Archive for the 'Off-topic' Category

Babbage and Turing: Two Paths to Inventing the Computer

Posted on April 29th, 2021 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion, Off-topic

A younger me at the Babbage difference engine built by the Science Museum Success has many fathers, and so it is hardly surprising that there are numerous claimants to the title “inventor of the computer”. These include innovators like Aiken (constructor of the Harvard Mark I, 1944), Zuse (Z1, 1938), Atanasoff and Berry (ABC, 1942), Flowers (Colossus, 1943), and Mauchly and Eckert (ENIAC, 1946). But two men stand out, head and shoulders above all of them: Charles Babbage and Alan Turing. These two Englishmen invented the computer from scratch, but unlike the others, both failed to construct an actual machine.. Read more

Progress and Pig-Headedness in COVID-19 vaccination

Posted on December 29th, 2020 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion, Off-topic

Well, at long last we have a COVID-19 vaccine – many of them, of which two are FDA-approved – and a vaccination drive is underway, just in time for the new year. I just got my first shot! Edward Jenner vaccinating his son. Note the cow outside! Colored engraving by C. Manigaud. [Source] Here I want to share some thoughts and observations about the vaccine situation. Soon after the pandemic became a thing I listed in my newsletter some ways that this pandemic, or rather our war against it, is different from earlier historical ones. One way I noted was.. Read more

What I Do in my Spare Time

Posted on April 1st, 2019 · Posted in Off-topic

If you read this blog you know that besides helping organizations eliminate Information Overload, I lecture about innovation in the history of computing and curate exhibitions in science museums that deal with the history of technology. What you may not know is that my main hobby these past 15 years is collecting and researching items form the history of computing, which has informed these activities. You can see part of my collection on my hobby site, here. Now Lele Terenzani, IBM’s “Dr. Connections” and a member of the Information Overload Research Group’s steering committee, has interviewed me in a webcast.. Read more

Science education – what I learned in Sardinia

Posted on December 2nd, 2018 · Posted in Off-topic

Just returned from a wonderful trip to Sardinia, Italy, where I saw some cool things related to the dissemination of science education, so I thought I’d share. I was invited by FestivalScienza Cagliari to deliver a lecture about Alan Turing and the future of AI – in Italian, mind you – which was a challenge not to be refused. This I did successfully, drawing a lively interaction with the audience and a subsequent interview in the TV news journal – evidently the lecture made everybody think, as well it should, given where AI is headed. But while I was there.. Read more

Artificial Intelligence: Where We are and Where We’re Headed

Posted on September 24th, 2018 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion, Off-topic

These days we hear a lot about Artificial Intelligence (AI), but many folks I speak to seem to have little appreciation for what it’s all about – and why it’s so important. If you’re curious, here is my take on the past, present and future of this discipline. Where we’re coming from Artificial Intelligence has gone through a number of phases in the past seven decades. In the fifties there was the vision, articulated by Alan Turing, that the newly invented electronic computer will attain the capabilities of human-like thought. Then, in the sixties and seventies, computers became powerful enough.. Read more

Proofreading: an Art and a Parable

Posted on August 14th, 2016 · Posted in Analysis and Opinion, Off-topic

Taking on the formidable Murphy These days I’m working part of my time as the editor of Coller Venture Review, the journal of the Coller Institute of Venture at Tel Aviv university. An interesting job, where I get to interact with interesting researchers and experts around the world who write interesting papers for this interesting publication. And then there’s the less interesting – yet vital – part of the job: making sure everything in the printed journal is perfect and error free. In other words, Quality Assurance, which in this domain is called proofreading. As an engineer I’ve learned very.. Read more

Insight Article: How to Leave the Cube Farm

Posted on June 19th, 2014 · Posted in Off-topic

The move from a stable corporate job to a self-employed new career is complex both practically and emotionally, and when seen from the comfort of a cubicle can seem forbidding indeed; yet I’ve taken that step five years ago – and what a fascinating adventure it’s been! I experimented in many directions, won some, lost some, and figured out how to create value and deliver it for the benefit of my clients. My recent insight article, How to Leave the Cube Farm and Go it Solo, shares some advice, caveats and observations from these five amazing years. If you plan.. Read more

Hanging on to our Technology

Posted on January 9th, 2014 · Posted in Off-topic

We often comment on how attached we’ve become to computing technology,  how we’ve made it play a central role in our life – like electricity, like fire, like stone tools in earlier eras. One way to think of it is how lost we’d be without the technology; but another is to consider how resolutely we refuse to have it taken from us. Last month I had a glimpse into that… This December we had a major snowstorm that caused massive infrastructure damage leaving my home without electrical power for a few days and without our telephone and internet lines for.. Read more

Better Place is gone, leaving our world a sadder place

Posted on May 27th, 2013 · Posted in Off-topic

Two years ago I made a hopeful off-topic post here upon sighting a parking lot with charging posts for Better Place’s novel electric vehicle system. I titled in “The future is here!”. Today I made another sighting – I went into a gas station I haven’t been to before, and there was the wondrous structure you see in the photo – a robotic battery swap station for Better Place’s cars. A few dozen of these stations are said to exist around Israel, but this was the first time I saw one. Alas, I was a day too late to rejoice. .. Read more

CAPTCHA: A Wonderful Adventure in Exhibition Space

Posted on April 7th, 2013 · Posted in Off-topic

Somehow my career has repeatedly led me into doing unexpected and wonderful things. One such piece of serendipity has been the role I landed at the Jerusalem Science Museum as the curator of an exhibition in honor of Alan Turing. This project took a year and half, and gave me the occasion to work with some amazing people at the museum, interact with many more from around the world, and learn so much about that tragic genius, Alan Turing, of which I wrote here before. Now we’re finally done, and the exhibition is open to the public. It wasn’t my.. Read more