Wednesday, July 16, 2025

2015 Documentary Film -- Calculating Ada

     One of the mathematicians that I celebrate for her achievements is Ada Lovelace  (1815 - 1832).  Despite her short life (with death due to uterine cancer) Lovelace did important work on the development of computers (in her time called analytical engines).   

     Here is a link to a fascinating documentary, "Calculating Ada:  The Countess of Computing -- 2015,"  about the life of Ada. Thinking about Ada and exploring mathy poems led me to the collection Against Infinity (on my bookshelf) and to the following poem:

          Zero     by Harriet Zinnes (1919-2019)

                 Everything has its beginning
                 The first letter of the alphabet
                 The first chord of a sonata
                 But everything is circular too
                 Is a first if z is not final?
                 Is not the last note in the first implied?

                 I have seen a dog try to catch its own tail
                 but I have never known a man
                 to prophecy the date of his natural death
                 It is for that reason that the suicide
                 thinks himself triumphant
                 He does not know that his end began in his beginning.


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