There Must Be an Angel
On the Beginnings of the Arithmetics of Rays
David Link

From August 1953 to May 1954 strange love-letters appeared on the notice board of Manchester University's Computer Department:

"DARLING SWEETHEART
YOU ARE MY AVID FELLOW FEELING. MY AFFECTION CURIOUSLY CLINGS TO YOUR PASSIONATE WISH. MY LIKING YEARNS FOR YOUR HEART. YOU ARE MY WISTFUL SYMPATHY: MY TENDER LIKING.
YOURS BEAUTIFULLY
M. U. C."

The acronym "M.U.C." stood for "Manchester University Computer", the earliest electronic, programmable, and universal calculating machine; the fully functional prototype was completed in June 1948. One of the very first software developers, Christopher Strachey (1916–1975), had used the built-in random generator of the Ferranti Mark I, the first industrially produced computer of this kind, to generate texts that are intended to express and arouse emotions. The British physicist performed this experiment a full thirteen years before the appearance of Joseph Weizenbaum's ELIZA, which is commonly – and mistakenly – held to be the earliest example of computer-generated texts.

There Must Be an Angel. On the Beginnings of the Arithmetics of Rays, in: Variantology 2. On Deep Time Relations of Arts, Sciences and Technologies, eds. Siegfried Zielinski and David Link (Cologne: König, 2006): 15-42.
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