April 22, 2018 Sunday
Bedtime Story
Note A of Ada Lovelace - Part 15
Tonight we are continuing with the Note A
of Ada Lovelace and will be finishing it as well.
This note ends with a polite recommendation
to read the 1834 paper of Edinburgh Review which Ada Love lace feels would give
a better clarity to the mechanical workings of the Analytical Engine and would
be a useful supplement to the Menabrea’s paper which is a rather generalized
memoir on this engine.
“The Analytical Engine, far from being more
complicated, will in many respects be of simpler construction; and it is a
remarkable circumstance attending it, that with very simplified means it is so
much more powerful.
The article in the ‘Edinburgh Review’ was
written some time previous to the occurrence of any ideas such as afterwards
led to the invention of the Analytical Engine; and in the nature of the
Difference Engine there is much less that would invite a writer to take
exclusively, or even prominently, the mathematical view of it, than in that of
the Analytical Engine; although mechanism has undoubtedly gone much further to
meet mathematics, in the case of this engine, than of the former one.
Some publication embracing the mechanical
view of the Analytical engine is a desideratum which we trust will be supplied
before long.
Those who may have the patience to study a
moderate quantity of rather dry details will find ample compensation, after
perusing the article of 1834, in the clearness with which a succinct view will
have been attained of the various practical steps through which mechanism can
accomplish certain processes; and they will also find themselves still further
capable of appreciating M. Menabrea’s more comprehensive and generalized
memoir.
The very difference in the style and object
of these two articles makes them peculiarly valuable to each other; at least
for the purposes of those who really desire something more than a merely
superficial and popular comprehension of the subject of calculating engines.”
This is the end of the Note A and as you
can see for yourself, it was almost totally non-mathematical and largely
descriptive.
It made for an easy reading and gave a
rather decent introduction into the essence of both the engines and how the
second diverges from the first.
Yet Ada Lovelace herself points it out that
in order to understand both the mechanical and mathematical aspect of the two
engines it is not only desirous but also imperative the reader takes extra pain
to read further on his own.
You will surely not recall but on the night
of April 02, 2018 we had switched from Part 2 of Note B of Ada Lovelace to Note
A because in her Note B Ada lovelace had stated:
“In note A the practicality of developing
symbolical with no less than numerical results has been touched on.”
I had meandered away from the Note A since
I had to tell you a little bit about ‘story writing’ itself and how crucial
narratives are, specially the false ones, for our insignificant existence.
The false narratives that we tell ourselves
provide a reason to carry on with our very often miserable, pathetic and
meaningless existence, for if one sees the truth and gets enlightened, one may
probably take recourse to the path of a serious philosopher or if most sincerely
affected, then Siddhartha Gautama, popularly known as Buddha.
Stay tuned to the voice of an average story storytelling
chimpanzee or login at http://panarrans.blogspot.com
Good night mon ami and my fellow cousin ape.
Advertisements
Another great educator and a teacher that I am aware of is
Professor Subhashish Chattopadhyay in Bangalore, India.
While I narrate stories, Professor Subhashish an electronic
engineer and a former professor at BARC, does and teaches real mathematics and
physics.
He started the participation of Indian students at the
International Physics Olympiad.
Do visit him here:
All his books can be downloaded for free through this link:
For edutainment and English education of your children, I
recommend this large collection of Halloween Songs for Kids:
No comments:
Post a Comment