Social Science Section 1

Question 1

What was Charles Babbage’s Machine called?

Answer 1

The Difference Engine

Question 2

Who was considered to be the first computer programmer?

Answer 2

Ada Lovelace

Question 3

What is the telegram

Answer 3

Messages sent through electrical pulses via railway lines

Question 4

What was Hilbert’s Entscheidungsproblem?

Answer 4

Proposed question of “Is it possible to create an algorithm that will prove any logical statement true or false?”

Question 5

Which theoretical device has the characteristics of a modern computer?

Answer 5

Alan Turing’s “Turing Machine”

Question 6

What is said to be the mother of invention?

Answer 6

Necessity

Question 7

How did the Industrial Revolution and increase population growth affect works?

Answer 7

Out of necessity, they needed to be more efficient and specialized

Question 8

What book did Adam Smith write in 1776?

Answer 8

The Wealth of Nations

Question 9

How does Smith’s The Wealth of Nations demonstrate that workers needed to be more specialized and efficient?

Answer 9

Through his example of manufacturing pins– he compares the slow process of a single craftsman manufacturing compared to many less specialized people working to make the pin so there is less expensive labour

Question 10

Who inspired Charles Babbage?

Answer 10

Gaspard de Pronv

Question 11

What is the “method of differences”?

Answer 11

Developed by Gaspard de Pronv; he broke down the process of calculating logarithms into a series of simple steps that only needed addition and subtraction

Question 12

What inspired Babbage to create the Difference Engine?

Answer 12

navigational tables as he believed they could be automated instead of being produced by skilled mathematicians

Question 13

How did Babbage convince the British government to fun his project to build the Difference Engine?

Answer 13

he argued his machine would prevent accidents resulting from human error, and eager to continue to have the best navy, the the British government agreed

Question 14

The Difference Engine is named after?

Answer 14

the “method of difference” used by de Prony a generation earlier

Question 15

When did Babbage produce a small-scale prototype of the Difference Engine?

Answer 15

1833

Question 16

True or False? The machine (prototype of the Difference Engine) Babbage made in 1833 was fully functional

Answer 16

False; it also could not print its results

Question 17

Why was Babbage unable to produce a fully functioning Difference Engine but he had to settle for a small prototype?

Answer 17

It was too expensive and time consuming despite not enough gears being produced

Question 18

What kind of calculation was the Difference Engine specialized to perform?

Answer 18

Differentiation

Question 19

How many calculations was the Difference Engine able to perform?

Answer 19

One

Question 20

Babbage envisioned the Analytical Engine as a __________________ calculating machine that could be programmed to perform any mathematical operation

Answer 20

the Analytical Engine

Question 21

Why was Babbage unable to receive more funding for the Analytical Engine?

Answer 21

because he failed to deliver regarding the Difference Engine and high costs

Question 22

True or False? The Analytical Engine ended up being successful as Babbage imagined.

Answer 22

False as the machine only existed on paper since he was unable to acquire more funding

Question 23

Who is Ada Lovelace’s father?

Answer 23

Lord Bryon who was a famous poet

Question 24

What did Lovelace do in 1843?

Answer 24

she translated a report that described the Analytical Engine from French and added her own commentary

Question 25

What is an algorithm?

Answer 25

a precise step-by-step list of instructions for accomplishing a given task; they are the key to computer science: a program is simply an algorithm expressed in computer code

Question 26

In her added notes to a French report on the Analytical Engine, Lovelace described what?

Answer 26

an algorithm for computing a series of numbers (called Bernoulli numbers) using the Analytical Engine

Question 27

What were bombes?

Answer 27

Electromechanical machines

Question 28

Who was on the team that developed the bombes?

Answer 28

Alan Turing

Question 29

What was the purpose of the bombes?

Answer 29

To assist in automatically decrypting messages intercepted from the Germans

Question 30

What is Turing best known for?

Answer 30

His contributions to theoretical computer science

Question 31

True or false. America industrialize faster than Great Britain.

Answer 31

FALSE

Question 32

After what event did large scale manufacturing became widespread in the U.S.

Answer 32

The Civil War

Question 33

In what year was the first census performed?

Answer 33

1790

Question 34

Name the earliest example of large-scale data processing project in the U.S.

Answer 34

The Census

Question 35

How often is the census performed?

Answer 35

Every 10 year

Question 36

How long did the census from 1880 took to process?

Answer 36

Seven years

Question 37

Who was appointed as the director of the 1890 census?

Answer 37

Robert Porter

Question 38

Whose proposal was accepted for the census of 1890 by Robert Poter in 1888?

Answer 38

Herman Hollerith

Question 39

What was Herman Hollerith proposal regarding the demographic recording for the census?

Answer 39

Record demographic information on small sheets of cardstock.

Question 40

What was Herman Hollerith inspiration for his punched card system?

Answer 40

Hollerith was inspired by the use of sheets of perforated paper to control the organette, a novelty musical instrument popular at the time.

Question 41

How many spring-loaded metal pins were pressed against the card in a punched-card system?

Answer 41

288 spring-loaded metal pins would press against a card

Question 42

When were the Remington Typewriter Company and the Rand Kardex Company merged together?

Answer 42

1927

Question 43

Who designed and patented the first practical typewriter?

Answer 43

Christopher Latham Sholes

Question 44

How was the keyboard layout in Sholes' early models?

Answer 44

Early models of Sholes' typewriter used an alphabetical keyboard layout.

Question 45

Who invented the Comptometer?

Answer 45

Dorr E. Felt

Question 46

Who invented the adding machinges?

Answer 46

William S. Burroughs

Question 47

Who was the first president of IBM?

Answer 47

The first president was Thomas J. Watson

Question 48

Who did he pass his reins, those of IBM, to in 1956?

Answer 48

To his son Thomas J. Watson Jr who succeeded him as IBM's CEO

Question 49

What computer did Clifford Berry and John Atanasoff make

Answer 49

They made the Atanaoff-Berry Computer (ABC)

Question 50

What type of problem's does the ABC Computer solve

Answer 50

It was meant to solve specifically Linear equations

Question 51

What did these early computing devices lack

Answer 51

Conditional branching

Question 52

What are modern computers descendants of

Answer 52

Early electromagnetic computers

Question 53

What is a Differential Analyzer.

Answer 53

It was a elaborate contraption, a network of ''shaft and wires wheels, pulleys, and 1,000 it was designed to solve differential equations only

Question 54

Who created the Differential Analyzer

Answer 54

Vanneevar Bush and Harold Locke Hazen

Question 55

what did the development of adding machines lead to?

Answer 55

the cash register

Question 56

why did James Ritty make the cash register?

Answer 56

He was worried that his employees was pocketing the cash, or making incorrect calculations

Question 57

what was the 2 main differences of a cash register from an Adding machine

Answer 57

had a compartment to hold cash, and the transaction was recorded the amount due would display on the top of the cash register as well as be recorded on a roll of paper

Question 58

who purchased the rights of the cash register to?

Answer 58

John H. Patterson

Question 59

what did John H. Patterson do after purchasing the rights to the cash register?

Answer 59

He created a company called National Cash Register Company (NCR), he created a school to educate his employees to be able to go out and sell the cash register

Question 60

what company did Tomas J. Watson work for before getting fired in 1911?

Answer 60

He worked for NCR (National Cash Register Company) and was rising the ranks really fast, was fired abruptly and on a whim

Question 61

After being fired where did Tomas J. Watson go to work?

Answer 61

He became employed at Computer- Tabulating- Recording (C-T-R) and rose up to being president in just 3 years

Question 62

what was C-T-R the descendent of what idea?

Answer 62

Hollerith's original punched-card machine company

Question 63

what was IBM company previously called?

Answer 63

C-T-R, the name changed and then they dominated the office- machinery industry

Question 64

because electricity became more common around the US this led to what modifications to the typewriter?

Answer 64

the typewriter no longer used the force of the writers pushing the key but converted to using electricity to replace this force, although other beyond where the force changed the design of the typewriter

Question 65

a engineer at MIT named Vannevar Bush created a machine called what?

Answer 65

Differential Analyzer

Question 66

what is the difference between a calculator and a computer?

Answer 66

a computer can respond to the If and Buts of a situation while a calculator in strait forward

Question 67

what degree and university did Howard Aiken?

Answer 67

physics and Harvard University

Question 68

what two companies turned Aiken down before IBM accepted his proposal?

Answer 68

Harvard's physics department, and Monroe Machine Company

Question 69

What political blunder did Howard Aiken commit at the reveal of Mark 1?

Answer 69

claimed sole credit for it when he had given lose plans to IMB's engineers who did literally all the work as he moved onto new projects and IMB sponsored the whole project destroying all relationships with IBM and never working w/ them again

Question 70

how many models got made of Mark?

Answer 70

there were a total of 4 marks

Question 71

how did Mark 1 stay coordinated while being so big?

Answer 71

it had a 51-foot shaft going down the center being 2 feet in diameter this helped it stay in sync

Question 72

What led to the cash register?

Answer 72

The adding machine

Question 73

Who invented the first successful cash register and when?

Answer 73

James Ritty in 1879

Question 74

What separated the cash register from an adding machine?

Answer 74

A cash register included a compartment for holding money and a display for the purchase amount

Question 75

How would the cash register guarantee that the clerk was not pocketing cash?

Answer 75

It had a roll of paper that would be used to compare the day's transactions to the money in the register

Question 76

Who bought the rights to James Ritty's cash register?

Answer 76

John H. Patterson

Question 77

When did Patterson fire Watson and why?

Answer 77

1911, for no specified reason other than it being on a whim

Question 78

what was adam smith's famous book

Answer 78

The wealth of nations

Question 79

what spurred the creation of the modern computer

Answer 79

the industrial revolution

Question 80

what is specialization

Answer 80

when you break down the production process into smaller steps

Question 81

who created the difference engine

Answer 81

charles babagge