My father used to sell machines that helped farmers cut chaff to feed buffaloes. As a kid, I watched very closely how these machines worked. It was like poetry to me. A man would put chaff into the mouth of the machine, and another person would rotate the wheel with blades attached to it. It moved the chaff towards the wheel, and the blades cut it with consistent precision. I watched how each part of the machine worked in coherence, like poetry. I saw how each part was essential too.
Sometimes, people would come with their machines to get them repaired, and watching machines get repaired was my favorite of all. It was like a puzzle, finding what the issue was. Usually, a very small piece was broken or it wasn’t cleaned properly. The smallest piece, which was like half an inch long, could choke the whole machine, which was 8-10 feet long.
I loved watching the machine working in such a poetic way. I guess this is what Ada Lovelace's Poetical Science means. Even Charles Babbage couldn't see the use cases of his proposed Analytical Machine like Ada. She explained:
The bounds of arithmetic were outstepped the moment the idea of applying cards had occurred. The Analytical Engine does not occupy common ground with mere “calculating machines.” It holds a position wholly its own. In enabling a mechanism to combine together general symbols, in successions of unlimited variety and extent, a uniting link is established between the operations of matter and the abstract mental processes
She observed that the machine might act upon things other than numbers, if those things satisfied mathematical rules. “Supposing”, she wrote “that the fundamental relations of pitched sounds in the science of harmony and of musical composition were susceptible of such expression and adaptations, the engine might compose elaborate and scientific pieces of music of any degree of complexity or extent.”
150 years after her death, machines are doing that and much more, which even she couldn't imagine. Her vision laid the foundation for a future where machines transcend calculation and embrace creativity. Today, her poetical science continues to inspire innovation in ways once unimaginable.
