Fatal Defect
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Fatal Defect by Ivars Peterson
An airplane crashes, killing eighty-seven passengers. A cancer patient receives a fatal dose of radiation from a machine designed to be foolproof. The ATMs at a New York bank debit customers twice their actual withdrawals, resulting in a loss of millions of dollars. In every case, the culprit was a computer bug, a software error or design defect that may escape detection until it erupts into the real world with sometimes catastrophic results. This arresting and at times terrifying book tells us just how prevalent these defects are and how they are multiplying as computers become more sophisticated and more deeply embedded in our daily lives. It is also a riveting portrait of the men and women who find and exterminate those bugs, whether they occur in pocket calculators or nuclear reactors. Fatal Defect reveals what you should know about the computers in our lives. Read it before you buy a computer, use a cash machine, or book an airplane flight. Then pray that one of its real-life heroes was on the job.
IVARS PETERSON is one of today's most popular math authors. He is the mathematics and physics editor of Science News, and the author of four previous books, including the bestselling The Mathematical Tourist, as well as Islands of Truth, Newton's Clock, and Fatal Defect. He received the award for exceptional skill in communicating mathematics to the general audience in 1991 from the Joint Policy Board for Mathematics.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780679740278 |
| ISBN 10 | 0679740279 |
| Title | Fatal Defect |
| Author | Ivars Peterson |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Random House USA Inc |
| Year published | 1996-04-30 |
| Number of pages | 288 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |