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Comment by PhilWright | Hacker News Reader

The PDF is just a scan of actual book printed pages. No wonder it is a monstrous size.

So a man who uses a machine for synthesis into text for speech, wrote a book which was then printed, scanned, and uploaded.

I wonder if they faxed it at some point too?

What's this got to do with his speech problems? Did you want him to ready it to you?

I think the point was that he entered the information in digitally, so it should have been easier to provide a digital copy rather than scan actual printed pages.

Note: Didn't go to the link, so just guessing.

His thesis is from 1966, an era in which (1) it is likely that he typed it on a typewriter, and (2) he was still almost completely able-bodied.

Not only did he type it with a typewriter, all the math notation in the thesis is hand-written! There was no math typesetting available in 1966 outside major printing houses. (Or, I guess, any reasonable priced option for getting your PhD thesis properly typeset and printed at all, math or not.)

>he entered the information in digitally

This is Stephen's Hawking's PhD thesis. It is dated 1966. How could he have entered it digitally? UNIX research didn't even start until 1970s.

I believe this comment chain thinks the thesis was written recently. So you guys thought Stephen Hawking didn't have a PhD till now?

Well, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expensive_Typewriter came out in 1961. Cool name also (because computer time was expensive back then!).

That looks interesting!

I quoted UNIX to show how primitive technology was at the time, rather than say he could've possibly used a computer. With ALS, using a computer would as hard as writing I would presume.

It's possible Hawking was able to type/write his thesis. It was published in 1965, two years after his ALS diagnosis. Wikipedia says he didn't begin to use crutches until the late 1960s.

In 1966?

HN's guidelines say that one shouldn't ask if one has read the posted link, but I'm tempted to all the time.

It would seem to be a joke.

But even so, while 1966 was indeed early for "regular" use of fax - the first "user friendly" Xerox fax machines hit the market around then -, the first transmission of facsimiles of images dates to the 1840's, and the first fax that used similar methods to "modern" fax machines of scanning line by line (the "scanning phototelegraph") dates to 1880. Commercial fax machines have been around since around 1900.

So it would indeed be possible.

One weird and wonderful product of early faxes (fax over radio predates "wired" fax machines): Finch Facsimile's [1] were used to transmit "newspapers" via AM radio in the '30's, that was then printed on thermal paper at the home of the subscriber.

From [1]: "Six hours overnight was enough time to print a six page two column news bulletin, delivered in time for breakfast."

[1]: http://www.theradiohistorian.org/Radiofax/newspaper_of_the_a...

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