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He's also a connoisseur and collector of slide rules and the Curta mechanical calculator! Here's a video of him describing how the Curta performs arithmetic: h
by gfaure 5y ago
He's also a connoisseur and collector of slide rules and the Curta mechanical calculator!
Here's a video of him describing how the Curta performs arithmetic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OynMJB-2J1o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OynMJB-2J1o — as well as the SciAm article he wrote on them: http://www.mycurta.com/Calculator.pdf http://www.mycurta.com/Calculator.pdf
- CliffStoll 5y agoConnoisseur? Naw! Stop by my place and you'll see a messy collection of oddball things ranging from some old calculators to stacks of old books. I received a Curta Calculator from my astronomy mentor, Ernst Both, when he got an HP-35 around 1973. I was one of his students; today, I can't look at it without thinking happy thoughts using a spectrohelioscope to understand sunspot magnetic fields. But that's another story...
- gfaure 5y agoWow, I'm honoured to hear from someone who loves these old calculating devices as much as I do! I have a Curta II and a number of the HP Voyager calculators from the 80s (11C, 15C, 16C), but the one that takes the pride of place in my collection has to be the Curta. Looking forward to adding a Klein bottle or beanie to my collection some day, too.