In a world that is dominated by men, there were few women who could stand up and be noticed in the earlier years. In the early nineteenth century, Ada Augusta Byron Lovelace, made herself known among the world of men and her work still influences today's world. She is considered the "Mother of Computer Programming" and the "Enchantress of Numbers." The world of computers began with the futuristic knowledge of Charles Babbage and Lady Lovelace. She appeared to know more about Babbage's work of the Analytical Engine than he himself knew. During the time of Lovelace's discoveries, women were just beginning to take part in the scientific world, although the attitude towards women and education was that women should not exceed or match that of a male. It was also believed that women who studied extensively would become extremely ill and eventually die. Lovelace was driven to the world of men by her passion and love for mathematics. Her upbringing, her search for more knowledge, her love for mathematics and her incredible inherited wiring abilities bought to life what we know today as computer programming or computer science.
Ada Augusta Byron Lovelace was born to Anne Isabella Milbanke and the famous British Poet George Gordon Byron on December 10, 1815 in London England. Her parent's marriage lasted for one year and one month after the birth of Lovelace. From that point in time, her domineering mother governed Lovelace's life. Her mother encouraged a formal education. In Lovelace's time, education of women was limited to that of bringing up their children and keeping the household. As a child, Lovelace's tutors and governesses were all instructed to teach her the discipline of science, mathematics, and music in such a way the she would never find the love of writing that her father possessed. "Undoubtedly, Lovelace was better off not attending a school where she would have been obliged to follow the typical curriculum for young ladies of her class. Living a sheltered live among her mother's circle of friends, Lovelace was better educated through governesses, tutors, and later, independent study." (Nilson, 84) One of her tutors was Dr. William King, the family physician. He was not fond of mathematics but was instructed to "operate" on Lovelace's thirteen-year-old brain. After his services were no longer needed, Lovelace continued contact with Dr.
In the 17th and 18th centuries women in science emerged that regarded themselves correct in doing so. Also there were those who announced their opinions to the world that women should not practice science and some who believed the women can and should practice science.
The 17th and 18th centuries saw the embryonic stage of women’s quest for intellectual and social parity with men. The evolution of women’s fight for equal opportunities was bogged down by a long history of stereotyping and condescension. Women were weaker physically, bore children and nurtured them. The economics and culture of Europe at this time was strongly influenced by religion and resulted in prejudice against women. The dominating religions of Europe in the 1600’s and 1700’s (Catholicism and Protestantism), citing the bible, reinforced women’s roles as mother’s, wives, and homemakers. Women were considered the weaker sex both physically and mentally. Men and most women assumed that because women gave birth and produced milk for their infants, God intended that their place was in the home. Men’s egos, as well, did not allow for women to compete with them. Males thought their place was to rule, fight wars, provide income, teach and be the head of his family. Women were not accepted in academics, politics, church leadership, business, or the military. Despite these prejudices, women saw an opportunity in the sciences. As a discipline based on observations and deductive reasoning it did not necessarily require a comprehensive academic background. Since most women were deprived of the more advanced education that men received, it was the perfect field for them to begin their pursuit of equality. As a result, a growing number of women actively participated in scientific research in chemistry, astronomy, biology, botany, medicine, and entomology.
The androcentric view of history often fails to acknowledge the achievements of notable women who have made profound impacts that have revolutionized the way in which we see the world, as well as the universe. Although the modernized 21st century society is more apt to recognize the achievements of women with an equivocal perspective with men, it was not always so. During the early 20th century, women were consistently denied equality with men due to a perverse androcentric, male-dominated perspective that deemed women as subordinate and insignificant. This androcentric perspective limited the opportunities available to women at the time, leaving them only with domestic occupations that were deemed acceptable for women such as nurses, teachers or clerics. Very few women aspired for higher education, and even fewer achieved it. There were very few colleges that accepted women at the time, save for those erected for women alone. It is because of this, women rarely e...
Throughout history women have been underestimated. Society as a whole is patriarchal, and even though women have mead great strides in gaining equality, there are still crimes and prejudice against women. Women are capable of great feats, if they are given a chance. Some women ignored all social standards and managed to accomplish incredible things that changed the course of history.
According to Microsoft Research, “By 2018, there will be 1.4 million open technology jobs in the U.S. and, at the current rate of students graduating with degrees in computer science, only 29% of applicants will be women.” The fight for women has been going on for more than 100 years and women today continue to face discrimination in daily lives. An important person in fighting for women’s rights was Betty Friedan, who was born on February 4, 1921 in Peoria, Illinois. A writer, feminist, and women’s rights activist published her book The Feminine Mystique in 1963 that began her journey of fighting for women’s rights. The idea behind the book Race presents important pillars that apply
Catherine de Pisan was a writer in the late thirteen hundreds/fourteen hundreds. She wrote a book called The Book of the City of Ladies. Catherine is often considered the first feminist author. In The Book of the City of Ladies, Catherine discusses how men of this period view a woman’s role in society; such as they cannot hold offices of judicial power or that they do not have the mental capacity to understand the sciences. Pisan believes that women can a have a role as homemakers and wives but also scholars and/or learned people. She goes onto say that women’s aspirations
Rosalind Franklin: Seeing a woman as a scientist during this time is somewhat rare, so the fact that she has taken up this profession show that she is persistent, dedicated, and smart. The only problem is that she is undervalued because of her gender. She is also very quiet and reserved because she’s in a different country.
...roblems of integration. If the science world takes advantage of undiscovered female talent, science as a whole will benefit greatly. For example, the original group of ENIAC programmers consisted of 6 women. In 1946, these women helped to develop the first operating stored-program computer.6 If female talent such as this goes to waste because of social neglect, the science world will never know what possible discoveries that could have been made with the help of women. If Dr. Djerassi is accurate with his examples of discrimination, the science world should take note of these problems and attempt to solve them.
Cole wants her readers to understand that everyone should have the right to learn this magnificent tool. K.C. Cole believes women did not have the same opportunities as men on the subject that they want to pursue in. She didn 't realize what an odd creature a woman interested in physics was until she saw a University’s conference, out of several hundred young students of physics and engineering in the room, less than a handful were women. This is especially true in the current society, where some occupation are considered women only, and some are men only. As said in her essay, “women are simply made to feel out of place in science. Her conclusion was supported by a Ford Foundation study by Lynn H. Fox on the problems of women in mathematics. When students were asked to choose among six reasons accounting for girls ' lack of interest in math, the girls rated this statement second - Men do not want girls in the mathematical occupations.” The author K.C. Cole uses historical allusion from another person to help support her idea of the exclusion of women in the science field. As we all can imagine, this did not only happen to K.C Cole. As she described in her essay, some of her friends and people she knows about also face challenges on this field, she remembers that, “A friend of mine remembers winning a Bronx Wide mathematics competition in the second grade. Her friends both boys and girls warned her that
When most people think of the Scientific Revolution, they think of scientists such as Galileo, Newton, Brahe, and Boyle. However, many people do not even know about the many women who played a vital role in the scientific advancements of this period. Even when these women were alive, most of society either ignored them or publicly disapproved their unladylike behavior. Because of this, these women were often forgotten from history, and very little is known about the majority of them. Although their names rarely appear in history books, the female scientists of the Scientific Revolution still impacted the world of science in several ways. In fact, all of the scientists listed above had a woman playing an influential role assisting them in their research. However, assisting men in their studies was not the only role open to women; several women performed experimentation and research on their own, or advancing science in some other way, even though the society of the time looked down upon and even resisted their studies.
Computers are a magnificent feat of technology. They have grown from simple calculators to machines with many functions and abilities. Computers have become so common that almost every home has at least one computer, and schools find them a good source for information and education for their students (Hafner, Katie, unknown). Computers have created new careers and eliminated others and have left a huge impact on our society. The invention of the computer has greatly affected the arts, the business world, and society and history in many different areas, but to understand how great these changes are, it is necessary to take a look at the origins of the computer.
Computer engineering started about 5,000 years ago in China when they invented the abacus. The abacus is a manual calculator in which you move beads back and forth on rods to add or subtract. Other inventors of simple computers include Blaise Pascal who came up with the arithmetic machine for his father’s work. Also Charles Babbage produced the Analytical Engine, which combined math calculations from one problem and applied it to solve other complex problems. The Analytical Engine is similar to today’s computers.
...ere are gears used to select which numbers you want. Though Charles Babbage will always be credited with making the first “true” computer, and Bill Gates with popularizing it, Blaise Pascal will always have a place among the first true innovator of the computer. There is even a programming language called Pascal or Object Pascal which is an early computer program.
George Gordon Byron, better known as Lord Byron, was a leading British poet in the eighteenth century. He is well known for his influence on the Romantic Movement that originated in the eighteenth century. He is mostly known for his scandalous affairs and eccentric way of life. Lord Byron was born on January 22, 1788 to Catherine Gordon, an impoverished Scots heiress, and Captain John ("Mad Jack") Byron, a fortune-hunting widower. It wasn’t until he was 10 years old that he inherited the title of Lord Byron from his great-uncle, the "Wicked" fifth Lord Byron. The title of Lord is typically given formally to a baron in England. In 1801-1805, he attended Harrow School in London, where he experienced his first sexual encounters with males and females. It is also during this time that he fell madly in love with a distant cousin of his, Mary Chaworth. The fact that she was engaged did not deter Lord Byron as his love and passion for her made their way into his poems, "Hills of Annesley" (1805), "The Adieu" (1807), "Stanzas to a Lady on Leaving England" (1809), and "The Dream" (1816). Years later, he recounted that all his "fables about the celestial nature of women" stemmed from "the perfection" his imagination created in Mary Chaworth. Lord Byron began to attend Trinity College from October 1805 until July 1808, where he received a Master of Arts degree. During "the most romantic period of [his] life," he engaged himself with many sexual affairs and activities such as boxing, horse riding, and gambling. He was living well beyond his means and started to accumulate such a debt which haunted him for years. (Lord Byron (George Gordon) (Lord Bryon - Biography)
The fist computer, known as the abacus, was made of wood and parallel wires on which beads were strung. Arithmetic operations were performed when the beads were moved along the wire according to “programming” rules that had to be memorized by the user (Soma, 14). The second earliest computer, invented by Blaise Pascal in 1694, was a “digital calculating machine.” Pascal designed this first known digital computer to help his father, who was a tax collector. Pascal’s computer could only add numbers, and they had to be entered by turning dials (Soma, 32). It required a manual process like its ancestor, the abacus. Automation was introduced in the early 1800’s by a mathematics professor named Charles Babbage. He created an automatic calculation machine that was steam powered and stored up to 1000 50-digit numbers. Unlike its two earliest ancestors, Babbage’s invention was able to perform various operations. It relied on cards with holes punched in them, which are called “punch cards.” These cards carried out the programming and storing operations for the machine. Unluckily, Babbage’s creation flopped due to the lack of mechanical precision and the lack of demand for the product (Soma, 46). The machine could not operate efficiently because technology was t adequate to make the machine operate efficiently Computer interest dwindled for many years, and it wasn’t until the mid-1800’s that people became interested in them once again.