Posted on 10/07/2007 7:15:09 PM PDT by monomaniac
A classic example of Serendipity is afforded by the tale of the "Archimedes Palimpsest". It also discloses the tragic disregard for non-Christian things evinced by those who should have been their curators.
"A parchment shortage is to blame for the overwriting. The original text apparently sat in a library in Constantinople until 1229 A.D. Then a scribe erased it; he needed someplace to write a prayer book. Seven hundred years later, Archimedes expert John Ludwig Heiberg discovered the traces of Archimedes after reading a few lines transcribed by a scholar in 1899. Over the next few decades, the book had a mysterious life, disappearing and reappearing. Eventually, it was sold at auction."
Technology was doing just fine without science...
Some of the steam machines from the Greek era were staggering.
They didn’t need to know that water =H2O...
Don’t need to know quantum mechanics to build a pretty good radio shack computer...
Evening Bob....
From a perspective looking back 2000 years , lost of the parchment seems tragic...For them it was just reuse of a resource that didn’t seem all that valuable.
The museum pressed ahead in its research and, just a few months ago, uncovered new diagrams and text in the original Greek -- as well as the signature of the scribe who erased the Archimedes text and wrote the prayers on top.They are more charitable to him than I would be. "Johannes" had a job as a scribe in a library. Someone should have explained to him that you don't erase a thousand year old book just to get blank paper.
"It just popped up," says Noel. "A guy called Johannes Myronas."
Despite the damage done to the ancient text, Noel doesn’t blame Myronas for the present state of the book. In fact, Myronas was most likely responsible for the book's survival.
"What a gift he gave us," Noel points out. "The great advantage of having them wrapped up in a Christian prayer book is that they were treasured and looked after for centuries."
So it was a love of math that preserved Archimedes' work for the first thousand years -- and a love of God that carried it to the present.
Then he signed his name. Oy.
That is one of the silliest things I have seen on the internet.
Please tell me you were misquoted.
Actually the fact that it was 2000 years old has nothing to do with it...There are lots of rocks around a lot older than than...Dirt is older than that.
As far as the information contained there on...It has since been duplicated.
The content is therefore useless.
The time when it could have been useful is 1000 years in the past.
Very good chance that the text was also copied by a scribe and not written by Archimedes...So you have a scribe erasing another scribes work...What’s the beef.
Ancient technology was not necessarily science based...Lots of it was trial and error.
Now eventually recipes and formulas were developed but you don’t need to know H2O to boil water.
That it was 2000 years old has everything to do with it. We're talking Archimedes, for crying out loud!
Would you have this attitude if this book were in Thomas Jefferson's library? He, you will recall, could not live in a world without books.
Erasing Archimedes would have killed him.
And don't talk to me about the age of dirt. I was here when it arrived, remember?
Now eventually recipes and formulas were developed but you don’t need to know H2O to boil water.
I agree. But that's not what you said.
You said,
Technology was doing just fine without science...
Not the same thing at all. Just try to think of all the things you would be doing without if it were not for science and scientists.
That example, yes.
Purposeful, maybe not.
If it were written in Archimedes hand it might be worth something.
Probably written by a scribe...
There are other copies of books in Jefferson’s library.
What is more important..The contents of their thoughts on the paper they are written on.
I can read Plato’s Republic on line...
I also have more non fiction in my library than Jefferson ..
A world today would be a lot harder without the previous work of Science...
For 95% most of human history science has not been essential..technical skills and tools were far more important..
You don’t need fire science to use flint to make fire.
And I would like to point out that you were the one slinging mud at alchemists and astrologers..
Ironically, two-thirds of the world would go to the flames rather than allow a particular book to be desecrated there.
And it isn't the same book.
Which 2/3....
At least we agree about something. Johannes Myronas would have said the paper.
An exercise for the student. (Hint: Which books?)
You wrote: “The 10 commandments were not delivered with, or by, a burning bush. When you mock someone’s religion, you should get the facts straight.”
______________________
My response: Of course they weren’t. They weren’t delivered at all, and there never really was a burning bush. But, of course, the tale is that God delivered the commandments to Moses at the top of Mount Sinai (Horeb), the same mountain peak on which God had earlier spoken to Moses while masquerading as a burning bush. You apparently missed the joke. By the way, you do agree with the point of my post, don’t you, i.e. that God has no problem with enslaving our fellow human beings?
The thoughts on the paper have been rediscovered..
We know the value of pi...we know how to calculate a parabola..
He has become a redundancy.
Course if you are just in love with the Romance of it all.
It’s hard to say what God has a “problem” with regarding slavery. God had no problem with his chosen people wiping out his enemies sometimes, and other times taking them for slaves. But the Bible doesn’t advocate individuals choosing to enslave others, it was always punishment God meted out on the enemies of Israel, or conversely on the Israelites.
However, the word translated “slave” is often really an endentured servant more than someone who has been captured into servitude. Not quite the same as selling yourself sometimes, as one might be forced into servitude, but still not the same as what we think of as slavery.
For much of history God had a rule about such servitude, not allowing it to go on in perpetuity.
The message seems not to focus on slavery itself, or on one group thinking itself above another based on their status.
As to your remaining point, it is most clear the 10 commandments were delivered. They appear in a book that was written millenia ago, so it’s not something we just made up a few years ago to adorn our courthouses to make the ACLU mad.
Further, the Supreme Court has ruled that the 10 commandments, above EVERY other set of principles which were based on MAN’S ideas, is the one true set of rules from the one true God.
That is why the 10 commandments cannot be posted in public places, while any other writing of man regarding laws could adorn our schools, courts, and other public places.
Who am I to disagree with years of supreme court jurisprudence, the ACLU, and the combined for of the liberal left?
The Cross is also a very revered sign in our society, more than any other. The Supreme Court has ruled that even our Flag, cherished as it is, can be burned publicly and with impugnity, and no punishment can be exacted.
But nobody may burn a Cross. To do so will earn you a jail term and the emnity of our society.
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