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DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T103000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T113000
DTSTAMP:20260501T032106
CREATED:20240515T140717Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240702T142527Z
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SUMMARY:Nigel Toon – How AI Thinks
DESCRIPTION:Those who understand how AI thinks are about to win big. Leading British AI entrepreneur Nigel Toon explains why it’s so exciting and how it can be controlled. \n\n\n\nHow AI Thinks shows us how we can harness the electrifying intelligence of machines. Unlike other books on AI which often scare us\, through storytelling that shows us how we think\, Nigel Toon helps us understand AI and its incredible possibilities. He explains that AI is a tool that we can control and how it will augment our own amazing human intelligence. ‘In my role running an AI company\,’ says Nigel Toon\, ‘I am often asked about artificial intelligence\, but people are prone to say that they don’t understand it and fear it. AI is complex and so\, like other powerful tools that have come before\, our lack of understanding can easily lead us to think that it might present a threat to humanity. We need to learn more\, not just about the risks but also about the benefits that this important new technology can deliver\, because it will end up changing our lives and\, perhaps more importantly\, the lives of the next generation.‘Over the course of a career spent at the forefront of technology\, I have been directly involved in developing the underlying technology that makes AI work\, and I understand how this story will play out. I want to help you learn how AI thinks’. \n\n\n\nNigel Toon is a leading figure in AI and is often called upon to speak at major industry events. He has been recognized with numerous industry awards including\, ranked #1 on Business Insiders ‘100 most influential people shaping British technology’ and as one of the ‘Top 100 entrepreneurs in the UK’ by the Financial Times. \n\n\n\nNigel has a background as a technology business leader\, entrepreneur\, and engineer having been CEO at three successful VC-backed processor companies\, including Graphcore which he co-founded and which developed a new type of microprocessor to accelerate Artificial Intelligence. He was previously a senior executive at a major Silicon Valley\, publicly listed semiconductor company. He has served as a Board Member and Chairman for several technology businesses and currently sits as a Non-Executive Director on the board of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) which is a non-departmental UK public body that directs over £8bn per year into research and innovation funding. He has also been a member of the UK Prime Minster’s Business Council. \n\n\n\nThis event is kindly sponsored by C P Fry \n\n\n\nTickets £12.00/£6.00 (students)
URL:https://dorchesterliteraryfestival.com/event/nigel-toon-how-ai-thinks/
LOCATION:Dorset Museum\, High West Street\, Dorchester\, DT1 1XA\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Adult
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DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T120000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T130000
DTSTAMP:20260501T032106
CREATED:20240515T140717Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240702T143311Z
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SUMMARY:Jim Down – Life in the Balance
DESCRIPTION:A Doctor’s Stories of Intensive Care \n\n\n\n\n\nDr Jim Down brings us to the very heart of the intensive care unit – the section of the hospital where the sickest patients are brought to be cared for until their condition improves. With honesty\, humility and a streak of dark humour\, Dr Down describes the quietly heroic work of doctors and nurses on the ICU\, a place which sits at the cutting edge of medical technology and where a split-second decision can make the difference between life and death. \n\n\n\nFrom headline-grabbing cases like that of Alexander Litvinenko\, poisoned by Russian agents and admitted to Down’s ward\, to the appalling aftermath of a train crash\, and the mundane daily struggle to simply find enough beds\, Jim Down provides a unique insight into life on The Unit\, and the critical medicine doctors and nurses perform there. \n\n\n\nLife in the Balance offers the first real glimpse of intensive care medicine\, its immense challenges\, deleterious effects on doctors’ mental health and enormous rewards. Its profundity will make you reconsider the fragility of life and reframe your understanding of what it means to care. \n\n\n\nDr Jim Down is a consultant in critical care and anaesthesia at University College London Hospitals. He chairs the ICU consultants’ group\, the department of anaesthesia weekly scientific meetings\, and the UCLH Trust guideline committee. During the Covid-19 pandemic he worked on UCLH’s busy ICU ward\, and was interviewed by the BBC for a groundbreaking report depicting medics on the frontline. His account of that period\, Life Support\, was published in 2021. \n\n\n\nDr Jim Down will be in conversation with Dr Helen Thomas \n\n\n\nTickets £12.00/£6.00 (students)
URL:https://dorchesterliteraryfestival.com/event/jim-down-life-in-the-balance/
LOCATION:Dorset Museum\, High West Street\, Dorchester\, DT1 1XA\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Adult
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T140000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T150000
DTSTAMP:20260501T032106
CREATED:20240604T150306Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240702T143537Z
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SUMMARY:Tim Spicer – A Suspicion of Spies
DESCRIPTION:The compelling first biography of Wilfred ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale – a ruthless and effective spymaster whose career spanned the Russian Revolution to the Cold War and beyond. A Suspicion of Spies is filled with stories of adventure\, bravery\,and glamour\, revealing the complicated intrigues of the world of British intelligence. A lifelong friend of Ian Fleming\,Biffy is considered to be the blueprint for James Bond. \n\n\n\n1916\, Russia. A 16-year-old Wilfred ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale is working for his father\, taking submarines from Vladivostok to St Petersburg for the Russian Imperial Navy. He takes a submarine out for sea trials along with a naval dockyard crew he’d never met before. Spotting a group of German ships\, he gives the order to attack and sinks four of them. On returning to Kronstadt\, breaking free from an anti-submarine net with just 30 minutes of oxygen left\, he opens the hatch to find every gun in the port facing him and his crew. Fluent in Russian\, he quickly defuses the situation. For this action he is awarded by Tsar Nicholas II the Order of St. Stanislav and the Order of St. Anne\, imperial Russia’s highest knighthood for military valour and ‘bravery in battle’. \n\n\n\nBiffy\, born and raised in Odessa\, soon learnt to operate at all levels of Odessan society. Clearly highly intelligent\, by 16 he was studying Naval Architecture and Naval Engineering in St Petersburg-broadening his education further in the waterfront barsof both Odessa and St. Petersburg. \n\n\n\nAged 18\,he was engaged by Naval Intelligence as an interpreter on account of his language skills\,English\, Russian\, French\, Polish and German. He would soon grow into a buccaneering member of the British Secret Intelligence Service in a career spanning forty years which Biffy described as ‘40 years of licensed thuggery.’ Biffy appears in over 60 books and websites and yet no one has ever written the story of his life. As Tim Spicer says\,‘He was rather like a ghost one knew was there but the apparition never stood still long enough for a clear view.’ Biffy was a lifelong friend of Ian Fleming and many attribute his influence to the creation of Bond.The tales of action and intrigue found in this comprehensive biography could be taken straight fromthe pages of From Russia with Love\, for which Biffy acted as consultant. \n\n\n\nLieutenant Colonel Tim Spicer OBE has led a life filled with action and adventure. During his twenty years in the British Army\, he saw active service in NorthernIreland\, the Falklands campaign\, the Gulf War and the Balkans\, as well as serving in the Far East\, Cyprus and Germany. Key appointments have included Chief of Staff of an Armoured Brigade\, Staff Officer at the Directorate of Special Forces and Commanding Officer of the 1st Battalion Scots Guards\, among many others.Over the course of his illustrious military career\, Spicer has developed extensive knowledge of intelligence\, counter terrorism\, complex relations and protective security. In 2001 he founded the private security company Aegis\, which has counted the UK\, US and Italian governments among its clients. He is the author of An Unorthodox Soldier: Peace and War and the Sandline Affair\, a fast-moving account of his military life\, including the events surrounding his time in Papua New Guinea when he was captured and held at gunpoint\, as well as the notorious ‘Sandline Affair’ of 1996\, and A Dangerous Enterprise that charts the history of the little-known\, yet remarkable 15th Motor Gunboat Flotilla\, commanded directly by the Secret Intelligence Service. \n\n\n\nTickets £12.00/£6.00 (students)
URL:https://dorchesterliteraryfestival.com/event/tim-spicer-a-suspicion-of-spies/
LOCATION:Dorset Museum\, High West Street\, Dorchester\, DT1 1XA\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Adult
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DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T160000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T170000
DTSTAMP:20260501T032106
CREATED:20240515T140716Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240702T143814Z
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SUMMARY:Sir Robin Niblett – The New Cold War
DESCRIPTION:How the contest between the US and China will shape our century \n\n\n\n\n\nAn urgent and essential assessment of the global contest between the US and China\, and how looking to history will help us to navigate it\, from former Director of Chatham House \n\n\n\nWe have entered a new Cold War\, even if most people choose not to admit it. The contest between America and China is global and unbridgeable\, and it encompasses all major instruments of statecraft: diplomacy\, technology\, military power\, intelligence\, trade and investment. It has its tinder box: Taiwan. And both protagonists are working hard to draw allies and friends to their side from east and west\, north and south. \n\n\n\nWe stand at its beginning. But this Cold War is nothing like the last\, which defined the second half of the twentieth century. We need new ideas to navigate its risks and to avoid a globally devastating war. \n\n\n\nIn this short\, urgent book\, Robin Niblett argues that only by looking back can we heed the warnings and learn the necessary lessons to guide us through this new reality: he goes through the ten ways in which the new cold war is different\, and offers five new rules for navigating it. How we manage this contest will determine not only whether there is still space for international cooperation to deal with our many global challenges\, from the climate emergency to the technological revolution\, but also who gets to dominate the twenty-first century and\, quite simply\, the course of all our futures. \n\n\n\nSir Robin Niblett is a leading expert on international relations. He is a distinguished fellow at Chatham House\, after spending 15 years as its director and chief executive until 2022\, and senior adviser at Hakluyt\, the British strategic advisory firm. He is also engaged by the Asia Society Policy Institute and the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) in Washington DC\, where he was Executive Vice President for ten years. He has served as chair of several World Economic Forum councils\, and advises governments and private institutions. His writing has appeared in many publications and books\, but this is his first solo book. \n\n\n\nSir Robin Niblett will be in conversation with Jo Durrant \n\n\n\nThis event is kindly sponsored by Michael and Eve Bonham Cozens \n\n\n\nTickets £12.00/£6.00 (students)
URL:https://dorchesterliteraryfestival.com/event/sir-robin-niblett-the-new-cold-war/
LOCATION:Dorset Museum\, High West Street\, Dorchester\, DT1 1XA\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Adult
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DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T180000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20241015T190000
DTSTAMP:20260501T032106
CREATED:20240515T140716Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20241007T162124Z
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SUMMARY:Tracy Chevalier – The Glassmaker
DESCRIPTION:A vivid\, inventive\, spellbinding virtuoso portrait of a woman\, a family and a city that are as everlasting as their glass by a master of her craft. \n\n\n\nVenice\, 1486. Across the lagoon lies Murano. Time flows differently here – like the glass the island’s maestros spend their lives learning to handle. \n\n\n\nWomen are not meant to work with glass\, but Orsola Rosso flouts convention to save her family from ruin. She works in secret\, knowing her creations must be perfect to be accepted by men. But perfection may take a lifetime. \n\n\n\nSkipping like a stone through the centuries\, we follow Orsola as she hones her craft through war and plague\, tragedy and triumph\, love and loss. \n\n\n\nThe beads she creates will adorn the necks of empresses and courtesans from Paris to Vienna – but will she ever earn the respect of those closest to her? \n\n\n\nTracy Chevalier is the author of 10 novels\, including the international bestseller Girl with a Pearl Earring\, which has sold over 5 million copies and been made into an Oscar-nominated film starring Scarlett Johansson and Colin Firth. American by birth\, British by geography\, she lives in London with her husband and son. Tracy is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature\, and has honorary doctorates from her alma maters Oberlin College and the University of East Anglia. \n\n\n\nTracy Chevalier will be in conversation with Lulu Taylor \n\n\n\nThis event is kindly sponsored by Blanchards Bailey \n\n\n\nTickets £12.00/£6.00 (students)
URL:https://dorchesterliteraryfestival.com/event/tracy-chevalier-the-glassmaker/
LOCATION:The Dorford Centre\, 2 Bridport Road\, Dorchester\, Dorset\, DT1 1RR\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Adult
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