It is a great edition. The November 2011 issue of Popular Science is chock a block full of interesting information and ideas. "Data is Power" is the topic and features large numbers and how they can be used. It is fascinating. Popular Science in the past was not very interesting or enlightening but now is one of the best magazines. For the past five years or so it has been high on my list to read when it first arrives in the mail but this one is worth buying the one issue from the drug store if you don't already subscribe.
On page 54, they are discussing FAOSTAT. Did you know that the world has plenty of food produced each year but that 13 % of the world population is malnourished. The point is that the large computers can now keep track of masses of information, which then can be sorted and organized. It is fascinating.
I knew that computers are getting smarter and larger. We arrived from Europe on Air France and passed through immigration using the new quick entry called Global Entry. The machine checks your passport and fingerprints. Then you are asked a series of questions, similar to the ones on the immigration form. Finally, we were asked to confirm our arrival on flight 26 on Air France, which we did. After one second, a card spewed out of the machine and we left the area to head home. Our question to each other was "How did they know which flight we were on?" Clearly, when we checked in and provided our passports to the airlines in Europe, the computer must have passed that information through to Immigration. It's another example of big computers. Amazing.
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