My name is Linda. I write a bi-weekly newsletter about computer science, childhood and culture - and there are 9771 of you listening. If you enjoy this issue, please share it with anyone you think may find it useful. I’ve been thinking recently a lot about nature, technology and how childhood animism might give us an understanding of that which is considered different than we are. No activities this week, but a few favorite quotes from Sherry Turkle and Edith Cobb. Scroll down!
Inspired by your text. In fact, so much I hit reply to answer your first question.
Once upon a time, in the far-far away land of Londonium, there lived a young boy name Barles Cabbage. He loved numbers, in fact, he loved crunching them. He would crunch them affectionately like you might crunch your morning cereal. Numbers were his friends, so Barles decided to build them a home, a place where they could live and play. It would be a wondrous place, a place to where Barles could always visit his number friends and ask them questions. Because this was what Barles loved – he loved asking his number friends questions. So he went out and built the number home and called it the Difference Engine. Barles also had a human friend, her name was Ada. One day Barles showed Ada the Difference Engine and immediately Ada loved it. She saw the numbers moving around and playing, while she kept on asking them questions. Ada got so excited, she made up games for the numbers that would get them to play one game after the other, repeating them in different orders, and making the numbers move vigorously. Suddenly, much like a dance, she saw that the numbers could answer complex questions, as long as she put a lot of simple questions in the correct order. So inspired by how the numbers would not become tired of their dance, she exclaimed: "One day I will be able to compose music with this! Only the sky is the limit on what I can create with you!”
And so, that is how the computer came about. A home for numbers to move and answer all the questions we can think of asking them.
I've always been frustrated before when children think that the monitor is the computer, but you've made me think about this in another way. For kids the computer seems to be the interaction, or maybe the screen is the face, or perhaps the personhood of a computer.
Inspired by your text. In fact, so much I hit reply to answer your first question.
Once upon a time, in the far-far away land of Londonium, there lived a young boy name Barles Cabbage. He loved numbers, in fact, he loved crunching them. He would crunch them affectionately like you might crunch your morning cereal. Numbers were his friends, so Barles decided to build them a home, a place where they could live and play. It would be a wondrous place, a place to where Barles could always visit his number friends and ask them questions. Because this was what Barles loved – he loved asking his number friends questions. So he went out and built the number home and called it the Difference Engine. Barles also had a human friend, her name was Ada. One day Barles showed Ada the Difference Engine and immediately Ada loved it. She saw the numbers moving around and playing, while she kept on asking them questions. Ada got so excited, she made up games for the numbers that would get them to play one game after the other, repeating them in different orders, and making the numbers move vigorously. Suddenly, much like a dance, she saw that the numbers could answer complex questions, as long as she put a lot of simple questions in the correct order. So inspired by how the numbers would not become tired of their dance, she exclaimed: "One day I will be able to compose music with this! Only the sky is the limit on what I can create with you!”
And so, that is how the computer came about. A home for numbers to move and answer all the questions we can think of asking them.
I've always been frustrated before when children think that the monitor is the computer, but you've made me think about this in another way. For kids the computer seems to be the interaction, or maybe the screen is the face, or perhaps the personhood of a computer.