Skeptics-The Mostly True Story of the 1st Computer

Active Hampshire Science & Technology enthusiasts are invited to join Bob at another Reading Skeptics event ... this time in a new venue, the RYND Bar and Kitchen at 11 Castle Street, Reading.  

Reading Skeptics in the Pub are about "Thinking and drinking, humour and debate.  Monthly talks and challenging discussions for people interested in science, skepticism, rationalism and critical thinking." 

They organise talks, often given by scientists, followed by questions from the audience and discussion in the second half.  You don't need to be a scientist or expert in the subject to enjoy the evening, everyone is welcome to ask a question or make a comment. 

Admission is free but the organizers ask for a voluntary contribution of about £2. It can be very crowded, so it's advisable to get there early for the talk which will start at about 7:30pm.

The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace & Babbage -
The (Mostly) True Story of the First Computer

"One hundred years before the first computers were built out of wires and transistors, the Victorian polymath Charles Babbage designed a gigantic steam-powered, punchcard-programmed, cogwheel computer, the Analytical Engine.  His friend Ada, Countess of Lovelace, daughter of Lord Byron, completed some of the first programs for the machine, and theorised that one day it could be used for the manipulation of any kind of information. Unfortunately Ada died young and Babbage never built his Engine, leaving their story as one of the greatest what-ifs in the history of science.

Sydney Padua’s cult webcomic The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage, now a bestselling graphic novel, combines extensive research with alternate-universe comic-book escapes, where the mechanical computer is finally completed and used to build runaway economic models, defeat spelling errors, and of course, fight crime. In this talk she will tell the story of these two fascinating and brilliant eccentrics, and discuss her process of primary-source research and creative transformation. She will also display her 3-d animations of how the Analytical Engine would have looked and operated, some of the first visualisations ever created of that extraordinary machine.

Sydney Padua is a cartoonist and visual effects artist whose animation appears in The Iron Giant, Clash of the Titans, and John Carter. Her work has been featured in Wired and The Economist and she has spoken at Microsoft, Google, the BBC, and the Computer History Museum."