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The 'Human Computer' Behind the Moon Landing Was a Black Woman (thedailybeast.com)
Reader bricko writes: The 'Human Computer' Behind the Moon Landing Was a black woman (video). She calculated the trajectory of man's first trip to the moon by hand, and was such an accurate mathematician that John Glenn asked her to double-check NASA's computers. To top it off, she did it all as a black woman in the 1950s and 60s, when women at NASA were not even invited to meetings. And you've probably never heard of her. Meet Katherine Johnson, the African American woman who earned the nickname 'the human computer' at NASA during its space race golden age.
I'm curious, was there supposed to be a link in the summary?
A link to an interesting and relevant story about Katherine Johnson...
Or were we supposed to just Google or Wiki her?
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
Not an article...
We're not allowed to talk about race or skin colour because that's racism.
Except when someone non-white does something, in which case we need to have the race or skin colour shoved in our face.
I do understand it's amazing given the decade it happened in, but still.
and what good did that do to her and women or minorities in general?
Was the discrimination of that time suddenly removed?
Dont get me wrong, it is not that I mind women or blacks in STEM, but it seems that many believe that if only there were more of those in STEM, suddenly all their problems would go away.
I think this story is proof that employment in science or technologies and equal rights do not automatically go hand in hand.
And if that is true, then the opposite must also be true: just because most engineers and scientists today are white males does not mean that it is because women are oppressed in these fields.
It's interesting how quickly what was a job title for someone, became so quickly a term used solely the device. Where in the 1940's a "computer" was someone who did math, then by the 1960's, someone who did the same job as her peers 20 years prior was given that as a nickname. http://crgis.ndc.nasa.gov/hist...
I be fair, I couldn't name anyone else on the Apollo engineering team, either.
I have no doubt they have good intentions writing this, though. But still.
Good for who did during .
That way we can get all the outrage and praise in all at once.
Wheel of Time: Book by Book and Sumview (summary review) Bigdady92 style: http://bigdady92.blogspot.com/
There was a pool of women (and men) at NASA who were ALL referred to as "computers". NASA didn't start using electronic computers for flight dynamics calculations until 1962, and continued to rely on the pool to crosscheck the electronic calculations until 1984.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
Margaret Hamilton wrote the on-board flight software.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
To me, all of them are great scientists, regardless of race.
Is it really necessary to bring the racial component into this?
She is a brilliant woman who was instrumental in our space program. Isn't that enough?
All I can think is if she's going to be remembered because of her work at NASA /or/ that she just because she was a black woman. In other words, would this video, this article, her popularity, etc etc, exist if she were not a black woman? Hmm.
All that headline leave out is the exclamation mark at the end. Why is it that we have to express such astonishment over the fact that a *black woman" (OMG!) calculated trajectories.
Or is this less about this competent mathemetician's imopressive accomplishments, or it is to, yet again, wring our little hands over the injustice of modern society and how terrible we should all feel about how bad we are?
The latter, I think
If she had been a man, we wouldn't have heard of him a lot either.
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
And neither should you. If you care that it was a woman, you're sexist. If you care that it was a minority, you're racist. If you think it has any bearing on current sex or race relations, you're a fool.
If she could get so good at math back then, why anyone should be able to do it now, right? We don't need to worry about the so-called education gap or take a bunch of extra steps to help black people overcome so-called obstacles because obviously if she was able to do it then, it should be much easier for even less skilled people to do it now.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/16/01/18/0326231/katherine-johnson-nasas-pioneering-female-physicist
OK, googled around a bit more. There's no "hello world" because it's a CASE tool--design abstractly in the GUI, dump out in the language of your choice.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
I guess this would be a lot more impressive if we had actually gone to the moon in the 60's. But it's a nice feel good story and helps perpetuate Nixon's myth.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Lies. The Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) was built by Raytheon and MIT.
The sad part is that this merits any comment at all. In my experience, neither race nor gender have any bearing on a persons ability. It is pathetic that as a society we have not been able to move past this.
I mean, if you are bold enough to spout racially regressive ideology, maybe attach your mostly anonymizing screen name to it. Many of the Anonymous Coward comments in this thread are part of the reason why the accomplishments of minorities and women continue to be seen as remarkable. Racism and sexism are endemic within tech industries, they are part of what drive the high turnover rate for minorities. I for one, choose not to work in private industry as I don't find the casual racism that exists there conducive to my quality of life. You ACs want to tell us one more thing about the negro?
You're not supposed to say "Black" when describing ethnicity. And, "Woman" is borderline. Please correct.
If we're so hell bent on equality, why is it necessary to write an article that specifically extols the facts that she was black and a woman? If we want to get to where equality is actually achievable we need to stop seeing gender and colour as such a big deal and focus specifically on the accomplishments of the person.
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
I a sick and tired of this American cultural perversion that sees anyone that has any Africa ancestors labelled as if that mattered, when the truth is we are all descended from Africans.
If you think a persons race is relevant you are racist, period, despite the fact that the entire concept of race is questionable.
The 'Human Computer' Behind the Moon Landing Was a black woman (video)
She was a first-gen Voodoo-card?
>"the African American woman who earned the nickname 'the human computer' at NASA during its space race golden age."
There are probably a number black women as well as European American women, and all kinds of people people of all races, creeds, religions, sexual orientations, etc behind all the workings of NASA that we have never heard of before.
I've never seen so many comments from people proudly proclaiming how offended they are that someone who did something historically important was identified as black.
Apparently we should go back to writing history books that pretend that everyone who did everything important was white. Who needs non-white role models, after all?
i think i need to get my eyes checked :P
that women would pass as white anywhere
"life is a joke, and someone is laughing at me"
Just tell him we owned slaves.
Taking into account the IQ distributions of women and blacks, she must have had a few noteworthy mutations which allowed her to perform these surprisingly human tasks.
Actually it IS amazing that a person who is BLACK and a WOMAN could get into such an important position back in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Today we recognize it as foolish and stupid to prejudge someone’s abilit to DO MATH (for instance) on the basis of gender or skin color. But back then?
What this tells us is that she’s fucking awesome, more awesome than you and me. She’s so awesome that people at NASA in an era that only valued white men simply were unable to deny the level of her skill. To break through the prejudice required that she have skill way beyond what a white male would have needed to get into the same job.
So yeah. Kudos to this woman for her intelligence, skill, and persistence in an era that would have otherwise begrudged her a job as a toilet cleaner.
U go gurl!!!!
congrats on the recognition you so richly deserve..
best wishes and thank you for your contributions to help further the "cause"
We in the community..
Human computer?! So they kept her chained up or something? I can picture it now :( /s
From a Slashdot article this last January:
https://science.slashdot.org/story/16/01/18/0326231/katherine-johnson-nasas-pioneering-female-physicist
> To top it off, she did it all as a black woman in the 1950s and 60s, when women at NASA were not even invited to meetings.
And the January article contained bullshit discriminatory assertions about NASA as well. She went to meetings, her name was listed on every paper she contributed to. Fucking racist SJW's don't know history at all.
Liberals are the true and pure racists.
Instead of bringing up a story about a remarkable person that did a remarkable thing, it's stated in a confrontational and inflammatory way that she was a woman and was black. (Take that you crack'as.) As also stated by others, there are out-right lies in the article as well.
Those who see everyone and everything in racial terms are the true racists.
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Too bad liberals do not get what the above quote really means.
Not one person to fill your cup.
You must be sooooo thirsty!
Wasn't anyone who did computations back then called a human computer?
but we have to tell you the colour of someone's skin each time we talk about someone who isn't white....
Obviously, this shows that shows that. Otherwise, why would you highlight that as the most significant attribute of this person to be there ancestry and gendwr, two things that were determined at birth.
I remember those days. Used to crash into the suface all the time playing lem.bas on a teletype. Glad she was better than me.
...would someone doing their job and also being black be news.
Are you aware how racist and ignorant this comment makes you? If you actually believe this nonsense, I feel sorry for you.
Unfortunately none of the "offended by the obvious racism" will understand what you pointed out.
Worse yet, the article is obviously false because everyone at NASA was racist and sexist so it is impossible that any woman or other "minority" was ever hired.
Now days we know there were no black teachers, lawyers, scientists, inventors, or doctors when the Americans fought the war of independence from England.
It wasn't until Linden Johnson became president, right?
No brain, no pain.
a black woman in the 50s had the proverbial snowballs chance in hell of doing what she did. It's speaks volumes to her genius that she wasn't shut out.
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A black woman could put a man on the moon... but she still can't get NOMINATED for an Oscar!
"she did it all as a black woman"
Did she do anything as a white woman? I vote this article, most racist of the year.
I knew that they had faked the moon landing and that Stanley Kubrick had been enlisted by Nixon to help win the space race against Russia but now you're telling me that rather than have a real computer plot the course they just used a black woman?
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
This article is racist.
Have you ever seen an article like that:
- "Facebook founder is a white man"
- "White male does the very first walk on the moon"
No? Guess why. Because they would be needlessly racist. And so is your stupid article.
Who cares what was her skin color and sex?
You do? Then, by the very definition, *you* are racist and sexist.
Check the articles by bricko: https://slashdot.org/~bricko
A liberal or an idiot?
>accurate mathematician
You are not a mathematician if all you do are calculations.
Go back to school because you are delusional.
THIS
She is not even really black.
-1 from liberals not being able to face the truth.
And so do I. Now, for the sake of the thought experimentation, let's imagine we have a second scenario. Same color, however exactly opposite academic and professional achievements. No achievements or accomplishments, to be precise.
All of the sudden, discussing about racism and underprivileged becomes acceptable. To me, that is the real racism.
As if women of color are not capable of making decisions. They are more than capable and there are a lot of inspiring examples, let's start from Madam C.J.Walker ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... )
He's right.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
Black Woman...black woman...black woman...African American woman
OK, so I got that she was a woman (since you mentioned it 4 times in the post), but I'm a little confused....was she black too?
I read the comments below...am I the only person in existence who doesn't care about skin colour, and judges people on what they do?
Seriously, who cares if someone's black or white...if they have talent and ability, they have talent and ability.
The headline implies it is hard to do anything significant as a black woman.
... in other words, misanthropes.
Or else why do they think this is newsworthy?
SJWs aren't just anti-white. They're anti-black, anti-hispanic
Are we supposed to give her special attention because she's black and/or female?
1. It seems unlikely that this is coming out all these years later.
2. There were many computers on that project.
3. This is most likely politically correct BS.
4. None of the black women I know are particularly competent; they gripe to get affirmative action to get a degree, to get a job, and to keep a job. Maybe Apollo was before affirmative action, but I would not trust a gerbil to a black woman's calculations. Sorry, but that is the reality of affirmative action.