As the number of people used as material increased, the Synaptic Lathe's computing power would multiply as well, especially after synaptic buildings were added.
A single brain was far less efficient at thinking through problems than a group of brains, especially when those brains had already formed a closely interconnected network.
The Synaptic Lathe itself was a massive computer that used human brains. Computation was merely its simplest function.
In fact, its greatest function was providing "inspiration" for scientific research.
What was inspiration?
It was a chance flight of fancy, a fleeting glimpse of future technology, the foundational idea behind any technological development.
The Synaptic Lathe could unlock the potential within human brains and consciousness, squeezing their thinking to its limits to generate "inspiration."
A spark of inspiration was far more important than the research that followed. It was equivalent to a "research option": only technologies that appeared in the technology pool could be researched. ()
"Inspiration test. Begin importing data."
More streamlined data was imported into the Synaptic Lathe. This test gave the synaptic computing network greater freedom to test the machine's ability to generate inspiration.
Here, the scientists gave that inspiration a name:
Transcendent logic.
Only after several minutes did the Synaptic Lathe finish all its calculations and produce an exceptionally creative new solution to the data.
"As you can see, the Synaptic Lathe has advantages far beyond traditional computing devices in computing power, thought, and design. We can obtain such enormous boosts merely by consuming some population. It will soon replace our traditional research methods."
"We can also freely adjust its computing output, like this."
The head of the Synaptic Lathe project was already utterly absorbed in its extraordinary capabilities. He tapped the screen, completed a complex authentication process, then adjusted a value to its maximum.
"Your