Maybe I’m not remembering how they work correctly, but I thought sliderules and abacus…es…abacuses? abacii?.. just helped you repeat operations and keep track of the work you’d done, rather than executing mathematical functions for you
Sliderules definitely do operations for you. The basic multiplication sliderule uses logarithmic scales to do multiplication by addition. Abaci (it is in fact a Latin word that takes the -i plural, but “abacuses” is generally acceptable) do just help you keep track, but I believe you can use clever tricks to mechanically simplify complex operations.
Maybe I’m not remembering how they work correctly, but I thought sliderules and abacus…es…abacuses? abacii?.. just helped you repeat operations and keep track of the work you’d done, rather than executing mathematical functions for you
Sliderules definitely do operations for you. The basic multiplication sliderule uses logarithmic scales to do multiplication by addition. Abaci (it is in fact a Latin word that takes the -i plural, but “abacuses” is generally acceptable) do just help you keep track, but I believe you can use clever tricks to mechanically simplify complex operations.