Catholic Scientists: Leonardo Torres Quevedo, engineer and mathematician

Leonardo Torres Quevedo (December 28, 1852 - December 18, 1936) was a civil engineer, mathematician and inventor. In 1887 he patented the cable car, one of which was commissioned by the Whirpool company for Niagara Falls, where it is still in operation in the 21st century. In addition, he improved the technology of the airships, achieving that practically all the models built throughout the 20th and 21st centuries were based on his patents, and created the first remote control (he called it telekino), a device with which he managed to move in any direction and up to a distance of two kilometers a boat in Bilbao, before the astonished eyes of a crowd of people among which was the King of Spain himself. This telekino was the first example of the new science he founded, automation, based on the control of drives by electromechanical mechanisms. He later developed the first computer game, a robot that played chess against a person. For this reason he is also considered a pioneer of artificial intelligence. However, his greatest work, from 1920, is the arithmometer. It was the first digital calculator, the predecessor of the modern computer. This equipment consisted of a memory, an arithmetic-logic unit that included a totalizer, multiplier and comparator, and a control unit with which to choose the type of operation. Finally, a typewriter served as a graphic interface, since the data for the operations were entered using its keyboard and the results were printed on paper. Leonardo also worked in the field of mathematics. In 1893 he published his "Memoir on Algebraic Machines", in which he demonstrated with innovative ideas how to mechanically solve eight-term equations, obtain imaginary roots and not only the real roots, or second-degree equations with complex coefficients. In addition, he also excelled in the field of literature, occupying the chair of the famous writer Benito Pérez Galdós in the Royal Spanish Academy of Language. But above all, he was a devout Catholic who marveled at reading the catechism and had the habit of taking communion every First Friday of the month, according to what was indicated in the apparitions of the Sacred Heart of Jesus to Saint Margaret Alacoque.