George Boole

Born in Lincoln, England, George Boole was the self-taught son of a shoemaker. Despite a lack of formal university education, he managed to become one of the most influential mathematicians of the 19th century, laying the groundwork for digital circuits and all subsequent computer logic. So, you know, just a small contribution to modern civilization.

Boole's masterpiece, An Investigation of the Laws of Thought, published in 1854, formalized logic into algebraic equations. Before Boole, logic was mostly the domain of philosophers arguing in circles; after Boole, it became something you could actually calculate. Which, naturally, made philosophers very cross.

Regarding his religious leanings, Boole was raised in the Church of England and became a devout Anglican later in life, even delivering sermons. He explicitly stated that his goal was to show that the human intellect and revelation were compatible, thereby proving religion could be, well, logical. Sadly, this didn't include any ancestral ties to the Tribe.

Despite the unfortunate lack of Semitic lineage, we can't deny the sheer nachas generated by Boolean logic. Every time a computer processes a 'true' or 'false,' a little piece of Boole's legacy is at work. It's almost enough to make us overlook the Anglican bit. Almost.