Method and apparatus for identifying that one of a set of past or historical events best correlated with a current or recent event

摘要

Methods and systems that employ electronic data processing to identify a set of data which can be outputted to a mechanical, electromechanical, electronic, or other device to optimize the performance of that device. The data to be outputted is identified by writing a function which represents a current event or situation as a string of binary digits, finding that one of a series of functions similarly representing past or historical events which is most closely correlated with the current event- representing function, and outputting the string of digits representing the thus identified historical event. The functions representing historical events can be derived from the function representing the current event or from information supplied from a separate source. The system includes delay circuits for generating the historical event- representing strings of digits, circuits for adding the string of digits representing the current situation to the string of digits representing each of the historical events by modulo two addition and counting the number of excess zeros in each resulting sum, a single elimination array of comparators for matching successive pairs of sum- representing strings of digits in enough levels to identify that string of digits with the largest number of excess zeros, and circuitry for: converting the winning string of digits back to the format in which the associated historical event is represented and outputting the string of digits in that format.