roughly
18 million years, when it parted from its parent species by
exclusively practicing asexual reproduction.

I think many (all?) plants can reproduce (propagate) asexually.
Even though that may not be the \"intended\" method of reproduction.

ISTR there is an extreme lack of diversity among banana trees (?)

 

[bitrex]

On 2/9/2022 5:21 PM, Don Y wrote:

On 2/9/2022 2:05 PM, bitrex wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the
scientific elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme
alive? Is a virus alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of
launching promising balloons that defined life in a sentence,
followed by equally conclusive punctures of these balloons, a
solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is the
essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science.
Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the
ability to reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one
rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either
one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter
of great importance to humans.

It\'s of \"great importance\" to folks who have very rigid notions of
\"how things should be\".  But, to many (and increasingly more), it\'s
just a <shrug

It\'s often easier to say what something isn\'t than what something \"is\",
a cloud is clearly not a person, and a person is clearly not a 1964 Impala.

Try to define what a person \"is\" though is more difficult

 

[Don Y]

On 2/9/2022 4:05 PM, bitrex wrote:

On 2/9/2022 5:21 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:05 PM, bitrex wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons
that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures
of these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to
reproduce—that is the essential characteristic of life,” said one
statesman of science. Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a
life was the ability to reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then
one rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either one
alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter of
great importance to humans.

It\'s of \"great importance\" to folks who have very rigid notions of
\"how things should be\". But, to many (and increasingly more), it\'s
just a <shrug

It\'s often easier to say what something isn\'t than what something \"is\", a cloud
is clearly not a person, and a person is clearly not a 1964 Impala.

Try to define what a person \"is\" though is more difficult

Their accomplishments + their relationships.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 09/02/22 23:05, bitrex wrote:

On 2/9/2022 5:21 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:05 PM, bitrex wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the scientific
elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive? Is a virus
alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching promising balloons
that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally conclusive punctures
of these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The ability to
reproduce—that is the essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman
of science. Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was
the ability to reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one rabbit
is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either one alone is
dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter of great
importance to humans.

It\'s of \"great importance\" to folks who have very rigid notions of
\"how things should be\".  But, to many (and increasingly more), it\'s
just a <shrug

It\'s often easier to say what something isn\'t than what something \"is\", a cloud
is clearly not a person, and a person is clearly not a 1964 Impala.

Try to define what a person \"is\" though is more difficult

Human beings have two legs. Is a thalodomide victim or amputee a human being?

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?

 

[Don Y]

On 2/10/2022 12:51 AM, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 09/02/22 23:05, bitrex wrote:
On 2/9/2022 5:21 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:05 PM, bitrex wrote:
On 2/9/2022 2:40 PM, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the
scientific elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme alive?
Is a virus alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of launching
promising balloons that defined life in a sentence, followed by equally
conclusive punctures of these balloons, a solution seemed at hand: “The
ability to reproduce—that is the essential characteristic of life,” said
one statesman of science. Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential
of a life was the ability to reproduce, until one small voice was heard.
“Then one rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but
either one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

Humans very much want to know what things \"is\", and this is a matter of
great importance to humans.

It\'s of \"great importance\" to folks who have very rigid notions of
\"how things should be\". But, to many (and increasingly more), it\'s
just a <shrug

It\'s often easier to say what something isn\'t than what something \"is\", a
cloud is clearly not a person, and a person is clearly not a 1964 Impala.

Try to define what a person \"is\" though is more difficult

Human beings have two legs. Is a thalodomide victim or amputee a human being?

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?

No, it\'s still a cup of coffee! ;-)

 

[David Brown]

On 09/02/2022 23:23, Don Y wrote:

On 2/9/2022 1:02 PM, Tom Gardner wrote:
On 09/02/22 19:40, Don Y wrote:
On 2/9/2022 1:46 AM, Jeff Layman wrote:
\"What is the definition of life? I remember a conference of the
scientific elite that sought to answer that question. Is an enzyme
alive? Is a virus alive? Is a cell alive? After many hours of
launching promising balloons that defined life in a sentence,
followed by equally conclusive punctures of these balloons, a
solution seemed at hand: “The ability to reproduce—that is the
essential characteristic of life,” said one statesman of science.
Everyone nodded in agreement that the essential of a life was the
ability to reproduce, until one small voice was heard. “Then one
rabbit is dead. Two rabbits—a male and female—are alive but either
one alone is dead.” - Daniel E Koshland, The Seven Pillars of Life

https://roaring.earth/all-female-lizard-species/

And, of course, aphids do reproduce asexually to the extent
that some aphids are born pregnant.

Then there\'s Diploscapter Pachys, which hasn’t had sex in roughly
18 million years, when it parted from its parent species by
exclusively practicing asexual reproduction.

I think many (all?) plants can reproduce (propagate) asexually.
Even though that may not be the \"intended\" method of reproduction.

Some plants are exclusively asexual, and some will use both sexual and
asexual reproduction. But for many, I think it is more accurate to say
that they are good at re-growing missing parts after injury - growing
new plants from cuttings is not really \"reproduction\".

ISTR there is an extreme lack of diversity among banana trees (?)

What we call \"bananas\" (and they are plants, not trees) are artificial
and human-made - like many of our major crops, they are the result of
massive-scale long-running selective breeding. Wild bananas have far
more genetic diversity. Low genetic diversity within crop plants is a
major problem, since it means a single virus, fungus, or other pathogen
can wipe out entire crops.


If you want a banana-evolution related laugh, have a look here:

<https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Banana_argument>

 

[Mike Coon]

In article <su1eta$e93$2@dont-email.me>, blockedofcourse@foo.invalid
says...

ISTR there is an extreme lack of diversity among banana trees (?)

Yes, the commercial \"Cavendish\" strain, bred to satisfy supermarket
customers and could not exist \"in the wild\". A bit like pedigree dogs
bred to satisfy some random cosmetic criteria that are then subject to
all sorts of inbred genetic conditions.

 

[Mike Coon]

In article <su2g5c$ajf$1@dont-email.me>, spamjunk@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?

I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

 

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:

In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other achievements to boast about.

The archetypical Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things. Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of people had Clive Sinclair stories.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[David Brown]

On 10/02/2022 12:20, Anthony William Sloman wrote:

On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:
In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other achievements to boast about.

The archetypical Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things. Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of people had Clive Sinclair stories.

The late /Sir/ Clive Sinclair was a hugely successful entrepreneur who
revolutionised the calculator and home computer market in particular,
and without whom you would probably not have anything remotely like the
computers you have today.

He did have plenty of failures - some due to a disconnect between making
technically good solutions without enough consideration of large
commercial companies and their power to control markets, and some
because his ideas were too early and the technology was not ready.

But you do not earn a knighthood for outstanding services to industry if
you \"don\'t have any other achievements to boast about\" or \"did quite a
few clever things\". The guy was responsible for a revolution first in
the pocket calculator industry, then the home computer industry - making
products that were a small fraction of the size and cost of the
alternatives, outselling everyone else put together, and bringing
computing to at least an order of magnitude more people than had ever
heard it before.

He was eccentric, certainly, but he was a genius whom Britons can
remember with pride as the UK sinks slowly into oblivion.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 10/02/22 11:55, David Brown wrote:

On 10/02/2022 12:20, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:
In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other achievements to boast about.

The archetypical Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things. Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of people had Clive Sinclair stories.


The late /Sir/ Clive Sinclair was a hugely successful entrepreneur who
revolutionised the calculator and home computer market in particular,
and without whom you would probably not have anything remotely like the
computers you have today.

He did have plenty of failures - some due to a disconnect between making
technically good solutions without enough consideration of large
commercial companies and their power to control markets, and some
because his ideas were too early and the technology was not ready.

But you do not earn a knighthood for outstanding services to industry if
you \"don\'t have any other achievements to boast about\" or \"did quite a
few clever things\". The guy was responsible for a revolution first in
the pocket calculator industry, then the home computer industry - making
products that were a small fraction of the size and cost of the
alternatives, outselling everyone else put together, and bringing
computing to at least an order of magnitude more people than had ever
heard it before.

He was eccentric, certainly, but he was a genius whom Britons can
remember with pride as the UK sinks slowly into oblivion.

I was in Cambridge in the 80s, and can corroborate what Bill said.

People there had a /much/ better opinion of Acorn Computers
(which later morphed into ARM).

 

[Mike Coon]

In article <992a5b3c-0975-433c-ba5f-3819beb11dfcn@googlegroups.com>,
bill.sloman@ieee.org says...

On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:
In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other achievements to boast about.

The archetypical Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things. Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of people had Clive Sinclair stories.

But did you get the specific relevance and joke?

 

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 10:55:13 PM UTC+11, David Brown wrote:

On 10/02/2022 12:20, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:
In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other achievements to boast about.

The archetypical Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things. Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of people had Clive Sinclair stories.

The late /Sir/ Clive Sinclair was a hugely successful entrepreneur who
revolutionised the calculator and home computer market in particular,
and without whom you would probably not have anything remotely like the
computers you have today.

Rubbish. He produced cheaper home computer and handheld calculators than anybody else, but they were always at least little bit too cheap.

I don\'t see any of his \"innovations\" as opening up possibilities that weren\'t obvious to pretty everybody at the time

He did have plenty of failures - some due to a disconnect between making
technically good solutions without enough consideration of large
commercial companies and their power to control markets, and some
because his ideas were too early and the technology was not ready.

But you do not earn a knighthood for outstanding services to industry if
you \"don\'t have any other achievements to boast about\" or \"did quite a
few clever things\".

In Thatcher\'s Britain there were loads of knighthoods given to equally insignificant twerps.

The guy was responsible for a revolution first in
the pocket calculator industry, then the home computer industry - making
products that were a small fraction of the size and cost of the
alternatives, outselling everyone else put together, and bringing
computing to at least an order of magnitude more people than had ever
heard it before.

He took the idea rather better realised in the Apple computer and made it even cheaper. I was a foundation subscriber to Byte - my wife was doing a post-doc at MIT at the time and thought that it was something that I would like, as indeed it was. Clive Sinclair was just one more of the people who latched onto those ideas

> He was eccentric, certainly, but he was a genius whom Britons can remember with pride as the UK sinks slowly into oblivion.

He wasn\'t any kind of genius. If there was a genius in that area in the UK in the late 1970\'s it was Andy Hopper. After Chris Curry fell out with Clive Sinclair , he set up Acorn Computers, which produce a rather better product, but looking at the subsequent history the good stuff seems to have come from Andy Hopper.

When I lived in Cambridge I knew David Johnson-Davies who was their software chief for a while, but got out when he could see one of their cash flow crises was coming up - probably the Christmas 1983 disaster. I was offered a job there when I moved to Cambridge, but Cambridge Instruments was prepared to pay my moving expenses and Acorn wasn\'t. I suspect that I was lucky.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[David Brown]

On 10/02/2022 12:58, Tom Gardner wrote:

On 10/02/22 11:55, David Brown wrote:
On 10/02/2022 12:20, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
On Thursday, February 10, 2022 at 8:51:29 PM UTC+11, Mike Coon wrote:
In article <su2g5c$ajf$1...@dont-email.me>, spam...@blueyonder.co.uk
says...

If I rest a cup of coffee on a stool, has it become a table?
I think you have to be a member of Mensa to answer that one!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensa_International

And probably a member of Mensa to ask it. Mensa is a society for
people who score very well on IQ tests, but don\'t have any other
achievements to boast about.

The archetypical  Mensa member was the late Clive Sinclair, who not
only scored well on IQ tests but also did quite a few clever things.
Sadly he was also brilliant at snatching defeat from the jaws of
victory, usually by some feat of mindless penny-pinching.

He was based in Cambridge around the time I worked there, and lots of
people had Clive Sinclair stories.


The late /Sir/ Clive Sinclair was a hugely successful entrepreneur who
revolutionised the calculator and home computer market in particular,
and without whom you would probably not have anything remotely like the
computers you have today.

He did have plenty of failures - some due to a disconnect between making
technically good solutions without enough consideration of large
commercial companies and their power to control markets, and some
because his ideas were too early and the technology was not ready.

But you do not earn a knighthood for outstanding services to industry if
you \"don\'t have any other achievements to boast about\" or \"did quite a
few clever things\".  The guy was responsible for a revolution first in
the pocket calculator industry, then the home computer industry - making
products that were a small fraction of the size and cost of the
alternatives, outselling everyone else put together, and bringing
computing to at least an order of magnitude more people than had ever
heard it before.

He was eccentric, certainly, but he was a genius whom Britons can
remember with pride as the UK sinks slowly into oblivion.

I was in Cambridge in the 80s, and can corroborate what Bill said.

People there had a /much/ better opinion of Acorn Computers
(which later morphed into ARM).

Acorn designed far better computers, both software and hardware - anyone
who has used a BBC Micro and a ZX Spectrum would be in no doubt which
was technically superior. But the BBC cost 3 times as much as the
spectrum - more, when you included buying a monitor instead of using an
old TV. The Spectrum (and its predecessor the ZX 81) were at least an
order of magnitude more popular as home computers - the BBC was
primarily found in schools.

The engineers at Acorn were also geniuses, and also highly important to
the British computer industry - but that does not in any way detract
from Sinclair\'s achievements.

And Sinclair had a smarter business strategy - anyone could make
software (and even hardware) for the Spectrum, while Acorn tried to keep
control of everything themselves. If the Acorn folks had been more
open, we\'d be using the descendents of Acorn-compatible computers
running MOS rather than IBM-compatible computers running DOS.

There are many reasons why Sinclair\'s computers are in the past, while
ARM microcontrollers (but not Acorn computers) are ubiquitous today.
But one thing you can be /very/ sure about, is that it is not because
Clive Sinclair was a man with a high IQ and no other achievements!