Blaise Pascal is known for a number of things, but we remember him best for the Pascaline, an early mechanical calculator. [Chris Staecker] got a chance to take a close look at one, which is quite a ...

While necessity is frequently the mother of invention, annoyance often comes into play as well. This was the case with [Blaise Pascal], who as a teenager was tasked with helping his father calculate ...

The Aritmometer was the first device capable of performing mathematical calculations automatically. It was invented in 1623 by the German mathematician and philosopher Wilhelm Schickard. However, ...