Self-study
Computer scientist: For several decades, the number of transistors on new computer microchips, and hence the microchips' computing speed, has doubled about every 18 months. ████████ ████ ███ █████████ ████ ███ ████ ███████ ████ ████ ████████ ██ █ ███████████ █████████ █████ ███ ███████████ ██ █ ████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ █████████ ████ ██████████
Summary
For several decades, the number of transistors on computer microchips has doubled every 18 months.
For several decades, microchips’ computing speed has also doubled every 18 months.
From the mid-1990s into the next decade, the cost of producing a microchip doubled each time the microchip’s computing speed doubled.
Very Strongly Supported Conclusions
From the mid-1990s into the next decade, the cost of producing a microchip doubled every 18 months.
From the mid-1990s into the next decade, the cost of producing a microchip doubled each time the number of transistors on a microchip doubled.
9.
Which one of the following ███ ██ ████████ ████████ ████ ███ ████████ ███████████ ███████████
a
The only effective ███ ██ ██████ ███ █████████ █████ ██ ████████ ██████████ ██ ██ ████████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████████ ███ ██████████
Unsupported. Doubling the number of transistors on a microchip is one effective way to double the computing speed of that microchip, but it’s not necessarily the only effective way.
b
From the mid-1990s ████ ███ ████ ███████ █████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ██████ ████ ██ █████████ ██ █ ██████ ██ ███ █████████ ██████ ██ ███████████ ██ ███████████
Unsupported. We don’t know anything about how the retail cost of computers was affected by the increased number of transistors. We only know that, during this time period, the production cost of microchips doubled each time the number of transistors doubled.
c
For the last ███████ ████████ ████████ █████████ ████ ███████ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████ █████ ██ ████████ ██████████ ███████ ██████ ███ ███████ ██ ███████ ███ ████ ██ █████████ █████
Unsupported. Just because microchip production costs increased from the mid-1990s into the next decade doesn’t mean that engineers made no effort to control those costs.
d
From the mid-1990s ████ ███ ████ ███████ █ ████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ███████████ ███ ████████ ██████████ ███████████ ████ ████████ ██ ███ ██████ ██ ███████████ ██ █████ ███████████
Very strongly supported. During this time, production costs doubled each time a microchip’s speed doubled, and speed doubled each time the number of transistors doubled, so we know that production costs doubled each time the number of transistors doubled.
e
It is unlikely ████ █████████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██ ████████ ███ █████████ █████ ██ ██████████ ███████ ████ ██████████ ███ ████ ██ █████████ █████
Unsupported. Just because production costs doubled with microchip speed in the 90s doesn’t mean engineers can’t increase computing speed without raising costs in the future.