10 Feb
2015
10 Feb
'15
10:30 a.m.
On 02/10/2015 09:56 AM, Dave G4UGM wrote:
Just because Turing didn't build a computer doesn't mean he wasn't
the father of computing. The work he did defined both what a computer
is, and allowed us to divide problems into those which can be solved
on a computer, and those where the computer can guess the answer
enough times that it will eventually get it right.
The point is that a lot of people were responsible for the development
of mechanical computation (I include electrical and electronic in this
definition).
Turing didn't invent computation any more than Edison invented the
incandescent lamp or Shockley et al invented the transistor.
In fact, it could be argued that the ball-and-disc integrator was more
responsible for the eventual Allied victory in WWII than Turing's work was.
The problem is that history is written by the victors and worse, the
historians, each with his own particular agenda--and that nothing
happens in a vacuum.
Let's just say that conditions were ripe for the technological advance
in computation.
--Chuck