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Ancient Babylonians Figured Out Forerunner of Calculus (sciencemag.org)

sciencehabit writes: Tracking and recording the motion of the sun, the moon, and the planets as they paraded across the desert sky, ancient Babylonian astronomers used simple arithmetic to predict the positions of celestial bodies. Now, new evidence reveals that these astronomers, working several centuries B.C.E., also employed sophisticated geometric methods that foreshadow the development of calculus. Historians had thought such techniques did not emerge until more than 1400 years later, in 14th century Europe.

4 of 153 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Modern arithmetic not up to Babylonian standard by Aighearach · · Score: 4, Informative

    Because the youngest end of their date range is less than 100 years BCE, and off-by-one is close-enough. Likely it 200 years older, but that isn't certain. 350 to 50 BCE is the range given.

  2. Re:We might as well break the new management in. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    There's a good reason that Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are called "Abrahamic" religions.

    Abraham (Abram) had a son by a concubine (Hagar). That son was named Ishmael. The Arabs claim ancestry back to him. He also had a son by his wife (Sarai/Sarah). That son was named Isaac. The Jews claim ancestry back to him. Jesus (Christ) was a Jew.

    Abraham was from "Ur of the Chaldeans", also known as Uruk. The name hasn't changed. That place is still called Iraq. (Say both of those names out loud if you don't "get it".) Specifically, the city of Ur was in the southern part of the Euphrates basin, right about where it curves east and runs to the Persian Gulf.

    Babylon was much farther to the north and a little east, where the Euphrates and Tigris run closest to each other. You can still see where Babylon was on Google Maps. It's immediately north west of Al-Iqsandariya (Alexandria), Iraq. It's a scorch mark, basically. Nothing grows there, nothing lives there. There was a prophecy issued about that in the 800's BC. (Isaiah 13:20, specifically.) Interestingly, it holds true despite many attempts to make use of that portion of land. Make of that what you will.

  3. Re:Archimedes had calculus by erapert · · Score: 4, Informative

    After the Dark Ages, where the Church basically did their best to wipe out human knowledge and sanitize everything...

    I was under the impression that it was rather the opposite. In reality the "dark ages" were neither literally nor figuratively dark. The name was given by Italians who were butthurt about not ruling the world anymore.

    It also seems that Christianity (Catholic monks in particular) was responsible for preserving western culture, civilization, and knowledge during the "dark ages" not destroying it.

    Even a gutter press site like Cracked seems to disagree with you on this matter.

    Contrariwise, there's a lot of evidence that certain modern, "scientific", and atheistic governments have destroyed and censored knowledge (I've linked only a few obvious and famous examples but there are others).

  4. Re:We might as well break the new management in. by Camel+Pilot · · Score: 3, Informative

    Disinformation....

    Looks pretty lush actually.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...