Repository: UIHistories Project: SWE - Proceedings of the First International Conference of Women Engineers and Scientists [PAGE 38]

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stage, in spacecraft. The shot to the moon required extensive use of mathematics provided by mathematicians of the highest qualifications and originality of thinking. Astronomical calculations are done by mathematicians of physicists with a special aptitude for and knowledge of mathematics. In nuclear physics, innumerable calculations have to be undertaken, and whilst some of these, by now, may have reached an almost routine stage, the development of the theories and their mathematical formulation can only be undertaken by mathematicians. Mathematicians are employed in telecommunications, where they perform the complicated network calculations for telephone and telegraph cables, filter design, etc. In the production field, large use is made of statistics, a specialized branch of mathematics, in data sampling, sample testing and bulk testing. Quality control is based on statistics. Data processing, used to an increasing extent for the supervision of complicated processes, e.g., in the chemical and petroleum industries, as well as in large power generating plants, rests on a mathematical and statistical basis. Man; involved calculations nowadays are done on computers. Apart from the fact that the conception of computer design Involves special extensions of mathematical methods, the translation of engineering and research problems in physics, chemistry, biology and other fields into formulae suitable for solution by computer is in the first place the job of a mathematician, working in conjunction with the engineers of scientists who are undertaking the research.

THE AUTOMATIC COMPUTER A great deal will have to be said in this survey about computers. They are the newest tools at the disposal of engineers and scientists and constitute a large step forward. Their introduction has been called a revolution, and although some forms of computing are almost as old as recorded history think only of the abacus - this is almost justified. It has been hailed by some as being endowed with almost superhuman powers. There have been visions of a world in which the humans can almost retire to a time of infinite leisure, whilst all the work is done by electronic robots under the control of electronic "brains". This is not only quite phantastic and fictitious, but is an unhealthy approach, which can only have harmful effects on future developments. One cannot be too emphatic on this point. A computer cannot, fundamentally, solve any problem that could not be solved by a good engineer or scientist, given the necessary time and manpower. What the computer can do is to solve problems Immeasurably faster and with greater accuracy. As far as controls by computer are concerned, where necessary information is missing, as for instance, when at some point in a process there are no

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