I Saw the Face of God in a Semiconductor Factory

This article seems overly dramatic. I've been living in Taiwan for over a year now, it's not like you can't utter the word "China."

If AI can produce this, that's only good news since that means we can have more fiction-like nonfiction (for these who want it).

The story of UMC is interesting too. They designed and made tons of PC chipsets and even their own x86 CPU:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UMC_Green_CPU

> God means nature. We are describing the face of nature at TSMC.

> The article "I Saw the Face of God in a TSMC Factory" describes the author's experience visiting a TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) factory and observing the advanced technology and processes involved in producing computer chips. The author marvels at the complexity of the machinery and the precision required to create chips that are smaller than a human hair. They also reflect on the spiritual experience of witnessing such advanced technology and how it can make one feel small in comparison. The article concludes by discussing the societal implications of technological progress and the need to balance technological advancement with ethical considerations.

No doubt, cultural differences are the reason why the East is forging ahead in technology. For the US to catch up it would have to return to the ways of research and manufacturing methods it adopted during WWII as well as adopting the attitudes it held back then that enabled that remarkable level of development and manufacturing output.

Much of the East works as if it's on a war footing, the US hasn't done so since 1945. One poignant illustration of that is the cultural clash of US engineers with their Taiwanese counterparts when they visited Taiwan as mentioned in the article.

"Careful attention to education over the last 30 years has begun to pay dividends,” Wang said of Taiwan in 1982."

There's a lesson here too for the US and the West. In recent decades many Western universities have allowed themselves to be torn apart by politics, education has suffered thus.

lol.

> "produces, by one analysis, a staggering 92 percent of the world’s most avant-garde chips—the ones inside the nuclear weapons, planes, submarines, and hypersonic missiles"

I'm no expert on semiconductors or even hardware but even I know that the vast majority of chips designed into such critical military systems are based on quite old designs and process nodes for multiple reasons (TEMPEST rating, fully characterized, proven reliable at long duration, guaranteed availability, etc). This is the kind of thing I'd expect competent editorial review even in a 'pop-tech' magazine to catch. I'm pretty sure that over the years even Wired itself has run articles about the "gray hairs" needed to still maintain old code on old CPUs running in military hardware...