Ancient Astronomical "computer" Discovered

[♦ ficino ♦]

A device found in a shipwreck from c. 60 BCE seems to have been made to chart/predict movements of heavenly bodies. It even came with an instruction manual carved in bronze.  It works by intricate gear mechanisms.

 

Was there science before Christianity or what?  

 

see link:

 

https://www.yahoo.com/tech/the-deepwater-search-for-the-antikythera-mechanism-the-97585514499.html

[miekko]

The problem with pre-Christian science (just as with most of the science throughout the Christian period) was that it quite largely rejected empiricism. At some point in Athens, empirical study was fairly popular, but the popularity of Platonism and Pythagoras made sure to kill that off. 

 

Astronomy, due to the popularity of astrology, however, had gotten around to developing quite good models for the movement of most celestial bodies - at least for the time scales they had need for. Using the term 'computer' may somewhat exaggerate what it was - in no way was the antikythera mechanism a general purpose calculating machine, it was gearwork for one particular type of task. It was well done for that kind of task though, and maybe they did develop even more remarkable things. 

[♦ Fuego ♦]

It is so interesting to me that it was done by hand, and that someone was able to work out the math (also without calculators) to be able to build it in the first place. I wonder how many modern folks could do that.

[Joshpantera]

That was a good read. I've heard about via ancient technological anomalies but never zeroed in on that specific one. Hopefully they turn up more evidence with the exo-suit.  

[ExCBooster]

The problem with pre-Christian science (just as with most of the science throughout the Christian period) was that it quite largely rejected empiricism. At some point in Athens, empirical study was fairly popular, but the popularity of Platonism and Pythagoras made sure to kill that off. 

 

Astronomy, due to the popularity of astrology, however, had gotten around to developing quite good models for the movement of most celestial bodies - at least for the time scales they had need for. Using the term 'computer' may somewhat exaggerate what it was - in no way was the antikythera mechanism a general purpose calculating machine, it was gearwork for one particular type of task. It was well done for that kind of task though, and maybe they did develop even more remarkable things. 

Exactly this, actually. Science isn't a body of knowledge - we'd found out some very nifty things with some reliability, before it. Science is a process, a tool we use to systematically test and uncover knowledge, with a fairly strict definition. The rough outline of the scientific process is as follows:

 

Hypothesis - a guess as to what will happen in a given situation.

Test - a method to test the guess. This part needs to meet a few more parameters: it has to be repeatable. (In a formal paper, you have to give detailed instructions for your method, so that other scientists can run the same test, and verify your results.) The test also has to be objective (eliminate biases as much as possible), as well as on measurable, and observable things. Part of this is controlling variables - the things that can impact your results. The more variables there are, and the harder they are to control, the "softer" the science. So, physics, which you can control very tightly, is a "hard" science, and at the other end of the scale is psychology, which is still using the scientific process, but with a lot less variable control, because there are so many.

Results - give the results of your test here and analyse them. It's also required to give a complete accounting of your method for analysis, so that people can further reproduce your test results.

Repetition - other scientists repeat the test, and if your results can be reproduced, and no mistakes were made in analysing them, then your hypothesis is confirmed. Yay. Some fields even have a statistical barrier that you have to pass, in order for your results to be confirmed. In particle physics, you have to be 99.9999% sure you have a new particle, and not just statistical noise.

 

Now, after lots of different tests are run on related hypotheses, to cover related cases, then a general rule might be drawn up, to help unify the hypotheses. If this rule passes every test it undergoes, and can be reliably used to predict results in general, then it becomes a formal Theory. A Theory is the highest possible standard of knowledge in science. It's not just an explanation: a theory is used to predict results, and has already been shown to do so to a very high standard of reliability (passes every test it has ever been put to). A theory also usually comes with Laws, or mathematical formulas for using the theory to predict results.

 

As an example, Newton's Theory of Universal Gravitation comes with a law for predicting how objects with mass attract each other:           So, with this theory and law, you can just plug in the masses and distance between the centres of two objects with the gravitational constant, and know what the gravitational force is between them.

 

That said, the scientific process didn't really come together in a recognizable form until just around Newton's time. So, before around 1650 (-ish) it's not science. Sir Francis Bacon is usually considered the first scientist, in this sense.

 

So, as awesome as the antikythera mechanism is, it's not really scientific. We did, though, come up with a lot of cool things, before science. Check out these star maps. What science did was make it possible for knowledge to move beyond dogmatic assumptions about how things worked, and the scientific method is a major factor in the explosion of technological know-how that you see in the 1700s and later. It takes a while for the medical field, especially, to break out of the dogma of the "humours" concept in the West. But, once science does get traction in medicine, the field improves by leaps and bounds, and the average life expectancy skyrockets. Not to mention, you know, actual rockets. Black powder was invented, pre-science, but science made the further development of the field at a much faster rate possible.

[♦ ficino ♦]

ExCBooster, have you weighed in on the question, whether (Protestant) Christianity as a "world-view" was a necessary ingredient for the rise of the enterprise that counts as science?  Ironhorse and various Christian apologists claim that it was.

[miekko]

ExCBooster, have you weighed in on the question, whether (Protestant) Christianity as a "world-view" was a necessary ingredient for the rise of the enterprise that counts as science?  Ironhorse and various Christian apologists claim that it was.

Given that medieval Islam stumbled very close to a scientific worldview, protestant Christianity is probably not all that necessary. Certainly it may be that at the time - roughly a couple centuries after the reformation - protestantism was the best bet. However, the Catholic world during the renaissance also stumbled close at times.

 

It is possible the Mongol Invasion put a stop to further developments in the Islamic world, and it's possible the counterreformation put an end to it in the Catholic world. 

 

Naturally protestantism did eventually bring it about - not intentionally or even actively, but it came about as a development out of the socioeconomic realities of northwestern Europe, and the religion of course was part of those socioeconomic realities. 

[ExCBooster]

ExCBooster, have you weighed in on the question, whether (Protestant) Christianity as a "world-view" was a necessary ingredient for the rise of the enterprise that counts as science?  Ironhorse and various Christian apologists claim that it was.

I didn't know that was an angle, here. Do they have a thread? So, no, I haven't weighed in, on that. But I will here and now.

 

The idea that Christianity was somehow a pre-requisite for science is ludicrous. I'll agree with and elaborate on what miekko said, and point out that a lot of cultures had quasi-Emperical reasoning, long before Europe even got there. With a big shout-out to the Islamic scholarship in the middle ages. That's exactly why most of the named stars have Arabic names. And, you know, Chemistry (Al-kimiya), algebra. Definitely why a lot of chemical family names are also derived from Arabic... alcohol. China also had a lot going on in the mathematics and proto-science department: one of the very first synthetic pigments, high-temperature ceramics, advanced metallurgy, differential gears, gunpowder for fun and profit.

 

I'll also say nice things about the Mongol Empire! If you want to know why Europe, specifically, developed the scientific method, the Mongolian expansion is the key. Mongolia is a very interesting culture, really. If Rome expanded based on infrastructure and projection of power through culture, Mongolia expanded through a similarly refined use of human resources. Seriously, they weren't some disorganized mob, they were - from Khan to camp scavenger dog - a highly efficient and organized war machine. This is due in large part to the strictures of nomadic life on the steppes: everybody had a place in survival, and everybody did it well. The other side of the coin was their religion: a shamanistic Sky worshipping religion, with a host of other beliefs in Spirits of land and life, and plenty of room for other Gods. They were not out to convert people to their religion. They were out to assimilate people to their empire. (Don't kill Genghis Khan's messenger, though... that always ends poorly. Resistance is futile, and if you do, they'll literally wipe your civilization off the face of the Earth. Khwarezmid Caliphate? Never heard of them, you say? Exactly.) As long as you declared allegiance, and helped crush the next town, you were part of their war machine, and they'd find a place for you. Especially your military engineers and bureaucrats. Somebody's got to run all those captured cities and empires, and bring in the taxes, after all. And, you can't have tax revenue without trade, and you can't have trade without security. With almost all of the Silk Road trade routes under unified control for the first time in history, Europe could trade in greater volume than ever with East Asia and Islamic civilizations (the ones still left...) who were seeking ways around the Mongolian Empire's borders. That's what kicks off the prosperity, and brings in the technology - gunpowder, cannons, and siege machines, mathematics, and all of these factors that will intellectually seed the scientific revolution.

 

The other factor? Disease. The trade routes brought in the Black Death, which cut down huge numbers of Europe's immunologically naive population. With disunity, lots of wars on, and all this new tech, European powers were soon competing in an intense labour shortage for any advantage they could get... Hence European proto-scientists like Leonardo da Vinci.

 

So, in short, due to long-term political stability and conflict in Islamic civilizations and East Asia, technology and mathematics could develop. Then, since the Mongolian Empire was the ultimate in pragmatism, all this tech got brought together, literally right at the gates of Europe (Vienna, actually, in spectacular fashion). Also, since disease utterly mowed its way through Europe's disunited population, all those little princelings and kings were looking for any advantage they could get, that wasn't population. This sparked a culture of aggressive and increasingly efficient inquiry into technology, mathematics and natural processes. Ultimately, if you're going to thank any religion for science, it should be Mongolian Tengriism. It was this belief system's acceptance and ready assimilation of others that allowed engineers and mathematicians, and thinkers of all other faiths to continue to work, and ensured the importation of these advances into Europe, and the Black Death as a catalyst for the scientific revolution.