Computer History

In 1949, Dorothy Vaughan became the first African American woman to lead a team at NASA's Langley Research Center. Her work as a mathematician was an important part of helping the United States explore space. Learn more about Vaughan's life as a famous mathematician!

Artificial Intelligence helps choose what books you buy, what movies you see, and even who you date. It puts the "smart" in your smartphone and soon it will drive your car. It makes most of the trades on Wall Street, and controls vital energy, water, and transportation infrastructure. But Artificial Intelligence can also threaten our existence. In as little as a decade, AI could match and then surpass human intelligence. Corporations and government agencies are pouring billions into achieving AI’s Holy Grail - human-level intelligence.

A fascinating exploration of the science of the impossible—from death rays and force fields to invisibility cloaks—revealing to what extent such technologies might be achievable decades or millennia into the future. One hundred years ago, scientists would have said that lasers, televisions...

Audible editor Sam Danis delves into spatial audio with Dolby Atmos: what it is, what makes it so immersive, and what the future holds for audio entertainment. Featuring conversations with experts in sound design and production, as well as samples from some of the most unique Audible productions available in Dolby Atmos. Listen in to discover the storytelling magic this innovative technology can offer.

Block by Block offers an original perspective on thermodynamic science and history based on the three approaches of a practicing engineer, academician, and historian. The book synthesizes and gathers into one accessible volume a strategic range of foundational topics involving the atomic theory, energy, entropy, and the laws of thermodynamics.

Humanity's first reusable spacecraft and the most complex machine ever built, NASA's space shuttle debuted with great promise and as a dependable source of wonder and national pride. But with the Challenger catastrophe in 1986, the whole space shuttle program came into question, as did NASA itself, so long an institution that was seemingly above reproach. Wheels Stop tells the stirring story of how, after the Challenger disaster, the space shuttle not only recovered but went on to perform its greatest missions.

When Ashley Shew became a self-described "hard-of-hearing chemobrained amputee with Crohn's disease and tinnitus," there was no returning to "normal." Suddenly well-meaning people called her an "inspiration" while grocery shopping or viewed her as a needy recipient of technological wizardry. Most disabled people don't want what the abled assume they want—nor are they generally asked. In vibrant prose, Shew shows how we can create better narratives and more accessible futures by drawing from the insights of the cross-disability community.

The word spread through the hacking underground like some unstoppable new virus: Someone - some brilliant, audacious crook - had just staged a hostile takeover of an online criminal network that siphoned billions of dollars from the U.S. economy. The FBI rushed to launch an ambitious undercover operation aimed at tracking down this new kingpin. Other agencies around the world deployed dozens of moles and double agents.

If you've ever made a secure purchase with your credit card over the internet, then you have seen cryptography, or "crypto", in action. From Stephen Levy - the author who made "hackers" a household word - comes this account of a revolution that is already affecting every citizen in the 21st century. Crypto tells the inside story of how a group of "crypto rebels" - nerds and visionaries turned freedom fighters - teamed up with corporate interests to beat Big Brother and ensure our privacy on the internet.

The bestselling author of E=mc2 weaves tales of romance, divine inspiration, and fraud through an account of the invisible force that permeates our universe—electricity—and introduces us to the virtuoso scientists who plumbed its secrets. For centuries, electricity was seen as little more...

Are you concerned about how artificial intelligence is reshaping our world? Worried about protecting yourself and your family in an increasingly AI-driven society? Looking to understand the real implications of AI beyond the Hollywood hype? In this groundbreaking book, cybersecurity expert and PhD researcher John Bambenek reveals the subtle yet profound ways AI is transforming our lives—from job applications and creative expression to privacy and personal security.

The world of computers is growing at an unrecordable rate every day. Computers are the most influential tools in our lives. They are our present and future. Most users see a computer at the front and use the graphical user interfaces. The first time I used a computer, it intrigued me to know how these interfaces work. In this book, you will learn the same way I did.

In The Alchemy of Us, scientist and science writer Ainissa Ramirez examines eight inventions - clocks, steel rails, copper communication cables, photographic film, light bulbs, hard disks, scientific labware, and silicon chips - and reveals how they shaped the human experience. Ramirez tells the stories of the woman who sold time, the inventor who inspired Edison, and the hotheaded undertaker whose invention pointed the way to the computer.

AI expert Yorick Wilks takes a journey through the history of artificial intelligence up to the present day, examining its origins, controversies, and achievements, as well as looking into just how it works. He also considers the future, assessing whether these technologies could menace our way of life and how we are all likely to benefit from AI applications in the years to come.

In this audiobook, machine learning expert Ethem Alpaydin offers a concise overview of the subject for the general listener, describing its evolution, explaining important learning algorithms, and presenting example applications. Alpaydin offers an account of how digital technology advanced from number-crunching mainframes to mobile devices, putting today's machine learning boom in context.

Today, not only is everything digital getting faster, cheaper, and smaller at an exponential rate, we also have the Internet. When these two revolutions - one in technology and the other in communications - joined, an explosive force was unleashed that changed the very nature of innovation. And with any change, we have seen many strategic blunders and extraordinary learning curves along the way.

Former Google advertising strategist, now Oxford-trained philosopher James Williams launches a plea to society and to the tech industry to help ensure that the technology we all carry with us every day does not distract us from pursuing our true goals in life. As information becomes ever more plentiful, the resource that is becoming more scarce is our attention. In this "attention economy", we need to recognize the fundamental impacts of our new information environment on our lives in order to take back control.

The term metaverse is suddenly everywhere, from debates over Fortnite to the pages of the New York Times to the speeches of Mark Zuckerberg, who proclaimed in June 2021 that “the overarching goal” of Facebook is to “bring the metaverse to life”. But what, exactly, is the metaverse? As pioneering theorist and venture capitalist Matthew Ball explains, it is the successor to the mobile internet that has defined the last two decades.

In a world of self-driving cars and big data, smart algorithms and Siri, we know that artificial intelligence is getting smarter every day. Though all these nifty devices and programs might make our lives easier, they're also well on their way to making "good" jobs obsolete. A computer winning Jeopardy might seem like a trivial, if impressive, feat, but the same technology is making paralegals redundant as it undertakes electronic discovery, and is soon to do the same for radiologists.

Empire of the Air tells the story of three American visionaries - Lee de Forest, Edwin Howard Armstrong, and David Sarnoff - whose imagination and dreams turned a hobbyist's toy into radio, launching the modern communications age. Tom Lewis weaves the story of these men and their achievements into a richly detailed and moving narrative that spans the first half of the 20th century, a time when the American romance with science and technology was at its peak.