Computer science in the 21st century is sometimes understood as a science dealing exclusively with high technologies and computers. In fact, this field of knowledge deals with any kind of information transfer, storage and processing.
Need to share information
It's hard to imagine, but for more than 95% of the time of human existence, information was transmitted only orally or through real-time observation. Ways to create tools, methods of hunting or growing plants, the simplest logical connections based on observations of nature, were passed down from generation to generation for millennia without a single record - people simply did not know how to do it otherwise.
With the advent of writing, the historical period of the existence of mankind begins - this means that it became possible to transmit any information in time and space. The growth in the volume of transmitted information has increased with each new century and continues to increase.today: the knowledge that today a person receives in a few years exceeds the knowledge acquired by a medieval person in a lifetime.
An outline of a lesson on the history of computer science should include data on at least two of the most important topics - counting and writing.
First attempts to work with information
At school, a lesson on the topic “Prehistory of Computer Science” begins with stories about the origin of counting, and this is no coincidence. A person learned to count much earlier than to write: notches indicating the number of objects occur several millennia before the first attempts to convey some deeper meaning with signs.
This can be seen in the example of modern tribes in the early stages of development: they are able to operate with prime numbers using fingers, pebbles or sticks, but they have absolutely no writing and do not even attempt to create one.
Danger signals
The most important signal known to the prehistory of computer science was the danger signal that man had to be able to transmit from the very beginning of his existence. Shouts were the simplest form of warning, but the limited range of the sound propelled the development of other visual methods.
Beacon fires were a widespread practice around the world. There was a group of people whose duties included promptly lighting a fire at a certain point in case of danger. Smoke was the signal during the day, and fire was the signal at night. Information along the chain reached the main city in the area, and the authorities took any action to solve the problem.
Also, signal flags were used, which made it possible to transmit several types of signals at once, the meaning of which people agreed upon initially. The visibility of such a signal was less, however, this method made it possible to convey not only the very fact of the existence of a danger, but also to determine its source.
Account history
The oldest reliable attempts at counting using notches on bones date back to the 30th millennium BC. This example cannot be considered an account as such, but it can be concluded that the development of the human brain is sufficient for the association of real objects with abstract quantitative values. From this point on, we can talk about the prehistory of computer science, and it is this property of the mind that will eventually mark the formation of science.
Regular use of mathematical operations appears only in the days of Ancient Egypt. It is safe to say that the names of the numbers appeared much later than the moment when humanity learned to count.
Number systems
Each civilization went its own way when creating number systems and designating numerical concepts. As evidenced by the prehistory of computer science, the history of numbers and number systems varies from civilization to civilization.
For example, the Babylonians counted “by sixty”, that is, the way we count minutes and hours today. Atsome peoples were counted by tens, for some - by "twenties". This choice is determined by the number of fingers used for counting: in the first case, these are fingers, in the second - hands and feet.
Hundreds of languages of all that exist on the planet have only numbers from one to five (or less), and the rest of the numbers are indicated by a combination of these words: for example, "four" can be indicated as "two-two".
Counting tools
The prehistory of computer science knows a whole lot of tools that help a person in calculations.
The easiest tools at hand were pebbles, seeds, or any other small object, each of which became the equivalent of the type of item that needed to be counted. Two dozen sheep could be replaced by twenty pebbles, five sheaves of wheat could be replaced by five tablets, etc.
Later, more “advanced” methods were invented: counting by knots on ropes; abacus, abacus - a board with parallel sections, each of which represented the next category.
The first calculating machine was invented in the 17th century by Blaise Pascal. Later, Leibniz proposed a model of adding machine, which, until the 20th century, remained the most popular computing device. Finally, in the 20th century, humanity will move from the prehistory of computer science to its history: it will create a computer, programming languages and databases, computational and neural networks, and much more. But that's another story.
