There Is No Hope of Doing Perfect Research (griffiths 97)

Edwin Malika

Professor

Research Test

21 February 2012

There is no hope of doing perfect research (Griffiths 97)

Research is an act of searching again into some existing work. This arises due to the incompleteness of the existing theories. Hence, research is not a new activity since it involves criticizing the existing theories. Researchers develop new theories that take into consideration the imperfectness in the previously developed theories. The statement by Griffiths that "there is no hope of doing a perfect research", applies to all research works. Therefore, I agree to the Griffiths' statement stated above. The following evidences support the Griffiths' statement. Firstly, we look at the evolution of computers. Computers developed in phases called generations. The amount of research influenced the transition from one generation to another. The first generation was the earliest time computers, which were in use from around 1946 to 1950. They used large physical devices in their circuitry and hence were large in their physical size. Their circuits incorporated the thermionic valves, none solid state electronic device as a complicated logic element. These computers consumed a lot of power hence generating a lot of heat and, therefore, none reliable as the circuitry components were prone to failure. They had limited internal memory, which depended on the use of delay lines and the processor, worked at slow speed. Examples of the first generation computers are UNIVAC and Lyon's Electronic Office (LEO). The second generation computers came at the closing of 1950 due to the incompleteness of research in the first generation computers. They used transistors which are relatively smaller than valves and consume comparatively less power and, therefore, the resulting computers were more reliable and smaller in size. The transistors depended on solid state technology, where the electronic pulses were not to through a vacuum as in the case of the thermionic valves of the first generation computers. They operated at a higher speed than the first generation computers. These computers had programming languages whose vocabularies are close to the human language. Examples of the second generation computers include IBM 300Series and ATLAS. The third computer generation came into existence towards mid 1960, and they used integrated circuits to replace the second generation computer physical transistors. The integrated circuits use several physical electronic components within a small crystal called the silicon chip. The ICs (Integrated Circuits) are much smaller hence the resulting computer was smaller than the second generation computers (Randon 63). Third generation computers had higher memory capacity and could support more than one user at the same