5 ms·
Fungus-treated Violin Outdoes Stradivarius
- mrshoe 17y agoFungus is the new computer. There's nothing like that feeling a beginning programmer has when he realizes that he can give the computer a few simple instructions and, in a matter of seconds, the computer does something that would take thousands of man-years of manual computation. This is why biotech is such an interesting field. If we can give fungi and bacteria simple instructions and let them execute those instructions in massively parallel fashion, we can accomplish amazing feats.
- jacquesm 17y agoI don't really see the link with computing here. The fungi changed the cell structure of the wood, chemistry and woodworking on a microscopic scale.
- trebor 17y agoWhich is in-line with its purpose: (in this case) the cellular digestion of waste wood. Given enough time, the fungus would have consumed all the wood, rather than die off like a scientist would prefer to program it to do.
- cakeface 17y agoThere is no link with computing as in running a program. The link is the perception changing technology that lets us accomplish previously difficult tasks in a simple manner.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- hawk 17y agowhat you mean is that nature is interesting. here's a clip to watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhh32JYkQPk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhh32JYkQPk
- fizx 17y agoWorth noting that this was only a single-blind test, with a sample size of 1 violinist.
- hawk 17y agoThere were 5 violins, 2 of which were fungus violins, one of those in particular received a staggering 60% of the votes. Not sure what the best conclusion to draw is but it's certainly believable that one day you'll be able to get a cheap violin with incredible tone quality.
- jacobolus 17y agoBut it's quite plausible that the performer played slightly differently on the various violins. A more robust test would include several performers, playing the different violins in arbitrary order, to rotating groups of listeners.
- euccastro 17y agoThat would introduce more extraneous variables. Do you think that different violinists might suit different violins better to an extent that overrides that additional noise?
- rms 17y agoI assure that you that short of molecular self-assemblers, these fungus treated violins are not going to be cheap. They will cost well above the average for a new violin, but much, much less than a violin from a classic master.
- nopassrecover 17y agoDemand will probably lower the cost of price due to competition and the related support of research. While demand for cheap violins might be low, the demand for cheap "x made better by fungus" will probably be pretty high, and violins will peripherally benefit.
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- doosra 17y agoWait, just by chance it looks like there was a 4/5 chance that the Stradivarius would loose/be outdone.
- ibsulon 17y agoThat's like saying a grandmaster has a 4/5 chance of losing a 5 person chess tournament. The competition must be genuinely good to have a chance.
- Dilpil 17y agoAs the article points out, other more mundane violins have done the same thing.
- philh 17y ago"Identify these sounds" is a fundamentally different exercise to "decide which of these sounds you prefer". And the sample size in that instance was three.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- mynameishere 17y agoThe prices of the Stradivarius violins are as reasonable as the price of Van Goghs and vintage wines. The truth is, Joshua Bell playing a swinette would sound better than me on a Stradivarius.
- wallflower 17y agoSince you mentioned Joshua Bell, I'd like to remind people of the previously posted on News.YC Pulitzer-award winning article, "Pearls before Breakfast" http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401721.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04...
- meriba 17y agoThis seems quite the same as saying that listening to a CD is exactly the same as listening to an old LP. No, it's not. Some humans (not many, though) can tell the difference; music simply can't be reduced to bits (without loosing some very, very, very fine information, not accessible to every instance of Ear on Planet Earth). In this case: I would swear that there are ears able to tell the difference...