Computers Anaylsis pages 83-149

In the first section of our reading of Swedin and Ferro's account of the development of the computer, the reader was left with the beginnings of the first electronic digital computer, with progress until 1960. Swedin and Ferro begin this second part of the reading by accounting the creation of the Apple computer, more commonly known today as Macs. The founders of Apple, two Silicon Valley students, Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs, went on to earn an average of $300 million in sales in just 1981 (93).

Computer games also play an essential role in text's account of computer history. By 1982, computer game sales in the United States averaged $1.2 billion (103). The authors tell us how these games had originally developed from mechanical and electronic pinball machines.

However, it is more important for the reader to recognize the pervasive attributes of these technologies, and how these technologies are incorporated into our every day lives. In every developed nation, one is constantly surrounded by computer technologies. So much of our everyday lives are dominated by the accessibility and convenience of these technologies, that our modern culture is actually shaping around our use of these technologies. All around the world, there are millions of gamers that depend on their "fix" of computer based games for satisfaction. For a lot of them it is hard to realize what life would be like without these technologies around to support their daily lives. In the future, our culture will grow even more heavily around technology, and maybe even one day people won't need human contact, only contact via technology. Technology may be evolving how we live, and how we think...

Computers Critical Analysis (1-83)

            In Computers: The Life Story of a Technology, Eric G. Swedin and David L. Ferro provide the reader with an in depth account of not only computers but also the general development of technology for the computer age. For most technology-oriented persons before the rise of computers mathematics was the key indulgence. A British mathematician, Charles Babbage invented both the difference engine and the analytical engine (p. 13, 20). The newer and arguably more profound invention, the analytical engine laid the groundwork for the fundamental components of the modern day computer that we know so readily incorporate into our everyday lives. Later during the early 20^th century John Atanasoff and his assistant Clifford Berry developed a digital computer capable of solving a series of twenty nine linear algebraic equations with twenty nine unknowns. Although this invention does not seem so profound to the modern person, their development laid the groundwork for future computation inventions and helped establish the modern era of computers. Their computer will later be known as the ABC computer. During the 1960s, the computer age really started to boom and computers started to become more prevalent in every day life. The most notable development was of microprocessors by Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore. They would later found the company Intel.

            The history of computers, although may be a little bland in substance, is definitely essential in our understanding of our use of the computer today. Without those babysteps in development of those early computers, not only would we be deprived of a technology but also a culture that comes with it. So much of our modern culture is either created by technology or is helped spread by it. Our modern day society revolves around this technology.

Introduction

Hello everybody. My name is Alex Weintraub, I am a freshman here at Rutgers. I am from Westfield, NJ, a medium sized suburban town not too far away. My academic interests include history, philosophy, and french. Outside of the classroom, I enjoy playing video games (competitively), paintball, and fitted hats. I am also a fan of wallabees. I enjoy watching basketball, as well as playing it. I did not really accomplish anything meaningful in high school, but I plan to pursue worthwhile endeavor whilst here at Rutgers. Anyway...

Over the past three days I have certainly interacted with technology extensively. The majority of time using technology is spent either on my phone or using the internet, like most others I would assume. I spend a good deal of time on facebook; about three hours on average everyday. However, I do not accomplish such a feat in one sit-in; I sporadically sign in throughout the day. Also, I spend about two hours-three hours a day playing Counter-Strike, an online first-person shooter (that's been around since 1998). On Sunday, I spent about 8 hours (this is not the usual amount I spent glued in to the tube) watching Lord of the Rings in my dorm room. Though, I usually only spend about an hour watching TV a day, if that. When I was back living at home, this amount was considerably larger. Other than this, my interaction with technology is usually spent by checking out music on iTunes and randomly surfing the web, accounting for maybe 2 hours a day.

I have conducted a similar experiment as this one last year during high school. I have already accepted the extreme amount of time I spend everyday using technology, and so I am not so surprised this time around to see how much of my life is spent in the virtual world. However, when I originally accounted my time spent on the web/ technology, I was dumbfounded as to how much of my life is spent indoors, on my chair, wasting away in the virtual world. I do not think that I am an outlier of any sense, and that most people spend just as much time as I do, if not more, using technology. I feel as though there is no way of reverting back to past lifestyles, and the time we spend everyday glued in to screens of some sort is just how life is nowadays, and that this time is a direct consequence of the virtual age. I don't necessarily think that the time I spend using the web is such a bad thing, although I could see why people are so frightened of current technology: life really does not mirror every day culture about twenty or thirty years ago.