
Untangling the Tale of Ada Lovelace - lispython
http://blog.stephenwolfram.com/2015/12/untangling-the-tale-of-ada-lovelace/
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ericjang
I thought this was a wonderfully written account of Ada and Babbage's role in
modern computing. It was delightful to see how someone from Victorian society
would express the frustration of debugging:

 _I am in much dismay at having got into so amazing a quagmire & botheration
with these Numbers, that I cannot possibly get the thing done today. …. I am
now going out on horseback. Tant mieux_

Stephen Wolfram does add a few self-congratulatory remarks, but by and large
it didn't really bother me for this article. Perhaps this is all part of some
grand scheme to inflate his own work, but I learned a lot of history reading
the article that I might not otherwise have by researching it myself. I think
this piece was well-written enough to be taken at face value.

~~~
lucozade
I think I'll have a New Year's resolution to write quagmire in bug reports
where I would have written spaghetti.

Might be harder to get the impact assessment to choose from: crash, error,
incorrect function, botheration.

But I'll give it a go.

------
joeyrideout
I absolutely love the parallels between this story of Ada and Babbage and
modern startup dynamics.

Early on, "Babbage was slightly distracted in 1824 by the prospect of joining
a life insurance startup". Later, Ada "proposed to take on the role of CEO,
with Babbage becoming CTO", where the CTO in this case had a personality that
"pushed others away" and the CEO was a "Steve-Jobs-like figure who would lead
the vision of the Analytical Engine".

My favourite excerpt from this piece, though, hits home for us programmers who
prefer to automate annoying tasks. I found it hilarious, and will probably use
this quote in my next commit message: _Babbage is said to have exclaimed, “I
wish to God these tables had been made by steam!”—and began his lifelong
effort to mechanize the production of tables._

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unlimitedbacon
There is an excellent webcomic called The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and
Babbage, that describes what would have happened if they had successfully
completed the Analytical Engine and gone on to fight crime.
[http://sydneypadua.com/2dgoggles/](http://sydneypadua.com/2dgoggles/)

More impressive than the comic itself is the amount of research put into it
and the footnotes that go along with it. The author often takes inspiration
directly from primary sources. For instance, a whole series on Babbage's
strange hatred of street musicians.

~~~
jordigh
I am a very happy owner of a print copy of the comic, and I recommend it at
every opportunity possible:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thrilling_Adventures_of_Lo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thrilling_Adventures_of_Lovelace_and_Babbage)

It is an amazing work of art and scholarship. It's so much fun. It is indeed
thrilling to imagine Ada as an accomplished horsewoman and lady of adventure,
wrangling engines both within and without. In one of the stories, she's
something of a parkour artist running through the gears of the difference
engine. And it's all full of footnotes to primary sources that explain more
about her actual life.

I find it more fun to read than Wolfram's blog post. Certainly more fun than,
"in apparent resonance with some of my own work 150 years later, he talks
about the relationship between mechanical processes, natural laws and free
will."

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JorgeGT
_But back in 1826 Babbage had invented something he called Mechanical
Notation—that was intended to provide a symbolic representation for the
operation of machinery. [...] Undoubtedly people didn’t understand it._

So, Babbage invented VHDL?

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Houshalter
This is really well written and researched. I can't imagine reading so many
century old letters and papers.

The most interesting part of this was getting a glimpse of a totally different
society. Little details, like all these notable people that knew each other.
And how many of them published in widely different fields. Or their totally
different style of speech. Or how Babbage had 8 children, and all but 3 died.

------
tudorw
Is it okay to mention
[https://ideas.lego.com/projects/102740](https://ideas.lego.com/projects/102740)
?

~~~
AReallyGoodName
The certificate for that site has expired (assuming it's yours).

~~~
tudorw
not awesome! will tell them :)

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no1ne
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K5p_tBcrd0&feature=youtu.be...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K5p_tBcrd0&feature=youtu.be&t=2190)

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leriksen
It might be the lack of coffee and food, (I read this before breakfast), but
the mental image of a flower describing how it got watered kept popping into
my head - the flower can't decide whats more impressive, the watering can
containing the water, or the water itself. And in the middle of telling the
story, every now and then, the flower says "But look how pretty I am !!"

------
j2kun
I like history and particularly the history of computing, but given how little
respect Wolfram had with regards to the history of mathematical ideas that
preceded his own work (and then claiming credit for those ideas), how can I
trust any historical analysis he authors?

~~~
dang
Every Wolframy thread turns into the same discussion about Wolfram himself.
Let's not let that happen here.

It's enough that the article is Wolfram's attempt to decide for himself what
the story is. Idiosyncrancies aside, he obviously has the mathematical and
computational background to understand the material. The main obstacle is
putting in the time to understand it, which he did.

The article is replete with historical information, he explains why he
concludes what he does, and the result is an order of magnitude more
substantive (and technical) than any other Lovelace/Babbage article I recall
seeing on HN. I think it can stand on its own. The content is fascinating and
is what deserves discussion.

~~~
p4wnc6
I disagree strongly with this. Wolfram himself litters the entire essay with
asides in which he compares and contrasts his own place within science history
with both Babbage and Lovelace. If Wolfram wanted to write a neutral
historical account, he could have, but instead _he_ opened the door for the
continued derision of NKS-style pomposity by specifically tailoring this
historical account as if it too must serve to underscore his own career
efforts, which _he_ chooses to frame as longsuffering attempts to have his
work be granted the correct degree of awe.

Until he begins writing things in which he doesn't infuse that sort of ploy to
underscore so-called credit he perceives he should be given, I think it's not
only fair but highly useful to the community at large for criticisms of any
work he produces to center on these aspects.

The only counter-argument I could see would be if the historical content of
the article were so story-breaking and important that we should all put up
with the pomposity in order to consume the never-before-explained-as-well
historical side, but w.r.t. the history of Ada Lovelace and Babbage, that's
just not true, and there are many other historical accounts that don't try to
coyly shoehorn in comparisons to Wolfram products, Wolfram computational
achievements, or credit/recognition that Wolfram believes he deserves.

~~~
dang
Yes, I know about Wolfram's asides, tics, and shoehorning, as does everyone
who reads a thing he wrote. But the Wolfram Derangement Syndrome it provokes
in internet forum threads isn't interesting either. It's a mirror image of the
thing it is annoyed by.

We're not going to ban what Wolfram writes because (a) he's a good writer, (b)
however one evaluates him, Mathematica is significant, and (c) his best
pieces—which this is one of—are interesting. That's enough to belong here, and
I think we can expect HN to have the discipline to focus on the substantive
bits and resist the hypnotic pull of the trollish ones.

~~~
p4wnc6
Who is talking about banning what he writes?

