<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Well put!<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Would you (or someone else reading this) happen to have a good bibliography on the history of computer science — such as it exists — that could be shared with me (this list)?</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Best wishes,</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">David<br class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Mar 24, 2017, at 11:17 AM, david nofre <<a href="mailto:d.nofre@gmail.com" class="">d.nofre@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class="">
<meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type" class="">
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000" class=""><p class="">David,</p><p class=""><font face="Bitstream Charter" class="">That's the question, right: to which
extent can we explain the emergence of computer science only
based on sociological explanations (search for professional and
academic legitimation) or simply noting its conceptual borrowings
from the mathematical logic of the 1920s and 1930s? On the other
hand, as Tom notes, it seems clear that the lack of a history of
computer science facilitates its conflation with the history of
computing, both in popular and academic discourse, and allows
computer scientists, logicians, and philosophers, to persevere
with their foundational myths.</font><font face="Bitstream
Charter" class=""> The Turing centenary has clearly shown, if anything,
how much we need to move on, turn</font><font face="Bitstream
Charter" class=""> common assumptions into research questions, and start
writing a history of computer science that differs from that of
the computer, that of computing practices, </font><font face="Bitstream Charter" class="">and that of mathematical logic.</font></p><p class=""><font face="Bitstream Charter" class="">Cheers, <br class="">
</font></p><p class=""><font face="Bitstream Charter" class="">David</font><br class="">
</p>
<br class="">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 24-03-17 14:02, David C. Brock
wrote:<br class="">
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:44D4B657-BDD2-4EF9-8B1E-37D8074A1357@dcbrock.net" type="cite" class="">
<meta http-equiv="Context-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" class="">
JS: That’s really funny!
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">But I do wish to note that it is my impression that
for Computer Science the debt owed to philosophy in the guise of
foundations of mathematics and formal logic goes beyond the
construction of a foundation myth or the legitimation of a
discipline. I take it that the work of Church, Turing, Post, et
al. was actually a central resource in forming the practice and
agendas of computer science to the present. But maybe I’m wrong?</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
<div class="">
<blockquote type="cite" class="">
<div class="">On Mar 24, 2017, at 5:41 AM, James Sumner <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:james.sumner@manchester.ac.uk" class="">james.sumner@manchester.ac.uk</a>>
wrote:</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
<div class="">
<div class=""><p class="">These days, on encountering any news story
or feature that seems to be touting a particularly
bizarre claim, I try to make sure I look at the text
without reference to the headline, which is often
constructed by a subeditor without input or right of
veto from the author. (Same applies to standfirsts,
where these are used: I have seen some particularly
mad examples of this form, even when both the headline
and article are restrained.) As Tom points out, Chris
Dixon's <i class="">Atlantic</i> piece has its
problems, but is considerably saner than its headline.
<br class="">
</p><p class="">"How Aristotle Created the Computer" has an
unfortunate ring of self-parody for anyone familiar
with technological precursoritis. I was reminded of a
line from the <i class="">TVGoHome</i> book: "Recent
archaeological digs have unearthed evidence of a
primitive Inca television set. Unlike modern units it
had no screen, and resembled a decorative cup. Instead
of broadcasting programmes, historians believe it was
mainly used for drinking liquid." <br class="">
</p><p class="">JS<br class="">
</p>
<br class="">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 23 Mar 17 21:39, Seamus
Sweeney wrote:<br class="">
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:CABXx8ndmskWe1O11Dgg-oq2vvY5AKg-cj0mN7-GKGgWd=ZmAyg@mail.gmail.com" type="cite" class="">
<div dir="ltr" class="">As often happens, dear old
Ireland can claim an even earlier invention: - <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="https://csiweb.ucd.ie/content/symbol-vec-newgrange" class="">https://csiweb.ucd.ie/content/symbol-vec-newgrange</a>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class=""><span class="">Over 5000 years ago
tomb builders in the Boyne Valley constructed,
possibly, the first optical computer in the
world using the main tomb at Newgrange. Every
winter solstice the light at dawn on the horizon
shines through a unique box-like structure over
the main entrance, down the passage to the very
back of the tomb; indicating very precisely the
time of the the year. While the outer stones of
the Newgrange tumulus are artistically decorated
with spirals and losenges, the meaning of which
is unknown, the reverse side of these kerb
stones have less well-executed symbols (dot
patterns, diamonds, spirals, losenges and so on)
which are assumed to have some symbolic meaning.
The aim of this project is to use the word2vec
system to analyse the co-occurrence structure of
these symbols with a view to saying something
about the similarities between different stones
and/or sites. Several current analyses have been
carried out, based on percentages of coverage of
certain symbols on given stones, but an
extensive and complete analysis has yet to be
carried out. Using an analogy to documents, each
tomb can be treated as a document, each stone as
a sentence and each symbol as a work. The aim
of the system would be to detemine statistically
what symbols tend to co-occur with other symbols
at different locations.</span><br class="">
</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra"><br class="">
<div class="gmail_quote">On 23 March 2017 at 21:34,
Thomas Haigh <span dir="ltr" class=""><<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:thomas.haigh@gmail.com" target="_blank" class="">thomas.haigh@gmail.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br class="">
<blockquote class="gmail_quote">
<div class="" lang="EN-US">
<div class="m_5899476957171025353WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">That’s
precisely why my CACM article had the
tag line “Separating the origins of
computer science and technology.”
Computer science comes along later, and
assembles its foundations long after
actual electronic computers already
exist. The mistake that computer
scientists and philosophers make is in
assuming that the development of actual
computers must have been driven by the
availability of abstract models. That
reflects their general disdain for
engineering and actual history. In
reality, people built computers first
and worried about how to legitimate a
discipline around their study later.</span></p>
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">An
article called “How Aristotle Created
Computer Science” would be making an
enormously different claim from one
titled “How Aristotle Created the
Computer.” However, any such article
would need to be about the 1950s and
60s, that being when the various
intellectual and institutional things
that were integrated to form the
foundations of computer science were
actually assembled.</span></p>
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Tom</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><a moz-do-not-send="true" name="m_5899476957171025353__MailEndCompose" class=""><span class=""> </span></a></p>
<span class=""></span>
<div class="">
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><b class=""><span class="">From:</span></b><span class=""> David C. Brock [mailto:<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:dcb@dcbrock.net" target="_blank" class="">dcb@dcbrock.net</a>]
<br class="">
<b class="">Sent:</b> Thursday,
March 23, 2017 4:21 PM<br class="">
<b class="">To:</b> Thomas Haigh
<<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:thomas.haigh@gmail.com" target="_blank" class="">thomas.haigh@gmail.com</a>><br class="">
<b class="">Cc:</b> David Brock <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:dcb@dcbrock.net" target="_blank" class="">dcb@dcbrock.net</a>>;
Len Shustek <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:len@shustek.com" target="_blank" class="">len@shustek.com</a>>;
<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:members@lists.sigcis.org" target="_blank" class="">members@lists.sigcis.org</a><br class="">
<b class="">Subject:</b> Re:
[SIGCIS-Members] The latest inventor
of the computer</span></p>
</div>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class="h5">
<div class=""> <br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div><p class="MsoNormal">But couldn’t one
argue that computer science owes a
huge debt to philosophy, particularly
foundations of mathematics and formal
logic? My impression is that debt is
under-paid and not that widely
appreciated.</p>
<div class="">
<div class=""> <br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
<div class="">
<blockquote class="">
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal">On Mar 23,
2017, at 4:48 PM, Thomas Haigh
<<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:thomas.haigh@gmail.com" target="_blank" class="">thomas.haigh@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:</p>
</div>
<div class=""> <br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Better than the
title, perhaps, but
everything is relative.</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">To be fair, the
article is doubling down
on a version of computer
history that is quite
popular, particularly
among non-historians.
Given the reach of Davis’
book, not to mention
Hofstadter, I’m not sure
that all this is as
unusual approach as the
opening implies. My views
on all this are on record
in the CACM article
“Actually, Turing Did Not
Invent The Computer.”<span class="m_5899476957171025353apple-converted-space"> </span><a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom/Writing/CACMActuallyTuringDidNotInventTheComputer.pdf" target="_blank" class=""><span class="">http://www.<wbr class="">tomandmaria.com/Tom/Writing/<wbr class="">CACMActuallyTuringDidNotInvent<wbr class="">TheComputer.pdf</span></a></span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">If you believe
Copeland, Davis, and
others who think that
Turing invented the
so-called "stored program"
computer in 1936, then why
not cut out the middle
man? Going up the chain
and handing the whole
thing to Aristotle is only
slightly more of a
stretch. Dixon clearly
does believe the
Davis/Copeland version:</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">In contrast to
Shannon’s paper, Turing’s
paper is highly technical.
Its primary historical
significance lies not in
its answer to the decision
problem, but in the
template for computer
design it provided along
the way….</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Turing showed how
a program could be stored
inside a computer
alongside the data upon
which it operates. In
today’s vocabulary, we’d
say that he invented the
“stored-program”
architecture that
underlies most modern
computers. [skipping quote
from Davis] This was the
first rigorous
demonstration that any
computing logic that could
be encoded in hardware
could also be encoded in
software. The architecture
Turing described was later
dubbed the “Von Neumann
architecture” — but modern
historians generally agree
it came from Turing, as,
apparently, did Von
Neumann himself.</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Asserting that
"modern historians
generally agree" that the
von Neumann architecture
came from Turing’s paper
seems like a rather
dubious claim to me.
Particularly if you read
Turing’s paper and look
for a von Neumann
architecture in it. At the
Early Digital workshop in
January I raised the
question explicitly with a
fairly good sampling of
“modern historians” and
nobody present supported
the idea. </span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Another
exaggeration: “Turing
joined a secret unit at
Bletchley Park, northwest
of London, where he helped
design computers that were
instrumental in breaking
German codes.” Bombes
weren’t computers, and
Turing didn’t help to
design Colossus (which
personally I don’t think
was a computer either, but
that’s more
controversial).</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class="m_5899476957171025353apple-converted-space"><span class=""> </span></span><span class=""></span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="m_5899476957171025353apple-converted-space"><span class="">People in the
comments section seem to
like it, but in an
unusually highbrow
example of internet
discourse are calling
out for more attention
to the anitkythera
device, Chrysippus,
Pierce, Polish bombe
creators, Thomas
Aquinas, etc. Nobody
seems to be objecting to
the Turing claim, though
someone does take the
opportunity to insult
Ada Lovelace.</span></span><span class=""></span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class="m_5899476957171025353apple-converted-space"><span class=""> </span></span><span class=""></span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Best wishes,</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">Tom</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">-----Original
Message-----<br class="">
From: Members [<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org" target="_blank" class=""><span class="">mailto:members-bounces@lists.<wbr class="">sigcis.org</span></a>]
On Behalf Of Len Shustek<br class="">
Sent: Thursday, March 23,
2017 3:11 PM<br class="">
To:<span class="m_5899476957171025353apple-converted-space"> </span><a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:members@lists.sigcis.org" target="_blank" class=""><span class="">members@lists.sigcis.org</span></a><br class="">
Subject: [SIGCIS-Members]
The latest inventor of the
computer</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">We're fully
engaged in the invention
of email, but we haven't
had any new inventors of
the computer in a while.
The Atlantic is helping
with that: "How Aristotle
Created the Computer".</span></p>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class=""><a moz-do-not-send="true" href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/03/aristotle-computer/518697/" target="_blank" class=""><span class="">https://www.theatlantic.com/<wbr class="">technology/archive/2017/03/<wbr class="">aristotle-computer/518697/</span></a></span></p>
</div>
<div class=""><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="">The article is
rather better than its
title.</span></p>
</div>
<div class="">
<div class=""><span class=""> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
</div>
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