Charles Babbage and his Difference Engine #2

He was way ahead of his time.

Absolutely amazing.

Truly an inspiration to us all - Thank you Mr. Charles Baggage for your vision.

Also came here as a result of the 11.10.09 NPR story. One of the most amazing stories I've ever heard about relatively unknown genius. I had read about Babbage before, but never specifically about this device. Considering the lack of precedence at the time and the practical difficulties involved, his conception and design was an incredibly brave intellectual quest.

In the NPR story today, they flew it in one 5 ton piece inside a 747

An incredible shame that he never completed it, this would have easily catapulted science decades

Just heard the National Public Radio piece on this. Lovely to see it working. An inspiration to every genius ahead of his time. Also to every crackpot, of course.

Similar, perhaps, but more general purpose than either, as the Difference Engine could have been used to perform the fundamental calculations of either of the others, and many more besides. The display on the special-purpose machines would be much more easily readable, of course.

Actually, if you watch the talk on the machine, they explain that, in fact, it COULD have been built at the time. Great care was taken to reproduce the tolerances and materials that would have been used had the machine actually been built.

I live near CHM and I visited there to watch the demo of the Difference Engine this spring. The way the disks and rods moves all together was stunningly beautiful and I felt like I could keep watching it forever.