Without 'conditional branching', the ability to mechanise the word IF, the grandest calculator would be no more than a glorified adding machine.
如果没有"条件分支"，或者说一个机械化的"如果……则……"的能力，那么他的伟大构想，与普通的加法机就没什么区别，
It might be thought of as an assembly line, everything being laid down from start to finish, and there being no possibility of interference in the process once started.
就只能将它看成一条流水线，从开始到结束，一切都是确定的，程序一旦开始运行，就不会有任何变化。
The facility of 'conditional branching', in this model, would be analogous to specifying not only the routine tasks of the workers, but the testing, deciding and controlling operations of the management.
而在他的模型中，"条件分支"意味着机器不仅具有工人的能力，还具有识别、决策和控制的能力。
Babbage was well-placed to perceive this idea, his book On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures being the foundation of modern management.
巴贝奇对这方面问题有很深刻的理解，他的《机械制造经济学》是现代工业管理的基础。
These ideas were a hundred years ahead of their time, and were never to be embodied in working machinery during Babbage's lifetime.
巴贝奇关于通用机器的这些想法，比他的时代超前了100年。在他有生之年，这些想法从未能够真正实现。
Government funding did not solve the problems created by his grossly over-ambitious specifications; the project was not advanced by Babbage's contempt for committees, administrators, and other scientists;
他过于野心十足的一番论述，吓跑了政府基金，他对行政人员和其他科学家的藐视，也阻碍了他的计划。
nor did his own efforts to bring mechanical engineering to an entirely new standard, and his absorption in every theoretical and practical aspect of the work, overcome these difficulties.
尽管他通过自身努力，开创了机械过程的新时代，并且吸收了各个领域的理论和实践知识，但这一切都没能帮助他实现这个项目。