It's a good story about an interesting guy. There is a follow up.
Posted on 08/19/2012 8:59:05 PM PDT by djone
The old man turned back at his coffee, took a sip, and then looked back at me.... “In fact, I’ve done lots of things ....Oh really? Like what types of things?, ...All the while, half-thinking he was going to make up something fairly non-impressive....I invented the first computer.....Um, Excuse me? ..... I created the world’s first internally programmable computer.... It used to take up a space about as big as this whole room and my wife and I used to walk into it to program it.... What’s your name?”. I asked, thinking that this guy is either another crazy homeless person in Portland or legitimately who he said he was........“Russell Kirsch”
(Excerpt) Read more at joelrunyon.com ...
“You know Russell, that’s really impressive.”
“I guess, I’ve always believed that nothing is withheld from us what we have conceived to do. Most people think the opposite – that all things are withheld from them which they have conceived to do and they end up doing nothing.”
“Wait”, I said, pausing at his last sentence ”What was that quote again?”
“Nothing is withheld from us what we have conceived to do.”
That’s good, who said that?
God did.
What?
God said it and there were only two people who believed it, you know who?
Nope, who?
God and me, so I went out and did it.
Well then, I thought – as he finished showing me through the archives – I’m not going to argue with the guy who invented the computer. After about 20 minutes of walking me through his contributions to technology, he sat down, finished his coffee, glanced at his half-eaten pastry now-cold, checked his watch and announced: Well, I have to go now......[hat tip : instantpundit.com]
It's a good story about an interesting guy. There is a follow up.
I believe this happened and I believe Dr Kirsch has had guidance from the Lord in his work; I just don’t understand what God meant by that sentence Kirsch repeated. Is Kirsch trying to communicate that God will help us or let us carry out any idea we get? Because that hasn’t been my experience of Him. At all.
Incredibly cool and fortuitous story, though. The sequel, telling readers of the lessons he has taken from the encounter, is also valuable and full of wisdom. So glad this young man decided to be receptive to the elderly man who walked up to him in a coffee shop.
Read the comments at the site... They are so derisive that, some one who is old, could have something interesting to say, and might possibly be relative to them, is so far beyond their conception....I weep for our country.......
How cool is that?
I’m actually shocked that the first digital image was of his newborn son, because the truth is that as feeble as it sounds most of the inventions man has made had some thing to do with getting a better look at Womens bottoms....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKGK2fplV_w
At 58 I’m blessed to be collaborating on projects with an 88-year-old control systems engineer in Switzerland, an 82-year-old former nuclear plant designer in Florida, a 77-year-old ex-GE systems engineer in Phoenix, a 75-year-old developer of one of the original relational database systems, an 80-year-old who developed automated software to repair Y2K-challenged software back in the day, and a 76-year-old former protege of Frank Lloyd Wright. These old farts keep on doing great stuff.
Barbara Saunders says:[Underlining added.]
August 12, 2012 at 9:20 pm
Extraordinary people came out of the old education system. Extraordinary people come out of the present education system. Ordinary and mediocre people were and are the majority. I think part of the problem today as in the past is that non-conformers pay a price. Even people who claim to value creativity tend to habitually enforce conformity and extract that price. It is rare for people to brave enough to follow their own drummer – and to do so without letting bitterness and rebellion poison the well.
She hit the nail right on the head. All too many times, valuable non-conformity is frittered away in rebelliousness and bitterness. The people who moved the world in tech weren't bitter or rebellious; they were just plain enthusiastic.
I have to confess that I had, and have, trouble on this front. Whoever Barbara Saunders is, she's very wise.
I find it amazing that men who created these things did it with slide rule and hand drawn schematics.
When we used to cut and paste we literally had to cut a circuit from one schematic that was a failure and paste it into a new Save to save time and not redraw the entire circuit.
You literally got out an exactly blade and cut and pasted.
Then We used white out LOL
Now everybody takes cut and paste for granted
The first computer I worked on was the size of a large kitchen table, it had to be programmed in binary with paper tape and could only add subtract divide and multiply.
Truly, I think reducing the tyranny of numbers (Man hours) is a huge deal.
http://www.mathworks.com/products/matlab/
Excel is an excellent tool that is very powerful and reduces man hours.
Pivot tables are very powerful
Larry T was a friend of mine. He had a wry sense of humor, a rebellious nature and he smoked way too much - which finaly got him in the end. He was one of the masterminds at the headgates at Klamath Falls - when they turned off the irrigation water to the farmers.
He would call and say he wanted to show me something and I’d climb into his car and off we would go. Ome of those times was the second time the locals physically cranked open the headgates to let the water through.
When Larry died, the local grange held a memorial celebration of his life. There were several folks there none of us knew. When it came time to introduce themselves and say a few words. They told us that the Larry they knew was an inventor and a computer developer. He was right there when Steve Jobs and others were working in their garage. In addition to developing many complex military applications, he had been the principle developer of the ATM.
Never be too quick to judge a man by his looks.
For some time now, electronic man has known how ‘in principle’ to extend greatly his visual, tactile, and mental abilities through the digital transmission and processing of all kinds of information. However, all these functions suffer from what has been called ‘the tyranny of numbers.’ Such systems, because of their complex digital nature, require hundreds, thousands, and sometimes tens of thousands of electron devices.
— Jack Morton, The Tyranny of Numbers
I remember a college math professor telling the class that anything man can conceive he can/will achieve or some very similar words to that effect. At the the time engineering calculations were done with a slide rule and perhaps some other contrived method. Along came computers because someone wanted to get out of linearizing complex relations.today I was watching a TV program telling how a secret German WWII winged bomber was reproduced in the USA using some very intricate machining programs. I thought of the atomic bomb. These along with reflection on so many advanced methods for technology reminded me that humans can indeed produce when the mind and necessity are joined. For me I give tribute to the God of Creation that such things happen in due time.
Evidently, only one copy of my first computer to use, still exists.
“Surviving examples
One reason for a lack of surviving examples of early units was the use of radium on the dials. This in essence made them hazardous waste, and therefore these type were disposed of by the United States Department of Energy. Currently there is one surviving example of FADAC at the Fort Sill artillery museum.”
God shows us marvels every day and blesses is when he shows is how it works.
Dang Chinese Keyboard!
And when all is said and done, if God decides to vaporize this planet because people absolutely, utterly refuse to stop being crabs...
... then I say BRAVO, LORD!
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