Alexander Aitken, the Human Computer (opens in new tab)

(nzedge.com)

14 pointskerny11y ago4 comments

4 comments

4 comments · 2 top-level

Medox11y ago· 1 in thread

"Aitken could recite Pi to 707 decimal places", and how about 22.514? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z22H89rIMHk @ 8:00 (although the entire documentary is great)

Tycho11y ago

When people say recite Pi is there some calculation involved or are they just memorising a large string of numbers?

thinkpad2011y ago· 1 in thread

Sounds like a remarkable guy. But, and not to nitpick, but calling him "the greatest mathematician of his era" is a bit ridiculous. This was the era of Hilbert, von Neumann, Gödel, Turing, Einstein, Ramanujan...

3rd311y ago

Yeah, the mainstream will probably never get the distinction between mathematics and arithmetics straight.

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