Sciencism

Degrees of freedom are the different variables that we manipulate during our lives. As in mathematics, every degree of freedom is like a variable of our life, that we manipulate. Here are some examples:

• Life
  
  • The age at which we decide to have children
  • Career choice
  • Religion
  • Travelling vs settling down
  • Amount of debt
  • Energy efficient appliances
• Computers (laptops)
  
  • Processor speed
  • Chipset
  • Amount of RAM
  • Brand
  • Number of hours on battery
  • Wireless options (infrared, wifi, bluetooth)
  • Webcam

Sometimes too many degrees of freedom can leave you paralyzed, not knowing what to do. Or might lead you to making a wrong decision. In some cases, given a choice, people will invariably make a wrong choice.

In the case of computer processors, processor manufacturers are already limiting degrees of freedom in order to better serve consumers. Whereas previously processor manufacturers marketed their processors using many different variables such as:

• Clock speed
• FSB speed
• Processor family
• Watts
• Performance benchmarks
• Wafer thickness

Now AMD, with their "Vision" program, has simplified the choices into:

• Vision Basic
• Vision Premium
• Vision Ultimate