Turing's cathedral : the origins of the digital universe

Resource Information

The work Turing's cathedral : the origins of the digital universe represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Chelmsford Public Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Turing's cathedral : the origins of the digital universe

Title remainder

the origins of the digital universe

Statement of responsibility

George Dyson

Creator

• Dyson, George, 1953-

Subject

• Computable functions
• Computers -- History
• Random access memory
• BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY -- Science & Technology
• Turing machines
• Turing, Alan, 1912-1954
• Von Neumann, John, 1903-1957
• SCIENCE -- General

Language

eng

Summary

• In this book the author re-creates the scenes of focused experimentation, incredible mathematical insight, and pure creative genius that gave us computers, digital television, modern genetics, models of stellar evolution, in other words, computer code. In the 1940s and '50s, a group of eccentric geniuses, led by John von Neumann, gathered at the newly created Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Their joint project was the realization of the theoretical universal machine, an idea that had been put forth by mathematician Alan Turing. Their work would break the distinction between numbers that mean things and numbers that do things. They achieved unprecedented success in both weather prediction and nuclear weapons design, while tackling problems ranging from the evolution of viruses to the evolution of stars. This group of brilliant engineers worked in isolation, almost entirely independent from industry and the traditional academic community. But because they relied exclusively on government funding, the government wanted its share of the results: the computer that they built also led directly to the hydrogen bomb. The author has uncovered a wealth of new material about this project, and in bringing the story of these men and women and their ideas to life, he shows how the crucial advancements that dominated twentieth-century technology emerged from one computer in one laboratory, where the digital universe as we know it was born
• "Legendary historian and philosopher of science George Dyson vividly re-creates the scenes of focused experimentation, incredible mathematical insight, and pure creative genius that gave us computers, digital television, modern genetics, models of stellar evolution--in other words, computer code"--

Assigning source

Provided by publisher

Cataloging source

DLC

Dewey number

004/.09

Illustrations

• illustrations
• maps

Index

index present

LC call number

QA76.17

LC item number

.D97 2012

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography

NLM call number

004.09 D998t