Giant brains; or, Machines that think

by Edmund Callis Berkeley

BELL LABORATORIES RELAY COMPUTERS

As yet no full-scale scientific report is available on the Bell Laboratories general-purpose relay computers that went to Aberdeen and Langley Field. However, there is some information about these and other Bell Laboratories relay computing machines in the following articles:

Alt, Franz L., A Bell Telephone Laboratories’ Computing Machine (two parts), Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 3, no. 21, Jan. 1948, pp. 1-13, and vol. 3, no. 22, Apr. 1948, pp. 69-84.

Cesareo, O., The Relay Interpolator, Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 24, no. 12, Dec. 1946, pp. 457-460.

Juley, Joseph, The Ballistic Computer, Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 25, no. 1, Jan. 1947, pp. 5-9.

Williams, Samuel B., A Relay Computer for General Application, Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 25, no. 2, Feb. 1947, pp. 49-54.

Williams, Samuel B., Bell Telephone Laboratories’ Relay Computing System, Proceedings of a Symposium on Large-Scale Digital Calculating Machinery, Harvard University Press, 1948, pp. 40-68.

Anonymous, Complex Computer Demonstrated, Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 19, no. 2, Oct. 1940, pp. v-vi.

Anonymous, Computer Mark 22 Mod. 0: Development and Description, Navord Report No. 178-45, Washington, D. C.: Navy Department, Dec. 6, 1945, 225 pp.

Anonymous, Relay Computer for the Army, Bell Laboratories Record, vol. 26, no. 5, May 1948, pp. 208-209.

THE KALIN-BURKHART
LOGICAL-TRUTH CALCULATOR

As yet there are no published references on the Kalin-Burkhart Logical-Truth Calculator.

Some books covering a good deal of mathematical logic are:

Quine, W. V., Mathematical Logic, New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1940, 348 pp.

Reichenbach, Hans, Elements of Symbolic Logic, New York: The Macmillan Co., 1947, 444 pp.

Tarski, Alfred, Introduction to Logic, New York: Oxford University Press, 1941, 239 pp.

Woodger, J. H., The Axiomatic Method in Biology, Cambridge, England: The University Press, 1937, 174 pp.

Chapter 2, [pp. 18-52], is an excellent and understandable summary of the concepts of mathematical logic.

Several papers on the application of mathematical logic to the analysis of practical situations are:

Berkeley, Edmund C., Boolean Algebra (The Technique for Manipulating “And,” “Or,” “Not,” and Conditions) and Applications to Insurance, Record of the American Institute of Actuaries, vol. 26, Oct. 1937, pp. 373-414.

Berkeley, Edmund C., Conditions Affecting the Application of Symbolic Logic, Journal of Symbolic Logic, vol. 7, no. 4, Dec. 1942, pp. 160-168.

Shannon, Claude E., A Symbolic Analysis of Relay and Switching Circuits, Transactions of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, vol. 57, 1938, pp. 713-723.

This paper has had a good deal of influence here and there on the development of electric circuits using relays.

The following report discusses the solution of some problems of mathematical logic by means of a large-scale digital calculator:

Tarski, Alfred, A Decision Method for Elementary Algebra and Geometry, Report R-109, California: Rand Corporation, Aug. 1, 1948, 60 pp.

OTHER DIGITAL MACHINES
FINISHED OR UNDER DEVELOPMENT

The Aiken Mark II Relay Calculator

The Computation Laboratory of Harvard University finished during 1947 a second large relay calculator, called the Aiken Mark II Relay Calculator. This machine is alluded to briefly at the end of [Chapter 10] and is described more fully in the following:

Campbell, Robert V. D., Mark II Calculator, Proceedings of a Symposium on Large-Scale Digital Calculating Machinery, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948, pp. 69-79.

Freeland, Stephen L., Inside the Biggest Man-Made Brain, Popular Science, May 1947, pp. 95-100.

Miller, Frederick G., Application of Printing Telegraph Equipment to Large-Scale Calculating Machinery, Proceedings of a Symposium on Large-Scale Digital Calculating Machinery, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948, pp. 213-222.

The Edsac

The Edsac is a machine under construction in England.

Wilkes, M. V., The Design of a Practical High-Speed Computing Machine: the EDSAC, Proceedings of the Royal Society, series A, vol. 195, 1948, pp. 274-279.

Wilkes, M. V., and W. Renwick, An Ultrasonic Memory Unit for the EDSAC, Electronic Engineering, vol. 20, no. 245, July 1948, pp. 208-213.

The Edvac

The Edvac is a machine under construction at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering, Philadelphia.

Koons, Florence, and Samuel Lubkin, Conversion of Numbers from Decimal to Binary Form in the EDVAC, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 3, no. 26, Apr. 1949, pp. 427-431.

Anonymous, EDVAC Replaces ENIAC, The Pennsylvania Gazette, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, vol. 45, no. 8, Apr. 1947, pp. 9-10.

The IBM Selective-Sequence Electronic Calculator

The IBM Selective-Sequence Electronic Calculator was finished and announced in January 1948, and is alluded to briefly at the end of [Chapter 10]. More information about this machine is in the following references:

Eckert, W. J., Electrons and Computation, The Scientific Monthly, vol. 67, no. 5, Nov. 1948, pp. 315-323.

International Business Machines Corporation, IBM Selective-Sequence Electronic Calculator, New York: International Business Machines Corporation (form no. 52-3927-0), 1948, 16 pp.

The Raytheon Computer

The Raytheon Computer is a machine under construction at the Raytheon Manufacturing Co., Waltham, Mass.

Bloch, R. M., R. V. D. Campbell, and M. Ellis, The Logical Design of the Raytheon Computer, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 3, no. 24, Oct. 1948, pp. 286-295.

Bloch, R. M., R. V. D. Campbell, and M. Ellis, General Design Considerations for the Raytheon Computer, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 3, no. 24, Oct. 1948, pp. 317-323.

A “System of Electric Remote-Control Accounting”

During the 1930’s a system using connected punch-card machinery was experimented with in a department store in Pittsburgh. The purpose of the system was automatic accounting and analysis of sales. This system is described in:

Woodruff, L. F., A System of Electric Remote-Control Accounting, Transactions of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, vol. 57, Feb. 1938, pp. 78-87.

The Univac

The Univac is a machine under construction at the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation, Philadelphia. A similar but smaller digital computer called the Binac is also being developed.

Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation, The Univac System, Philadelphia: Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp., 1948, 8 pp.

Electronic Control Co. (now Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp.), A Tentative Instruction Code for a Statistical Edvac, Philadelphia: Electronic Control Co. (now Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corp.), May 7, 1947, 19 pp.

Snyder, Frances E., and Hubert M. Livingston, Coding of a Laplace Boundary Value Problem for the UNIVAC, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 3, no. 25, Jan. 1949, pp. 341-350.

The Zuse Computer

The Zuse Computer is a small digital computer constructed in Germany.

Lyndon, Roger C., The Zuse Computer, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation, vol. 2, no. 20, Oct. 1947, pp. 355-359.