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re: Advanced imaging reveals a computer 1500 yrs ahead of its time
Posted on 1/2/14 at 3:57 pm to Kentucker
Posted on 1/2/14 at 3:57 pm to Kentucker
quote:
Is your outlook as black and white as your post indicates?
Not sure what you mean. There was no distinction between the sacred and secular in any society up until, what, sometime in the 17th or 18th century?
1
Posted on 1/2/14 at 7:05 pm to RandyVandy
We don't know enough about the ancient eastern Mediterranean societies to say that about them. The builder of the Antikythera Mechanism may have lived in a culture that valued discoveries as scientific knowledge rather than as the result of religious ritualism.
The Antikythera Mechanism is thought to have been constructed to predict eclipses. Whether the interest in eclipses was scientific or religious, or both, can only be conjectured.
I like to think that at least some cultures had purely scientific interest in exploration. I visited the ruins at Chichen Itza and saw the astronomical observatories there. The Mayans' interest in astronomy was intense and they were quite accomplished as scientists.
Was their prime motivation to explore the skies scientific or religious? We may never know. Their hundreds, maybe thousands of books, or codices, were destroyed by Spanish invaders in the 16th century. Only four remain.
The Spaniards reason for destroying the books? Religion.
The Antikythera Mechanism is thought to have been constructed to predict eclipses. Whether the interest in eclipses was scientific or religious, or both, can only be conjectured.
I like to think that at least some cultures had purely scientific interest in exploration. I visited the ruins at Chichen Itza and saw the astronomical observatories there. The Mayans' interest in astronomy was intense and they were quite accomplished as scientists.
Was their prime motivation to explore the skies scientific or religious? We may never know. Their hundreds, maybe thousands of books, or codices, were destroyed by Spanish invaders in the 16th century. Only four remain.
The Spaniards reason for destroying the books? Religion.
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