Technological Change (in my life) part-3

edit: 2024-10-25 (this is a stream-of-consciousness thing)

Epiphany 20: The Apollo 11 moon landing (50 years later)

The manned spacecraft programs in both Russia and the United States changed the world in more ways than most people would ever know. First off, humanity cannot ignore the contribution of the Soviet space program because the United States would have never attempted such a thing if it were not for cold-war politics. The plain fact is this: many Americans didn't care about Apollo but did care about beating the Russians at something. History informs that President Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger were plotting to terminate the Apollo Program at the very time that Nixon was congratulating, via telephone from the White House, Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong who was standing on moon (both Nixon and Kissinger thought that Vietnam was a more urgent issue; more on this in a moment). To add insult to injury, many Americans lost interest after the apparently routine flight of Apollo 12 (e.g. we won that race twice; time to move on). Proof of this can be seen in the number of citizens who complained to the TV networks about favorite TV programs being preempted by spaceflight coverage. Heck, in-flight video transmissions from Apollo 13 were not aired until after a tank explosion placed the mission in jeopardy. Part of this public disinterest led to cancellations of Apollo flights 18-20.

FACT: development of the Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) was the trigger event for the largest amount of human technological progress. The design work was done by Draper Labs at MIT while manufacturing was done by Raytheon. Why was the AGC necessary? Initially, many astronauts and cosmonauts incorrectly thought that human pilots would be able to directly fly spacecraft much in the same way that pilots flew aircraft. Consider this thought experiment: you are flying the Lunar Module and need to catch-up-to, then dock with, the Command Module. For simplicity, assume that both vehicles have identical orbits and velocities but are separated by a distance of 1000 m (3280 f). Without thinking about life outside of the atmosphere, you fire your RCS thrusters (force: 100 pounds or 444 Newtons) while aiming at the Command Module. This will increase your velocity which pushes you into a higher orbit. Your new orbital velocity is faster but your orbital time is now slower. This causes the Command Module to quickly pass under you making it impossible to dock. One correct solution dictates that you should fire your RCS thrusters away from the target vehicle, which will cause you to drop into a slightly lower orbit; then wait a short period of time; then fire your RCS thrusters in the opposite direction which should return you to the original orbit as the CM but hopefully much closer (BTW, first firing forward then quickly firing backward produces the same result). Remember "F = ma" from Isaac Newton's second law? Since "a = dV/dT" then the second law can be rewritten as "F = m x dV/dT" which becomes "F x dT = m x dV". (the left side of the equation is known as impulse). The instantaneous mass of the LM (which decreases every time you fire your thrusters) determines how long you should fire them in every maneuver (e.g. two one-second thrusts will not produce identical results; a one-second forward burn cannot (exactly) be cancelled by a one-second reverse burn). These real-time calculus solutions are best determined by a guidance computer because fuel is limited so must be conserved.

How did the development of the AGC improve things here on Earth? First off, commercial mainframe computers in the 1960s were manufactured from discrete electronic components, including individual transistors and diodes. So when IBM learned that the AGC computer had to fit into a volume the size of a bread-box (one cubic foot or 28,316 cc) many IBM engineers didn't think it was possible. The Draper/Raytheon solution employed "integrated circuits" (semiconductor chips containing numerous transistors) which they were already using in a more primitive way inside Polaris missile guidance systems. The high per-component prices meant that the American government was their primary customer (Apollo consumed 60% of the IC developed by America in 1966). Because of high cost, government contractors developed semiconductor test methods to ensure that the government would only pay for components that met design specifications. These testing methods eventually migrated from the customer (government) back to the manufacturing industry which resulted in affordable chips for the rest of us. That revolution in chip manufacturing produced things like:

• the development of minicomputers (based on chips) that were more powerful and reliable while less expensive than existing mainframe computers (based upon discrete components)
  • early minicomputers acted as packet routers on a prototype internet known as ARPANET
  • work on minicomputers caused Bell Labs to create a portable operating system known as UNIX as well as the "C" programming language. After the breakup of the telephone system in the 1980s, corporate greed caused American UNIX to be replaced with European Linux.
  • Moore's Law (see: Epiphany 11 just above)
• the development of microcomputers for use in minicomputers (technological feedback), then the development of workstations which eventually became just as powerful as minicomputers
  • work stations were used to create the first web servers and web browsers when a British contractor, Tim Berners-Lee, created the world-wide-web while working for CERN in Switzerland.
    comment: many Americans today falsely believe that the world-wide-web was an American invention
  • microcomputers became the basis for internet packet routers (CISCO Systems) as well as commercial and residential firewall appliances
  • personal computers which eventually became just as powerful as work stations
    • gaming requirements triggered the development of graphics cards and GPUs (graphics processing units which act like thousands of special purpose CPUs)
  • gaming consoles (PlayStation, Xbox, etc.)
    • game consoles triggered the move from CRT technology to flat screens (the first LCD display was developed for the Sony PlayStation 1)
    • development of monochrome and color LCD displays feedback into the computer industry to replace CRT-based monitors with LCD-based monitors. This business morphs into very-large digital displays in commercial movie theaters which trickles down to large screen TVs in residences
  • phones, tablets, phablets, pads, e-book readers, smart phones, smart TVs all connected via the internet

comment: Apollo used 3-input NAND gates manufactured by Fairchild Semiconductor. Engineers leave to form Intel then later, AMD

Software jobs also changed drastically during this time. While it is true that high-level programming languages like FORTRAN (1957) and COBOL (1959) existed, the phrase "computer programmer" did not yet exist as computer programming was primarily done by mathematicians. High-level languages required more memory and CPU power then what was available on the AGC, but they were employed on mainframe computers used "to run AGC flight simulations" then "generate the necessary binary code" for the hand-made read-only core rope memory used to hold AGC programs. The level of redundancy built into the AGC programs (see reference-1) should inform that these people were doing "computer engineering". Click Margaret Hamilton to see what I mean.

• reference-1: examples include overload alarms "1201" and "1202" where the computer was indicating that it had discarded low priority tasks in order to continuing performing critical tasks (no Blue Screen of Death, or Three Finger Salutes allowed here; the computer-based guidance system needed to keep limping along)
• recommended_books_technology.html#space
• eagle_lander_3d_activities.html#book-links

Critics of Apollo mention that the program was too expensive in that it was consuming too much of the national budget with 4% being the oft quoted maximum number. Let me remind everyone that cold-war concerns at the time mandated that the Defense budget was kept secret. On top of that, no American citizen knew how much money was being used to support the Vietnam War. Today we know that the total cost of Apollo (in 1968 dollars) was $25 billion whilst the cost of the Vietnam War (also in 1968 dollars) was $168 Billion dollars. Now everyone knows that it is much harder to create than to destroy so allow me to state the obvious: America got no return on the $168 billion investment. Check out the next chart then advise your political representatives accordingly or vote differently.

war references:

1. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RS22926.pdf (published by: Congressional Research)
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War_casualties
3. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/asia-pacific/death-from-below-in-the-world-s-most-bombed-country-1.3078351
4. https://www.cnn.com/2013/09/15/world/meast/gulf-war-fast-facts/index.html
5. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/14/us-has-spent-5point9-trillion-on-middle-east-asia-wars-since-2001-study.html
6. 
   

comments:

• Since world-war-two ended in 1945, the United States of America has lost every war but no one seems to care as long as the economy is humming along.
• Many Americans continually bang-on about the USA being a Christian nation but I wonder if they will ever turn their spears into pruning hooks as is mentioned in Isaiah 2:3–4

What About China?

Back in the 1960s, conservatism revolved around business interests which caused some Americans to wonder if China was a missed business opportunity. This was the main reason for Nixon and Kissinger opening relations with China in 1972 which was trigger event started the Chinese shift from agriculture to industrialism. (think of this as an industrial revolution confined to one country)

American companies and schools in the 1980s found themselves in the Reagan era of "minimal government" which now goes by the name austerity. This might have translated into greater economic problems, including unemployment, except for the actions of China's leader, Deng Xiaoping, who favored "maximal government" so was paying to send thousands of Chinese students to the USA every year to be educated.

Comments:

• China is investing in their citizens while America is investing in their military which makes me wonder if America will, one day, recognize "an education gap" much in the way they became mobilized by the Soviet launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957. Many IQ charts (including these two: here and here) show average IQ levels in Hong Kong and Singapore (score: 109) are a full eleven points ahead of the USA (score: 98). Also notice that countries with high levels of religious extremism tend to have lower IQs.
• since the 1980s, China has moved more than 300 million Chinese citizens from the poor agricultural class into the middle class. This is approximately the same size as the total population of the USA where "middle class" is becoming a fading memory.
• Since American educators showed China how to modernize, I can't seem to stop thinking about the story of "the Tortoise and the Hare". If Charles Dickens were alive, I am certain he would be toying with writing a book titled "A Tale of Two Countries"

Steps to MAGA (Make American Great Again)

1. ELIMINATE OFFENSE SPENDING
   • The colored chart (28-lines above) provides proof that many millions of people would be alive today if the USA had not been funding foreign wars on foreign shores. One way to make American great again is to stop funneling taxpayer money into those defense programs which, in realty, are offense programs used to support the American empire
     • most Americans refuse to see itself as an empire but with more than 1,000 military bases outside of the United States (2023), "empire" is the only label that fits
     • I suppose this makes POTUS an emperor. Think about that for a moment
2. FUND SCIENCE and TECHNOLOGY
   • Like an addict that is unable to quit cold-turkey, defense contractors will probably not be able to survive having their government funds reduced. But just as happened during the 1950s and 1960s, defense contractors could be employed by the government to do big science projects though civilian agencies like NASA
   • During the 1990s, the American defense budget was always under $300 billion per year. By 2023 the defense budget had climbed to $785 billion per year. Meanwhile, NASA's budget has fluctuated between $17 to $20 billion since 2006. If NASA's budget was doubled by diverting money from the defense budget would the Pentagon even notice? And yet we know that spending on NASA will have a positive ROI (return-on-investment)
   •  DARPA is on American defense investment with a very high ROI
3. FREE EDUCATION
   • There are still many people alive today who will tell you that they attended Harvard University in the 1950s and only paid $100.⁰⁰ tuition
   • Before defense contractors started receiving the bulk of government monies, the American government (via the Pentagon) used to subsidize all college and university educations. Funding for education slowly dried up as money was diverted into the defense/offense budgets.
   • Once money is diverted from offense back into education, the whole economy will repair itself

Epiphany 21: Microsoft is promoting Python3 (Python version 3.x)

2020-05-06: Today’s alert from ZNET informs that Microsoft has added 51 Python videos to their previous 44. I read somewhere that because Bill Gates had started programming in BASIC, that Microsoft could never really get rid of it (other than the massive changes to "visual studio" between VS6 and VS.net where they made it play-nice with C/C++ and anything else that generated code under the .net framework). I wonder what Bill would say about the shift to Python?

“Python for beginners” playlist from Microsoft (this is the original 44)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlrxD0HtieHhS8VzuMCfQD4uJ9yne1mE6
notes:

• video #4 shows how to configure Video Studio Code which can now be acquired and used FREE of CHARGE
• Video Studio Code can integrate with a GIT repository including GitHub

“More Python for beginners” (this is the new 20)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlrxD0HtieHiXd-nEby-TMCoUNwhbLUnj 

“Even More Python for Beginners” (this is the new 31)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlrxD0HtieHhHnCUVtR8UHS7eLl33zfJ-

Epiphany 22: Machine Learning is a real thing

• While my technical life has contained a lot of "holy crap" moments, there have only been a few times where my epiphany meter maxed out at 100%.
• Perhaps I am a bit late to this epiphany but there has been a quiet revolution happening in the area of machine learning starting in 2007 when the Python library Scikit-learn was made freely available by Google. Since then, this field has exploded with most work being performed by internet companies. Why? In machine learning "data generates code" rather than the other way around so using the enormous amount of data available via the internet to train your machine results in better code solutions.
  comment: in 2021 humanity discoverers that data (or information) is much more valuable than energy
• Then in 2012 Google announced a breakthrough in the ability to detect a cat (or not) anywhere in youtube videos (Google's training data).
• Since then, Alphabet/Google companies (DeepMind is one) have made huge breakthroughs in goal oriented game-playing machines like AlphaGo (2016), and AlphaZero (Go and Chess in 2016).
  comment: here, the word "zero" means zero human input (usually achieved by forcing two machines to pay several million games with each other)
• Companies like Tesla employ as many as 1,000 people developing Machine Learning which the intend to use to implement Full Self Driving (FSD)
• comment: these systems are not yet capable of consciousness. It may be better to think about them as super neural networks (or super spinal cords)

caveats: both machine learning and artificial intelligence have a lot of history going back to the 1940 and 1950s so contains a lot of non-computer terminology. Modern computer technologists wishing to learn more might wish to start here:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aircAruvnKk - But what is a neural network? | Chapter 1, Deep learning :: by 3Blue1Brown
• Watch Introduction to Machine Learning (Michael L. Littman of Brown University) at https://www.wondrium.com/ ($20 per month; a trial month can be had for free)
• https://www.w3schools.com/python/python_ml_getting_started.asp (Machine Learning)
• https://www.w3schools.com/ai/default.asp (Artificial Intelligence)
• https://nostarch.com/practical-deep-learning-python
• https://www.udemy.com/

Epiphany 23: 5G is still confusing some

Not sure why some people are still complaining about 5G. Is it ignorance or something else? Here's a thumbnail table of facts:

• Residential microwave ovens cook by heating water molecules with a frequency of 2.45 GHz which has nothing to do with any special resonance frequency of water molecules. Click here and here for more information about this public misconception.
• While residential microwave ovens typically cook at 1200 Watts, inverter-powered variants are able to reduce their cooking power in 10% decrements via the front panel
• Smart phones transmit much less power (4G=0.25mW max; 5G=100mW max) than microwave ovens but automatically reduce their transmitter power by continually measuring the strength of the signal received from the cell tower (similar to you needing to speak louder at a noisy party). Reducing power also allows your phone to run longer before needing a recharge.
• But if you are still concerned about holding a radio transmitter next to your brain then use "the hands free feature" or "ear buds" or "wired head phones" because the inverse-square law applies to radio waves as well as light.
• Caveat: "ear buds" are wireless bluetooth devices which work in the 2 - 2.4 GHz range but only utilize a tiny amount of power (range is usually a few meters). If this still makes you nervous then use wired head phones.
• how do ear buds work? video (prepare to be shocked)
• how does Bluetooth work? video
• Many people have lived in the presence of CB radios ever since they were introduced in 1958. While the frequency of CB radio may be 10,000 times lower than 5G, notice that the power output is 40 times higher.

Epiphany 24: big advancements happen every 10 years

notes: these are not hard dates. For example, Integrated circuits were invented in 1959 but only NASA, and the American military, could afford them during the 1960s. While minicomputer processors might have been using integrated circuits in the 1960s these systems usually employed magnetic core memory. Once integrated circuits were used to manufacture computer memory then personal computers became economically feasible.

Epiphany 25: Star Trek (art imitates life?)

External Links

• https://router-network.com/internet101-html-history

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Back to Home Neil Rieck
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.