Atheist "church" in London.

[Angrboda]

You're not hearing me Ape. The astrology theory at the time regarding planetary motions was Ptolemaic epicycles. That's easy to reproduce using gears since it simplifies very nicely. They're not claiming that the device didn't reproduce the epicycles. They're pointing out the flaw in the astrology of the time that thus resulted in any device like this actually being flawed in its representation of celestial motion for bodies in our solar system.

I'm getting the impression that you don't actually know how a real computer works.

Having studied computers myself, and played with them for a long time, I think the definition of 'computer' is sufficiently vague that it could, arguably, embrace either point. It's certainly not a computer in the sense of a von Neumann style modern computer, but then not everything is. (See analog computers, for example.) I'd say that you are both right, given appropriate definitions; however, at this point, I've forgotten what the original question was. Is it an advanced mechanical device capable of operations that might reasonably called calculation? Likely, yes. Is it a computer in the modern sense? Likely no. What was the question again?

(For some strange reason I'm reminded of mercury tubes in early computers as an example of why one shouldn't judge too quickly about what is and is not a computer. As well as Turing oracles and quantum computers.)