Nobel, Physics, 1901

TL;DR -- Let's spend some time using the Nobel prize to track the history of advances in science. After all, people do the science. And, some factors related to people come out of genealogical and historical (cultural) studies. 

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We have paid more attention to the Nobel prizes this year than ever before. This might become a habit since the 2024 prizes referenced, indirectly, the bugaboo of the modern world, AIn't. The Physics Prize was for machine learning; the Chemistry Prize was for protein modeling. In looking at the Nobel material, it seemed obvious that the material presented about the work of het honoree was remarkable. We can follow the prize over the year to obtain material for analysis.  

As an aside, we mentioned a Balch descendant who was a Peace Prize honoree: Emily Greene Balch. But, we need to get more particular. 

Looking at Physics, first, the inception of the prize was in 1901: Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. Here is the link to the Award Ceremony Speech. There are many years to cover. 

With the 2024 Prizes for Physics and Chemistry dealing with computational approaches which is our technology interest, we have a natural categorical framework with which to start. We will not do a linear search but will follow some interesting parallels. For instance, the 1918 Prize for Physics went to Planck for his work in quantum mechanics. Who we have referenced him in several place. In 1922, Einstein got the award for his work with blackbody radiation in 1905. Einstein presented his relativity theory in the meantime; the committee felt that there was not enough proof for an award. We'll go more into that later. 

This thematic bit of research will cover a lot of ground. Well, with respect to machine learning, we are talking the sum total of knowledge that can be handled using computational means. 

Switching to the Chemistry Prize, we thought to look at how many awards dealt with the computational in Chemistry. We expect this in Physics. Wiley published an essay that lists prizes, both Physics and Chemistry, that will be of interest to us: The Nobel history of computational chemistry. A personal perspective. 

We looked an early Chemistry prize, 1910, which was for an 1893 thesis: Nobel Week. The theme was remarkable for several reasons, one of which is the history of science as it is unfolded through human effort.Johannes Diderik van der Waals (Wikipedia) showed that elements are molecularly the same as they go through phases. We will get more into that topic as we go along. 

A final note provides a summary by Gemini of Google via Chrome. After all, the Nobel committee opened this door; we ought (actually, must) to use it. 

Courtesy, Gemini of
Google via
Chrome

Remarks: Modified: 12/07/2024

12/07/2024 -- 

Warning, on AI

TL;DR -- The Nobel's can be used to learn the history of science and to discuss choices made plus their ramifications through time. 2024 showed the Nobel focus on machine learning. In general, we can find many types of warnings that are not being heeded or even discussed. 

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We mentioned the Nobel prizes this year, several times, example: Nobel Week. Because of the theme of some prizes in 2024, we finally paid attention. The Nobels can be used to trace the history of science since the Awards started so as to have philosophical discussions about choices. Why related ANN merely to mathematical physics? Wait, physics underlies everything else intellectually, one view says. 

Okay, fair enough. But the mathematical frameworks related to physics go far beyond those used so far in GenAI. This is an empirical matter that can be an ongoing discussion. GenAI came on the scene in 2022. We saw 2023 as a get acquainted time where sides of the issues were established. Cautions were thrown to the wind in 2024 as things went full speed ahead. Yet, the issues of hype continued to exist in public view. 

But, the use of ML (the AI of current mode) has exploded across the land. Repercussions are imminent (which timeframe?). Perhaps, we'll learn something. 

So, Scientific American provided us an opinion that express a "Warning about AI" which compares things to the bomb era and race. The author has a site and partners: Not just Math; Partnership on AI. 

Did the Nobel choices add to the necessary conversation? We have not seen yet anything positive, but it is still early. And the topic is here to stay. 

Along with its machine intelligence focus in the Prizes, the Nobel committee honored a person attempting to end nuclear war. 

Remarks: Modified: 01/10/2025

01/10/2025 --  

Nobel, Chemistry, 1901

TL;DR -- Significant to us were the Prizes for Physics, Chemistry and Medicine. In this post, we point to the 1901 award. As such, that is a good start with van der Walls and Hoff for physics and chemistry. 

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We mentioned the 2024 Nobel Prizes earlier with more references to the Physics award which dealt with  machine learning. At the time, we emphasized the importance of the one for chemistry and for medicine. 

This post looks at the 1901 prize. It can be categoried as dealing with theoretical chemistry. After studying the advance of science and pondering what might bridge the gaps that are currently found in knowledge as we see observe the problems of technology, we settled upon theoretical chemistry as a central theme. Looking at the first Nobel prize in Chemistry is a good place to start. 

Nobel, Chemistry, 1901

In Physics, van del Waals was the first Awardee for his work in thermodynmics but focused on his PhD thesis from 1873. Contemporary with van der Walls in doing the early work in thermodynamics was Josian Willard Gibbs who was an American and who we wrote of as a descendant of Thomas Gardner and Margaret Fryer through their son George. 

In Chemistry, Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff (Wikipedia) was the first Awardee for his work in the "the discovery of the laws of chemical dynamics and osmotic pressure in solutions" and demonstrated the importance of physical chemistry. 

Tying back to the 2024 Prizes, we see that the mathematical aspects of physics and its kin has advanced tremendously with an acceleration that accompanied the growth, recently, of computing prowess. Both the physics and chemistry prizes acknowleged advanced computing which applied knowledge brought forth by studies in mathematical physics. 

Another topic that will be constantly at hand is the Philosophy of Physics. Wikipedia provides a good overview, except the material is rated as "original research" as an indication of value, improperly source information, and perhaps even viewpoint. There is also an article on the Philosophy of Chemistry (Wikipedia) which does not have the problem. They quote Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling as their first philosopher. One interesting twist? Is it thing or action that is important? That issue resonates to this day. A resolution was to accept both and make the situation the focus. 

BTW, philosophy of science is important by default, almost, to the upcoming discussions. 

Note: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Chemistry; Modeling and Chemical explanation).  

Remarks: Modified: 12/30/2024

12/30/2024 -- See post (Nobel, Medicine, 2024) for link to those for Physics, Chemistry, and Medicine.  

Nobel Week

TL;DR -- Nobel week looms. Their website will be a proper fount of knowledge about human culture through time in a technical sense. 

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The Nobel week is coming. This year, the prizes bring attention to new types of modeling: Nobel, Medicine, 2024. 

Their post today, on a 1910 Prize for the 1873 doctoral thesis of Johannes Diderik van der Waals (Wikipedia), shows how far we have come in 120 years and how we can use the Prizes to track progress which will become more important as we establish a basis for computational decisioning. 

We will continue the historical look under our technology theme.

Remarks: Modified: 12/14/2024

12/07/2024 -- Changed "edit" link to the Nobel website. 

12/14/2024 -- van der Waals was instrumental in going from the past to now; this was done by diving into the work of Gibbs of New England. 

Economics, 2024

TL;DR -- Economics? About time. We looked at the science and medicine awards earlier. We have a category of Nobel as the posts are stacking up. A discussion of ChatGpt brought the additional Nobels to attention. The gist of the work is that GenAI/LLM will have minimal impact which brings up questions, such as, why all of the wasted effort and hype? 

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We just made a "Nobel" category since there are so  many posts and there will be more. Our last post on the subject was about a family member starting an organization that supports excellence for high school students. The focus is mathematics as it will become more important due to computing's use (misuse) of the phenomenality and to its role as supporting science and technology. Other posts dealt with awards this summer that brought to fore an awareness of machine learning (couched as an misnomer, via "AI"). 

Now, economics? On Ln, we saw discussion of AI what was mature where a remark noted that an expert at MIT suggested that gains from AI will be less than 1%. Wait? Sounds like our sort of argument. Besides, one of John's graduate advisors was from MIT. And, John McCarthy was there. It, with Stanford and Carnegie Mellon, was a noted academic resource back in the '70s and '80s, prior to the downturn that was due to several factors. The term for this was "AI winter" with this concept being brought forth now due to the hype-driven scene that we have seen for two years. 

• ChatGPT (Feb, 2023) -- We had written on AI for a long while, using AIn't for the most part. We are dealing with buckets-of-bits that are "warping our imaginations, clouding our intuition" (as we wrote elsewhere). But, notice that this post is about three months late, since OpenAI released their toy/tool in Nov of 2022. I had not been paying close attention to them. Since that time, there are several other posts. And, we have written elsewhere on the matter. Needless to say, in this interchange, we asked about Thomas Gardner. And, instructed it on what we knew then, or thought that we knew. Irony? At that same time, while I was looking at Wolfram's use (Mathematica) of ChatGPT (and others), some research work was being done via WikiTree (see Currrent Status). With that work, the TGS, Inc. foundations were shaken. We did not fall and are in a repair state. Sherborne, UK records show all of the kids, but Seeth, being born in England. Now, we are keeping to the notion of Thomas going back and forth and explain our reasoning. 

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For now, here are a few links to material about the award. 

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  MIT economists Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson share Nobel Prize -- The small reward (1%) does not support the hype or the ungodly amount of money and resources going into GenAI/LLM. Conversations are starting to emerge with more critical viewpoints being expressed.  
• Drawing a line from colonialism to artificial intelligence --  We like this as our whole outlook pertains to carry the tales forward about the history of the U.S., especially with respect to the early days. Then, it was the fifth generation that bore the onus of the Revolution. 

The unconstrained hype is normal for people. Newton (gravity and light guy) lost lots of money in some silly scheme. Bohr (more smart) said that the ca-pital-sino (our neologism) cannot allow winning without insider information. Oh? Yes, long ago, he said that. 

Too, where are the engineers? And, we will invoke KBE (knowledge based engineering) which allows the well-educated brains to qualitatively control the beasts of quantitative modes. GenAI/LLM for too long has adopted the aura of Einstein and his mathematics. Well, physics might win some battles with Ma Nature. It does not rule, yet. Nor will it. 

Computing? Out of mathematics via physics. Less than mature in so many ways. 

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The Nobel's work can be used to analyze our progress over time as we consider those who got awarded and all of their compatriots, of their time. We will engage in that sort of discussion. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/16/2025

02/16/2025 -- 

Nobel, Medicine, 2024

TL;DR -- This is the third of three gifts from the Nobel Committee. Starting with the math of machine learning and then with the chemistry work with proteins, there were heady responses with respect to the applicability of the technological insights. Ah, but wait. The Medicine prize brings us back to complexity and the reality of such. Now, one topic that will be continually on the table is this: has computing been a boon or a bane? 

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This is the third post on the 2024 Nobel. The earlier two were: Physics; Chemistry. 

This post looks at the Prize for Medicine which reports on increased insights into cell regulation. 

These three can be thought of as gifts. Let's use them correctly. All things that can come from this will be discussed and utilized over the next few years. 

1. Physics - ANN and mathematical physics. I might say AIn't, but it is to the hype and misunderstanding (managers, something from nothing? - perpetual motion - need you a reminder?). Nope, the solution to the issues is right before us. It's that thing between the ears which has been allowed to go astray as it deals with complex things (yes, Mathematics - let's discuss). 

2. Chemistry - We see the hubristic side of Google (unfortunately so) tamed plus acknowledgement of lab work which is far from application (with respect to several proposed notions). At the same time, we see feedback into the thing mentioned in 1) with respect to interpretations (which is human and very much on display in the current mess) and changes that can come when empiricism works (busyness? your money focus is deleterious). 

3. Medicine - Back to reality. We now see that genetics is not under our thumb (note prizes the past few years). Insights to be gained there will play into better understanding of the computational (applied) mathematics that allows these freaky/magical moments (busyness people, look up Minsky - not Marvin, btw). Yes, complexity in another light (looking forward to seeing this generally known). 

And so, we proceed. Where we know that we are more than brain. What we need to look at further is that we can describe the necessary maturity for computation. If only, we can look at the past two decades and discuss what not to do (again) based upon our analysis.

Remarks: Modified: 11/18/2024

11/18/2024 -- 

Nobel, Chemistry, 2024

TL;DR -- We provide a link to Nobel Prize material that goes into the detail of the Chemistry prize and its computational framwork. 

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Going forward,we can pay more attention to the material from the Nobel committeee with regard to the technology behind the selection. This image is from a page that looks at the history of the 2024 award for Chemistry which helps us document progress in GenAI (machine learning). 

How does AlphaFold2 work?

Advances using computational assists that reduce time and costs for experiments have been expected from the beginning, decades ago. What changes is the complexity. Fortunately, the domain of this research can have lab support as well as the use of physical experiments. 

We will discuss possible issues as we look at the topic. However, that there are those considerations on the table is beyond doubt. How we might attempt to rectify them is not so clear. 

Remarks: Modified: 11/04/2024

11/04/2024 -- 

Nobel, Physics, 2024

TL;DR -- Good old mathematics behind machine learning gets some respect. That is good news. 

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New directions pend. We have talked AIn't for a while. There's no critter in the buckets of bits. There may be patterns. Now, the Nobel Prize folks say that this is physics and a result of its mathematics. 

Okay, that's great. We argued anyway that the focus ought not be intelligence which goes with life, and its study - biology, as far as we know. We stressed the mathematical connectsions, but having physics now in the game improves the chance of lifting awareness to things that matter. 

So, this post goes with our technology focus which we are trying to define and foster.   

Remarks: Modified: 11/18/2024

11/13/2024 --  Added Nobel Prize, to the name. 

11/18/2024 -- So, we now have Physics, Chemistry and Medicine, connected. Expect further discussions. 

History of mathematics I

TL;DR -- While browsing on education and technology, we settled on the medical example and look at suggestions for High School work given an interest in Medical School. That leads to mathematics since the normal will be computational involvement brought to us by GenAI and its impact on modern culture. As such, there is lots to look for that is not available yet. That will change as mathematics is lifted to public view. 

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This also could have been titled "computing and mathematics" given events of the past two years plus just what happened within the first month of 2025. However, the computer naturally comes out of mathematics (slide rule?, remember?, others?). That topic will be handled as needed. 

One focus that we have is supporting scholarly pursuits. In that sense and given our mission, much work has gone into the study of history and genealogy related to the experiences of the U.S. from early New England until now. We have supported the work of others in this regard through various means, mostly research. A goal has been to provide even more support of a financial nature. 

Lately, with GenAI now part of daily life for many, we have been increasing the attention given to technology; also, we consider that the U.S. and its 250th coming up fit into the various themes of governance of technology which seems to have been sorely lacking. With the emphais on computing being stronger now, we thought to look at people and their involvement especially as it pertains to the future. 

Education is a necessary theme. One result of GenAI's emergence has been that confusion has come about as to get involved or not. Many students adopted the technology early though overall there is no clear consensus on how such use ought to play out in an equitable sense. Now, after two years have lapsed, we see academic interest coming to fore. 

So, education needs to stay abreast of issues as well as adapt to new methods. We thought that it might be of interest to consider the experience and consquences of education with respect to a well-known field of operation, training of a medical doctor. As we started to browse, we ran into an interesting group and want to use them as a topic for further research. 

•  The National Society of High School Scholars -- NSHSS -- "NSHSS is a distinguished academic honor society, committed to recognizing and serving the highest-achieving student scholars in more than 26,000 high schools across 170 countries. With access to valuable resources and a network of more than 2 million exceptional peers spanning high school to college and career, NSHSS scholars embody academic dedication and outstanding leadership in their schools, workplaces, and communities."

Our first encounter with their site was this post: You Want to Be a Doctor? Here is the Average Salary for Each Medical Specialty. So then, if we look at that discipline which is well-known, one would look to see how to meet the requirements for doing the work. We all know of the academic work after the undergraduate college experience: medical school (internship); residency; further study. What about pre-college? 

Turns out that there was a NSHSS post that goes into this as it is a very good example: How to Prepare for a Future in Medicine Early in High School. This post gives an example course load with 4-years of mathematics, science and a foreign language. It is a typical mix for a scholarly pursuit with the newer emphasis on AP courses which exposes the student to college-level material. One new emphasis is on getting into the ways of calculus. We touch upon that below. Also, there are many more resources for supporting this focus, including preparation for testing. 

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One founder of NSHSS was of the Nobel family (Claes Nobel, Commemorative) whose prizes we started to pay attention to this year. Mainly, that was due to the Physics and Chemistry Prizes honoring computational work. The former was recognized in its association with mathematical physics. The latter included work sponsored by Google plus associated lab work. 

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The past two years we have seen GenAI/LLM come into daily life with impacts that range from good to bad and with unknown ramifications. One thing clear is that underlying what we observe and talk about is mathematics in action. Hence, that topic must be brought to general attention including supporting material that will make specifics known at all levels as needed. This is a new task, essentially. 

For now, let's look at one aspect of mathematics that the NSHSS has on its list: calculus. Other courses include preparatory work as well as advanced material. But, we thought to point to a fuller picture than one gets where the algebraic view is associated with geometry which is on the Freshmen list. 

With computing and its advances? Expect that geometry will be a part of daily life. It actually is already in a native sense. Parts of and events in our 3D world are associated with Euclid's insights from over 2000 years ago. Before the latter part of last century, students studies analytic geometry and calculus, rather than calculus alone which avoids some of the niceties for the mathematician. 

The following link is to a chapter of the material for a class in the History of Mathematics at UC Irvine: 8 Analytic Geometry and Calculus. Neil Donaldson of Scotland (Edinburgh and Bath Universities) is a visiting lecturer whose material covers many of the topics that will come into the discussion. 

As we have mentioned, AI of late is not due to some critter emerging via heated circuits with their buckets of bits. Not at all. We are seeing, finally, years of effort at computing mathematics paying off with remarkable results. That some of these astonish only show how much we do not know but could and will know. 

Now, all of this material covers a range of fields in mathematics, all of it undergraduate in scope. Now, a first step would be to bring this into a College 101 format. Given the ability now for presentation via the web, one could then point back to the view of the undergraduate mathematics major and then to various graduate specialities. Yet, at the same time, material related to the application of mathemaics would be (or become) available. 

Now, the general public? Or the C-Suite? That is work to be done. Domain focus? OpenAI's success in playing around with mathematical games does not mean that human expertise and talent will become less than worthy. On the contrary, people ought to (and will) be the focus. We already have touched upon this at lenght but need to organize the material.  

Remarks: Modified: 02/14/2025

02/14/2025 -- Two days ago, OpenAI pushed out a view, based upon aesthetics - finally, with respect to their models: OpenAI Model Spec.  

Memory - present, past

TL;DR -- The cloud and such? What's the use? Science was an early motivation for the research and engineering. We're at a crossroad, somewhat. So, posts on technology themes will be a regular occurrence. 

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Technology is the theme as it has given us a universal memory machine, somewhat. That is, computing and its cloud and the related trackers provide a seemingly endless memory. That digital ocean was one of the things used to train GenAI (ChatGPT, &c). Back in 2015, we had a post (Web/cloud presence) that brought up the choice for us all, ought what we do be forgotten? 

At that time, the cloud was 10 years old (we date it from GSA's decision that the US Government could use the emerging resource). We found out the other day, that Microsoft's cloud is used in the work of 85% of the US Departments. What comes to mind? Single point of failure, for one thing. 

Technology brings changes to which we have to adapt. That neverending affair can be a little offsetting. We do have choices in the matter which will be discussed on a regular basis. 

Today, let's look at keeping something that has value. 

The context is Physics and its rewards. The technology is a blog that quit adding new material a few years ago: Lady Science. There were two contributors from 2014 (see Archive - of their Monthly Issue). The first of these was titled "Delivery Room Drama" (17 Oct 2014). The last issue of a post was 8 Oct 2021. On browsing the site, we thought that it's good that this material is still around dealing with the topics of women, history and science. Some of the earlier posts were oriented toward art. One of the writers went back to school to learn the history of science. 

And, the blog got attention. Fortunately, it's archived at the Library of Congress. After a pause to look at our interest, we will discuss how we found this blog. 

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So, our technology focus will make use of this material. Too, we like to do some comparisons related to time. In 2014 (see posts from that year), we were working in this blog plus our website which was hosted by a site using Linux as the OS. We started with blogger in 2010 which was picked up by Google. Having started our site with Microsoft, we moved when they went to Office365. After researching content vs configuration, we went with custom development. We have blogged about the technical aspects on the necessary choices and will organize a better summary review at some point. As, right now,we're looking at the future of software from several angles. We can all see the edges fraying. How did this happen? Can we recover without too much pain? Lots off questions. 

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Also, we have paid attention to women and science in posts. See post on the daughter (Geertruida de Haas-Lorentz) of Hendrik Lorentz. We discovered her through the experiment of Einstein that she gave to a museum which represented the facility of small experiments. 

Today, in LinkedIn, we saw a post of The Nobel Prize group about the 1912 marriage of (Margrethe Nørland Bohr) of Neils Bohr. She was actively involved in his research and writing, but that work is not mentioned by the group. A comment provided this post: Crafting Quantum Theory: Margrethe Bohr and the Labor of Theoretical Physics. Their son got a Nobel Prize for his work on the nucleus. 

This blog represents several things. It's content will be apropos to the continuing discussions of STEM and its uses. Too, though, the structure of the content and the approach to the subjects are remarkable. As well, we like how it was designed for several reasons. Which of the various subjects to be addressed will be first is unknown. We're bringing the blog to awareness, in general. 

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Our new project deals with a redux on AI along several fronts which deals with the timely problems that will emerge soon enough. 

Remarks: Modified: 08/05/2024

08/05/2024 --    

Computational Chemistry

TL;DR -- Machine learning and its use of physics was the focus for the Nobel award. This was followed up with the chemistry award being given to protein research. This is a step forward for various reasons. Ultimate consequences are not really known at this time. Research deals with the future.  

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Yesterday, we noted that the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2024 was given for work in machine learning. ML which is usually known as AI (artificial intelligence) deals with the technology of a computer systems taking as input huge streams of data and reducing these through various techniques into information that people can understand and use. But, this information can feed back into the computer model itself. 

The emphasis is on modeling which is accomplished through computational techniques. "computational" goes along with "theoretic" which deals with analytic and quantitative means applied to a field of study in order to effect desirable effects such as design, prediction and continuing analysis, generally in support of scientific endeavors. If one surveys the STEM discplines, one sees a huge influence of computational modes. With respect to some of the harder problems such as life and intelligence, one could very well suggest that theoretical chemistry will play a huge role. So, this is a necessary step; but, we have huge problems yet to resolve. 

Along with that of Physics, the Prize for Chemistry in 2024 was given to researchers who used a variant of ML from Google (AlpaFold). This work portends to future benefits that have been elusive using other means. Needless to say, the success is heavily dependent upon the researchers who are working now as well as the continually developing frameworks of their disciplines. 

A technical paper explains some of the details: COMPUTATIONAL PROTEIN DESIGN AND PROTEIN STRUCTURE PREDICTION. The following is a quote from the paper:

In summary, the achievements of David Baker, Demis Hassabis and John Jumper in the fields of computational protein design and protein structure prediction are truly profound. Their work has opened up a new era of biochemical and biological research, where we can now predict and design protein structures in ways that had not been possible before. Hence, a long-standing goal has finally been met, and the impact of this will have far-reaching consequences. 

As it says, this is research and applies to the future. We will look at some recent applications of the techniques and discuss the matters that relate. 

The use of AI is somewhat unfortunate. The work is an example of applied mathematics, computational modeling of such, people who are in the position to exploit the facilities in their work, and long years of work captured various ways as science has been doing for the past 200 years or so. 

AI deals with intelligence which we know is mostly associated with living forms. Now, we can look more closely at modeling these by using improved protein analysis plus a whole lot of other information. Like with physics which is strongly using normals in order to reduce problems to a proper scope, we will see this with other scientific domains. 

At we see with GenAI, what are the costs of this research in comparison with other work that is necessary, in terms of the resources used (say power), or the potential for misuse given our proclivity to not know how to manage complexity? 

Congratulations to the Laureates. Looking forward to watching things unfold. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/04/2025

10/09/2024 --  

Rachel, again

TL;DR -- Looked at the data related to Rachel (Gardner) Noble and considered how she might relate to Thomas Gardner. More questions than answers.  

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This post will pull together some posts from the past, beginning real early. We were asked if Thomas has a sister, Rachel. Had not hear that, at the time, so went looking. There was no real resolution, however lots of material was covered which is scattered through these posts. There was a recent notice received that there was research backing this up. So, we have to follow that hint like fish after bait. 

Now, we are in the process of updating Thomas' Profile on WikiTree. The idea now is to make it a solid piece which references proper sources, starting with Anderson's work (Great Migration Project). Then, we will add in research details, some of which was contributed by Gardner Research. However, with respect to Rachel, do we know any more than about Margaret's proposed brother, Thomas Friar, who came over to Gloucester?

It has been a couple hundred of years since the Revolution and of Americans wandering the world. Someone came back with a tip that Sherborn records mention Thomas and Margaret. Felt heard this and printed the tip (without source - by the time he heard it, how many mouths would it have gone through?). We used that as a clue. Too, old man Folger was noted for telling people that John Gardner had said that his father told him that they were from Sherborn. We like their coffee and took that as a clue. 

Well, we will be doing this in a more formal manner to meet NEHGR requirements. That'll take time. In the meantime, stay tuned. So, back to Rachel. There are only three bullets here. The last one is to a search that has all of the posts that mention Rachel. This is an example of hoping that looking at some related pedigrees might help with another. It can work. Usually? Probably not. But, the attempt needs to be documented.  

• 

  Just Answer
  from the Presidio of
  San Francisco
  

  LDS and Thomas Noble -- Gosh, all of those Thomases. We first ran into this while looking at the Rachel issue and thought that it ought to be brought forward. It is interesting since it has persisted, pay and get some bit of information, and on a quick look the stuff is appealing. That Thomas Nobel had Rachel Gardner as a wife is known; who she is is not; nor, is he known as well as some proclaim, evidently. You see the issues. Truth engineering, folks, with our 'portal to truth' as an offering as a stable source of good information. Now, in this case, the person paid to find out that stuff on family search (et al) may be bogus. Too, the notion is that someone needs to search actual records (assuming that they can get hold of them). We're fortunate that Sherborn did digitize some records. 
  
• Rachel (Nobel) Gardner -- This is from five years ago when we were trying to pull together some loose strings. After all, we had seen the marriage of Thomas Gardner and Margaret Friar. Too, we saw the boys being born in the right order with years agreeing. Then, that family disappeared from Sherborn records. But, more records are available now. We have lots of people interested. And, some are on the ground in the UK, so that might help. 
• Search on 'Rachel' -- When scrolling through this list, look for a yellow box. In there, we tried to follow a suggested ancestry for Thomas, as proposed by the Noble family. At the time, we didn't get far. But, then, we are not saying no either. Case in point is George Gardiner of Rhode Island. They published their book before Dr. Frank did his. Too, they have published books about their meetings over the years. Yet, on WikiTree, there is controversy where the notion is to set his Profile up similar to Thomas' where it's clear about sources and what's still in the air. 

This is one of many avenues of research that are on-going. Based upon our experience, we like the WikiTree approach and the genealogical views being upheld there. 

Too, for those who wonder about technology. WikiTree is a 'wiki' thing where one can edit the code or by menu. They have brought in more menu support, but the code view is still there. Too, they have standards. A method, named G2G (genealogist to genealogist), can be used for coordinating work where comments/updates keep everyone abreast of status. We have some G2Gs related to our WikiTree work. Some like menus; some like code; there are other ways (say, AI); however, common standards can apply but require definition and monitoring. What we have is more stuff stacked on the back of people doing thankless work (thank the Registrar of whatever group you might belong to for their service).  

Gosh, think back to before the camera and the copier and, even, the mimeo machine. Looking at the handwritten notes from 100+ years ago makes one marvel that some progress did occur. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/24/2021

02/24/2021 -- Put link to George Gardiner's profile on WikiTree. We have lots of people with unresolved ancestry. The group on WikiTree is doing a good job providing sources for choices. Not like the shaky tree thingee on ancestry[dot]com. 

Emily Greene Balch

TL;DR - Focus, descendants and their child of Thomas and Margaret.

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Emily Greene Balch received the 1946 Nobel Peace Prize.

Today, while reading book reviews in the WSJ, we saw Emily mentioned. The theme of the books being reviewed dealt with the upcoming celebration of the 19th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Given her surname, we wondered if she was a descendant of Sarah (Gardner) Balch who lived in Beverly, MA. It turns out that she is, as shown in this WikiTree profile. Somehow, we missed her in our earlier survey and have added her to the list of Thomas Gardner descendants on Wikipedia.

Her parents were Francis Vergonies Balch and Ellen Maria Noyes. We will be looking at the family a little closer as well as getting more into this, and associated, subject matter. Her peers would have been of the generation of Ann's grandmother who was a Suffragist.

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Of late, we have started to look at the U.S. generations with a New England reference. We know that Virginia was here prior to Plymouth. As well, we will consider the experience of other countries.

Emily would have been the 8th or 9th generation of the Massachusetts variety.

The 5th took the brunt of the Revolution with some of the 4th were still here as the older generation. It was the 7th generation that  began to obtain the rewards of the new country in established areas with others extending the country through trials of frontier living. We can look at the later generations, too.

Though it may seem that we are considering the good times, we recognize that major problems still existed over this time period whose solution would come later or is still pending.

Remarks: Modified: 0313/2022

08/14/2020 -- Jane Addams was the first American woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931. Her ancestor received his land grant from William Penn. Jane's parents moved to northern Illinois in 1844.

08/16/2020 -- On doing some research on Emily, I see that her ancestor's page has been edited. It is an example that we could follow: John Balch. Notice that these early Profiles are being driven by the Great Migration Project. We, the TGS, are helping edit the profile for Thomas (see right menu).

03/13/2022 -- Bryn Mawr was the alma mater of Drew Gilpin Faust.  It also welcomed Emmy Nother to the U.S. after her family fled the Nazi madness. Her brother went north to the Soviet Union and was killed by the powers that be. 

Josiah Willard Gibbs

TL;DR -- Josiah is a descendant and a well-known contributor to the development of a major theory in physics: thermodynamics. We will look at both his work and his pedigree. 

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In our studies related to the Science of Technology, we will be running into many names. Some will not be American (such as Noether). Some will be American, and, of those, we will look for New England associations. The series on the Harvard Presidents is an example. We started this when we ran into a New Yorker article on James Bryant Conant. That got us to looking at all of the Presidents. 

Recall, one motivator for this work related to technology is machine learning (ML) masquerading as artificial intelligence (AI). But, in general, we want to follow the evolution of STEM along with the advance of the U.S. whose 250th is coming up. 

The Nobel prizes this year were a motivator,as well, with the focus on computation: Physics (neural nets); Chemistry (protein folding); Medicine (microRNA).  

Now, back to New Englanders, some will be descendants of Thomas Gardner and Margaret Fryer. We ran into one this week. Josiah Willard Gibbs (Wikipedia; WikiTree). How did we get to him? In our technology studies, we are looking at the foundations of science. In that regard, thermodynamics is important. There are many other types of dynamics. Right now, we are considering those related to science and engineering but will broaden the scope as we go along. 

A well-known treatise on the subject was written by Max Planck (archive.org). Planck references several prior researchers, such as van der Waals. But, Gibbs is a frequent reference. On looking further, we found his association with James Clerk Maxwell (well-known contributor to mathemattican physics) and one of his detailed books on entropy that published his experimental work: On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances. We will use this work to leverage several discussions about knowledge and machine learning. 

So, Josiah will feature in future posts. He is a descendant of Thomas and Margaret via their son George. He is mentioned in later edition of Dr. Frank's book (1933: pg 63). 

Postnote: It is fortunate for us that we can use a Thomas descendant to scrutinize machine learning along several frameworks in our technology research. As such, this focus will cover both the U.S. and European contributions, indexed according to the times of the Nobel prizes with Planck's efforts as central to the discussion. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/28/2026

12/21/2024 --  Added Josiah to the "Descendants of George" list. 

12/18/2024 -- Gibbs is on this graphic from the Geometric Science of Information site. 

01/26/2025 -- Gibbs was first in traisping through vector spaces: The Stargate Project. 

04/28/2026 -- Updated links and image. 

Alan M. Turing

This is one of those posts that can be considered a diversion (earlier example) from our normal purpose. However, it does deal with an important theme and does relate to the context of the blog.

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Alan M. Turing was born 100 years ago in London. His work in computation was highly influential. The ACM gives an award yearly in his name that is the "Nobel" for computer scientists. In fact, this year, they're gathering thirty-three of the recipients at a meeting in San Francisco.

As an aside, let me note that computation will be important to genealogy in many ways. I have already made one comment about reluctance to adopt new technology (On blogs and other modern means). We could think of many ways that computation will be essential. Here is a very short list (for starters): immersion into gaming environments that unfold events with real characters -- not just those covered by history, extensions of augmented reality schemes to include facts from historic genealogy (verified by NEHGS, et al), ...

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As I was re-acquainting myself with Alan's work, I noticed that he went to the Sherborne School in Dorset. Remember that some on Nantucket say that Thomas' family came from that region. The school was established in 1550.

Running across that little tidbit reminds me that we need to learn more about this area, as we try to run down information about Thomas and Margaret from before their 1624 arrival at Cape Ann.


Remarks:

05/01/2012 -- We'll need to talk singularity in the context of Alan. The computer has as many holes as do we; however, we can cut out of the fog. Genealogy (historic, biologic, and more) will be a basis for looking at this concept and its importance. That is a forward look. Going backward, we'll find a way to adopt memes, as a necessity. We are, one might say, meme readers. Too, we express what they convey. That is supposed to suggest something that we need to understand: parallel to we being expressions of our genes. Now, within that framework, our look back at Thomas is apropos.

04/26/2012 -- Will need to do some Brit-based research, no doubt. For starters, we'll begin to look at work that is already done.

Modified: 05/01/2012

Charles Horton Cooley

TL;DR -- The Economist is British and published weekly. We like their humor plus their take on matters across the globe. But, given that England is a large part of our history, we appreciate their in-depth reports on things over here. Recently, they mentioned Charles Horton Cooley. Per usual, we went looking. Hence, the following. And, the implications of all of this? Stay tuned. 

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A recent issue of The Economist had an OpEd on the origins of  "soc med" and provided some details about engineering and science, in a humanist sense, and the messes of the internet gone bad. We like The Economist and read, at least, their double issue that is published in late December of each year. But, we sample issues from time to time. 

Charles Horton Cooley was born in Michigan. His father, who was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Michigan was born in New York. WikiTree did not show data past Charles' grandfather. However, records at FindAGrave (follow links for parents at each generation) suggest that Charles is a descendant of early New England pioneers. That is of interest to our research from the historical sense. Too, Charles was a sociologist. He coined "social media" in 1897. 

Reading further, Wikipedia has an article (that needs a little TLC) on the "Looking-glass self" of Charles which considers how the concept applies to social media (his neologism) especially of the type that we see now, over 150 years later of meddling with life by science, engineering, and technology. 

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Staying with the times, here is what Gemini (becoming a drag on Google - tsk, guys - I really liked Bard and its representation choices) says:

• Charles Horton Cooley is credited with the term "social media," which he coined over a century ago in 1897, even though the concept of social media as we know it today didn't exist at the time; this is significant because his work focused on how individuals perceive themselves based on how they believe others see them, which aligns with the idea of how people present themselves online through social platforms. 

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Now, we have been pursing the study of computing, since Kant, through mathematics, science and engineering without consideration of the "social/personal" sciences. Even though, we might add, that we see people as more complicated than anything that physics deals with in its fantasy (cosmology) or destructive modes (reductionist's grappling with wannabe particles and/or waves). 

About Kant? He was before the expansion of mathematics that happened in the 19th century. But, there was general increases in most areas of study during that time. We need know about that. Too, we are fortunate to have the American experience as a provider of threads for research. 

So, knowing things of his time (coincident with our Revolution), he stressed that we need to look at Reason as source of our abilities to know a priori and to cogitate from that in his analytic sense. All else is synthetic. Too, Kant was right on the target as he showed what modern theorem provers know: we cannot prove the existence nor the non-existence of God via logic (Kant's Prolegomena and Logic). It is a matter of choice. Right there? Free will. But, we will save this discussion for later. 

For now, please understand (Kant's emphasis) that the 400 years of the colonies that started the U.S. 250 years ago gave (give) adequate support for a new basis. Note, we are not using new science as did Wolfram. We just started to dig and can name four names of note in the American contributions: Count Rumford; Nathaniel Bowditch; Josiah Willard Gibbs; and James Bryant Conant. We could pick more (Peirce - father and son - Benjamin and C.S.), 

Notes: 

• 1. See Charles Horton Cooley. The Social Self -- 1. The Meaning of "I", Chapter 5 in  Human Nature and the Social Order (Revised Edition). New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, (1922): 168-210.
• On education, see our post on the Nobel influence. We will get more into that as the colonies (U.S.) took up education, in general, early on. There lots of things that were done in the U.S. of note beyond running after optimization which is freedom taken to an extreme and stupid as hell. 
• 2. John's education was classical in scope (four years of Latin, mathematics, and science - ages ago, in high school). As such, he strongly thinks that education ought to be Liberal Arts and Sciences (and engineering - get those ones involved in learning about the world before they screw it up, please). This cursory remark will be expanded over time as we deal with the 250th and the various 400ths before that. The American Dream is more "light on a hill" than ruling the world. 
• 3. Now, that the C-Suite is running after the illusion of GenAI wholehog, what can we do? Look at "humanist mathematics" for one thing. That is, we have to persevere in pursuit of truth across levels from atoms up to the ethereal. By doing so, we will get science and engineering back on track, as well, one might hope.  

Remarks: Modified: 02/18/2025

02/18/2025 -- 

Humanizing mathematics

TL;DR -- GenAI is everywhere for the good and the bad. Which is which? There are  many themes like this that need attention. One thing to address is how humans and mathematics go together. Along that line, we have to address the history and philosophy of mathematics, in general. But, then, those aspects of the discipline dealing with computing and GenAI (and AGI), in particular, require special attention. 

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We have been trying to avoid use of GenAI, in general, while a few issues get worked out. That is not a "luddite" approach as we have studied several of these and definite knowledge about how things went awry. As a reminder, here are some of our posts: ChatGpt; Bard, later Gemini; GenAI. 

Of late, Google has a summary in Chrome which is from Gemini's take on the matter at hand. This applies to any search. 

Example, we looked for material related to "humanizing mathematics" which is now a growing topic due to the emergence on the landscape of GenAI. This comment was for a search on "humanist mathematics". 

Humanist mathematics is a way of teaching and studying mathematics that emphasizes the human aspects of the subject. It can include using history, imagery, and technology to help students understand mathematical concepts. 

Now, why mathematics? Are we picking on it? Well, it's about time that someone does. And, this is merely a small start. 

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Before getting in that, let's look at a couple of things related to the Humanist's view.

• HumanizingMathematics and its Philosophy (book review) - "The Humanist view is contrasted with Platonism and Formalism. Platonism is the position that mathematical objects and truths  exist independently of individuals, and the obligation of mathematicians is to discover these truths. Formalism regards mathematics as the study of formal deductive systems, and  athematical truth is just provability in the system." This is a simple summary of positions; there are more which we will be getting into as the discussion continues.
• Journal of Humanistic Mathematics - Editorial from the lastest issue: "We feel strongly about the human nature of mathematics; there is a reason “humanistic” is in the title of this Journal after all! So it is quite appropriate that several articles in this issue remind us that mathematics has always flourished as a human endeavour and it is perhaps the reduction to sterile algorithms that has stripped it of interest for many students. So we are actually trying to rehumanize mathematics, to bring back that spark that leads to students looking upon their math journey in a more positive light.

Again, a major motivation is the GenAI appearance which represents a particular type of applied mathematics be used for make an argument for computer superiority. People react to that various ways which brings in psychology. But, science needs to weigh in as well. Our posts of the Nobel activity this past summer suggest another type of motivation. The subject is not simple, by any means. 

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Frankly, to do this right, we will go back to Kant's time and look at two of his works: Prolegomena; Logic. We started with the first one in 2022, after ChatGpt and its peers were out long enough for us to know something of substance. Actually, back in the late 2010s, I started to use AIn't. In 2023, Larry Walker of the former Sperry Knowledge Systems Center used "no critter" in response to something that I had written. 

This post is a year before the onset of OpenAI's, ChatGPT, into the public sphere: How dumb is AI? This was in response to an article in the IEEE's monthly, Spectrum (Oct 2021). The graphic included in the post is to the right. Our argument was that the "black box" that was puzzling everyone was really applied mathematics in action, being driven by non-mathematicians, therefore being opaque. 

Since that time, we now see lots of mathematical analysis coming forward. Our task is to bring these notions to public view, including the C-Suite where the mentality seems to be buying into the hype prematurely. But, that's another topic or two. 

We intend to be regular in posting material. As well, we would like to hear from others on their views with respect to GenAI as well as examples of how they have put it to use or have done studies in order to determine the ins and outs. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/28/2025

02/28/2025 -- 

New Englanders and Leary

TL;DR -- We saw a genealogy chart which included shields and looked further. That reminded us that we have had several posts on the subject. Heritage is an important subject, even for relationships in fields of expertise such as mathematics, technology, and psychology. 

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We were looking at an old pedigree chart that was hand drawn. Wonderful work. My thought was, at least, we know this didn't come from GenAI/LLM. Here is a compressed look at the photo of the chart that was posted by Melissa Berry on the FB Group - New England Family Genealogy and History.  

Posted on FB by
Melissa Berry

One sees modern verrsions of this type of chart, many done by computers. Our hope is that these get documented some way for future researchers, especially if provenance needs to be considered. But, that's another issue for another time. 

We have had several posts on genealogy and on our thoughts of such. To note, we support The Heritage Society  Community and the Daughters of the American Revolution and more. With the 250th now in progress, themes of lineage will be constant. 

But, with tecnology, especially advanced computing, we have been going on about this for several years now. In particular, we note the need for computers to support science and any work of difficulty and as those that are complicated. Along that line, we looked at Gibbs of thermodynamics fame after the Nobel prize of last year being directed to mathematical physics (namely, xNN). HIs work impressed Maxwell of Scotland (as in, James Clerk). 

Some posts on genealogy: Endless genealogies; Vanity genealogy; Modern genealogy; Major players; ... This might be the time to point to the Mathematics genealogy project. Here is the page for Josiah Gibbs. 

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Switching gears, while looking at our posts, we found this article: 10 New Englanders Turned On By Timothy Leary. Taking a quick look, we saw many familiar names. We might look at this further in terms of genealogy and psychology.    

Remarks: Modified: 08/11/2025

08/11/2025 - 

Women's History Month, 2022

TL;DR -- This month, the Gairdner Foundation announced a special award for a woman researcher who will be identified in early April. We had known of the organization since our own early research and went to find out about Women's History Month. We also took the opportunity to mention a few (via a post) of the women who will be subject to attention in our work. We have written many posts about the women of interest to 'All things Gardner' over the years and will index these references.  

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Earlier in the month, we saw the Gaidner Foundation's post on Women's History Month on their Facebook page and wrote our own blog post. We had made reference to the non-profit organization over the years. The founder was of a family from Scotland who wanted to support medical research. He founded the organization in the 1950s. Now, it offers yearly prizes and keeps up the interest with a ceremony held yearly. To date, 97 of those who got an annual Gairdner Foundation award went on to obtain a Nobel Prize. That is something to look at further, especially in how to support technology and research of such which is our interest. 

Gairdner was going to announce a special award in early April for a woman researcher. We will be paying attention. Also, on their FB page, they have listed some of the female winners their prize. The first such recipient was Eleanor Zaimis in 1959.  

We had been looking at the history of Harvard, starting with a survey of the Heads of Harvard, for the purpose of matching up the histories of the U.S. and Harvard. There was a recent Head who was female and deserving of attention. Our focus had been at former Heads in order to establish themes and relationships. Many Heads were from New England. Some were recent arrivals. 

Drew Gilpin Faust was the 28th President. The current occupant of the office is the 29th. President Faust was from the American South but does have New England genealogical connections. She was one of the few Heads who was not a graduate of Harvard. Faust attended Bryn Mawr.

Speaking of Bryn Mawr, we stopped to look at its history in Quakerism. Turns out that one of its professors had fled Nazi Germany. She was a mathematician of note and is buried in the U.S. We are speaking of Prof. Emmy Noether who was from a mathematical family that was split. She will come back into attention, again, due to the mathematical aspects of some technology issues.  

Over the years, we have had many posts about women in the long 400 years from early New England down to the present day. One task will be to identify these as we get going in our 12th year.

Women's History Month has been declared for several years now but has a long history back to 1909. see details at the website for the National Women's History Museum. The early references relate to International Women's Day. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/25/2023

03/25/2023 -- The focus was on Margaret and Hypatia for 2023.

Whole views

People have been interested in genealogy for a long time, to wit, the Bible (from 2013, Endless genealogies, quoting Timothy). But one bogs down quickly with more than the mere brick wall. What were these people up to? What were their times like?

Oxford view

Having just gone through Dr. Frank's Massachusetts Magazine (2018, all issues) from cover to cover, I have acquired a little more understanding of one-hundred years ago, more or less. The last post (on Jedediah Smith - true mountain, and desert, man) looked at activities regarding western expansion which was post the jaunt of Lewis & Clark. Also, that post brought up the notion of a larger focus, namely: culture, history, technology (which includes genetics/genealogy). We will be discussing this, however a quote from an Oxford book of 1850, gives the proper view.

A review of posts in this blog will show many devoted to issues of Whence (2014) and What we know (2012 - definitely needs to be updated). Since the start, we have had several of these types of posts on a subject that will still need some attention. One approach will be to gather what has been found so far so as to evaluate the information and sources. Nothing new there. It is work, but fun. There is a lot of material on the web regarding Thomas and Margaret and variations thereof. For instance, did Thomas have a sister named Rachel? In that case, I looked at this and tried to establish sources (2015, Rachel (Nobel) Gardner).

One post looked at the period around the arrival, briefly (2013, Plus or minus the arrival - I call this the cigarette posts as the time view of the reigns look like ascending smoke). That image shows the long reign of Elizabeth I. Her time overlapped the life of Thomas' father and his birth. Recently, I have started to dig deeper. Frankly, I was motivated by seeing an article on Elizabeth and the Spanish armada incident. In other publications, I read of the various players and places. But, I also noticed Dorset (2015, Sherborne) which is where son John said that they had come from. That lead to a bunch of reading, especially to get familiar with the counties involved, Dorset and the surrounding, such as Somerset, Devon, Wiltshire, and Hampshire.

But, too, I got a better appreciation for the geography of the War of Roses (2013, Origins - Motivations). I do not like how Game of Thrones has warped  the story (only read 2 1/2 books - put it down, never watched any of the Hollywood renditions). But, then, I learned today that Shakespeare is considered a propagandists for the Tudors by historians. Nothing new, as the saying goes.

Dorset countryside

Before ending, that is Alfred the Great's territory. Of course, the Romans were there, earlier. There was a Sherborne Castle built in the time of William the Conqueror. I think Edward II had some type of confab there. It decayed and was destroyed during the Civil War. Oh yes, the next county has Stonehenge.

Let's stop with a photo out of Dorset.

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We expect to move this blog to be under TGSoc.org. Once we get the new blog set up, volunteers who want to help to move things over would be gladly acknowledged.

Remarks: Modified: 01/18/2022

07/17/2018 -- As we look at things related to western expansion, we need to remember the ones who were here prior to that event. 

09/30/2018 -- Need to mention Corfe Castle that was in the area. King John used it to starve Maude and her son (Maude de Braose). 

01/18/2022 -- We are now seeing Weymouth in the limelight. Gloucester has is deal next year. And, as always, we need to be looking further into the Dorchester Company, without limit. In another forum, we saw Sir Ridley Scott mentioned. He filmed in Dorset (see image) a time or two.