The economic destiny and prosperity of entire nations may rest on one question: Can silicon-based computer technology sustain Moore's law beyond 2020? Moore's law (see sidebar) is the engine pulling a trillion-dollar industry. It's the reason kids assume that it's their birthright to get a video-game system each Christmas that's almost twice as powerful as the one they got last Christmas. It's the reason you can receive (and later throw away) a musical birthday card that contains more processing power than the combined computers of the Allied Forces in World War II.
The secret behind Moore's law is that chipmakers double...