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Jeff Thompson

Software, hardware, art – a blog of process and findings

Tag: Galton

Posted on August 8, 2017August 8, 2017

Fingerprints and Biometrics

A few interesting images, via this great-looking show “Data (after)Lives: The Persistence of Encoded Identity” at the University of Pittsburgh.

Above, Francis Galton’s notation for fingerprints from this book; below, his own fingerprints arranged in a paw-like formation.

Posted on July 16, 2015

A Few Historical Random Number Generators

GaltonsDice-web

A few historical random number generators. From top to bottom: Galton’s dice (capable of 24 digits instead of the usual 6), a Type 1390-B Random Noise Generator (runs on 6D4 tubes and was likely the device used for RAND Corp’s “A Million Random Digits”), and the first two iterations of random.org’s generators (both run on un-tuned radio noise fed into a computer).

Type1390-B_RandomNoiseGenerator-web

OriginalRandomOrgSetupWithRadio-web

RandomOrgRadioSetupV2-web

Artist, musician, programmer, educator, hacker, curator, explainer. Assistant Professor and Program Director of Visual Art & Technology at the Stevens Institute of Technology.

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