Re: [silk] most important science stories of 2006
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6191462.stm It says: The delicate workings at the heart of a 2,000-year-old analogue computer... ... the new studies ... suggest it would have been constructed around 100-150 BC... So: The Antikythera findings are the same sort of thing that was reported a few years earlier in other archeological studies. As it was a device for computing, it seems appropriate to call it a computer. It was much closer to 2000 than to 3000 year ago. While these recent studies are interesting, it has been pretty obvious for a long time that fairly sophisticated equipment was used in the hellenistic period, in an area extending from Greece to Sicily (e.g. Archimedes) and, of course, including ptolemaic Egypt. So there isn't any new discovery dating the whole thing 800 or 900 years earlier... simply a reporter or editor made a gross mistake in arithmetic? There is a lot of such nonsense around, but it's peculiar to see it happen when discussing science and computing... Giancarlo (Giancarlo Livraghi [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://gandalf.it)
[silk] Most important science stories of 2006
Somebody had to start the best of postings. :) Udhay http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa004articleID=9C4685FE-E7F2-99DF-365095BE29603DBFref=rss Most Important Science Stories of 2006 Humans controlled computers with the power of thought, built an invisibility cloak, cracked the mystery of a 3,000-year-old computer, discovered a new element, unearthed a missing link and kicked Pluto out of the planet club--and those are just the highlights. snip -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
Re: [silk] most important science stories of 2006
... cracked the mystery of a 3,000-year-old computer... I am interested in the 3000-year-old computer story, but I can't find any explanation in that Scientific American page - nor any link to a specific article. I tried with Google, but all I found was more of the same. (There were reports, in 2004, on complex mechanical computing machines in the hellenistic period - but that was less than 3000 year ago). Does anyone know here there may be more information on this subject? Thanks Giancarlo (Giancarlo Livraghi) (gian @ gandalf.it) (http://gandalf.it).
Re: [silk] most important science stories of 2006
At 2007-01-02 17:45:17 +0100, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am interested in the 3000-year-old computer story, but I can't find any explanation in that Scientific American page I didn't read the article, but surely it's referring to the Antikythera mechanism (which is, as you say, considerably less than 3000 years old). -- ams
Re: [silk] most important science stories of 2006
On 1/2/07, Abhijit Menon-Sen [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 2007-01-02 17:45:17 +0100, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am interested in the 3000-year-old computer story, but I can't find any explanation in that Scientific American page I didn't read the article, but surely it's referring to the Antikythera mechanism (which is, as you say, considerably less than 3000 years old). Yes, I thought so too, I remember reading about it at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6191462.stm Cheeni
Re: [silk] most important science stories of 2006
On Wednesday 03 Jan 2007 8:25 am, Srini Ramakrishnan wrote: Yes, I thought so too, I remember reading about it at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6191462.stm Quote from the above link: Researchers believe these would have been housed in a rectangular wooden frame with two doors, covered in instructions for its use. The complete calculator would have been driven by a hand crank. Hmm - complete with manual and all. Do you think the instructions would have come in Chinese as well? I would have thought that such ingenuous people would have utilized the services of a certified sane person to drive the calculator rather than a crank. shiv
