Babbage's Calculating Engines and the Factory System

Summary: The English mathematician Charles Babbage, who during the first half of the nineteenth century invented the precursors of today's computers, was keenly interested in the economic issues of the Victorian era. His calculating engines were an application of contemporary theories on the division of labour and provided models for the rationalisation of production. Bahhage's ideas contributed to the dehumanisation of labour hut were also the source of major discoveries. The mathematician's history was closely linked to that of the industrial revolution, cradled in England, the 'workshop of the world'. This article recalls the effervescence of that period.