
African American Women Worked as Some of NASA's First Computers - rhizome31
https://bitchmedia.org/article/african-american-women-worked-some-nasas-first-computers
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geomark
One of my undergrad math teachers once held a job as a computer. She liked to
tell the story of how she once spent about a week solving a complex integral.
The answer turned out to be 1. She said she felt both elated and kind of
disappointed.

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astrange
This is basically the plot of an Iain M. Banks novel. (Spoilers.)

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feral
I've read that novel. I think your comment, while clever, and admittedly a
little oblique, is still a major spoiler.

Why would you write 'spoilers' _after your comment_? Its probably better to
say nothing. Would you consider editing?

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reustle
I don't understand how people continue to expect that it is nearly their right
to not be spoiled about every book, movie, and so on. You're on the internet,
on a website with public comments. If it is such a big deal to not be spoiled
about an old book you probably weren't even going to read, then maybe you
should reconsider your browsing habits.

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downandout
There are smart people of both sexes and all races, and I always assumed that
an organization as focused on problem solving as NASA would employ the
smartest _people_ and ignore the discrimination that was all too commonplace
at the time this occurred. While I'm glad to see that my assumption was
grounded in facts, articles like this, in 2016, seem divisive to me.

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DanBC
> While I'm glad to see that my assumption was grounded in facts

Sadly, you're wrong. For years the route to become a NASA astronaut included
being a military test pilot. That position was not available to women, and so
NASA prevented women from becoming astronauts.

They continued to do so even when testing showed that women were at least as
good as men, and often better, and had other advantages. (Smaller, and thus
lighter, and thus considerably less expensive to send into space).

[http://history.nasa.gov/printFriendly/flats.html](http://history.nasa.gov/printFriendly/flats.html)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_13](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_13)

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downandout
I was just referring to the article. Apparently the "computer" position was
open to the best applicants, regardless of sex or race. You know, the way
things are supposed to be.

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horsecaptin
Pretty cool. They used to have a position at NASA whose job title was
"computer", which was typically filled by women. They would compute whatever
was necessary, and invent any tools they needed to make those computations.

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aaronbrethorst
The term dates back to the 17th century:
[http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=computer](http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=computer)

