<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-size:small">Doug, I suggest you think about this question in the context of signalling and communications more broadly. Specifically, consider the genealogy of telegraphy, which begins with connected machines and includes the idea of remote automation, predating Turing by centuries. Best,</div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-size:small"><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-size:small">Dennis<br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-size:small"><br clear="all"></div><div><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><font size="1"><span style="font-family:monospace,monospace">Dennis Yi Tenen <br>Associate Professor, English and Comparative Literature</span></font></div><div><font size="1"><span style="font-family:monospace,monospace">Data Science Institute, </span></font><font size="1"><span style="font-family:monospace,monospace"><span>Affiliated Member, </span>Data, Media and Society<br></span></font></div><div dir="ltr"><font size="1"><span style="font-family:monospace,monospace">Columbia University<br><span><span><a href="http://denten.github.io" target="_blank">denten.github.io/</a> | <a href="https://twitter.com/dennistenen" target="_blank">@dennistenen</a> | 415.215.3315</span></span><br><i><a href="http://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=26821" target="_blank">Plain Text: The Poetics of Computation</a></i><br></span></font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><br></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Tue, Aug 24, 2021 at 5:44 PM Douglas Lucas <<a href="mailto:dal@riseup.net">dal@riseup.net</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<p>Dear SIGCIS members,<br>
</p>
<p>I'm a freelance writer/journalist who's published in multiple
news outlets on hacktivism and who's lurked on this email list for
some time. The past several months, I've been reading a great
dealing about Alan Turing and the math behind <i>Computable
Numbers</i> (fundamental theorem of arithmetic, G<span>รถ</span>del
encoding, etc). A fairly straightforward question occurred to me,
one I hope this list can help answer:<br>
</p>
<p>As is well known, Turing's 1936 paper <i>Computable Numbers</i>
invented the concept of a universal machine, which includes what
today would be called an airgapped computer. For quite a while,
all computers (universal machines) were airgapped devices. The
historical casual chain is clear: first the idea documented in <i>Computable
Numbers </i>came into existence, and only later are physical
computers actually built, initially as standalone, airgapped
devices.<br>
</p>
<p>But how did plugging computers into one another with wires/cables
begin? Did a thinker first conceive of a profound idea
underpinning wired/cabled networking, and then only later,
engineers implemented that concept in the physical realm? Or, did
people first begin hooking computers up to one another, perhaps
experimentally, and then a theorist subsequently created an idea
to describe/frame what was happening (maybe a mathematical graph
theory or something)?</p>
<p>To put it another way, in terms of a simple standardized
test-like verbal analogy, <i>Computable Numbers</i> is to
airgapped computers as ??? is to wired/cabled networking of
computers.<br>
</p>
<p>I omit wireless connections (e.g., Bluetooth) for the time being.</p>
<p>Thanks much,</p>
<p>Doug Lucas<br>
</p>
</div>
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