The Guardian of All Things

Notes

1. Finding a Voice

1. Robin McKie, “How a Hobbit Is Rewriting the History of the Human Race,” The (Guardian) Observer, February 21, 2010.

3. http://anthropology.net/2007/10/18/neandertals-have-the-same-mutations-in-foxp2-the-language-gene-as-modern-humans/.

4. www.andreasbick.de/en/writings/sound_reading/?article=111.

5. “Toba Catastrophe Theory,” ScienceDaily.com, www.sciencedaily.com/articles/t/toba_catastrophe_theory.htm.

6. J. David Sweatt, “The Neuronal MAP Kinase Cascade: A Biochemical Signal Integration System Subserving Synaptic Plasticity and Memory,” Journal of Neurochemistry 76 (2001): 1–10.

7. www.enotes.com/topic/Baddeley<#213>s_model_of_working_memory.

8. www.audiblox.com/human_memory.htm.

9. www.longtermpotentiation.com. Use the March 1, 2011, entry for an excellent explanation.

10. Endel Tulving, “What Is Episodic Memory?” Current Directions, 1993, available online at http://alicekim.ca/ET93.pdf.

11. www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topics/SETI/drake_equation.html.

2. The Cave of Illumination

1. http://communications.uvic.ca/releases/tip.php?date=22022010.

2. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb3284/is_295_77/ai_n28995839/.

3. www.omniglot.com/writing/vinca.htm.

4. www.ancientscripts.com/indus.html.

5. www.feelnubia.com/index.php/culture/tongues/133-the-ancient-nsibidi-writing-system.html.

6. http://incas.homestead.com/quipu/caral_oldest_quipu.html.

7. “About Sequoyah,” http://www.sequoyahmuseum.org/index.cfm/m/1/fuseAction/contentpage.main/detailID/29.

3. Clay, Reeds, and Skin

1. Martin Litchfield West, The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry and Myth (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1997), 334–402.

2. www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/.

3. www.buzzle.com/articles/history-of-egyptian-hieroglyphics.html.

4. Rosicrucian Museum, San Jose, California.

5. www.buzzle.com/articles/history-of-egyptian-hieroglyphics.html.

6. http://legacy.earlham.edu/~seidti/iam/papyrus.html.

7. Robin McKie, “Arab Scholar ‘Cracked Rosetta Code’ 800 Years Before the West,” The (Guardian) Observer, October 3, 2004.

8. www.rosettastonelanguagekey.com/html/an_ancient_mystery/egyptian_hieroglyphs.htm.

9. www.crystalinks.com/libraryofalexandria.html.

10. Ibid.

11. www.alpharubicon.com/primitive/tanningdragoona.htm.

12. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parchment.

13. http://elab.eserver.org/hfl0243.html.

14. http://cunnan.sca.org.au/wiki/Codex.

4. The Bloody Statue

1. Dr. Charles Fernybough, “Moonwalking with Simonides” review, Psychology Today blog, April 23, 2011, www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-child-in-time/201104/moonwalking-simonides.

2. www.iep.utm.edu/cicero/.

3. http://public.wsu.edu/~dee/REN/HUMANISM.HTM.

4. Cicero, De Oratore II (lxxxvi), 351–54.

5. Rhetorica ad Herennium, Book III, Chapter 22.

6. Ibid., Book III, Chapter 19.

7. Joshua Foer, Moonwalking with Einstein (New York: Penguin Press, 2011), 248.

8. www.iep.utm.edu/cicero/.

9. www.roman-empire.net/articles/article-003.html.

10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Psellos.

11. Richard Erdoes, 1000 AD (Berkeley, CA: Seastone, 1998), 60–61.

12. http://everything2.com/title/Historical+Evidence+Regarding+the+Libraries+of+Muslim+Spain.

13. Erdoes, 1000 AD, 60–61.

14. Karl Christ, Handbook of Medieval Library History (New York: Scarecrow, 1984), 14–15.

15. “Celebrities in the History of Printing,” www.chinaculture.org/library/2008-02/06/content_46431.htm.

5. Long-Leggedy Beasties

1. Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the Twelfth Century (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1927), viii.

2. Ibid., 6–8.

3. Lawrence M. Principe, The Scientific Revolution (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press 2011), 7.

4. www.cosmopolis.com/villa/liberal-arts.html.

5. www.chinaculture.org/gb/en_aboutchina/2003-09/24/content_26624.htm.

6. T. H. White, The Book of Beasts (Mineola, NY: Dover, 2010).

7. George McCauley Trevelyan, A Shortened History of England (New York: Penguin, 1988), 69.

8. White, The Book of Beasts, 240.

9. Ibid., 241.

10. Ibid., 244.

11. Ibid., 5.

12. Author’s conversation with Martin Kaufmann, November 2008.

6. Theaters of Memory

1. Michael Lewis, “The Roasting of Giordano Bruno,” Slate, February 28, 2000, www.slate.com/articles/news_and-politics/i-see-france/2000/02/the-roasting-of-giordano-bruno.html.

2. http://bigbendnow.com/2011/02/giordano-bruno-martyr-or-fool/.

3. http://romaexperience.com/romediary/giordano-bruno/.

4. Frances Yates, The Art of Memory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966), 12.

5. http://galileo.rice.edu/chr/bruno.html.

6. Yates, The Art of Memory, 41.

7. Ibid., 130–31.

8. Ibid., 131–32.

9. This explanation taken from the Church of St. James the Great’s booklet on its murals.

10. William Boulting, Giordano Bruno: His Life, Thought, and Martyrdom (New York: E. P. Dutton 1916), 58.

11. Select Charters and Other Illustrations of English Constitutional History, ed. W. Stubbs, 2 vols., 9th edition (London: Clarendon Press, 1913), 176.

12. M. T. Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record, England 1066–1307, 2nd edition (Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 1993), 115.

13. Ibid.

14. www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/william-tyndale.html.

15. www.tititudorancea.com/z/encyclopedia_35892.htm.

7. Patterns in the Carpet

1. Alfred Chapuis and Edouard Gélis, Le Monde des automates, volume 2 (Paris: Neuchatel 1927), 149–51; Alfred Chapuis and Edmond Droz, Automata (Paris: Neuchatel, 1958), 233–34; Jessica Riskin, “The Defecating Duck, or, the Ambiguous Origins of Artificial Life,” Critical Inquiry (September 2003).

2. www.antikythera-mechanism.gr/.

3. “Seventh Olympic Ode” by Pindar, www.jstor.org/pss/4430612.

4. http://library.thinkquest.org/C006011/english/sites/heron_bio.php3?v=2.

5. Joseph Needham, Science and Civilization in China: Volume 2. England (Cambridge, UK, Cambridge University Press, 1986), 53.

6. Ibid.

7. Ibid., 54.

8. www.classicallibrary.org/descartes/meditations/.

9. Riskin, “The Defecating Duck.”

10. Ibid.

11. www.newadvent.org/cathen/10325a.htm.

12. http://research.miralab.unige.ch/automata/eightennth/vaucanson_uk.htm.

13. Book review, “Living Dolls: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life,” by Gaby Wood, The Guardian, February 16, 2002.

14. Ibid.

15. Ibid. For a good history of automatons, including the intriguing fate of the Digesting Duck (which may still exist), see Living Dolls: A Magical History of the Quest for Mechanical Life by Gaby Wood (Faber & Faber, 2003).

8. Tick, Talk

1. http://wiki.whitneygen.org/wrg/index.php/Archive:Domesday_Book.

2. Adam Goodheart, “The Census of Doom,” New York Times, April 1, 2011, online edition, http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/01/the-census-of-doom/.

3. Ibid.

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid.

6. Ibid.

7. William Aul, “Herman Hollerith: Data Processing Pioneer,” Think (IBM employee magazine), November 1972, 22–24. Available at www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/builders/builders_hollerith.html

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid.

10. Michael S. Malone, The Big Score (New York: Doubleday, 1985), 14.

11. Nikola Tesla, “Thomas Edison,” New York Times, October 19, 1931.

12. “George Eastman,” www.nndb.com/people/980/000086722/.

13. Quoted in Patrick Robertson’s Film Facts (New York: Billboard Books, 2001), 5.

14. www.acmi.net.au/AIC/MAGIC_MACHINES_4.html.

15. Some material in this section is from www.ce.org/Events/Awards/468.htm.

16. http://cs-exhibitions.uni-klu.ac.at/index.php?id=220.

17. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/audio/bias.html.

18. www.videointerchange.com/wire_recorder1.htm.

19. www.computerhistory.org/events/.

20. Malone, The Big Score, 67.

9. Diamonds and Rust

1. www.cci-compeng.com/Unit_5_PC_Architecture/5202_Who_Invented.htm.

2. Lawrence M. Fisher, “Reynold Johnson, 92, Pioneer in Computer Hard Disk Drives,” New York Times, September 18, 1998.

3. Dinner talk by Rey Johnson at the DataStorage ’89 Conference, September 19, 1989. Available at www.magneticdiskheritagecenter.org/100th/reyjohnson.htm.

4. George Rostky, “Disk Drives Take an Eventful Spin,” EE Times, July 13, 1998.

5. www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/storage/storage_3340.html.

6. Ibid.

7. Malone, The Big Score, 279.

8. Michael S. Malone, Betting It All (Wiley, 2002), 129–30.

9. Ibid., 129.

10. Ibid., 131.

11. Ibid.

12. Rostky, “Disk Drives Take an Eventful Turn.”

13. Malone, Betting It All, 133.

14. Ibid., 136.

15. Ibid.

16. Ibid.

17. www.seattlepi.com/default/article/Apple-s-new-iPod-player-puts-1-000-songs-in-your-1070406.php.

18. www.cedmagic.com/history/transistor-1947.html.

19. Michael S. Malone, The Microprocessor: A Biography (New York: Springer, 1995), 33.

20. Ibid., 53.

21. www.computerhistory.org/semiconductor/timeline/1958-Miniaturized.html.

22. Malone, The Microprocessor, 54–55.

23. Ibid., 56–58.

24. http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2008/09/moore.ars.

25. Michael S. Malone, “The Future Still Lives,” Forbes, May 11, 2011.

26. Malone, The Microprocessor, 3–15.

27. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programmable_read-only_memory.

28. http://searchcio-midmarket.techtarget.com/definition/EEPROM.

29. http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/flash-memory.htm.

10. The Persistence of Memory

1. www.wisegeek.com/how-big-is-the-internet.htm.

2. Eliphas Lévi, Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual (The Occult Publishing House, 1860, 1913), 108.

3. http://psychology.about.com/od/biopsychology/ss/brainstructure_2.htm.

4. www.musanim.com/miller1956/.

5. Henry Markram, from 2009 TED Conference, Oxford University, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS3wMC2BpxU.

6. Jonathon Fildes, “Artificial Brain ‘10 Years Away,’” BBC News online, July 22, 2009, accessed February 21, 2012, news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8164060.stm.

7. H. G. Wells, World Brain (New York: Doubleday), xvi; George B. Dyson, Among the Machines (New York: Basic Books, 1997).

8. Ibid., 87.

9. Garet Garrett, Ouroboros (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1926), 19.

10. Dyson, Darwin Among the Machines, 227.

11. Ibid., 1–2.

12. Michael Chorost, World Wide Mind (New York: Free Press, 2011), 9–10.

13. Dr. David Whitehouse, “Computer Uses Cat’s Brain to See,” BBC News Online, October 8, 1999, accessed February 21, 2012, news.bbc.co.uk./2/hi/sci/tech/468857.stm.

14. Ian Sample, “The Brain Scan That Can Read People’s Intentions,” The Guardian, February 9, 2007.

15. www.singularity-universe.com/technologicalsingularity. Primary source for Irving Good quote: www.acceleratingfuture.com/pages/ultraintelligentmachine.html.

16. www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vinge/misc/singularity.html.

17. http://reason.com/archives/2007/05/04/superhuman-imagination.

18. Ibid.

19. Clive Thompson, “A Head for Detail,” Wired, November 1, 2006.

20. Gordon Bell and Jim Gemmall, Total Recall: How the E-Memory Revolution Will Change Everything (New York: E. P. Dutton, 2009).

21. Thompson, “A Head for Detail.”

22. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/03/110302-solar-flares-sun-storms-earth-danger-carrington-event-science/.

23. www.technologyreview.com/blog/mimssbits/26889/?p1=blogs.