What is a Computer?

hi I'm NAT I was one of the original

designers of the Xbox I've been working

with computers since I was maybe seven

years old and now I work on virtual

reality

computers are everywhere there it keeps

pockets there in people's cars or have

them on their wrists they might be in

your backpack right now but what makes a

computer a computer what does make a

computer a computer anyway and how does

it even work

as humans we've always built tools to

help us solve problems tools like a

wheelbarrow

a hammer or a printing press or a

tractor trailer all of these inventions

helped us with manual work over time

people began to wonder if a machine

could be designed and built to help us

with the thinking work we do like

solving equations or tracking the stars

in the sky rather than moving or

manipulating physical things like dirt

and stone these machines would need to

be designed to manipulate information

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the earliest computers were made out of

wood and metal with mechanical levers

and gears by the 20th century though

computers started using electrical

components these early computers were

really large and really slow a computer

the size of a room might take hours just

to do a basic math problem

these machines are things of gleaming

very colored metal and numerous flashing

lights computers started out as basic

calculators which was already really

awesome at the time and they were only

manipulating numbers back then but now

we can use them to talk to each other we

can use them to play games control

robots and do any crazy thing that you

could probably imagine the computers we

use today look really different from the

earliest thinking machines and who knows

what the computers of tomorrow will be

like my hope is that you get to help

decide what you want the computers of

tomorrow to look like

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