Reading 1
Today, we have machines that can tell us anything. They can predict the future and tell us what the weather will be like tomorrow. We have all this and more at the click of a button.
However, in the past, most people had to wait and see. Machines were very rare but there was one special machine that could help make predictions. This ancient device was the Antikythera mechanism. Divers discovered this ancient bronze tool in 1901 in a shipwreck dating from the 1st century BCE, but the device actually dates back to the 2nd century BCE. Modern scientists needed to use X-rays and high-resolution scans to find out what it was, how old it was and what it was used for.
They discovered it had a set of scientific dials and thirty gear wheels and it probably had a wooden case. They called it the first computer as it made calculations. People used it to follow the movements of the Sun and the Moon, to predict eclipses, track the positions of the closest planets and even to track the four-year cycle of the ancient Olympic Games. There was no machine like it until the 14th century when men such as Richard of Wallingford and Giovanni de Dondi created astronomical clocks, which many scientists found amazing.
Ancient literature mentions some other ancient machines that Archimedes made to predict the movements of the Sun and the Moon and the planets. Archaeologists have also found parts of a machine from the 5th or 6th century that people may have used as a calendar and to tell the time. These days, we have superfast computers that we can hold in our hands as well as space telescopes to see what is happening in space in real time. We have come a long way and so have the machines we use.
(Adapted from Bright Exercise Book)
