BY HAND.
SHE CALCULATED ROCKET TRAJECTORIES BY HAND.
BUZZ ALDRIN TRUSTED NO-ONE ELSE, NOT EVEN THEIR COMPUTERS. https://t.co/liVtd8cX8c
— Oli Young (@oliyoung) August 25, 2017
Happy 99th birthday Katherine Johnson, NASA mathematician who calculated the trajectory of the Apollo 11 mission https://t.co/aay2OKlxev pic.twitter.com/f04GIFINDU
— Dr Paul Coxon (@paulcoxon) August 25, 2017
… I was so proud of Katherine as I sat with hundreds of other guests in the East Room of the White House and watched as she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama last year. Katherine’s great mind and amazing talents advanced our freedoms at the most basic level—the freedom to pursue the biggest dreams we can possibly imagine and to step into any room in the country and take a seat at the table because our expertise and excellence deserve it. Katherine, now 97, took her seat without fanfare. As far as not being equal was concerned, she said, “I didn’t have time for that. My dad taught us ‘you are as good as anybody in this town, but you’re no better.’ ” I’d posit that Katherine was better—not only at math but also at applying her talents with the precision and beauty possible only in mathematics. She achieved the perfect parabola—casting herself to the stars and believing she could chart the journey home.
Apart from honoring our heroes, and prepping (or praying for those) in the path of Hurricane Harvey, what’s on the agenda for the day?
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On a much less elevated level, just to vent…
I avoid Andrew Sullivan’s work as a general practice, but the NY Mag Most-Read sidebar title only said “The Boston Rally Exposed the Left’s Intolerance of Free Speech“. I won’t quote here, but this was an astonishing hat trick of Sully-ness.
Saturday Morning Open Thread: Going StrongPost + Comments (223)