The Difference Engine

by Swade, Doron (Author)

• ISBN13: 9780142001448
• ISBN10: 0142001449
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-11-01
• Publisher: Penguin Group USA

Summary

In 1821 an inventor and mathematician named Charles Babbage was reviewing a set of mathematical tables. After finding an excess of errors in the results, he exclaimed, "I wish to God these calculations had been executed by steam." Thus began Babbage's lifelong enterprise to design and build a mechanical calculating engine-the world's first computer. Drawing on Babbage's original notes and designs, Doron Swade recounts both Babbage's nineteenth-century quest to build a calculating machine-the Difference Engine-and Swade's own successful attempt to build a replica for the bicentennial of Babbage's birth. Set against the tantalizing background of Victorian science and politics with a colorful cast of characters, The Difference Engineis a saga of ingenuity and will-and the dawning of a new age.

Author Biography

Doron Swade, assistant director and head of collections at the Science Museum in London, is an engineer, historian of technology, and a leading authority on the life and work of Charles Babbage.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	p. vii
A Note on the Value of Money in the Nineteenth Century	p. x
Preface	p. 1
The Difference Engine
The Tables Crisis	p. 9
A Personal Question	p. 32
Tragedy and Decline	p. 49
Miracles and Machines	p. 72
The Analytical Engine
Breakthrough	p. 91
Applause in Turin	p. 114
The Astronomer Royal Objects	p. 134
The Enchantress of Number	p. 155
Intrigues of Science	p. 172
Visionaries and Pragmatists	p. 193
Curtain Call	p. 210
A Modern Sequel
Here We Go Again	p. 221
The Trial Piece	p. 232
The Money	p. 252
The Deal	p. 269
The Build	p. 283
The 'Irascible Genius' Redeemed	p. 296
The Modern Legacy	p. 308
Charles Babbage: Biographical Note	p. 319
Bibliography	p. 321
Credits	p. 332
Index	p. 333
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