26 December 1791 18 October 1871 both the date and the place of birth of Charles Babbage were long uncertain, but were now firmly established. His birth date is scheduled on 26 December 1792 and seems to have taken place near Teignmouth (England). Babbage's father was Benjamin Babbage, a banker, and his mother was Betsy Plumleigh Babbage. Babbage had suffered ill health as a child. As his father had become quite wealthy, could afford the luxury that Babbage was educated in private schools. After school in Alphington, he was sent to an Academy in Forty Hill, Enfield, Middlesex, where he began his education complete. He began to show an unbridled passion for math, and a distaste for the humanities. After leaving the Academy, he continued to study at home, with a brace of Oxford who tried to bring it up to a level of academic preparation. Babbage entered Trinity College, Cambridge in October 1810. However the base he had received from the books on which he had studied made him dissatisfied with the teaching at Cambridge. He wrote: "so it happened that when I went to Cambridge I could solve some issues like the moderate sum in math, which I then I must admit I owned, with equal ease, Newton and Leibniz, or points on jumps of Lagrange. I so I bought an aversion to the routine of studies of the place, and I devoured the Euler's mathematical and other cards scattered among the many volumes of the Academy of St Petersburg, Berlin, and Paris, that libraries that I had made use of them. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that I should understand and penetrate with the superior power of the numbering of Leibniz". It is difficult to understand how the book "the principles of analytical calculation" Woodhouse may have been an excellent book from which to learn the methods of Leibniz, since the same Woodhouse was still teaching calculus of Newton in Cambridge without reference to Leibniz's methods. Woodhouse was one of the teachers of Babbage in Cambridge, but it seems that has not taken part in society that Babbage founded to try and bring the continental modern mathematics at Cambridge. Babbage sought to buy the book by Lacroix on the differential and integral calculus, but this wasn't easy because of ongoing wars with Napoleon. When he found a copy of the work had to pay seven Guineas-an incredible amount of money for that time. Babbage afterwards she intended to found a company to translate the work: "I later prepared a sketch of a society that was established to translate the short work of Lacroix on the differential and integral calculus. The project proposed that periodic meetings were held for the propagation of the d's; and entrusted to destruction all who supported heresy points. He argued that the work of Lacroix was so perfect that every comment was uncalled for. " Babbage spoke with his friend Edward Bromhead (who would become George Green's friend a few years later) who encouraged him to found the company. The Analytical Society was founded in 1812 and its members were all students of Cambridge. Nine mathematicians were present at the first meeting, but the two most important members, in addition to Babbage, John Herschel and George Peacock. Babbage and Herschel produced the first of the publications of Analytical Writing Memoirs Analytical society in 1813. This is a remarkable job and extremely important, especially if you realize that it was written by two university students. They gave a history of calculus, and wrote about the controversy of Newton and Leibniz: "it is painful to note that that discovery, which has more than any honor due to the genius of man, must however carry a train of reflections so low to the credibility of his heart". The next two publications of Analytics were a team work of Babbage, Herschel and Peacock. This is the English translation of The differential and integral calculus by Lacroix, published in 1816 and a book of examples on calculation, who published in 1820. Babbage had moved from Trinity College to Peterhouse and it was from that College that he graduated with B.A. in 1814. However, Babbage realized that Herschel was a mathematician better prepared than him. Babbage married in 1814, 1815, Cambridge, then left to live in London. He wrote the two major papers on functional equations in 1815 and 1816. Also in 1816, at the age of twenty-four, he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in London. In later years, he wrote papers on various mathematical topics, which are not particularly important, and some, such as his work on infinite series, which clearly are not correct. Babbage was not happy of how the society taken by that time you were moving. Although he was elected to the Royal Society of London, there didn't seem to be happy. He spoke of his feelings about how the Royal Society was moving: "the Council of the Royal Society is a collection of men who elect each other to an Office and after dining together at the expense of this society to praise each other under the influence of wine and get medals". However in 1820 he was elected as a member of the Royal Society at Edinburgh, and in the same year influenced the founding of the Royal Society. He served as Secretary of the Royal Astronomical Society for the first four years and then as Vice-President of the company. Babbage, along with Herschel, led some experiments on magnetism in 1825, developing methods introduced by Arago. In 1827 Babbage became lucasian Professor of mathematics at Cambridge, a post which he held for twelve years, although never taught. The reason he held this prestigious post, although did not ever complete our duties we would have expected from the possessor, was that at that time he was intent in what became the main passion of his life, namely the development of mechanical calculators. Babbage is undoubtedly the original thinker of the concepts that underlie the modern computer. Around 1812 the calculation of logarithms had made him aware of the poor accuracy of human calculation. He wrote: "... I was sitting in the room of the Analytical Society, at Cambridge, my head is bent forward over the table like in some kind of dream stage, with a table of logarithms lying in front of me. Another Member, coming into the room, and seeing me half asleep, he yelled, "well, Babbage, what are you dreaming about? -and I said-I'm thinking that all these tables (pointing to the logarithms) could be calculated through a machine". Definitely not this idea cultivated Babbage at that time, but in 1819, when his interests revolved around astronomical instruments, his ideas became more precise and he formulated a plan to build the tables, using the method of differences through mechanical instruments. A machine that should be able to carry out complex operations using only the mechanism for addition. Babbage began to build a small car in 1819 and completed it in 1822. He announced his invention in a paper Note on the application of the machine in the calculation of mathematical and astronomical tables that he read to the Royal Society on 14 June 1822 Astronomical. Although Babbage imagined a machine capable of impressing the results obtained, this was not possible at the time the paper was written. An Assistant had to record the test results. Babbage illustrated what his little machine was able to do through consecutive terms of calculation of a sequence of n ^ 2 + n + 41. The terms of this sequence are 41, 43, 47, 53, 61, while differences of 2, 4, 6, 8 are terms, and the second differences are 2, 2, 2. The difference machine is given by the initial data 2, 0, 41; constructing the next series 2, (0 + 2), (41 + (0 + 2)), which is 2, 2, 43; afterwards the series 2, (2 + 2), (43 + (2 + 2)), which is 2, 4, 47; After 2, 6, 53; and then 2, 8, 61; Babbage reported that a small difference machine was capable of producing a number of members of the sequence n ^ 2 + n + 41 at a speed of about sixty every five minutes. Babbage was clearly and strongly influenced by the great enterprise of de Prony the French Government in the production of trigonometric and logarithmic tables, with a team of people, to complete the calculations. He argued that a large difference machine could do the work undertaken by a team of people, removing the cost and being totally accurate. On 13 July 1823 Babbage was awarded a gold medal from the Astronomical Society for his progress in the machine for the difference. He later met with the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Finance Minister) for get public funds for the construction of a large difference machine. Initially he was given £ 1500 and he began to work on a big difference machine that he believed that he could finish in three years. He began to build a car with "six orders of difference, each of twenty places of figures, while the first three columns would each have to have half a dozen additional figures." A machine that would be able to easily calculate all boards that de Prony had calculated, and it was believed that he had a printer to print the results automatically. However, construction proceeded more slowly than he had expected. And in 1827 the funding were completed. The year 1827 was a tragic year for Babbage; his father, his wife and two of his children died. His health deteriorated and he was advised to travel on the continent. After his travels he returned towards the end of 1828. Subsequent attempts to get government support were finally the Duke of Wellington, British Finance Minister and other members who visited to Babbage and examined the work. In February 1830 the Government paid, or promised to pay, 9000 pounds for the project. In 1830 Babbage published Reflections on the decline of science in England, "a polemical work that led to the formation, one year later, the British Association for the advancement of science. In 1834 Babbage published his most influential Sull'Economia machine and manufacturing, in which he proposed a first draft of what we now call research related to operations. The year 1834 was the year when work on the difference machine stopped. At that time the Government had allocated £ 17000 for the project and Babbage had put it out of his own pocket £ 6000. For eight years from 1834 to 1842 the Government did not take any decisions on the continuation of financial support. In 1842 the decision not to proceed was taken by the Government of Robert Peel. By 1834 Babbage had completed the first drawings of the analytical engine, the forerunner of the modern electronic computer. His work on the difference machine had led him toward an idea much more sophisticated. Although the analytical engine not improved compared with detailed drawings, it is strikingly similar in logical components to a modern computer. Babbage describes five logical components, the establishment, control, output and input. Control over the sequence of operations was made from Jacquard type project. Was operated through some perforated cards punched cards containing simple, some the program for a particular job: "each of the cards was referring to a formula that will recalculate at some future time the same formula with any constant demand. So the analytical engine can have a personal library. Each of the cards once you are able to play at some future time the calculations for which it was first placed. " The reserve kept 1000 numbers each of fifty figures but Babbage built the analytical engine for had actually an endless reserve. This was done through the production of punched cards that could be read back again, later, when there was need. Babbage decided, however, not to seek more government support, after his experiences with the difference machine. Babbage visited Turin in 1840 and discussed there his ideas with some mathematicians included Menabrea. During the visit of Babbage, Menabrea collected all the material needed to describe the analytical engine and released it in October 1842. Lady Ada Lovelace translated article of Menabrea in English and added important notes largest of original memories. Although Babbage never built a mechanical computer capable of performing operations, its concepts of construction proved to be correct. He wrote in 1851: "the designs of the analytical engine were made entirely by me: I set up the long series of experiments with the desire to reduce the expense of its construction to the limits to which perhaps I could afford the luxury of providing. Are now resigned to the need to abstain from its construction". In spite of this last statement, Babbage never renounced not to hope that the analytical engine would be built sooner or later, writing in 1864: "... If I could get through a few more years, the analytical engine exists". After the death of Babbage, a Committee was appointed by the British Association, whose members included Cayley and Clifford: "... to confirm the feasibility of the project, and to testify that its successful implementation could mark an epoch in the history of computation equally memorable as the introduction of logarithms." This was an inadequate assessment. The construction of modern computers, logically similar to the project of Babbage, they changed the whole of mathematics and it is not an exaggeration to say that they have changed the whole world. Charles Babbage died in London on 18 October 1871 at the age of 80 years.
Article contributed by the team of collaborators.