What Ancient Tech Do You Do?

neonfrog asks: "Before silicon, before electricity even, what the heck did those of us with geek brains do? Our brains have not evolved appreciably in half an eon (at least mine hasn't, but I may be descended from turtles). What would today's programmers have been doing centuries before the invention of the keyboard? What would an electrical engineer be doing a millennia or three before the concept of resistors and capacitors? What piqued their curiosity? Were their skills esoteric or exotic? They can't all have been Leonardo Da Vincis or court 'magicians', right? Summer's starting and, for some, it's hobby time. I bet the Slashdot community harbors quite a few Journeyman, or even Masters. I know a lot of geeks are beer-makers (and I do so appreciate you folk ... urp!) so there's no danger of that knowledge getting lost. What other ancient tech do you indulge in and keep alive? What are some good resources?"

Comments

Religion stifles advancement in our species

[Anonymous Coward]

Before silicon, before electricity even, what the heck did those of us with geek brains do? Oh, the geeks have only recently been truly free:
Archimedes, the father of calculus, has his ancient texts bleached and written over with religious mumbo jumbo. Over 1800 years passed before Newton 're-discovered' calculus.
Galileo proclaimed that the earth wasn't the center of it all. Then the Catholic church made him recant (this was the time of the Inquisition which killed a friend of his just a few years before). (it was only in 1992 that the Catholic Church said Galileo wasn't such a bad guy, and that was after 12 years of arguing)
More recently Louis Pasteur, a lifelong rationalist, had his crazy ideas of bacteria and disease poo-poo'd by various religious leaders.

Seeing a trend? Ancient geeks were free to test and invent only so long as the results agreed with the religious diatribe of the day.

Re:Religion stifles advancement in our species

[Monty_Lovering]

Actually you'll find that compared to say, Islam, Christianity was very backward until the renaissance.

The Arabic Islamic world was the most advanced civilisation in the early centuries of the second millennium, whilst the European Christian world was stagnated around the bits of Greek science they could understand.

In addition to developing from the knowledge of the Greeks in such areas as medicine, they developed our modern mathematical characters and the idea of 0. They also developed a law system where Christians and Jews could peacefully co-exist in Islamic countries, albeit as second class citizens.

This was a far cry from the situation in Europe where anyone who was non-Christian in the same period was likely to end up dead. Even being suspected of something like witchcraft (normally an elderly woman with some property but no surviving relatives, funny that, eh?) was a death sentence, unless of course you weighed more than a duck.

Somehow the Muslims in power were more able to tolerate the advance of science than the Christians in power during the same period.

So the original post seems to be fair in its focus on Christianity as a bad example of established power structures fighting progress with dogma.

And it still goes on; eggs, sperm, zygotes, blastoclysts and embryos with less nerve tissue than a per rat are claimed to have equal rights to born humans by the Roman Catholic Church.

Jehovah's Witnesses oppose the transfusion of blood.

Fundamental Christians deny the vast level of supporting evidence for an ancient naturalistically formed Universe where life developed under the control of natural selection, and insist on a literal 7 x 24-hour day creation. ... of course there are Muslims and Hindus capable of equivalent stupidity, plus stuff like Mormons, Scientologists, etc., but Christianity seem to win the contest as 'religion most likely to stifle scientific advancement'.

Look at the lobby groups now most opposed to stem cell research...

Musician

[hoggoth]

It's not tech, but I bet a lot of geek minds that are attracted to programming languages are also attracted to the languages of music.

Also designing and building musical instruments would be pretty geeky even in the 16th century.

Engineering and Mathematics

[dutky]

Both engineering and mathematics are ancient disciplines, with origins dating back almost as far as written history itself. The ancient Babylonians, Sumerians and Egyptians were aware of mathematics to the extent that they were able to contruct mathematical proofs for the same geometric theorems that we all learned in high school. These same cultures obviously had a superb understanding of engineering in order to be able to build monumental architechture that stood for millenia, all without the benefit algebra or decimal arithmetic (much less, calculus).

There is no reason to think that the sorts of folks that became engineers or mathematicians 5000 years ago were, tempermentally, any differnt from the sorts of folks that become engineers or mathematicians today.

There were, no doubt, other highly skilled and technical professions that would have attracted ancient geeks: other's have mentioned smithing, scribing is another possability (just being literate enough to read and write was analogous to the general level of education of most geeks today), as is accountancy (conducting simple arithmetic without the benefit of decimal numbers must have required great patience and dedication). In the far east, at least since about 200 B.C., there was a good chance that anyone with reasonable education would have become a government functionary under the Confucian civil service system. I also suspect that, in other times, when people's conception of the world was very different from ours, many geeks may have gone into fields that would seem highly esoteric by modern standards: ancient geeks may have become musicians, artists, poets or monks as a means of persuing the life of the mind.

Finally, we should recognize the uncomfortable fact that most ancient geeks probably never got the opportunity to persue any career whatsoever. Throughout most of history, most people, no matter what their personal interests or inate abilities, were destined to be peasant farmers, servants, slaves or other bondsmen, like their fathers and grandfathers and so on. The idea that people, no matter what their station by birth, should be able (or even required) to choose their path in life, is a thoroughly modern concept.

Re:Make mead.

[bill_mcgonigle]

That second link *is* an Amazon link, but not a referral link, so I'm not whoring.

Well, for Pete's sake, put a referrer link in there next time. I mean, you're providing us with useful information and it's not like I'm going to save money if you don't put a referrer link in there - Amazon is simply going to keep the profit.

Now, who would I rather see the money go to, Amazon or Numbski? That's easy.

If you were selling your book there might be a conflict of interest, but Amazon has nearly every book in existence so this is just a matter of who gets the money, and contrary to the comments of some on Slashdot, there's nothing wrong with making money for your work.

WRT naturalistically formed universe

[anomaly]

You said:Fundamental Christians deny the vast level of supporting evidence for an ancient naturalistically formed Universe where life developed under the control of natural selection

I would certainly be described as one of those "Fundamental" Christians, and I must respectfully take issue with your point.

People who believe as I do do not deny the evidence. We collect evidence and draw inferences from it to see how that fits into our view of how the universe works. To be fair, this is precisely what naturalists do. We all share the same evidence. We differ in the meaning of the evidence and the explanations that accompany the evidence. Only a fool would reject solid evidence.

You also said:Christianity seem to win the contest as 'religion most likely to stifle scientific advancement'

I'll take issue with that as well. While it is true that many who claimed the name and power of the Christian church have abused that power and have done despicable things, that is not consistent with Christian beliefs. The list of Christians who have offered up significant scientific advances includes:
Johann Kepler, Francis Bacon, Blaise Pascal, Robert Boyle, Charles Babbage, Samuel F. B. Morse, Gregor Mendel, Louis Pasteur, Henri Fabre, Lord William Thompson Kelvin, Joseph Lister, George Washington Carver, Wernher von Braun, and many others.

To suggest that scientific advancement is inherently incompatible with Christianity is simply not inclusive of the facts.

Look at the lobby groups now most opposed to stem cell research...

Embryonic stem cell research is definitely opposed on moral grounds.

Adult stem cell research - the area that shows therapeutic benefit TODAY is not morally out of bounds and is helping people to live a more healthy life. This is GOOD science, and should be promoted.

Embryonic stem cell research is different. We believe that all human life is sacred and that no human should be killed to make life easier or healthier for someone else. The science shows that these zygotes are inherently human - that all that is required for a person to grow from a fertilized egg is food and shelter.

Science's technological reach has exceeded its moral grasp in this area. Science has long existed in a realm where there were moral guidelines on appropriate research. e.g. People must know that they are part of an experiment, and what the risks are, etc. I feel strongly that one day, the conventional scientific wisdom will look on this and say 'oops' we messed that one up.

FWIW - While I've not seen it written this way elsewhere, I rather like the idea of a "Fundamental Christian" over the moniker "fundamentalist" As a Fundamental Christian, I hold fast to the tenets of the historic Christian faith, which is somewhat different from the connotation of a fundie as described on /.

Respectfully,
Anomaly