On the use of digital computers

Let me say, right off, that I don’t intend to give you a sales talk on how electronic computers will do all the observing for the experimental physicist and all the thinking for the theoretical physicist. That doesn’t mean I think computers won’t be of any use to us, however. They are tools, like cyclotrons and spectroscopes, which can help us carry on research but, as with any other tool, it’s going to take a great deal of thought and ingenuity to realize their full potentialities. As with any of our other instruments, only those of us who take the time and trouble to learn thoroughly the computer’s operations and its limitations will be able to exploit fully its potentialities.

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