The accumulation of skill and science which has been directed to diminish the difficulty of producing manufactured goods, has not been beneficial to that country alone in which it is concentrated distant kingdoms have participated in its advantages.
CHARLES BABBAGEThe first steps in the path of discovery, and the first approximate measures, are those which add most to the existing knowledge of mankind.
More Charles Babbage Quotes
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I am inclined to attach some importance to the new system of manufacturing; and venture to throw it out with the hope of its receiving a full discussion among those who are most interested in the subject.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The economy of human time is the next advantage of machinery in manufactures.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
A young man passes from our public schools to the universities, ignorant almost of the elements of every branch of useful knowledge.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Miracles may be, for anything we know to the contrary, phenomena of a higher order of God’s laws, superior to, and, under certain conditions, controlling the inferior order known to us as the ordinary laws of nature.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The quantity of meaning compressed into small space by algebraic signs, is another circumstance that facilitates the reasonings we are accustomed to carry on by their aid.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
No person will deny that the highest degree of attainable accuracy is an object to be desired, and it is generally found that the last advances towards precision require a greater devotion of time, labour, and expense, than those which precede them.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Scientific knowledge scarcely exists amongst the higher classes of society. The discussion in the Houses of Lords or of Commons, which arise on the occurrence of any subjects connected with science, sufficiently prove this fact.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
To those who have chosen the profession of medicine, a knowledge of chemistry, and of some branches of natural history, and, indeed, of several other departments of science, affords useful assistance.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The difference between a tool and a machine is not capable of very precise distinction; nor is it necessary, in a popular explanation of those terms, to limit very strictly their acceptation.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Perhaps the most important principle on which the economy of a manufacture depends, is the division of labour amongst the persons who perform the work.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The whole of the developments and operations of analysis are now capable of being executed by machinery … As soon as an Analytical Engine exists, it will necessarily guide the future course of science.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
What is there in a name? It is merely an empty basket, until you put something into it.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The fatigue produced on the muscles of the human frame does not altogether depend on the actual force employed in each effort, but partly on the frequency with which it is exerted.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
You will be able to appreciate the influence of such an Engine on the future progress of science. I live in a country which is incapable of estimating it.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Whenever a man can get hold of numbers, they are invaluable: if correct, they assist in informing his own mind, but they are still more useful in deluding the minds of others. Numbers are the masters of the weak, but the slaves of the strong.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
I wish to God these calculations had been executed by steam.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Errors using inadequate data are much less than those using no data at all.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
An object is frequently not seen, from not knowing how to see it, rather than from any defect of the organ of vision.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
Those from whose pocket the salary is drawn, and by whose appointment the officer was made, have always a right to discuss the merits of their officers, and their modes of exercising the duties they are paid to perform.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The Council of the Royal Society is a collection of men who elect each other to office and then dine together at the expense of this society to praise each other over wine and give each other medals.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
A powerful attraction exists, therefore, to the promotion of a study and of duties of all others engrossing the time most completely, and which is less benefited than most others by any acquaintance with science.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
In mathematics we have long since drawn the rein, and given over a hopeless race.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
That the state of knowledge in any country will exert a directive influence on the general system of instruction adopted in it, is a principle too obvious to require investigation.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
In turning from the smaller instruments in frequent use to the larger and more important machines, the economy arising from the increase of velocity becomes more striking.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The first steps in the path of discovery, and the first approximate measures, are those which add most to the existing knowledge of mankind.
CHARLES BABBAGE -
The successful construction of all machinery depends on the perfection of the tools employed; and whoever is a master in the arts of tool-making possesses the key to the construction of all machines… The contrivance and construction of tools must therefore ever stand at the head of the industrial arts.
CHARLES BABBAGE