🚀 go-pugleaf

After following the "analog vs. digital" discussion for some time,
I have finally felt moved to post my very first (golly!....a drum roll,
please!) response here.  

The difference between "analog" and "digital" is nothing more than the
difference between a table of numbers and the corresponding graph; in a
digital representation, we assign a finite-precision number to indicate the
value of something (usually a signal) at various points in time (or frequency,
or space, or whatever).  An "analog" representation is just that - we choose
to view some value (voltage, current, water pressure, anything) as hopefully
being a faithful copy of something else.  An excellent example is a
microphone, which converts a varying pressure into an "analogous" signal -
a varying voltage.  This distinction has nothing to do with the accuracy of
the representation obtained, the technology used to obtain, or any of a host
of other items that come to mind when we think of the terms "analog" and
"digital".

This whole discussion brings to mind a quote that, I believe, Carl Sagan used
in his recent novel, "Contact".  It had to do with a conference of SETI
researchers trying to define "a living organism".  After a lengthy and rambling
discussion, one member of the British delegation said, "Gentlemen, everyone
here knows the difference between a dead horse and a live one.  Pray, let us
cease flogging the latter."


                                           Bob Myers
                                           Somewhere Out of My Mind,
                                           HP Fort Collins