"In addition to its numerical efficiency, base 3 offers computational advantages. It suggests a way to reduce the number of queries needed to answer questions with more than two possible answers. A binary logic system can only answer “yes” or “no.”"
Yes... but nobody uses binary systems. We use 64 bit systems (and a number of other systems, but all larger than one bit), which has abundantly more than enough space to represent "greater than/less than/equal".
The main software issue with ternary computing is that with this, the entire advantage goes up in smoke. It is quite hard to articulate an actual advantage a multi-bit system would see since we do not use 1-bit or 1-trit systems in real life. (If you've got some particular small hardware thingy that could use it, by all means go for it; it's no problem to use it in just one little place and have a conventional binary interface.)
Taylodl's hardware issue with ternary circuits sounds like a reasonable one as well. If you've already minimized the voltage difference for your binary circuits to as small as it can reasonably be, the addition of ternary hardware necessarily entails doubling it the maximum voltage in the system.
Is this Quanta Magazine's "Brash And Stupid Claims About Computing Week" or something? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41155021 The last paragraph is outright crockery, that "trit-based security system" is well known to be from a crackpot who appears to simply not comprehend that our binary systems do not in fact explode the moment they have to represent a "3", despite repeated attempts for people to explain it to the guy.
Programmers and hardware designers are not in fact just total idiots stuck in the mud about digital (vs analog) and binary (vs ternary) representations. They are the way they are for good and solid engineering reasons that aren't going anywhere, and there is basically no space here for someone to displace these things. It isn't just path dependence, these really are the best choices based on current systems.
Ternary is one of several crackpotry schools that were established in USSR. You'd have them write books on the subjects, rant in tech magazines… there even was an SF short story about evil alien robots defeated by ternary.
Another big thing was TRIZ: a theory that you can codify invention by making a rulebook and arranging the rules in different permutations. There were plenty of smaller things too, especially in academia. It would typically start with one researcher sticking to some bizarre idea, then growing his own gang of grad students and adjuncts who all feed on that. Except the theory would be borderline batshit and all the publications are in-group, referring each other, and naturally a semester or two worth of this sectarian stuff is getting dropped into the undergrad curriculum.
TRIZ is not bizarre or strange. It is a series of concepts and ideas which are meant to help you get unstuck when working through a difficult engineering problem.
Fringe theories in mathematics sometimes work out. Neural nets is arguably one of them: For the longest time, neural nets were simply worse than SVMs on most metrics you could think of.
>A binary logic system can only answer “yes” or “no.”
This line really struck me and it's a failure in technical writing. This is an article published on "quantamagazine", about niche computing techniques. You have a technical audience... you shouldn't still be explaining what binary is at the halfway point in your article.
Yes... but nobody uses binary systems. We use 64 bit systems (and a number of other systems, but all larger than one bit), which has abundantly more than enough space to represent "greater than/less than/equal".
The main software issue with ternary computing is that with this, the entire advantage goes up in smoke. It is quite hard to articulate an actual advantage a multi-bit system would see since we do not use 1-bit or 1-trit systems in real life. (If you've got some particular small hardware thingy that could use it, by all means go for it; it's no problem to use it in just one little place and have a conventional binary interface.)
Taylodl's hardware issue with ternary circuits sounds like a reasonable one as well. If you've already minimized the voltage difference for your binary circuits to as small as it can reasonably be, the addition of ternary hardware necessarily entails doubling it the maximum voltage in the system.
Is this Quanta Magazine's "Brash And Stupid Claims About Computing Week" or something? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41155021 The last paragraph is outright crockery, that "trit-based security system" is well known to be from a crackpot who appears to simply not comprehend that our binary systems do not in fact explode the moment they have to represent a "3", despite repeated attempts for people to explain it to the guy.
Programmers and hardware designers are not in fact just total idiots stuck in the mud about digital (vs analog) and binary (vs ternary) representations. They are the way they are for good and solid engineering reasons that aren't going anywhere, and there is basically no space here for someone to displace these things. It isn't just path dependence, these really are the best choices based on current systems.