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CS 273 Tentative fall 2016 lecture schedule (does not list the labs)

Date What you need to read/watch & suggested discussion questions W 8/24 McClellan chapter 1

1. What is the difference between technology and science? What was the extent of prehistori scientific knowledge? 2. According to the chapter, what were the major turning points in human prehistory? How di Homo sapiens and neanderthal differ from Homo erectus and Homo habilis? 3. What were some important examples of Paleolithic technology? 4. Why was there so little technological progress during the Paleolithic period? What where th living conditions during this time? 5. What was the role of art and astronomical observations? 6. Please comment on other prehistorical facts not mentioned in this chapter that you may ha learned or read elsewhere. For example, did early Homo sapiens have advantages over the peoples of today?

F 8/26 McClellan chapter 2 1. What defines the Neolithic period? Why is it significant? 2. What were some important tools or technology developed in the Neolithic era? 3. How did people's lifestyles change during the Neolithic period? 4. What is the significance of Stonehenge? How is it similar to other megaliths? 5. How has our perception or understanding of megaliths like Stonehenge changed over time? 6. What did you find most surprising or unexpected in this chapter? 7. How have humans changed over the last tens of thousands of years? In what aspects has there been no appreciable change? McClellan chapter 3 8. How did Neolithic settlements evolve into civilizations? 9. What kinds of technological achievements became typical in these ancient civilizations? 10. What types of institutions and governments were created in these civilizations? What wou you be doing if you lived during this time? 11. Which scientific subjects or scholarly endeavors were approached in ancient civilizations? How did these studies arise? Why were these subjects important at the time? 12. What do you find most impressive about the achievements of the civilizations discussed in

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the chapter? Which achievements would have a lasting effect for us today? 13. What is civilization? How do we find evidence of it?

M 8/29 McClellan chapter 4 1. Why was Greece a conducive place to study philosophy and science? What was the

comparative role of technology in Greece?

2. Discuss the contributions of these thinkers: Thales, Plato, and Aristotle.

3. How was the Greek approach to mathematics different from other civilizations before it?

4. Explain the Greek theory of the 4 elements. Where was this theory applied?

5. How accurate were ancient Greek scientific theories?

6. The chapter discusses various scientific accomplishments of the Ancient Greeks. Explain ho their ideas are still significant or influential in our lives today.

W 8/31 Cosmos: “The backbone of night”

1. According to McClellan and Sagan, what is noteworthy about each of the following? Thales Anaximander Theodorus Empedocles Democritus Anaxagoras the Pythagoreans [Socrates] [Plato] [Aristotle] Aristarchus Ptolemy 2. How did Greek science change during the Hellenistic period? 3. How would you contrast Greek versus Roman approaches to science and technology? What were their priorities? 4. Why did Greek and Roman knowledge become "lost"? Could our civilization today be similarly vulnerable?

F 9/2 Ascent of Man: “The grain in the stone” and “The hidden structure”

Grain in the Stone: 1. Why does Bronowski devote an entire episode to architecture? What is his message? 2. What is a city? What does it need?

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3. What are the lessons of Machu Piccu, 13th century cathedral building, and the Watts Towers? The Hidden structure: 4. What metals were used most in ancient times? What is significant about each? 5. What did alchemists achieve? In other words, what is their legacy? 6. In the 16th century, how did Paracelsus and Vesalius, in part, change science? 7. According to the episode, what do we learn about fire?

W 9/7 Day the Universe Changed: “The way we are” 1. How does James Burke describe human nature? 2. What examples does he give of rationalism? 3. What sort of institutions do we create? 4. Do societies have to change? Landels chapter 1 5. How were animals used in classical society? 6. Describe the three types of water wheels mentioned in the chapter. What were water mills used for? 7. Why could an industrial revolution never occur in classical times? What was missing? 8. What kind of sources does Landels use to discover what devices existed during the time?

F 9/9 Landels chapter 2 1. According to the ancients, what is wrong with leaving a tank of fresh water exposed to the elements indefinitely? 2. What is a typical gradient for drawing water through pipes from its supply? 3. Landels says that if you have an open conduit system, it is better to dig a tunnel through a hill than to go around it. Why? 4. Why were air shafts dug about every 100 feet in a tunnel? 5. What is the difference between a substructio and an aqueduct? 6. What were some disadvantages of the closed pipe system of carrying water? 7. A city would typically have its water supply split into three branches. What was the purpose of each branch, and which was considered most essential?

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8. How does Landels criticize the way that the Romans billed people for their water? 9. Did Rome have an adequate water supply?

M 9/12 Landels chapter 3 1. What are the 5 types of water pumps mentioned in chapter 3? Describe the appearance and function of each. Which ones are more suitable for raising water more than a few feet? 2. According to various water pump calculations, how much water can one person generally expect to raise one foot in one minute? 3. What can we infer when some engineering detail is mentioned in passing in a work of literature (e.g. a drama)? 4. What written sources does Landels refer to in these chapters? Who are the classical authors? 5. According to Landels, what remains unknown or uncertain about classical water technology? Landels chapter 4 6. Why did cranes require two ropes? 7. What made it possible for people to lift blocks weighing tons? In other words, what was incorporated into crane design to make this feat possible? 8. Suppose you want to use a crane to lift a heavy block. What are four techniques to grab hold of the load? 9. How were these cranes adapted for warfare?

W 9/14 Landels chapter 5 1. What were the requirements of a good catapult? For what specific purposes were catapults employed? 2. How did the belly shooter get its name? What can be propelled from it? 3. What materials were used to make a catapult? What choices needed to be made? 4. The second type of catapult was the torsion spring. What is the role of each of the following pieces: rope, arm, bow, frame, rod, washer, trough, slider 5. How big were catapults, and how were they kept in place? 6. What challenges were encountered in catapult design?

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How did the Greeks attempt to improve the device? 7. How was the onager different from other catapult designs?

F 9/16 Landels chapter 6 1. Why was shipbuilding more important to Athens than to Sparta or Rome? How can we tell? 2. What evidence comes to us from Homer about shipbuilding? Where else does information about ship design come from? 3. What techniques were used to strengthen a hull? 4. What were the two main types of Greek vessels, and what were the main features of each? 5. How were rowers positioned on board a ship? How fast could they row? 6. What amenities could be found on a trireme? What kind of wood was used to make a trireme? What were the consequences? 7. Demonstrate how precision was important in a sea battle. 8. What weather and navigational limitations on sailing existed in the Mediterranean at the time? Why is this significant? 9. How does Landels describe how to sail when the wind is not blowing exactly the direction you want? 10. What special maintenance issues existed for large ships?

M 9/19 Landels chapter 7 1. At what point do animals take over the human task of carrying loads? 2. Why were mules preferred over horses for land transport? How much could they carry? How fast could they go? 3. How were oxen used for land transport? How was using an ox different from other animals? 4. Landels gives two general explanations for why a technology does not exist or fails. What are they, and why does he bring this subject up? Landels chapter 8 5. According to Landels, what was the dominant ethos of Greek thought that dominated how they saw the world? What evidence do we have of this ethos? How did it affect their scientific progress?

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What is our ethos today? 6. How did Plato and his exponents advance this trend in Greek thought? 7. How did the Greeks measure time? 8. In his "Hydrostatics", how does Archimedes construct his arguments? 9. How did Archimedes compute the volume of irregular objects? 10. What does Landels say about Hero's use of the scientific method to explain the function of a siphon? 11. How did Greek philosophers compare the universe to a bowl of soup? 12. How did Greek doctors prescribe medications?

W 9/21 Landels chapter 9 1. In Hero's works "Pneumatica" and the "Making of Automata" what purposes are served by the devices he describes? 2. According to Vitruvius, what sort of education should an architect have? Why? 3. What does Landels have to say about Frontinus's management style? Nova: “Ancient Computer” 4. What numbers were important in the encoding of information in the Antikythera device? Why were these values significant? 5. How did researchers settle on a date and origin of the Antikythera device? 6. What questions about the Antikythera machine are left unresolved by the Nova program? 7. Before 1915, Furman like most colleges required students to take at least 2 years each of Greek and Latin. Why?

F 9/23 Test #1 M 9/26 McClellan chapter 10

Day the Universe Changed: “In the light of the above” MD Chapter 10 1. What was distinctive about European agriculture in the Middle Ages? How did this affect the structure of society? 2. What remarkable things happened in Europe in the 12th century? 3. What was the purpose of universities and learning during this time?

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4. How did European science begin to distance itself from Aristotle? 5. What are some pivotal events that foreshadow a later renaissance in scientific discoveries? 6. What significant technological advancements were made during the Middle Ages? Why were these important? Burke: "In the light of the above" 7. What effect did Augustine, Martianus Capella, and monasteries in general have on intellectual life in the Middle Ages? 8. How did Charlemagne seek to change education? 9. By the tenth century trade started to increase. What examples does Burke give for this? 10. Why does Burke focus on activity in Bologna? 11. What were the challenges in translating books discovered in Toledo? 12. In the 12th and 13th centuries, what was the effect of rediscovered knowledge?

W 9/28 McClellan chapter 11 1. If you asked people (1000 years ago) the difference between a star and a planet, what would they tell you? 2. What is retrograde motion? When does it occur? 3. How did Aristotle, Apollonius and Ptolemy make the case for geocentrism? 4. Who wrote the following works, and when: "On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres" "Astronomia Nova" 5. What time period is covered by the events of chapter 11? What was the general European approach to science and learning during this time? 6. How did Copernicus contribute to our understanding of astronomy? 7. Why is Tycho Brahe an important figure in (g)astronomy? How did he respond to the problem of the planets? 8. What are Kepler's laws? How did he discover them? 9. How did other people react to these astronomical theories? Cosmos: “Harmony of the worlds” 10. According to Sagan, how has astrology changed over time? 11. Where did Tycho and Kepler do their work?

F 9/30 McClellan chapter 12

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Ascent of Man: “The starry messenger” 1. What role did courts and academies have on science and learning in Italy during the Renaissance? 2. What astronomical discoveries did Galileo make? 3. Why did Galileo get into hot water with the Church? 4. What tactical errors did Galileo make? 5. What are Galileo's contributions to physics? How were his later ideas received? 6. What happened to science after Galileo? What was the overall effect of the Renaissance on scientific thinking? 7. According to the chapter, what can societies do to sustain scientific progress? 8. How might a scientist today suffer persecution?

M 10/3 Ascent of Man: “Music of the spheres” 1. What property of light was discovered by Alhazen and Brunelleschi? 2. How did Brunelleschi and Alberti change art? Consider for example Raphael's "School of Athens" (1511). 3. According to Bronowski, what mathematical concepts were introduced by Kepler, Newton and Leibniz? Day the Universe Changed: “Point of view” 4. In the 1400s how did sailors navigate on the high seas? 5. Why did the equator present a problem in finding a route to Asia? How was the problem solved? 6. According to Bronowski, what has happened to the concept of time? According to Burke, what has happened to the concept of place?

W 10/5 McClellan chapter 13 1. What were Newton's most significant accomplishments? Who else was doing significant scientific work during this time? 2. What had Aristotle claimed about projectile motion? What was Newton's argument about a cannonball shot from a mountaintop? 3. How did European governments get involved in science, circa 1700? 4. What technological achievements were mentioned in the chapter?

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How did these relate to science? 5. What was the role of the experiment in gaining scientific understanding? 6. What interests did Newton have besides calculus and mechanics? What did he believe about the universe? Ascent of Man: “The majestic clockwork” 7. What was Newton's personality? 8. What was the relationship between science and religion and the occult? 9. During Newton's lifetime, what was the reputation of science? Where did scientists work? 10. According to Bronowski, what important questions did Newton not solve or address?

F 10/7 Cosmos: “Traveller’s tales” 1. How does Sagan describe Dutch life in the 1600s? What is a fluyt? 2. What were the major accomplishments of Christiaan Huygens and Anton Leeuwenhoek? 3. Sagan takes us back to the day when he saw the first pictures of Jupiter's moon Europa. What is his message? Crabtree: “Electricity: its practical applications” 4. What was known about electricity and magnetism before 1700? 5. Describe the contributions of the following luminaries to the study of electricity: Volta, Gilbert, Davy, Oersted, Ampere, Faraday, Maxwell 6. According to Crabtree, what were the most important facts discovered about the nature of electricity? 7. What practical applications does Crabtree describe? 8. How did Galvani's work inspire biology? 9. What was Edison's most influential invention? 10. What did scientists discover about light?

M 10/10 McClellan chapters 14 and 15 1. How significant is the Industrial Revolution? 2. What examples do the authors give to show that technological innovation proceeds in non-linear, hard-to-predict ways? 3. What specific technologies were invented during this time? Who was responsible for them?

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4. According to Chapter 14, during the Industrial Revolution, what was the relationship between science and technology? How were scientists and engineers trained? 5. What sort of lifestyle and social changes took place during this period? 6. How did society in general embrace or criticize the Industrial Revolution? Find examples. 7. According to Chapter 15, what is the difference between classical and modern science? 8. How did "physics" come about? 9. How did our understanding of chemistry change during the 18th and 19th centuries? 10. What is the "classical world view"? 11. What do the authors mean by a "second" scientific revolution? What happened to scientific education and research during the period? 12. According to Chapter 15, what were the effects of applied science?

Lab Nova: “Lost at sea” 1. In our earlier lab, a 3 degree error was pretty good. If you are going to sail somewhere, how much error can you tolerate? 2. Therefore, how far off is it okay for your clock to be? 3. Why was a clock better than relying on the moon and stars to work out your position? But why were Newton & his cronies against clocks? 4. John Harrison is an early example of an ordinary person making a major

W 10/12 McClellan chapter 16 Ascent of Man: “The ladder of creation” Day the Universe Changed: “Fit to rule” 1. What makes a scientific discovery revolutionary or transformative? Would the work of Darwin be more revolutionary than that of Galileo? 2. How did Linnaeus, Buffon and Lamarck view the species of life? 3. What evidence was discovered in the 19th century that suggested the extreme age of the earth? What theories accounted for geologic changes? 4. What did Darwin and Wallace discover on their respective voyages? 5. What important ideas does Darwin discuss in Origin of Species? What evidence did he lack at the time?

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6. How were Darwin's ideas received by others? 7. Before 1800 how did people generally believe about the origin of life and how different forms of life related to each other? 8. How did Malthus inspire Darwin and Wallace? 9. Why was Darwin reluctant to publish his work? 10. According to Burke, how was the theory of natural selection applied to economics and political movements?

F 10/14 History of Science: “How did we get here?” and “What is the secret of life?” Here is a list of some people mentioned in the videos: Hans Sloane Georges Cuvier Buffon Robert Chambers Darwin Alfred Wegener Galen Filippo Brunelleschi Andreas Vesalius William Harvey Giovanni Borelli Galvani Alexander von Humboldt Robert Hooke Robert Remak Maurice Wilkins Rosalind Franklin Francis Crick James Watson 1. According to the narrator, what are some general causes of scientific change that we should look for? 2. Why were societies generally slow to begin the study of biology and the origin of life? 3. How was the concept of extinction discovered? 4. What was controversial in Robert Chambers' book? How was it a product of his time? 5. What was Alfred Wegener's geologic theory? How was evidence found to support it? 6. According to the narrator, how is geology connected to biology?

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7. When the narrator asks about the secret of life, what is meant or desired by the question? 8. What was Galen's theory of the secret of life? What was his evidence? 9. Which intellectual movements of the Renaissance affected the way scientists studied the human body? 10. How did Vesalius teach anatomy, and how was this different to how the subject had been taught in the Middle Ages? 11. What was William Harvey's discovery about blood? Why might it have been controversial at the time? 12. Why was the discovery of cells important to understanding life? 13. Why was Germany influential to the development of biology as a science? 14. How does the Manhattan project relate to the study of chromosomes? 15. Give an example of an important aspect of living things that was not mentioned in the videos.

W 10/19 Day the Universe Changed: “What the doctor ordered” 1. How does medicine figure into the history of the world? 2. In the late 1700s how did the practice of medicine begin to change in France? What was the difference between a doctor and a surgeon? 3. How were mathematical principles introduced into medicine? 4. How was the London cholera mystery solved? How could the analysis techniques be used to solve other problems? What did the city do to make sure cholera would not come back? 5. What were the major contributions of Crawford Long, Joseph Lister and Robert Koch? When and where did they work? 6. What is Benjamin Franklin's medical legacy? 7. What concerns does Burke raise about treatment and epidemiology?

F 10/21 Day the Universe Changed: “Matter of fact” 1. What is the purpose of information? 2. How have the following changed over time: a. how we ascertain facts b. how we organize information

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c. how we decide what information is significant d. how we find out what is going on in the world 3. Why was it common for monasteries to misplace their completed manuscripts? 4. What did Johannes Gutenberg achieve? 5. How did Church leaders make use of printing? 6. In the first century of mass printing, what kinds of books were in demand? 7. What effects did the sudden proliferation of books have on society? What was lost? 8. Burke mentions the idea of cross referencing. How does it work? How is it employed today? 9. Can you think of other institutions or occupations that came about as a result of mass printing?

M 10/24 McClellan chapters 17 and 18 1. According to the authors, what is a technological system? Why does the auto industry provide a good example? 2. In the early 20th century, what were the effects of large-scale technology and manufacturing? 3. How would you describe the changes in the automotive and aircraft manufacturing in the last 100 years? Has technology stagnated in the last few decades? 4. When did common household appliances, such as vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, washing machines and air conditioners become commonplace? How dependent are people on technology at home? 5. How did entertainment become an industry? Where is it going today? 6. Considering the large-scale industries described in the chapter, what ideas, values or agenda have emerged from them in the world today? 7. How did the classical world view of physics break down? How did physics and chemistry change? 8. What does the chapter reveal about the connection between various sciences such as geology, biology, chemistry, anthropology and psychology? 9. In your opinion, what are the most important (top 5 or so) scientific discoveries of the twentieth century? What are your criteria? 10. Do we understand the world around us fundamentally differently from how

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people did 100 years ago? Would today's science be comprehensible to an educated person of the 19th century?

W 10/26 Ascent of Man: “World within world” and “Knowledge or certainty” 1. What was Mendeleev's approach to classifying the various elements? 2. Bronowski points out that knowing an element's atomic weight says nothing about structure & behavior. What was the key to unlocking this mystery? Who worked on this problem? 3. How did atomic theory inspire art? 4. What idea did Boltzmann propose about energy? 5. How can atomic theory be seen as a sort of evolution? 6. What did Einstein and Heisenberg conclude about scientific knowledge? 7. What was Gauss' technique for estimating a scientific measurement? 8. Max Born said "I am now convinced that theoretical physics is actual philosophy." What did he mean by this? What problem was being studied at the time? 9. What scientific discovery did Leo Szilard want to keep secret, and why? What would you do? What sort of discoveries should be a secret? 10. Is it fair to say that Einstein and other scientists failed to stop work on the bomb? 11. According to Bronowski, what was the fundamental error of Nazi Germany?

F 10/28 Essay due Crabtree: “Modern machinery, its benefit to mankind” The second chapter in Crabtree is long, and you only need to find information on the historical development of the steam engine and railroad, not how all the pieces work. 1. How had printing progressed by the late 1800s? 2. Which inventions listed in Crabtree (pp. 25-37) do you think had the most significant impact on people's lives? Why? Crabtree: “Power, its production and use” 3. How would you critique Crabtree's definition of energy (pp. 40-41)? 4. According to Crabtree, when was the first steam engine produced? When did it become economically viable? When did it reach its maximum impact on society?

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5. How and when were railroads initially used? How did the public initially react to the technology? 6. At the end of the 1800s what were typical speeds of medium and long distance routes by rail?

M 10/31 Ascent of Man: “The drive for power” 1. Why does Bronowski call the Industrial Revolution a social revolution? 2. When people moved to cities, in what ways did their lives improve; get worse? 3. What major social or philosophical ideas emerge in the Industrial Revolution? Where would we find evidence of them? 4. Bronowski says the Industrial Revolution established the unity of nature. What does he mean? Day the Universe Changed: “Worlds without end” 5. Why does Burke bring up the subject of witch trials? 6. What is the story of Piltdown Man? What point does Burke make here? 7. What examples does Burke give of scientific views supported by the established Church that were contradicted by science? What had been the justification for the original theories? 8. Why are there conflicts between science and religion? 9. What does it take for a scientific theory to become accepted? 10. Which Eastern religious tradition does Burke illustrate? How does Burke contrast East and West? 11. What is Burke's overriding message in this video? How can we apply these concepts to other facets of life?

W 11/2 Crabtree: “Transportation, its relation to progress” Connections: “Fuel to the flame” In Crabtree, focus on these sections: Railroads: pp. 127-134 Urban transit: 168-179 On wheels: 180-183 Air ships: 192-196 On the water: 209-217; 220 1. Besides steam power, what other methods of propulsion were used or proposed for railroads during the 1800s? 2. For the period before 1800, what concerns does Crabtree mention about urban planning? How did the need for

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urban transit arise? (See pp. 168-169) 3. What types of rapid transit systems developed in cities in the 1800s? Which types survive to this day? 4. What essential inventions were needed to create a successful bicycle? 5. What is the most important message of Crabtree's chapter on transportation? 6. One method of historical analysis is challenge-response. How does Burke use this technique at the beginning of the video? 7. Burke points out that cannons with a manufacturing defect can explode. What particular defect does he mention, and how was it solved? Why is this important? 8. According to Burke, what were the essential discoveries and inventions needed to produce the automobile? 9. How did the automobile inspire people's leisure and imagination? What evidence do we have? 10. Why does Burke talk about Wilhelm Kress? 11. In retrospect, was Concorde a success or a failure?

F 11/4 Test #2 M 11/7 Crabtree: “Means of communication: telephone, telegraph, postal service”

1. What forms of long-distance communication existed before the discovery of electricity? 2. How long did it take for telegraph systems to go from the first prototype until the first commercial use? What was the cost of sending a message in 1844? 3. What problem did Guglielmo Marconi work on? What was he able to accomplish by 1900? 4. How does Crabtree criticize "the Marconi system"? See p. 538. 5. What were the challenges of linking Europe and America with undersea cables? When was the project completed? 6. As of 1900, what was the extent of the world network of undersea telegraph cables? How does Crabtree describe the effect of this network? 7. According to Crabtree, as of 1900, what were the main challenges to telephone technology?

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8. What other practical communication technologies are described by Crabtree?

W 11/9 Connections: “Eat, drink, and be merry” Needless to say, I don't expect you to remember Burke's entire train of thought. The whole point he raises in every episodes is that the next step in technological progress is often unpredictable. 1. Where is Burgundy? Why does Burke talk about the Duchy of Burgundy of the 1400s? 2. What was the Swiss "secret weapon"? How was it adapted in later weapons? 3. "An army marches on its stomach." How does Burke apply this idea when discussing Napoleon? What invention ensues? 4. What major considerations do you have when shipping food? 5. How does a thermos work? How is a rocket like a thermos? 6. How much more powerful is a Saturn V than a typical automobile engine? Why does it need to be so powerful? 7. From what you have seen/read, what was the most important factor that led to the success of the US Space program? Why did the Apollo program abruptly end in 1972? 8. What are the long-term effects of the space race?

F 11/11 Crabtree: “Photography and printing” 1. How did the camera obscura work? According to Crabtree, how did the camera obscura evolve into the camera? 2. When was Daguerreotype invented? What accident led to its success? What were its disadvantages? 3. When did photography begin to become used by many people? What early applications of photography does Crabtree highlight? 4. What other kind of imagery was produced near the end of the 1800s? By whom? 5. How long did it take for typewriters to become commercially successful? What was wrong with early models?

M 11/14 Crabtree: “Military art and science, the evolution of the materials of warfare” Connections: “Wheel of fortune” As usual, you can skip many of the details on how to make

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the various inventions described. 1. According to Crabtree, what is a common theme in the history of military technology? Give an example of his point. 2. Why does Crabtree talk about steel? 3. When talking about heavy guns / cannons used in the 1800s, what sizes were typical for the caliber of gun, weight and cost of shell, and the amount of blasting charge? See p. 393 4. What is the difference between a Shrapnel shell and an armor-piercing shell? When would a Shrapnel shell be preferred? 5. Based on experience with firearms over the last few centuries, how did people by the 1800s design bores and bullets? 6. What were some problems with small arms and rifles manufactured before 1800? See pp. 400-402 7. At the end of his section on firearms, Crabtree refers to the Gatling gun. When was it invented, and what were its chief advantages? Any disadvantage? 8. What convinced navies to abandon wooden ships? When did the switch to iron and steel hulls begin? 9. How were the Crimean War or US Civil War fought differently from earlier wars due to technology? 10. What is gunpowder? Where did it originate? What noteworthy alternative explosives were discovered in the 1800s? 11. What major inventions does Burke highlight in "Wheel of Fortune"? What does he say about how we have improved timekeeping?

W 11/16 Isaacson chapters 1 and 2 Connections: “Faith in numbers” We have reached the final unit of the course, which traces the history of the computer. In Burke's video 1. At what point did it become apparent that the culminating invention was to be the computer? 2. What precursor inventions were most influential in computer design? 3. According to Burke, what need did people have for a machine to automate certain tasks?

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4. What 19th century details does Burke omit? Chapters 1-2 in The Innovators 5. What were the main contributions of the people highlighted? For example: Ada Byron, Charles Babbage, Howard Aiken, Claude Shannon, John Mauchly, Presper Eckert, and Alan Turing? 6. What time period is covered by these chapters? What were the most significant obstacles or challenges did these people face? For what purpose did the earliest computers get used? 7. If you lived in the 1940s, how would you get involved in the computer industry?

F 11/18 Isaacson chapter 3 Please be ready to explain the significance of the following people, ideas and machines: Grace Hopper John von Neumann Alan Turing and the "Turing machine" Maurice Wilkes and EDSAC ENIAC EDVAC UNIVAC

M 11/21 Isaacson chapters 4 and 5 1. What time period is covered by these chapters? What specific aspect of computer history is discussed? Why is it significant? 2. What technical challenges needed to be overcome? 3. Who are the most important people and companies mentioned? What did they create or discover? Who collaborated? How did they get along? 4. What corporate cultures or business decisions does Isaacson highlight? In other words, what decisions did companies make that worked out well (or not)? Based on the chapters, what advice should a tech company take? 5. How did the events of the chapter affect everyday people? When did this start to happen?

M 11/28 Isaacson chapters 6 and 7 1. How did the first video game come about? What challenges needed

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to be overcome in its development? 2. What inspired Steve Russell and Atari? What did the company accomplish? 3. How were the following people instrumental to the development of the Internet? Vannevar Bush J.C.R. Licklider Bob Taylor Vint Cerf 4. What is the difference between circuit switching, message switching, and packet switching? Why does the Internet rely on packet switching? 5. Why does Isaacson draw attention to the PDP-1 computer; what was so special about it? 6. What problem did each of the following attempt to solve? When were they put to use? time sharing ARPANET TCP/IP 7. According to Isaacson, what political statement was, in effect, being made in the creation of the Internet?

W 11/30 Isaacson chapters 8 and 9 “Pirates of Silicon Valley” 1. According to Isaacson, what were the social forces or ideas that inspired the development of personal computers? 2. Isaacson describes many people in Chapter 8. Which are most instrumental, and why? 3. What technological hurdles needed to be overcome to produce PCs by the 1970s? 4. How did Paul Allen and Bill Gates meet? How did they get their start in computing? 5. What do Allen and Gates accomplish before founding Microsoft? 6. How does the Homebrew Computer Club annoy Bill Gates? Why was it a blessing in disguise? 7. How does Microsoft become a household name? 8. What conflict arises between Steve Jobs (Apple) and Bill Gates (Microsoft)?

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9. What is the philosophy of GNU and Linux?

F 12/2 Isaacson chapter 10 1. How did Ray Tomlinson create e-mail? 2. During the 1970s, what services were created as a result of the popularity of e-mail? 3. What was "The Source"? What services were originally offered in 1978? Who were its competitors? 4. America Online was created as a response to what problem of existing Internet providers? What legal issues needed to be overcome?

M 12/5 Isaacson chapter 11 1. What did Tim Berners-Lee accomplish, and why is this significant? 2. What was Mosaic? What were its competitors? 3. How did the Web get so big? As the Web has grown, what positive and negative features have appeared over time? In other words, what services or technological issues do we now associate with using the Web? You should be able to come up with at least 6 examples. 4. Was anything else not mentioned or downplayed by Isaacson in explaining the last 20 years of popular computer history?

R 12/8 Final exam 12:00 – 2:30