Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works, and I heart radio and I love
Speaker 1: all things tech and his time for another classic episode
Speaker 1: of tech Stuff. This episode originally published on May two,
Speaker 1: thousand ten, and I wanted to publish it today. On
Speaker 1: March eight two is when the republication date is because
Speaker 1: it's International Women's Day, and I thought what more appropriate
Speaker 1: way to celebrate International Women's Day than by celebrating one
Speaker 1: of the most remarkable women in tech history, Ada Lovelace.
Speaker 1: So this episode has the title was Ada Lovelace the
Speaker 1: first computer Programmer, which is particular regularly fascinating because she
Speaker 1: lived at a time before computers. Chris Pallette and I
Speaker 1: talk about Ada and you can hear how much we
Speaker 1: fell in love with her as we did our research.
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoy this classic episode. We got two
Speaker 1: requests in the space of a week, which is not
Speaker 1: a big surprise considering the the subject of this um
Speaker 1: this podcast, it's a listener mail rock blow Yes. So
Speaker 1: this comes from Bridget and Adam. So I'll read bridgets first,
Speaker 1: Bridget is from Australia, but I'm not going to try
Speaker 1: and do an Australian accent because whenever I do, I
Speaker 1: 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 Aida Lovelace,
Speaker 1: otherwise known as the Mother of Coding. I've done a
Speaker 1: little search 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 jan, 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 you 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 she wrote
Speaker 1: a programmer. That's been a long week. Well, we're gonna
Speaker 1: do this on Friday. Actual clearly not, but we're going
Speaker 1: to tell you how she wrote a computer program. First
Speaker 1: of all, Bridget I'm going to get this all the way.
Speaker 1: First of all, congratulations on your child, Um, and also
Speaker 1: Aida is more than worthy, I would say. In fact,
Speaker 1: I kind of fell in love with this lady the
Speaker 1: more I read about her. Actually her first name was
Speaker 1: an Aida. No, it was Augusta Augusta Ada Byron. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Augusta Ada Byron, daughter of Lord Byron the poet. Yes.
Speaker 1: She was born December eighteen fifteen, the daughter of Lord
Speaker 1: George Gordon Byron and Annabella Millbank Byron. Um. Actually, your
Speaker 1: parents married on the second of January and eighteen fifteen,
Speaker 1: but were separated by January six, eighteen sixteen. YEA, so
Speaker 1: the marriage lasted a full year and a week and
Speaker 1: a half, just long enough to uh to have the
Speaker 1: first computer programmer born to them, right, Um, so yes,
Speaker 1: they're they're marriage was not a happy one. Her parents
Speaker 1: and uh. In fact, um young Ada was never to meet.
Speaker 1: Her father was separated. Um, she lived with her mom,
Speaker 1: and her mom had decided that Aida did not really
Speaker 1: need to have the distractions of poetry. She thought that
Speaker 1: Byron's rather unpredictable personality let's call it that showy um
Speaker 1: was due to his romanticism and his obsession with poetry. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's just and and Annabella. The mother felt that the
Speaker 1: that such qualities were not really admirable. She didn't want
Speaker 1: her daughter to have the same sort of personality and
Speaker 1: uh and and wanting lifestyle as the father did had
Speaker 1: so um, so she thought, well, what's the least poetic
Speaker 1: thing I can push my daughter into. I happen to
Speaker 1: be an amateur mathematician. Let's push her into mathematics. Yeah. Actually, uh.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, I found out that Lord
Speaker 1: Byron had referred to his very brief married married wife. Um,
Speaker 1: he called Annabella the Princess of parallelograms. Yes, that was
Speaker 1: a lot poetic. It was not meant to be a compliment, nonetheless,
Speaker 1: but 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 wonderful, wonderful title given to
Speaker 1: her by by Charles Babbage, who will will discuss at
Speaker 1: 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: the subject of 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 UM. 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 expressed 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? Well, the first
Speaker 1: William King who was who was her tutor? I found
Speaker 1: that I found this interesting. I mean the two different
Speaker 1: William Kings. Well, no, actually I did mean I did
Speaker 1: mean her future husband. But it was really funny because
Speaker 1: it confused me for a second when I was doing
Speaker 1: the research. I said, William King was her tutor, and
Speaker 1: then it turns out there was a William King, not
Speaker 1: the one she married, as her tutor, who was apparently
Speaker 1: immediately feeling out of his depth as he talked to her.
Speaker 1: He realized that she had a much more innate grasp
Speaker 1: of mathematics than he did, so he he actually bowed
Speaker 1: out very quickly. He was one of the many many
Speaker 1: But yeah, less than a year later, apparently he uh
Speaker 1: ad married the other William King, who um was the
Speaker 1: eighth Baron King and was an earl, made an earl
Speaker 1: in ninety eight, so that's when she became eighteen thirty eight, dude, Sorry, 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: he 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 us 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. Right.
Speaker 1: Uh so, but during that her life she ended up
Speaker 1: encountering lots of remarkable people, including you know, like the
Speaker 1: author of Charles Dickens, who became a close friend. One
Speaker 1: of her other friends was Charles Babbage. Yeah, she met
Speaker 1: she met Babbage, who was the Leucassian professor of mathematics
Speaker 1: at Cambridge. She met him when she was just seventeen. Um,
Speaker 1: which is a pretty interesting eighteen thirty three was it
Speaker 1: went around when that happened. Chris and I have more
Speaker 1: to say about Ada Lovelace in just a moment, But
Speaker 1: first let's take a quick break. Should we get into
Speaker 1: the the time when she was talking at a party
Speaker 1: Babbage about this new machine Um, he had come up
Speaker 1: with this thing, the analytical Engine. Yes, all right, well
Speaker 1: let's let's backtrack just a touch before we get into
Speaker 1: the analytical Engine. That was not the first machine that
Speaker 1: Babbage had proposed. No, no, not at all. As a
Speaker 1: matter 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, Babbage 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, it was different
Speaker 1: from the other one, right, it was a little more
Speaker 1: simplistic than his idea for the analytical engine. Right now.
Speaker 1: The Difference Engine, he managed to get some money to
Speaker 1: fund it, but his the process of building it was
Speaker 1: a very long, laborious process. They had to actually machine
Speaker 1: these parts by hand and and try and it all together.
Speaker 1: And uh, he kind of ran out of money before
Speaker 1: he ran out of machine. Machine was not done yet.
Speaker 1: And um it was in the process of this whole
Speaker 1: construction phase that he got the idea for the analytical machine,
Speaker 1: which was even more ambitious than the difference 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, right.
Speaker 1: The analytical engine was more like a very primitive computer.
Speaker 1: And as a matter of fact that at that time,
Speaker 1: that whole time thing, the fact that it was taking
Speaker 1: a long time to build, did not help him when
Speaker 1: he was seeking funding for the analytical engine. Right. There
Speaker 1: were two things that two things that budd that kind
Speaker 1: of 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 given you no more money. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And then the other part of they probably did say
Speaker 1: like that out They probably said with an English accents,
Speaker 1: that's probably till you go and fish daddy, we ain't
Speaker 1: given you no more money. They're apparently all glad, apparently
Speaker 1: apparently all played by Dick van Dyke. So anyway, at
Speaker 1: any rate, so Sabbage is in a tight spot. But
Speaker 1: he comes up with this idea of the analytical engine,
Speaker 1: and of course he's very passionate about it, so he's
Speaker 1: blabbering on and on about it at parties. Yes, then
Speaker 1: you have young Ada Lovelace, who overhears 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. Sabbage
Speaker 1: is thinking, well, this would allow you to create an
Speaker 1: engine that would be able to generate the numbers that
Speaker 1: you would find in a logarithmic table. Yes, 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 make a mistake along the way, which would of
Speaker 1: 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 would
Speaker 1: had foreseen computers. This remarkable woman was able to look
Speaker 1: at this machine that really was meant to be able
Speaker 1: to run algorithms so that you could generate more mathematical
Speaker 1: figures mainly in the in the pursuit of mathematics itself
Speaker 1: and things like number theory, um, and she was able
Speaker 1: to see even grander uses, which to me is it's
Speaker 1: it's it's one of those discoveries that I just think
Speaker 1: before 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 geeking
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 h she compared to to Jacquard's looms
Speaker 1: if you will remember we've mentioned that machine a couple
Speaker 1: of times on the podcast. I believe, Um, this was
Speaker 1: a loom that was invented by uh Monsieur Jacquard and
Speaker 1: basically made a lot of unhappy because it used punch
Speaker 1: cards to automate parts of the weaving process. You could
Speaker 1: put in a pattern, a card for a pattern, and
Speaker 1: the loom would be able to weave that pattern into
Speaker 1: the fabric. While she said, um, we may say most
Speaker 1: aptly that the analytical engine weaves algebraical patterns just as
Speaker 1: the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves. So see, there
Speaker 1: 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 and 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, Babbage himself talked a little
Speaker 1: bit about punch cards when he wrote about his analytical engine. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and in his sense he was talking about the the
Speaker 1: use for punch cards for two purposes. And we've talked
Speaker 1: about this. Babbage also we we shouldn't we shouldn't know.
Speaker 1: He's leave him out of this amazing innovation as well.
Speaker 1: Babbage was also amazing in his ability to foresee the
Speaker 1: future as far as computers are concerned. Now, granted, his
Speaker 1: devices were all mechanical as opposed to electrical, Yes, but
Speaker 1: they the principles of electronic computing are based very firmly
Speaker 1: on Babbage's discoveries. Um. Babbage foresaw the use of punch
Speaker 1: cards using a few 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 variables of whatever formula you're
Speaker 1: plugging in. Right, So one is the program and the
Speaker 1: other is the information that you plug into the program
Speaker 1: to get a result. Exactly the 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 wafer, yeah,
Speaker 1: he never. He never did build the analytical engine. He
Speaker 1: did he realized during his lifetime that it was not
Speaker 1: going to happen, and I'm sure it was a massive
Speaker 1: 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 the mention
Speaker 1: of as I was looking specifically for information about it
Speaker 1: to love life, so I didn't follow it, but yeah,
Speaker 1: I think I think I saw that there were two
Speaker 1: in existence now that had been created just because you
Speaker 1: can and and Babbage actually wrote that the analytical engine
Speaker 1: would eventually contain an apparatus for printing on paper or
Speaker 1: if required, up to two copies printed out on paper
Speaker 1: ahead of the iPad. I'm kidding their software for that.
Speaker 1: It would have a means for producing a stereotype mold
Speaker 1: of the tables or results it computes, and it would
Speaker 1: have a mechanism for punching on blank pasteboard cards or
Speaker 1: metal plates the numerical results of any of its computations. So,
Speaker 1: in other words, you would read it by looking at
Speaker 1: a punch card. You would find the results of whatever
Speaker 1: it was that you were trying to uh to calculate,
Speaker 1: and the his his method of designating a punch card
Speaker 1: was actually pretty simple. But each punch card had um
Speaker 1: had several columns of holes or columns where you could
Speaker 1: punch a hole and ten rows. And if you punched
Speaker 1: the top hole, that would be a one. If you
Speaker 1: punched the top two that would be a two, If
Speaker 1: you punch the top three that would be a three.
Speaker 1: So this isn't binary, you see what I'm saying. Yes,
Speaker 1: So it was a very simple way. You would look
Speaker 1: at the punch card and you would say, all right,
Speaker 1: well the first number is a three because the first
Speaker 1: three holes are punched. That kind of thing that made
Speaker 1: it pretty easy to read. Yes, But again Babbage was
Speaker 1: just thinking in terms of numbers. Love Lace was the
Speaker 1: one who was thinking in terms of graphics, music, that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. We have a bit more to say
Speaker 1: about the enchantress of numbers, but before we get into that,
Speaker 1: let's take another quick break. Lovelace comes up with a
Speaker 1: kind of a test. She she writes out of program
Speaker 1: essentially based on Babbage's uh design for the analytical engine. Now,
Speaker 1: 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 no, seriously, I looked at Bernoulli numbers.
Speaker 1: I looked up five or six different explanations, and really
Speaker 1: it's just a it's a it's a level of mathematics
Speaker 1: with which I am not comfortable. So I cannot even
Speaker 1: explain um. They're generated through the through a simple algorithm,
Speaker 1: relatively simple algorithm, and um, Lovelace was able to create
Speaker 1: a program that would have generated Bernoulli numbers through the
Speaker 1: analytic engine had it ever been built. So I would
Speaker 1: say that, yes, you can call her the first computer
Speaker 1: programmer definitely. So um, yeah, it's I admit it's been
Speaker 1: a long time since, uh, since I took calculus to
Speaker 1: more than twenty years now. But yeah, the Bernoulli numbers
Speaker 1: were named for Jaco Bernoulli, who published actually the work
Speaker 1: was published after his death. It was published in seventeen thirteen,
Speaker 1: um and based on the and that was in the
Speaker 1: art I hope I probably am not pronouncing this right
Speaker 1: ours knjak Condi or yeah, anyway, anyway, it was published
Speaker 1: by Mr Bernoulli, who was one of several in his
Speaker 1: family to work with math um. But the Bernoulli numbers
Speaker 1: are very very important because they can be used in
Speaker 1: a lot of different ways related to number theory and
Speaker 1: triggonometric functions as well. But yes, number theory, I mean
Speaker 1: we're talking about a lot of pure mathematics here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's basically has to deal with the consecutive integers
Speaker 1: and and the way the sums of powers are calculated. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I read that, and um sure ye. Also I should
Speaker 1: also point out before anyone writes in uh, he was
Speaker 1: not the first, He was not the only person to
Speaker 1: discover this principle. Well, I mean this is a time
Speaker 1: of people who were discovering things at the same time,
Speaker 1: right at the same time. There was two different forms.
Speaker 1: I want to say it was a Japanese scholar who
Speaker 1: discovered it, and also his work was published after he
Speaker 1: passed away, and it was published in seventeen twelve, one
Speaker 1: year before. But they probably discovered it around the same time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because this was actually almost ten years I think after
Speaker 1: Bernoulli's death, so it would have been back concurrently, simultaneous,
Speaker 1: concurrently sign I was sorry that would have been rely redundant. Well,
Speaker 1: it's hard to say he was first, but they were
Speaker 1: around the same time. I'm just as you know, in
Speaker 1: the 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. Oh sure, and uh so yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: the fact that that Lovelace was able to you know,
Speaker 1: she she knew of course about this um the algorithm
Speaker 1: to generate Bernoulli numbers and was able to program a
Speaker 1: You know this this is all more or less a
Speaker 1: thought experiment, because again, nothing existed with which upon which
Speaker 1: she could run this program. But she was able to
Speaker 1: create a program that would have generated Bernoulli numbers based
Speaker 1: upon the way that the analytical engine would have worked.
Speaker 1: So the fact that one she understood this, which all
Speaker 1: by itself is pretty amazing to me, because I mean
Speaker 1: in the sense that I find it completely incomprehensible. Too.
Speaker 1: She was able to write a program for something that
Speaker 1: only existed in theory, I mean, and and she had
Speaker 1: a lot of influence with Babbage. The two of them
Speaker 1: together really kind of shaped the analytical engine, and they
Speaker 1: would find errors into each other's work. So it wasn't
Speaker 1: like like Babbage would make mistakes because he's human and
Speaker 1: Lovelace would find them. And sometimes Lovelace 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.
Speaker 1: Oh this, guys, do a search on on the web
Speaker 1: for 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 analytical engine to to deffe eat crime and
Speaker 1: solve mysteries and what those sort of sound like, the
Speaker 1: like it should be a Hanna Barberi show or something
Speaker 1: kind of, but the arts better. So yeah, no, it's
Speaker 1: really great stuff. I definitely recommended. And you know, you
Speaker 1: know why we got these these emails so close together, right,
Speaker 1: why is that? It's because of it a 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 you can find information about Ada
Speaker 1: 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, I ignore that because
Speaker 1: this woman was just phenomenal period, absolutely brilliant. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: And I should point out to that that's not the
Speaker 1: only time she's been honored, um, you know, and recognized
Speaker 1: 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. Lay 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 may be that her
Speaker 1: vision of of mathematics representing music and graphics and that
Speaker 1: sort of thing would take longer and possibly a totally
Speaker 1: different form factor than the analytical engine. But we might
Speaker 1: compute completely differently than we do now. Yeah, who knows.
Speaker 1: It could have been a very steampunk kind of a
Speaker 1: kind of future. Right. Well, I hope we did justice
Speaker 1: to uh Ada Lovelace again, And if you want to
Speaker 1: know more about her as a person, definitely check out
Speaker 1: the stuff you missed in history class. Yes, they do,
Speaker 1: they do. It's an excellent job. Yeah, we I listened
Speaker 1: to it before we did this podcast, and uh and
Speaker 1: and Katie and Sarah really do a great job at
Speaker 1: giving an idea of what her life was like, and
Speaker 1: especially her relationship with her mother, which was a very
Speaker 1: complex relationship. Um and sometimes combative, but it's a it's
Speaker 1: an interesting story, kind of tragic ultimately, but definitely helps
Speaker 1: shape the way the history of computers. And that wraps
Speaker 1: up this classic episode of tech Stuff. I hope you
Speaker 1: enjoyed it. If you really like the story of Ada Lovelace,
Speaker 1: you gotta check out our store over at t public
Speaker 1: dot com slash tech stuff. We have the code like
Speaker 1: a Girl T shirt that has Ada Lovelace on The
Speaker 1: shirt has an illustration of Ada Lovelace. It's one of
Speaker 1: my favorite shirts. Um. I own a couple of them.
Speaker 1: In fact, I bought them. In fact, I loved it
Speaker 1: so much I would have purchased it. Didn't tell anyone,
Speaker 1: and then everyone said, hey, we could have sent you
Speaker 1: a version of that if you wanted, but no, I
Speaker 1: I really felt like that was something important. And uh,
Speaker 1: I love that particular shirt. You should go check that out.
Speaker 1: Even if you don't buy one, go at least take
Speaker 1: a look at it, because I'm really proud of that
Speaker 1: particular product. If you guys have any suggestions for future
Speaker 1: episodes of tech Stuff, send me an email. The address
Speaker 1: is tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com. Don't
Speaker 1: forget to visit our website that's over at tech stuff
Speaker 1: podcast dot com. You can find us on social media
Speaker 1: over there as well, and I'll talk to you again
Speaker 1: and really soon for more on this and thousands of
Speaker 1: other topics, because at how stuff works dot com you