Archimedes manuscript yields secrets under X-ray gaze

PhysOrg.com ^ | 20 May 2005 | Staff

[PatrickHenry]

Archimedes hasn't had a good thread lately.

[PatrickHenry]

SciencePing

An elite subset of the Evolution list. See the list's description at my freeper homepage. Then FReepmail to be added or dropped.

[skinkinthegrass]

Thanks, for the post, PH. :D

[Socratic]

Archimedes hasn't had a good thread lately.

One might have thought that the topic of Archimedes was threadbare, but apparently not. (Interesting read)

[Larry Lucido]

Just realized that I've never seen a Math ping list on FR.

[Lockbar]

In honor of this Archimedes thread, I will now post a pic of a lever and fulcrum:

[Erasmus]

Archimedes hasn't had a good thread lately.

s/thread/screw/

[snowsislander]

There's nothing more important and more romantic in the history of ancient science and currently in the history of medieval manuscripts. We're discovering new readings of Archimedes.

Truly, it is a fantastic occurrence. It's even more improbable (and more interesting) than, say, finding the exact formula for Greek Fire.

[Junior]

The palimpsest is a 1,000-year-old parchment made of goatskin containing Archimedes' work as laboriously copied down by a 10th century scribe. Two centuries later, with parchment harder to come by, the ink was erased with a weak acid (like lemon juice) and scraped off with a pumice stone, and the parchment was written on again to make a prayer book.

An early example of religion suppressing science.

[Lazamataz]

Just realized that I've never seen a Math ping list on FR.

Just realized that I've never seen a NakedMathWithFeathers ping list on FR.

[roaddog727]

"s/thread/screw/"

Inclined plane - QED

[JohnBovenmyer]

Moving the Earth is easy. Moving the US Senate, now that would be impressive.

[dsc]

"An early example of religion suppressing science."

Oh, horse poop.

Love your tag line, by the way.

[snowsislander]

Just realized that I've never seen a Math ping list on FR.

While we have a number of people who are interested in mathematics, I believe that most of the math-related threads on Free Republic tend to be about math education. (Though I do remember a longish one about equations back in October: What Makes an Equation Beautiful?)

Looking at threads with the key word "math" (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=math), I would not surmise that such a ping list would be a "high volume" ping list.

[Pablo64]

"In honor of this Archimedes thread, I will now post a pic of a lever and fulcrum:"

What, you're not going to jump out of the bathtub and run naked through the streets shouting "Eureka!"? Come on, where's your commitment? ;-)

[Bear_Slayer]

upon displacing water in his tub and realizing he had found a way to measure volumes, leapt out of the bath and ran naked through the streets shouting 'Eureka!' (I have found it!).

Actually . . .

He preferred to take cold baths, then the whim hit him. "I think I'll take a hot bath." he found a missing appendage . . . and the rest is history. :-)

[Larry Lucido]

Well, if anyone puts together a Math list, please be sure to put me on your "do-not-ping-list." Math wasn't my best subject by a long shot. :-)

Of course, geometry was pretty cool sometimes. I'd still like to be the first one to trisect an angle using only a protractor and a straight edge.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[Junior]

Obviously it was. The prayer book was oh so more important for posterity than the collected works of one of the greatest mechanical geniuses to ever to walk the Earth.

[6SJ7]

LOL! Good one! Took me a minute before I said Eureka!