The Sun Also Rises: I am wrong about something and also a massive nerd about something

I take it all back. I love the London Science Museum. We'd been there a few weeks ago and I'd sneered all over it, but I later discovered that the Science Museum contains something very special. The working model of Charles Babbage's Difference Engine. Oooh. So we went back so that I could have a good nerdy perv at it.

Despite the fact that I am as hopeless with maths and science as it is possible to be without actually being in a coma, I am a massive fan of the concept of maths and science in general, and a massive fan Charles Babbage in particular. He's amazing. He spent almost all of his life (1791-1871) trying to construct a machine capable of performing accurate, complicated arithmetic, and though he came close several times, he never managed to make it work. In 1991 a working model was finally made from his plans, but it was a huge job even with the more advanced technology the engineers had available then. He's often called the father of computers, but this isn't quite accurate as what he was doing didn't really prefigure modern computers in any significant way. I mean, it did a bit, but it's a bit of a stretch to call him the 'father of modern computers'.

But this isn't the reason that I love the guy. On a superficial level I love him because he called his machines the Difference Engine and the Analytical Engine, which is brilliantly steampunk, but more than that I love him because he was such an interesting guy. He was acquainted with Darwin and Dickens, and was sought after for all sorts of fancy parties, in spite of his various eccentricities. He could be a bloody minded crank - he almost wasn't awarded his degree because he refused to apologise for making remarks that were thought to be blasphemous during a debate. He could also he a crotchety old bastard - he hated street musicians, and in his later life he launched a one man campaign to have them banned. He once wrote to Alfred Lord Tennyson to correct his poetry;

In your otherwise beautiful poem, one verse reads,

Every moment dies a man,

Every moment one is born.

... If this were true, the population of the world would be at a standstill. In truth, the rate of birth is slightly in excess of that of death. I would suggest [that the next version of your poem should read]:

Every moment dies a man,

Every moment 1 1/16 is born.

Strictly speaking, the actual figure is so long I cannot get it into a line, but I believe the figure 1 1/16 will be sufficiently accurate for poetry.

He was a proper mad genius. I mean, how many other Victorian-era scientists can boast of being the inspiration for a way cool web comic?

So I was very excited about seeing the Difference Engine. And it was pretty good.

But guess what else they had at the museum? His notebooks!

And his brain!

I was thrilled. I lingered for quite a long time over the case with the notebooks in it, along with a middle aged chap with a notebook. Neither of us said anything, but we exchanged looks that said it all; 'Babbage, eh?' But in a reverent sort of way. When we finally moved away from the case,a museum employee swooped in behind us, gave the case a little squirt with Windex and a wipe with some paper towels, then looked at us reprovingly. I didn't think I'd even touched the case, but apparently we had managed to displease him by breathing on the glass too messily.

But officious glass polishers couldn't get us down. We weren't finished with the Science Museum yet, not by a long shot.

We wanted to see the History of Medicine exhibit. Or, as we came to call it, the History of Human Suffering exhibit. It was pretty gruesome. But also fascinating. Doctors and surgeons in the past often did more harm than good (leeches and bleeding, for e.g.), but it was surprising to see how much they were actually capable of. For example, I wasn't aware that they had such things as prosthetic limbs and glass eyes. I also didn't realise that they were actually able to do things like bone setting and removal of bullets, and all sorts of surgery that, while it must have been pretty grim, must also have saved the odd life here and there.

The museum also had these on display;

Neat!

Lest you think that I'm some kind of weirdo obsessed with bits of famous dead people and trepanning, let me leave you now with some pictures of old-timey calculators. If these names don't make you smile, you're probably much better at parties than I am.