Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

youtube.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 50 posts

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#31

Post by mindcrime »

noizejoy wrote: post #28
mindcrime wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I've often wondered if that's her normal speaking voice, or if she adopts that particular tone just for her videos.

I also wonder what the correlation might be, between such “wondering” about somebody’s speaking voice and the gender of the speaker.

I don't know. I can off-hand think of exactly two Youtubers that I am familiar with, who frequently get comments about how their voice would make good ASMR audio, etc. One is male (the guy from Far North Bushcraft and Survival) and the other is female (Tibees). shrug

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#32

Post by readams »

An article that discusses attribution for the paper:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kionasmith/2018/08/30/katherine...

'As Johnson later recalled, "Finally, Ted told him, 'Katherine should finish the report, she's done most of the work anyway.' So Ted left Pearson with no choice; I finished the report and my name went on it, and that was the first time a woman in our division had her name on something."'

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#33

Post by drfuchs »

wrs wrote: post #20
mattofak wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the work itself is interesting, I'm also super curious to know how this was typeset. Did NASA have special typewriters with common math symbols, or go through some office with a Linotype or early digital typesetter, or something else?

In addition to Selectric symbol balls, you could use a "normal" typewriter with a set of extra symbols on tiny plastic sticks. You would place the symbol head on the stick in the way of the typewriter's strike. I found a Math Overflow thread full of stories about this: https://mathoverflow.net/questions/19930/writing-papers-in-p... And see page 7 of this for pictures: https://etconline.org/backissues/ETC099.pdf

Indeed, pre-TeX, Phyllis Winkler prepared all of Knuth's papers using TYPIT sticks for all the math symbols. Unfortunately, I didn't nab her typewriter and TYPIT box after her retirement, but here's a good set of photos and explanation: https://twitter.com/mwichary/status/1098850604640755712?lang...

Also, a TYPIT advertisement on the bottom left of the third page of https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=6500767

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#34

Post by jonnybgood »

TedShiller wrote: post #8

This work was done by a team of people. This is commonly misattributed to a single person.

What are you referencing? The paper in the video has two authors. Johnson's name wasn't going to be on it. Initially, it was going to be misattributed to one person who was not Johnson.

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#35

Post by interblag »

TedShiller wrote: post #8

This work was done by a team of people. This is commonly misattributed to a single person.

Out of curiousity, have you looked at the paper or read the Forbes article linked in one of the other top-level comments? (https://www.forbes.com/sites/kionasmith/2018/08/30/katherine...)

The paper itself has only two listed authors - that's also visible in the linked YouTube video and in the paper itself here: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19980227091

Further, the Forbes article has a quote from the paper's other author:

> [the other author] told [their boss], 'Katherine should finish the report, she's done most of the work anyway.'

With that in mind, I don't think it's a stretch to refer to this as her calculations, even though I'm sure Ted Skopinski (the other author) made significant contributions as well.

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#36

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

mattofak wrote: post #12
mindcrime wrote: post #2

Link to the paper at NASA's NTRS: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19980227091

While the work itself is interesting, I'm also super curious to know how this was typeset. Did NASA have special typewriters with common math symbols, or go through some office with a Linotype or early digital typesetter, or something else?

There were typewriters with math symbols:

https://www.mrmrsvintagetypewriters.com/products/hermes-3000...

Notably, Dijkstra used a modified Hermes with a mixture of different type bars to get the output he wanted in his earlier EWDs.

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#37

Post by reactspa »

> Johnson showed strong mathematical abilities from an early age. Because Greenbrier County did not offer public schooling for African-American students past the eighth grade... [1]

The struggle is real.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_Johnson#Early_life

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#38

Post by curiousgal »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #30
noizejoy wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also wonder what the correlation might be, between such “wondering” about somebody’s speaking voice and the gender of the speaker.

Right. If you've ever thought somebody sounded weird it's because you're a biggot/racist/sexist/homophobe/other-insult-here and it definitely could not possibly be that the person just sounded a bit strange to you.

The funny part is that I'm a woman myself haha I guess I'm a misogynist!

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#39

Post by aaaaaaaaaaab »

curiousgal wrote: post #38
ARandomerDude wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. If you've ever thought somebody sounded weird it's because you're a biggot/racist/sexist/homophobe/other-insult-here and it definitely could not possibly be that the person just sounded a bit strange to you.

The funny part is that I'm a woman myself haha I guess I'm a misogynist!

Internalized oppression!

Re: I found Katherine Johnson's calculations at NASA [video]

#40

Post by greggsy »

tlb wrote: post #17
mattofak wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the work itself is interesting, I'm also super curious to know how this was typeset. Did NASA have special typewriters with common math symbols, or go through some office with a Linotype or early digital typesetter, or something else?

IBM Selectrics had a symbol ball [𝛼] you could swap for the standard one. It only takes a few seconds to change balls, though when I've seen people doing it they would normally type all the prose on a page, then go back and type all the math. Super/subscripts were done by rolling the paper up and down half a line. The big symbols like the square root were done later with pen and a ruler. Working from a handwritten m…

I was wondering the same, until I realised that typewriters were presumably also sold in Greece.
Post reply on HN