[sdiy] Is everything digital?

[Samuel Morse]

Is emitter coupled logic digital? All IC's are "analog". If you probe a 
CLK line on a fast uProcessor it doesn't look like a square wave. The 
basic building blocks of IC's are transistors which are 'analog'. Are 
bypass caps digital. Charge is quantized but nobody uses bra and ket 
notation to design a latch.

 Scott Gravenhorst wrote:

>Glen <mclilith at charter.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>At 12:12 PM 5/14/2005 , Scott Gravenhorst wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>I partially agree, that is, binary is not the only digital system.  With
>>>respect to discrete states, a digital system, to be useful as such, depends
>>>upon them and reacts distinctly to them.  I don't see any dependance in
>>>analog electronics upon the discrete states that may be present.  I don't
>>>believe that it is correct to call analog "digital" simply because there are
>>>steps.  I agree with Paul S., that this is more properly called "quantized"
>>>and not "digital".  I also see no support for this in the dictionary
>>>definition of "digital".  The definitions I see all depend upon the
>>>recognizable distinct states.
>>>      
>>>
>>Okay, I wasn't referring to the analog circuitry being somehow "aware" of
>>all the individual distinct states. 
>>    
>>
>
>However, a digital system, to be useful as such, does require a reliable and
>predictable recognition of such states.  And if not useful as such, why then
>call it digital?
>
>  
>
>>I was primarily referring to the
>>*signal* having distinct states (and therefore the *signal* being "digital"
>>in nature.) Perhaps I was being slightly euphemistic in using the word
>>digital, but I'm not sure of that.
>>
>>You might think of the *signal* being *digital* and the analog circuitry as
>>being a "fuzzy logic* processor.  :)
>>
>>"Quantized" implies that something started out as being "unquantized" and
>>was subsequently made to be quantized. 
>>    
>>
>
>I don't see this as true, you are saying that something that is quantized
>didn't necessarily start out as such.  "2 : to calculate or express in terms
>of quantum mechanics", from Webster (quantize), would say that things can be
>in a quantized state without having started out "unquantized".
>
>  
>
>>(The word practically wreaks of the
>>past tense.) A common example is quantizing a musical performance to the
>>nearest 32nd note or whatever. We would call such a performance quantized,
>>because it has been reduced in complexity to a discrete number of
>>possibilities.
>>
>>If something never existed in a purely unquantized form, and always existed
>>in its current form of discrete countable states, then I doubt it is
>>totally accurate to call it quantized. 
>>    
>>
>
>Not according to Webster.
>
>  
>
>>Otherwise, who or what quantized it? What form was it in before being quantized?
>>    
>>
>
>>From Webster, the definition does not eliminate things which were of quantum
>state to start with and cannot be further reduced.  There is no pre-quantized
>state recognized as part of the definition. 
>
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