The Most Dangerous Animal

The first computer was invented in the 1940s. Back then, it was as large as several rooms and was developed at America's Aberdeen Proving Ground to meet the need for calculating ballistics.

Today's computers could fit on a single desk, and their processing speeds were far faster than before.

Computers already existed in the 1970s, though they were nowhere near as widespread as they were now. If Zodiac understood computers, he could have entered his ciphertexts and keys into one and printed them out instead of copying them by hand, without having to worry about spelling errors creating ambiguities during encryption.

Compared with computers, the human brain was prone to forgetting and making mistakes. That might seem like a flaw, but weren't some discoveries born from mistakes?

In the Martina Human Nature Experiment, the idea of two men pointing guns at her head had not come from the men themselves. It had been egged on by a woman in the crowd.

When Gabriel Truman dueled Ravenclaw's prefect over whether Bridget Wenlock, the famous thirteenth-century Arithmancy scholar, belonged to Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw, Pomona had indulged him.

Everyone knew Ravenclaw was clever, while Hufflepuff was the house for useless fools. How could a scholar as gifted with numbers as Bridget Wenlock possibly have been a Hufflepuff?

Pomona gave Truman a coconut-flavored ice cream instead of punishing him for fighting. So he thought he had done the right thing, and he even proudly boasted about it in his welcome speech to the first-years.

If a football player scored a goal and the coach praised him, he would keep trying hard next time.

If the "player" killed someone and the "coach" praised him, the "player" would not think he had done anything wrong, because he had made the "coach" proud.

Bridget Wenlock had been