Babbage's two lives

Menachem Fisch

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

Babbage wrote two relatively detailed, yet significantly incongruous, autobiographical accounts of his pre-Cambridge and Cambridge days. He published one in 1864 and in it advertised the existence of the other, which he carefully retained in manuscript form. The aim of this paper is to chart in some detail for the first time the discrepancies between the two accounts, to compare and assess their relative credibility, and to explain their author's possible reasons for knowingly fabricating the less credible of the two.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)95-118
Number of pages24
JournalBritish Journal for the History of Science
Volume47
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2014
Externally publishedYes

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