Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone,
Speaker 1: Welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poette and
Speaker 1: I am an editor here at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me, as usual, is senior writer Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 1: Does not compute. Nice, very nice, Thank you. Not everything computes, No,
Speaker 1: not everything. But the lady will be talking about in
Speaker 1: this podcast. Sure dead, Yeah, let's talk about her. This
Speaker 1: is comes courtesy of a little listener mail. And uh,
Speaker 1: this listener mail is actually a two fur We got
Speaker 1: two requests in the space of a week, which is
Speaker 1: not a big surprise considering the subject of this um
Speaker 1: this podcast. It's a listener mail rock blaw. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: this comes from Bridget and Adam. So uh, I'll read
Speaker 1: Bridgets first. Bridget is from Australia, but I'm not going
Speaker 1: to try and do an Australian accent because whenever I do,
Speaker 1: I sound like a New Zealander who suffered massive head trauma.
Speaker 1: So here is bridgets email. Good day, Chris and Jonathan.
Speaker 1: I've been spending some time lately looking to inspirational people
Speaker 1: in hope of finding a suitable name for my soon
Speaker 1: to be born child. Such searching brought me to Ada Lovelace,
Speaker 1: otherwise known as the Mother of Coding. I've done a
Speaker 1: little research into Ada and found that there's some discussion
Speaker 1: as to whether she deserves this moniker. Was Ada Lovelace
Speaker 1: the first computer programmer and therefore a worthy namesake for
Speaker 1: my future daughter? Let me know what you think. Cheers,
Speaker 1: Bridget and Adams. Was I recently learned a little about
Speaker 1: Ada Lovelace, the first woman to write an algorithm that
Speaker 1: would be read by a computer, and thought it would
Speaker 1: make a great podcast. I love the show. Keep up
Speaker 1: the amazing work. Can you also do a show on
Speaker 1: the LHC. Please cheers? Insert beer clink sound here. Alright,
Speaker 1: Bridget and Adam, this is our podcast about Ada, not
Speaker 1: about the LHC. Um Jonathan, we can't do this podcast.
Speaker 1: What do you mean we can't do this podcast. It's
Speaker 1: already been done. I mean stuff he missed in History Class?
Speaker 1: It's already done a whole podcast. There's a podcast called
Speaker 1: stuff you Missed in History Class? There is It's wonderful.
Speaker 1: Is that the one with Katy and Sarah. It is indeed,
Speaker 1: and they talked about Ada Lovelace already they did, and
Speaker 1: they did really well, you know what we should do.
Speaker 1: What's that? We should just have their podcast play and
Speaker 1: we'll sign off. All right, we'll just insert their podcast
Speaker 1: here and then no, we can't. We can't do that.
Speaker 1: We can't do that. Besides, they specifically mentioned us in
Speaker 1: that podcast. Well, maybe what we should do then is
Speaker 1: talk specifically about her computer programming expertise and how she
Speaker 1: managed to do that considering she lived in the eighteen hundreds. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you would think she lived before computers. How could she
Speaker 1: have written a computer programmer program? Rather not wrote a
Speaker 1: programmers a long week? Well, we're gonna do this on Friday.
Speaker 1: Actual clearly not, but we're going to tell you how
Speaker 1: she wrote a computer program. First of all, Bridget, I'm
Speaker 1: going to get this all the way. First of all,
Speaker 1: congratulations on your child. And also, Aida is more than worthy.
Speaker 1: I would say, In fact, I kind of fell in
Speaker 1: love with this lady the more I read about her.
Speaker 1: Actually her first name was an Aida. No, it was
Speaker 1: Augusta Augusta Ada Byron. Yeah, Augusta Ada Byron, daughter of
Speaker 1: Lord Byron the poet. Yes, she was born December tenth,
Speaker 1: eighteen fifteen, the daughter of Lord George Gordon Byron and
Speaker 1: Annabella Millbank Byron. Um. Actually, your parents married on the
Speaker 1: second of January and eighteen fifteen, but we're separated by
Speaker 1: January six, eighteen sixteen, So the marriage lasted a full
Speaker 1: year and a week and a half, just long enough
Speaker 1: to uh to have the first computer programmer born to them, right, Um,
Speaker 1: so yes, they're there. Marriage was not a happy one
Speaker 1: her parents and uh. In fact, um young Ada was
Speaker 1: never to meet. Her father was separated. Um, she lived
Speaker 1: with her mom, and her mom had decided that Aida
Speaker 1: did not really need to have the distractions of poetry.
Speaker 1: She thought that Byron's rather unpredictable personality let's call it
Speaker 1: that showy um was due to his romanticism and his
Speaker 1: obsession with poetry. Yeah, let's just and and Annabella the
Speaker 1: mother felt that the that such qualities were not really admirable.
Speaker 1: She didn't want her daughter to have the same sort
Speaker 1: of personality and uh and and wanting lifestyle as the
Speaker 1: father did had so um so she thought, well, what's
Speaker 1: the least poetic thing I can push my daughter into
Speaker 1: I happen to be an amateur mathematician. Let's push her
Speaker 1: into mathematics. Yeah. Actually uh. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: I found out that Lord Byron had referred to his
Speaker 1: very brief married married wife, um uh, he called Annabella
Speaker 1: the Princess of parallelograms. Yes, that was a lot poetic.
Speaker 1: It was not meant to be a compliment, nonetheless, but
Speaker 1: it does illustrate that she had a mathematical bent herself.
Speaker 1: And what I find interesting is that not only were
Speaker 1: Lord Byron's poetical genes evident later in Ada's life, but
Speaker 1: it's actually she ended up being sort of a blend
Speaker 1: of both of her parents, as is appropriate for this case. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and Ada herself received a a wonderful, wonderful title given
Speaker 1: to her by by Charles Babbage, who will will discuss
Speaker 1: at length in a little bit, uh, the Enchantress of Numbers,
Speaker 1: which I think is an amazing, amazing phrase and very
Speaker 1: fitting as well. So Aida grows up um with some
Speaker 1: of the best tutors in that you can imagine. During
Speaker 1: this time she studies mathematics and has absolutely fascinated with them.
Speaker 1: It's the subject mathematics, and is incredibly adept an amazing student.
Speaker 1: In fact, the more we research data, the more I
Speaker 1: realized anyway, that she was phenomenally more intelligent than I am.
Speaker 1: I mean, I can't even really compare. Uh. She was
Speaker 1: able to to understand algorithms that that completely baffle me,
Speaker 1: and I was able to to really study them in
Speaker 1: a way that she found fascinating. I find them perplexing
Speaker 1: and maddening. She found it as having its own kind
Speaker 1: of poetry. Um, and in a way you think about it, well,
Speaker 1: this kind of makes sense, you know. We we when
Speaker 1: you really look at algorithms, we're talking about things like
Speaker 1: number theory and how the universe sort of works, like
Speaker 1: how things kind of fit together. And we express this
Speaker 1: more often than not through mathematic equations and algorithms and
Speaker 1: things of that nature. And she was able to see
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. I'm under I can understand the
Speaker 1: underlying concept, but when you get beyond that, it just
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm a fish out of water. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I understand. Well, let's see, um, somebody who else who
Speaker 1: was fascinated with her would be William King. Yes, he
Speaker 1: was so fascinated. Whether he married her? Yeah? Well the
Speaker 1: first William King? Who was who was her tutor. I
Speaker 1: found that I found this interesting. I mean the two
Speaker 1: different William Kings. Well no, actually I did mean, I
Speaker 1: did mean her future husband. But it was really funny
Speaker 1: because it confused me for a second when I was
Speaker 1: doing the research, I said William King was her tutor.
Speaker 1: And then, as it turns out, there was a William King,
Speaker 1: not the one she married, as her tutor, who was
Speaker 1: apparently uh immediately feeling out of his depth as he
Speaker 1: talked to her, he realized that she had a much
Speaker 1: more innate grasp of mathematics than he did, so he
Speaker 1: he actually bowed out very quickly. He was one of
Speaker 1: the many many but yeah, less than a year later,
Speaker 1: apparently he uh ad married the other William King, who
Speaker 1: um was the eighth bear in King and U was
Speaker 1: an earl made an earl in nineteen thirty eight, so
Speaker 1: that's when she became eight eighteen thirty eight, dude. So yes,
Speaker 1: he was made an earl in eighteen thirty eight, and
Speaker 1: that's when she became the Countess of Lovelace. Yes, so
Speaker 1: we usually just referred to her as Ada Lovelace. Uh. Now,
Speaker 1: Aida continued her her almost obsession with mathematics throughout her life,
Speaker 1: which unfortunately was tragically short. Ada passed away from after
Speaker 1: contracting cancer. Um. I think she was thirty seven. It
Speaker 1: was eighteen fifty two, and she died November eighteen, eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty two. Right. Uh so, But during that her her life,
Speaker 1: she ended up encountering lots of remarkable people as including
Speaker 1: you know, like the author of Charles Dickens, who became
Speaker 1: a close friend. One of her other friends was Charles Babbage. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she met she met Babbage who was the Leucassian Professor
Speaker 1: of mathematics at Cambridge. She met him when she was
Speaker 1: just seventeen, um, which is a pretty interesting eighteen thirty three,
Speaker 1: was it right around when that happened. Um. And she
Speaker 1: she rubbed elbows with other people who were interested in
Speaker 1: math and science, like Mary Somerville. Um. And that's uh,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Should we get into the the time
Speaker 1: when she was talking at a party with Babbage about
Speaker 1: this new machine four Um. He had come up with
Speaker 1: this thing, the analytical engine. Yes, all right, well, let's
Speaker 1: let's backtrack just a touch before we get into the
Speaker 1: analytical engine. That was not the first machine that Babbage
Speaker 1: had proposed. No, no, not at all. As a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, we brought it up before from the past, right,
Speaker 1: that was a fun podcast, um, but yes, this was
Speaker 1: a more recent one. And as we talked about on
Speaker 1: that podcast, UM, Abbage was having difficulty getting funding for
Speaker 1: these amazing machines because people just didn't get it. Babbage
Speaker 1: was able to get subfunding for his first uh machine,
Speaker 1: which is called the difference engine. Yes, different from the
Speaker 1: other one. Right. It was a little more simplistic than
Speaker 1: his idea for the analytical engine. Right now, the difference engine,
Speaker 1: he managed to get some money to fund it, but
Speaker 1: his the process of building it was a very long,
Speaker 1: laborious process. They had to actually machine these parts by
Speaker 1: hand and and try and put it all together, and uh,
Speaker 1: he kind of ran out of money before he ran
Speaker 1: out machine. The machine was not done yet, and um
Speaker 1: it was in the process of this whole construction phase
Speaker 1: that he got the idea for the analytical machine, which
Speaker 1: was even more ambitious than the difference yes engine. Right.
Speaker 1: So the analytical engine was going to be uh more
Speaker 1: complex and be able to do more than the difference engine,
Speaker 1: which you could kind of say was essentially a giant calculator.
Speaker 1: The analytical engine was more like a very primitive computer. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and as a matter of fact that at that time,
Speaker 1: that whole time thing, the fact that was taking a
Speaker 1: long time to build, did not help him when he
Speaker 1: was seeking funding for the analytical engine. Right. There were
Speaker 1: two things that two things that budd that kind of
Speaker 1: plagued him when he was trying to get some money.
Speaker 1: One was that he had not finished the difference engine,
Speaker 1: and that was kind of what he was being paid
Speaker 1: for in the first place. So his funders were saying,
Speaker 1: until you build this other machine you promised us several
Speaker 1: years ago, we ain't giving you no more money. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then the other part of they probably did. They
Speaker 1: probably said with an English accent, So that's probably until
Speaker 1: you go and fish daddy, we ain't given you no
Speaker 1: more money. Uh. They're apparently all glad, apparently apparently all
Speaker 1: played by Dick van Dyke. So um anyway, at any rate,
Speaker 1: so the sammage is in a tight spot. But he
Speaker 1: comes up with this idea of the analytical engine, and
Speaker 1: of course he's very passionate about it, so he's blabbering
Speaker 1: on and on about it at parties. Yes, then you
Speaker 1: have young Ada Lovelace who over here such talk thinks
Speaker 1: this sounds absolutely fascinating, and not only does she think
Speaker 1: it's interesting, she immediately sees the potential to use such
Speaker 1: a device far beyond even Babbage is uh concepts s.
Speaker 1: Babbage is thinking, well, this would allow you to create
Speaker 1: an engine that would be able to generate the numbers
Speaker 1: that you would find in a logarithmic table, because until
Speaker 1: that point you pretty much had to be able to
Speaker 1: come up with those figures by doing the calculations all yourself.
Speaker 1: And these calculations were pretty complex, and it was easy
Speaker 1: to to make a mistake along the way, which would
Speaker 1: of course affect all of your figures from that point on. Uh.
Speaker 1: And he he just he was sitting down one day
Speaker 1: and he was thinking, what if I could What if
Speaker 1: there are a machine, some steam powered machine that could
Speaker 1: generate these numbers so I wouldn't have to and then
Speaker 1: I could I could generate them as far out as
Speaker 1: I wanted to. Uh, And I wouldn't have to worry
Speaker 1: about error because the machine would just be following the
Speaker 1: same algorithm over and over and over again. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: Ada thought of that, and she even went further. She
Speaker 1: said that you could potentially use mathematics to represent other
Speaker 1: things like text or images or even music. She had
Speaker 1: foreseen computers. This remarkable woman was able to look at
Speaker 1: this machine that really was meant to be able to
Speaker 1: run algorithms so that you could generate more mathematical figures,
Speaker 1: mainly in the in the pursuit of mathematics itself and
Speaker 1: things like number theory, UM, and she was able to
Speaker 1: see even grander uses, which to me is it's it's
Speaker 1: it's one of those discoveries that I just think before
Speaker 1: that time, no one had ever really even considered this,
Speaker 1: and then she just comes up with it just by
Speaker 1: looking at this thing and seeing its potential. Yes, it's
Speaker 1: that's where I'm like, Okay, this woman was way above
Speaker 1: and beyond smarter than I am. All right, stop geaking
Speaker 1: out for a second. Okay, I'm sorry, I will. I
Speaker 1: will give you a quote from her. As a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, she uh, she compared to Jacquard's looms. If
Speaker 1: you will remember we've mentioned that machine a couple of
Speaker 1: times on the podcast I Believe UM. This was a
Speaker 1: loom that was invented by uh Monsieur Jacquard, and UM
Speaker 1: basically made a lot of people unhappy because it used
Speaker 1: punch cards to automate parts of the weaving process. You
Speaker 1: could put in a pattern, a card for a pattern
Speaker 1: in the loom would be able to weave that pattern
Speaker 1: into the fabric. While she said, um, we may say
Speaker 1: most aptly that the analytical engine weaves algebraical patterns just
Speaker 1: as the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves. So see,
Speaker 1: there you go, there's that whole poetry thing she's you know,
Speaker 1: that's just in there. Yeah. Well, and and like I said,
Speaker 1: even if you even if you ignore the language, and
Speaker 1: Ada was very gifted with with words, just as she
Speaker 1: was with mathematics. Um, the fact that she could see
Speaker 1: the poetry in in math is again very phenomenal to me. Well,
Speaker 1: I meant that she was making connections between something that
Speaker 1: was completely, well not completely, but in wide in a
Speaker 1: wide way. It was, it was not very related directly
Speaker 1: to this analytical engine. Uh. Also you might notice, Um,
Speaker 1: she sort of foresaw the use of punch cards uh,
Speaker 1: to be used for programs. So she's already thinking in
Speaker 1: a programmatic sense. Yeah. Actually, U Babbage himself talked a
Speaker 1: little bit about punch cards when he wrote about his
Speaker 1: analytical engine. Um. Yeah, and in his sense. He was
Speaker 1: talking about the the use for punch cards for two purposes.
Speaker 1: And we've talked about this. Babbage also we we shouldn't
Speaker 1: we shouldn't know. He's leave him out of this amazing
Speaker 1: innovation as well. Babbage was also amazing in his ability
Speaker 1: to foresee the future as far as computers are concerned. Now, granted,
Speaker 1: his devices were all mechanical as opposed to electrical, yes,
Speaker 1: but they the principles of electronic computing are based very
Speaker 1: firmly on Babbage's discoveries. Um Babbage foresaw the use of
Speaker 1: punch cards using two different kinds of punch cards. One
Speaker 1: would be a set of instructions and the other would
Speaker 1: be would represent the constants or variables of whatever formula
Speaker 1: you're plugging in. Right, So one is the program and
Speaker 1: the other is the information that you plug into the
Speaker 1: program to get a results. Exactly same sort of thing
Speaker 1: that we see in microprocessors today. What Babbage was doing
Speaker 1: was was the the precursor to the micro processor. It's
Speaker 1: just his was a macro processor because it was enormous
Speaker 1: and weighed tons and tons. If he had ever managed
Speaker 1: to actually build it at the size of that silicon
Speaker 1: waver yeah, he never He never did build the analytical engine.
Speaker 1: He did, he realized during his lifetime that it was
Speaker 1: not going to happen, and I'm sure it was a
Speaker 1: massive disappointment to him. But they have been made since. Yes,
Speaker 1: there was one created almost like an art project in
Speaker 1: the early nineties, and um fun I think it's in
Speaker 1: a museum now, right, Yeah, Actually, I think I think
Speaker 1: there may be two. To be honest, I think it's
Speaker 1: one of the things that I ran across a mention
Speaker 1: of as I was looking specifically for information about it
Speaker 1: to lovel so I didn't follow it, but yeah, I
Speaker 1: think I think I saw that there were two in
Speaker 1: existence now that had been created just because you can
Speaker 1: and and Babbage actually wrote that the analytical engine would
Speaker 1: eventually contain an apparatus for printing on paper or if required,
Speaker 1: up to two copies printed out on paper, and that
Speaker 1: puts it ahead of the iPad. I'm kidding their software
Speaker 1: for that. It would have a means for producing a
Speaker 1: stereotype mold of the tables or results it computes, and
Speaker 1: it would have a mechanism for punching on blank pasteboard
Speaker 1: cards or metal plates the numerical results of any of
Speaker 1: its computations. So in other words, you would read it
Speaker 1: by looking at a punch card. You would find the
Speaker 1: results of whatever it was that you were trying to
Speaker 1: uh to calculate. And the his his method of designating
Speaker 1: a punch card was actually pretty simple. The each punch
Speaker 1: card had um had several columns of holes or or
Speaker 1: columns where you could punch a hole uh and ten rows.
Speaker 1: And if you punched the top hole, that would be
Speaker 1: a one. If you punched the top two that would
Speaker 1: be a two, if you punched the top three that
Speaker 1: would be a three. So this isn't binary, you see
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. Yes, so it was a very simple way.
Speaker 1: You would look at the punch card and you would say,
Speaker 1: all right, well the first number is a three because
Speaker 1: the first three holes are punched. That kind of thing.
Speaker 1: That made it pretty easy to read. But again, Babbage
Speaker 1: was just thinking in terms of numbers. Lovelace was the
Speaker 1: one who was thinking in terms of graphics, music, that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. And then Lovelace comes up with a
Speaker 1: kind of a test. She she writes out a program
Speaker 1: essentially based on Babbage's UH design for the analytical engine.
Speaker 1: Now this engine again did not physically exist at this point,
Speaker 1: in fact, that it never existed during his life and
Speaker 1: and and Lovelace predeceased Babbage. So Lovelace looks at this
Speaker 1: design and she says, you know what, let's just take
Speaker 1: one uh one mathematical algorithm, and I will design a
Speaker 1: program for this engine that would fulfill this algorithm. So
Speaker 1: she decides to create a program that would generate Bernoulli numbers.
Speaker 1: I would like to explain to you what a Bernoulli
Speaker 1: number is, Honestly, I would like to, but I'm an
Speaker 1: English major, and seriously, I looked at Bernoulli numbers. I
Speaker 1: looked up five or six different explanations, and really it's
Speaker 1: just a it's it's a level of mathematics with which
Speaker 1: I am not comfortable. So I cannot even explain. Um,
Speaker 1: they're generated through the through a simple algorithm, relatively simple algorithm,
Speaker 1: and um, Lovelace was able to create a program that
Speaker 1: would have generated Bernoulli numbers through the analytic engine had
Speaker 1: it ever been built. So I would say that, yes,
Speaker 1: you can call her the first computer programmer definitely. So um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I admit, it's been a long time since, uh, since
Speaker 1: I took calculus to more than twenty years now. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the Bernoulli numbers were named for Jaco Bernoulli, who published
Speaker 1: Actually the work was published after his death, was published
Speaker 1: in seventeen um and based on the and that was
Speaker 1: in the art I hope I probably am not pronouncing
Speaker 1: this right ours conject CONDI or yeah. Anyway, anyway, it
Speaker 1: was published by Mr Bernouilli, who was one of several
Speaker 1: in his family to work with math um. But the
Speaker 1: Bernouilli numbers are very very important because they can be
Speaker 1: used in a lot of different ways related to number
Speaker 1: theory and trigger a metric functions as well. But yes,
Speaker 1: number theory, I mean we're talking about a lot of
Speaker 1: pure mathematics here. Yeah, it's it's basically has to deal
Speaker 1: with the consecutive integers and and the way the sums
Speaker 1: of powers are calculated. Yeah, I read that, and um
Speaker 1: sure yea. Also, I should also point out before anyone
Speaker 1: writes in uh, he was not the first, He was
Speaker 1: not the only person to discover this principle. Well, I
Speaker 1: mean this is a time of people who were discovering
Speaker 1: things at the same time. Right at the same time,
Speaker 1: there was two different forms of I want to say
Speaker 1: it was a Japanese scholar who discovered it, and also
Speaker 1: his work was published after he passed away, and it
Speaker 1: was published in seventeen twelve, one year before. But they
Speaker 1: probably discovered it around the same time. Yeah, because this
Speaker 1: was actually almost ten years I think after Bernoulli's death,
Speaker 1: so it would have been back concurrently, simultaneous, concurrently side
Speaker 1: of time. I was sorry, that would have peditively redundant. Well,
Speaker 1: it's hard to say he was first, but they were
Speaker 1: around the same time, just as you know, in the
Speaker 1: immediately preceding years we have the calculus being conceived of.
Speaker 1: It's fast. It must have been a really heavy time
Speaker 1: for mathematicians. And uh so, yeah, I mean the fact
Speaker 1: that that Lovelace was able to you know, she she
Speaker 1: knew of course about this um the algorithm to generate
Speaker 1: Bernoulli numbers, and was able to program a you know
Speaker 1: this this is all more or less a thought experiment,
Speaker 1: because again nothing existed with which on upon which she
Speaker 1: could run this program. But she was able to create
Speaker 1: a program that would have generated Bernoulli numbers based upon
Speaker 1: the way that the analytical engine would have worked. So
Speaker 1: the fact that one she understood this, which all by
Speaker 1: itself is pretty amazing to me because I mean in
Speaker 1: the sense that I find it completely incomprehensible too. She
Speaker 1: was able to write a program for something that only
Speaker 1: existed in theory. I mean, and and she had a
Speaker 1: lot of influence with Babbage. The two of them together
Speaker 1: really kind of shaped the analytical engine. And they would
Speaker 1: find errors in each other's work. So it wasn't like
Speaker 1: like Babbage would make mistakes because he's human and Lovelace
Speaker 1: would find them. And sometimes love Lace would make mistakes
Speaker 1: and Babbage would find them. They had a very long
Speaker 1: history of correspondence. Um. And also a web comic. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: we have to mention that the Lovelace and Babbage web comic. Oh,
Speaker 1: this guy's do a search on on the web for
Speaker 1: the Lovelace and Babbage web comic, because it is phenomenal.
Speaker 1: I think it's a it's a very playful, tongue in
Speaker 1: cheek tribute to these two individuals. But I think it's
Speaker 1: also you can tell it's it's made out of love,
Speaker 1: I mean that kind of effort to go into two
Speaker 1: and and it's great art, it's great writing. Um. It
Speaker 1: kind of picks up on the presumption of Lovelace and
Speaker 1: Babbage becoming kind of like a crime fighters using computational
Speaker 1: in the the the analytical engine to to defeat crime
Speaker 1: and solve mysteries. And what does sort of sound like
Speaker 1: the like it should be a Hanna Barbera show or
Speaker 1: something kind of, but the arts better. So yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it's really great stuff. I definitely recommend it. And you know,
Speaker 1: you know why we got these these emails so close together, right,
Speaker 1: why is that? It's because of Ada Lovelace Day. Ah. Yeah, Now,
Speaker 1: the very first Aida Lovelace Day was held on the
Speaker 1: March two thousand nine, and they had another one this
Speaker 1: year again March. And um, you can find information about
Speaker 1: Ada Lovelace Day on Facebook, on on the web in general.
Speaker 1: There's a Twitter feed for called finding Ada and Ada
Speaker 1: is a d A, so it's all one word finding Ada. Um,
Speaker 1: and they try and get people to sign a pledge
Speaker 1: to blog about Ada Lovelace and kind of increased public
Speaker 1: awareness of who this woman was and what she accomplished
Speaker 1: and how really amazing you know she was. And um,
Speaker 1: there if you look at contemporary records of Lovelace, Uh,
Speaker 1: it's it's a little for me, it's a little discomforting
Speaker 1: because it's it's almost dismissive. It's like she's amazing despite
Speaker 1: the fact that she's a woman, I mean, which is
Speaker 1: of course indicative of the the general philosophy of the era, right,
Speaker 1: but I mean it's you know, you I ignore that
Speaker 1: because this woman was just phenomenal, period, absolutely brilliant. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And uh, I should point out too that that's not
Speaker 1: the only time she's been honored, um, you know, and
Speaker 1: recognized for her work. Uh the As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: oddly enough, the United States Department of Defense honored her
Speaker 1: with her own program, own programming language in nine. So
Speaker 1: she's I think she's fascinating enough that she just sort
Speaker 1: of keeps popping up in history from time to time.
Speaker 1: People get fascinated and want to learn more about her
Speaker 1: and every reason. She's absolutely brilliant, lating anyone, anyone who
Speaker 1: has a computer science background has heard of her just
Speaker 1: from their their studies. But yeah, I can't help but
Speaker 1: feel that had she not had cancer, had she been
Speaker 1: able to to live on and continue her work, um,
Speaker 1: that possibly the era of computers would have come a
Speaker 1: little faster. Now it's the main thing that would have
Speaker 1: had to have happened was that the combination of Lovelace
Speaker 1: and Babbage's work would together would have to convince people
Speaker 1: to invest in completing the analytical engine. Um, because of
Speaker 1: course they didn't have the resources at their disposal to
Speaker 1: create an electrical computer that would still it would still
Speaker 1: have been a mechanical instrument, and who knows how sophisticated
Speaker 1: it ultimately would have been. It Maybe that her vision
Speaker 1: of of mathematics representing music and graphics and that sort
Speaker 1: of thing would take longer and possibly a totally different
Speaker 1: form factor than the analytical engine, but we might compute
Speaker 1: completely differently than we do now. Yeah, who knows. It
Speaker 1: could have been a very steampunk kind of a kind
Speaker 1: of future. Right. Well, I hope we did justice to
Speaker 1: uh to aid a Lovelace again, And if you want
Speaker 1: to know more about her as a person, definitely check
Speaker 1: out the stuffy Missing History class. Yes they do, they do.
Speaker 1: It's an excellent job. Yeah, we I listened to it
Speaker 1: before we did this podcast, and UH and and Katie
Speaker 1: and Sarah really do a great job at giving an
Speaker 1: idea of what her life was like, and especially her
Speaker 1: relationship with her mother, which was a very complex relationship. Um.
Speaker 1: And sometimes combat of but it's a it's an interesting story,
Speaker 1: kind of tragic ultimately, but definitely helps shape the way
Speaker 1: the history of computers. And since that wraps up that discussion,
Speaker 1: I thought we'd go on too a little listener mail.
Speaker 1: This listener mail comes from Johnny, and Johnny says, Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: I heard that Stuff you Should Know is making T shirts.
Speaker 1: How about we have a T shirt contest? Also, you
Speaker 1: said in your Microchip podcast that you guys were related
Speaker 1: to the Science Channel. What's going on here? Is there
Speaker 1: any other things that how Stuff works is related to?
Speaker 1: Thanks well, Johnny. UM. As for the T shirt thing,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't hold my breath right now. Stuff you Should
Speaker 1: Know is by far our most popular podcast, and of
Speaker 1: course has the the biggest audience, which is fantastic, great show. UM,
Speaker 1: And so we've kind of we're kind of trying to
Speaker 1: see how that goes before we do any other kind
Speaker 1: of T shirt stuff. We'll definitely keep it in mind,
Speaker 1: but I'm I'm not gonna I don't I don't see
Speaker 1: it happening in the near future. However, you did ask
Speaker 1: what our relationship was to the Science Channel. You want
Speaker 1: to take that one, Chris well, of course we are
Speaker 1: a part of Discovery Communication, right. Uh, and there are
Speaker 1: lots and lots of really awesome TV channels and websites
Speaker 1: related to that, like the Discovery Channel, Science Channel, TLC,
Speaker 1: Planet Green and well Planet Right and all those guys. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so sites like tree hugger dot com. Right awesome. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're part of a really big family. And that's
Speaker 1: what Pilette meant when he said that, Uh, the Science
Speaker 1: Channel was kind of related to us. We're all kind
Speaker 1: of under the umbrella Discovery Communications. So um, hopefully that
Speaker 1: answers your question. If any of you have any other questions,
Speaker 1: send them into us. Our email address is tech stuff
Speaker 1: at how stuff works dot com and Chris and I
Speaker 1: will taught to you again really soon for more on
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff
Speaker 1: works dot com and be sure to check out the
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