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Stanford Accelerator Uncovers Archimedes' Text
AI Playground points to a Newsday.com report which reads in part "A particle accelerator is being used to reveal the long-lost writings of the Greek mathematician Archimedes, work hidden for centuries after a Christian monk wrote over it in the Middle Ages. Highly focused X-rays produced at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center were used last week to begin deciphering the parts of the 174-page text that have not yet been revealed."
"In the 12th century, parchment -- scraped and dried animal skins -- was rare and costly, and Archimedes' works were in less demand."
Why would scraped and dried animal skins be rare and costly in the 12th Century farming economy where these monks lived? There were certainly lots of skins, from all the animals. And monks were making their own ink, and spending their lives working on transcriptions and other writing. I don't buy the "necessity" of erasing Archimedes' works, no matter how often they repeat that story to elementary schoolers learning the definition of "palimpset", or how many of us grow up to write stories for newspapers repeating it.
The "less demand for Archimedes" part does ring true. After 600 years in the hands of the Catholic Church, European civilization had lost most of its heritage of learning and rationality it inherited from the Grecoromans who produced it. So much that it would be another 600 years before the rebirth ("Renaissance") of individual inquiry and reason, leading to the Enlightenment ("you can know it for yourself"), the "Age of Reason", and the rise of science as the most popular way of explaining life.
Looking at today's antiscience crusade by religious powermongers, it's easy to believe that a monk a thousand years ago just scrubbed the pages. Not for the great value of a blank page for new writing, but to destroy the scary science already written on it. Foreign words, explanations without "god" every other sentence, and especially these writings, where Archimedes tells how his mathematical proofs were derived from physical evidence (mechanics), rather than just consistent language - all inconvenient to a society which demanded obedience from the few people lucky enough to learn to read. Maybe if we can read between the lines in this story, we can learn to avoid the plunges into darkness we get when we erase science in favor of blind faith.
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make install -not war
Ah, but my comment was assuming that there is no religion whatsoever (facts apart that your logic is quite as flawed as my trollish post).
On the other hand, it did help me vent out some frustration. I'd do anything to see a world where religion is taken care of once and for all.
Religion and religious nuts should simply be shoved up and their genes gotten rid of once and for all. Freakin' retards.
...Christians have been consistent throughout the ages. Squashing the advancement of our knowledge about the world time and time again. Can you imagine if Bush was in the White House during the 50s and 60s. Instead of giving the American people an amazing goal to reach, he'd have arrested scientist who were attempting to disprove the existence of the firmament!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Thanks for reminding me that the Church is a single man.
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.