Charles Babbage
English polymath who originated the concept of a digital programmable computer.
He is credited with inventing the first mechanical computer, the difference engine, and also designed the first computer printers.[1] Babbage's proposed Analytical Engine was to have been a general-purpose mechanical digital computer.[2]
Quick Facts
- Born
- 26 December 1791
- Birthplace
- London, England
- Died
- 18 October 1871
- Place of death
- Marylebone, London, England
- Field
- Mathematics
- engineering
- political economy
- computer science
- Workplaces
- Trinity College, Cambridge, Peterhouse, Cambridge
- Education
- Peterhouse, Cambridge
- Known for
- Analytical engine; Difference engine
Facts from the source article.
Life and work
Babbage was most likely born at 44 Crosby Row, Walworth Road, London, England.[3] He was one of four children of Benjamin Babbage and Betsy Plumleigh Teape.[4] Babbage arrived at Trinity College, Cambridge, in October 1810, already self-taught in some parts of contemporary mathematics.[5] He formed the Analytical Society in 1812 with John Herschel, George Peacock, and several other friends.[6]
He also proposed the Analytical Engine, which would have been controlled by a program of instructions on punched cards.[2] Babbage died in 1871 with a full-scale Analytical Engine never built.[2] In 1832, Babbage's book On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures was released, which became a foundational text in operational research.[7] A small working model of Babbage's calculating machine was put on display by him in 1822.[2]
What the cited sources add
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy notes that Babbage's Difference Engine was a special-purpose digital computing machine for automatic production of mathematical tables.[2] A 2019 Science and Industry Museum blog states Babbage was irritated by frequent human errors in complex mathematical calculations.[8] The blog also notes Babbage published 83 papers and six full-length books on subjects including mathematics, geology, submarines, and solar eclipses.[8] In that treatise, Babbage argued there exists no fatal collision between the words of Scripture and the facts of nature.[9]
According to the same source, Babbage's calculating machine was never finished and was moved to the Science Museum in London during 1862.[8] Within the Ninth Bridgewater Treatise (1837), Babbage put forward a theory that the air retains a permanent record of all spoken words and movements, a concept he described as the air itself being a vast library.[8]
References
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Copeland, "The Modern History of Computing (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)", Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 18 December 2000; Halacy, "Charles Babbage, Father of the Computer", Crowell-Collier Press, 1970; "Charles Babbage Institute: Who Was Charles Babbage?", cbi.umn.edu; Swade, Doron, "The Difference Engine: Charles Babbage and the Quest to Build the First Computer.", Penguin, 2002; Copeland, "The Modern History of Computing (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)", Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 18 en.wikipedia.org
- Copeland, "The Modern History of Computing (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)", Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 18 December 2000. facts only, no text reused. plato.stanford.edu
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Swade, "Babbage, Charles"; (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Members Constituencies Parliaments Surveys, "Praed, William (1747–1833), of Tyringham, Bucks. and Trevethoe, nr. St. Ives, Cornw.", Historyofparliamentonline.org (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: ; Leedham-Green, "A Concise History of the University of Cambridge", Cambridge University Press, 1996, p. 142 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Wilkes (2002) p.355; Hofstadter, "Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid", Penguin Books, 2000, p. 726; "Charles Babbage'S Computer Engines" (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Babbage" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: ; Charles Manby, "Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers", 1846, p. 57 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- "Babbage's 'Library in the Air' Science and Industry Museum", Science and Industry Museum blog, 29 May 2019. facts only, no text reused. blog.scienceandindustrymuseum.org.uk
- Babbage, Ninth Bridgewater Treatise. Chapter V. Further View of the same Subject. The Victorian Web.. facts only, no text reused. victorianweb.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Charles Babbage (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
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