Perhaps we should transmit signals thousands of miles to avoid even the simplest processing function. Daniel Hillis of Thinking Machines Corporation offers a similar vision, adding to Lucky's insight the further assertion that massively parallel computer architectures are so efficient that they can overthrow the personal computer revolution. Hillis envisages a powerplant computer model, with huge Thinking Machines at the center tapped by millions of relatively dumb terminals. All these speculations assume that the Law of the Telecosm usurps the Law of the Microcosm. But in fact the two concepts function in different ways in different domains.
Electronic transistors use electrons to control, amplify, or switch electrons.
But photonics differ radically from electronics. Because moving photons do not affect one another on contact, they cannot readily be used to control, amplify, or switch each other. They resist the miniaturization of the microcosm. For computing, photons are far inferior to electrons. With single electron electronics now in view, electrons will keep their advantage.