I saw a demo of this machine at the Computer History Museum some time when it was first brought in there. It really cannot be stated how loud the machine was! It was really something else.
A great man but as I understand only 3 people went to his funeral. He managed to alienate and loose all his friends, family and admirers. Thankfully remembered for what we now know what he achieved!
I don't believe it's proper to call Babbage crazy, he spent much of his own money on trying to get this machine built. When a person has a lot of money, he is called eccentric, not crazy. But Babbage spent his and other peoples' money trying to get it built. His theory was sound, but the technology of the day wasn't good enough to make the precision parts. It had to be made big because of this reason. It could be made smaller with todays Technology. But this is still an amazing machine. Search for more RUclips videos of it actually calculating.
Now Japanese would miniaturize this calculator to the thickness of a credit card so it would be a standing metal sheet 3 x 2 meters wobbling and tilting by its own weight and making those "woowwow wuwuw" tin noises.
Why does everyone swoon over Babbage (who never got any of his full sized designs to work), and ignore the people who *did* get calculating machines to work?
Because what he designed was a century ahead of its time, even if he never did manage to build one. And because his design was completely, 100% sound, as demonstrated by this modern-day construction of his Difference Engine. Babbage's failure was partly his inability to work with his helpers; but partly the limitations of precision manufacturing in the mid-19th century. The fascination lies in the fact that, had he somehow pulled this off, we would have had stored-program computers (the Analytical Engine, which was bigger and more elaborate than this, and could be programmed with punch cards!) in 1850!! I don't think anyone else can claim that. Fred
Design is every bit as important as construction. The point is, he has anticipated aspects of computing devices that were revolutionary, and a lifetime and a half ahead of his time. There was *no* built and working system for a century, that did what Babbage's design had built into it. Can you cite one example of a machine built before 1901 (when Babbage was already dead for 3 decades), that could be programmed with a set of instructions, which could include conditional branching and GOTO statements? Or that was Turing complete? The Analytical Engine satisfies all those criteria. Fred
I saw a demo of this machine at the Computer History Museum some time when it was first brought in there. It really cannot be stated how loud the machine was! It was really something else.
Beautiful!!! Thanks for showing us!
A great man but as I understand only 3 people went to his funeral. He managed to alienate and loose all his friends, family and admirers. Thankfully remembered for what we now know what he achieved!
You should get one. Kids could use it for homework and I bet your wife would love to have that in the living room. :-)
Who wouldn’t be fascinated by such a thing?
We truly _stand on the shoulders of giants!_
Fabulous. What an impressive machine, so glad you brought us the video. Many thanks.
Wow, what a sound. This wonderful mechanical sound, and then the bell like ring of the tines(?) advancing the number dials.
I don't believe it's proper to call Babbage crazy, he spent much of his own money on trying to get this machine built. When a person has a lot of money, he is called eccentric, not crazy. But Babbage spent his and other peoples' money trying to get it built. His theory was sound, but the technology of the day wasn't good enough to make the precision parts. It had to be made big because of this reason. It could be made smaller with todays Technology. But this is still an amazing machine. Search for more RUclips videos of it actually calculating.
…When it took units of FORCE to complete Floating Point Operations!!
Fabulous machine, but way too much ambient noise for me to hear the otherwise very good narration. I thought museums were supposed to be quiet.
+Anton Nym I wrote close captions. But you need to turn them on to see them. Little CC button at the bottom.
+CuriousMarc oh, nice going. I"ll definitely check it out.
Ed is is like a real life Morshu from Legend of Zelda, except more normal looking
looks like cranking speed is important because there are non guided weights in there that could swing and probably irritate the function.
The bart of technology, with me, Brian Badonde....... BING.
I wonder what modern mechanical design and construction could do in binary.
amazing. thanks Marc
Этот чувак, что создал эту машину- супер крут!
How many q-bits ?
I wonder what Nathan Myhrvold is doing with it now? Does it just hang out in the living room? No issues with that, just curious.
Why did it have to be so large?
Most mechanical calculator are desk top sized
Nathan Pratt you couldn’t make parts that small and intricate back then, so it needed to be large.
@@angoose2515
I do believe it was over thought, i think the designer could have simplified it
It looks beautiful none the less
And the answer is ...
42!
Good tool for mining (joke)
42
Now Japanese would miniaturize this calculator to the thickness of a credit card so it would be a standing metal sheet 3 x 2 meters wobbling and tilting by its own weight and making those "woowwow wuwuw" tin noises.
Why does everyone swoon over Babbage (who never got any of his full sized designs to work), and ignore the people who *did* get calculating machines to work?
Because what he designed was a century ahead of its time, even if he never did manage to build one.
And because his design was completely, 100% sound, as demonstrated by this modern-day construction of his Difference Engine.
Babbage's failure was partly his inability to work with his helpers; but partly the limitations of precision manufacturing in the mid-19th century.
The fascination lies in the fact that, had he somehow pulled this off, we would have had stored-program computers (the Analytical Engine, which was bigger and more elaborate than this, and could be programmed with punch cards!) in 1850!!
I don't think anyone else can claim that.
Fred
Coulda woulda shoulda.
No matter how advanced the design... they were *not* built, but others *did* build working systems.
Design is every bit as important as construction. The point is, he has anticipated aspects of computing devices that were revolutionary, and a lifetime and a half ahead of his time.
There was *no* built and working system for a century, that did what Babbage's design had built into it.
Can you cite one example of a machine built before 1901 (when Babbage was already dead for 3 decades), that could be programmed with a set of instructions, which could include conditional branching and GOTO statements? Or that was Turing complete?
The Analytical Engine satisfies all those criteria.
Fred
Why do we swoon over Leonardo da Vinci? He never got his designs to work.
He did get his design to work, just 150 years late.