IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2016 - 49

that Ada's ambition was possibly driven in part by her
father's creative passions and free-ranging thinking. She
was drawn to abstract thought and to linking ideas in
unexpected ways. Had she lived longer, she may have
been the first to accurately describe the field of biophysics and the nature and role of electrical conductivity in
biological systems. She was not constrained by conventional thinking - on many levels. What can we draw from
this story about innovative thinking in science related to
the situation today for young women? Ada Lovelace succeeded in spite of the exclusion, prejudice, and stereotyping that existed in her era, and there is no more excuse
for those attitudes now than there was in the 18th, 19th,
or 20th centuries.
An unintended consequence of exclusion, prejudice,
and stereotyping, which results in anything less than
full inclusion of all humanity in Science, Technology,
Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) activities is the
loss of considerable scientific and economic potential.
We ignore this consequence at our peril as Sadker [4]
states, "If the cure for cancer is in the mind of a girl, we
may never find it."
Full inclusion for all members of humanity in STEM
endeavors coupled with a truly integrated approach to
embracing creativity, will surely lead to intended consequences of equity, diversity, and inclusivity, and better
opportunities to achieve real solutions to complex problems that affect everyone.

Author Information
Imogen R. Coe is Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biology and the founding Dean of Science at
Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada. Her research
focuses on structure, function and regulation of drug
transport proteins. She is also known for her work
as an advocate for equity, diversity and inclusivity
in STEM. Email: imogen.coe@ryerson.ca.
Alexander Ferworn is Professor in the Department of
Computer Science, Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada,
where he serves as the Graduate Program Director and
Associate Chair. His research focuses on computational
public safety with a special interest in urban disaster
response. He is the father of two daughters who both
study science. Email: aferworn@ryerson.ca.

References

[1] R. Gandy, "The confluence of ideas in 1936," in The Universal
Turing Machine A Half-Century Survey, R. Herken, Ed. Springer
Verlag, 1995, pp 55-112.
[2] L. F. Menabrea, "Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by
Charles Babbage," Bibliothèque Universelle de Genève, Oct. 1842,
no. 82.
[3] J. Ouellette, Black Bodies and Quantum Cats: Tales from the
Annals of Physics. Penguin, 2005.
[4] M. Sadker, "Myra Sadker: 1943-1995," The Myra Sadker Foundation; http://www.sadker.org/about-bio.html, accessed Oct. 1, 2016.
[5] S. Wolfram, "Untangling the tale of Ada Lovelace," Stephen
Wolfram Blog, Dec. 10, 2015; http://blog.stephenwolfram.
com/2015/12/untangling-the-tale-of-ada-lovelace/.

Book Reviews (continued from page 12)
integral in my calculus class. If the
lecture had been recorded I could
have watched it over and over until
it penetrated. Best of all, I might
have watched it a few times before
class so as to bring in some smart
and probably dumb questions. This
practice is now widely done and is
known as the "flipped classroom."
It is most popular and effective in
science courses where it can be difficult to assimilate an idea presented just once in a lecture hall. There
is no suggestion in Turkle's book
that recorded lectures might have a
different place in the sciences from
what they do in the humanities. As
DECember 2016

for the importance of live interaction - and the brief conversations
with the professor right after class -
this is old news.
Turkle has written an important
book, albeit not a Silent Spring.
Future historians of science and
technology will see it as a product of
the period when mobile devices
began to play a very large role in
American life. It is an eloquent, compact record of what concerned us.

Author Information
David Wunsch is Professor Emeritus
of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Massa∕

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

chusetts Lowell. He is Book Review
editor of this magazine. His email
address is A_Wunsch@uml.edu.

References

[1] W. Benjamin, Berlin Childhood Around
1900, H. Eiland, trans. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
Univ. Press, 2006.
[2] C. Fischer, America Calling, A Social History of the Telephone. Univ. of California
Press, 1992, pp. 93, 102.
[3] Y.T. Uhls et al., "Five days at outdoor education camp without screens improves preteen
skills with nonverbal emotion cues," Computers in Human Behavior, vol. 39, pp. 387-
392, Oct. 2014.
[4] "What happens when your MOOC implodes,"
Chronicle Higher Ed., June 10, 2016.

http://www.sadker.org/about-bio.html http://www.blog.stephenwolfram

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