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Mystery of Ancient Calculator Finally Cracked
Posted by
kdawson
on Thu Nov 23, 2006 06:50 PM
from the Curta-had-nothing-on-the-ancients dept.
from the Curta-had-nothing-on-the-ancients dept.
jcaruso writes, "It's been more than 100 years since the discovery of the 2,000-year-old Antikythera Mechanism, but researchers are only now figuring out how it works." From the article:
"Since its discovery in 1902, the Antikythera Mechanism — with its intricate and baffling system of about 30 geared wheels — has been an enigma... During the last 50 years, researchers have identified various astronomical and calendar functions, including gears that mimic the movement of the sun and moon. But it has taken some of the most advanced technology of the 21st century to decipher during the past year the most advanced technology of the 1st century B.C."
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Science: Ancient Astronomical Computer Decoded 233 comments
slimjim8094 writes "A mechanical device from 150BC was found in a shipwreck. Upon examination with X-Rays, the device appeared to be a revolutionary computer used to calculate lunar cycles. This device "is technically more complex than any known for at least a millennium afterward." From the article
"The hand-operated mechanism, presumably used in preparing calendars for planting and harvesting and fixing religious festivals, had at least 30, possibly 37, hand-cut bronze gear-wheels, the researchers said. A pin-and-slot device connecting two gear-wheels induced variations in the representation of lunar motions according to the Hipparchos model of the Moon's elliptical orbit around Earth."
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The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
Somewhat hard, given that it predates Beowulf [wikipedia.org] by at least 600 years.
Parent
Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Doesn't this [nott.ac.uk] run NetBSD too?
Netcraft Confirms It... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
It was designed by the famous Roman programmer Linicus Torivicus.
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Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
KFG
Parent
Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Insightful)
If the big business (Sony/MS/Real *and* Apple) get their way all these little plastic discs and memory stones will just be pretty ornaments to our descendants.
There will be no way to decode the data stored within.
We will become a black hole in history (no goatse refs).
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I can just see 'em sittin' around saying "We don't know WTF they were thinking, because we don't know WTF they were thinking"
You take F451, I'll take Time Enough For Love. We can pool camping gear.
KFG
Re:The question on everyones lips... (Score:5, Funny)
The Antikythera mechanism is *not* user friendly, and until it is Antikythera will stay with >1% marketshare.
Take installation. Antikythera zealots are now saying "oh installing is so easy, just do hammer-dowel install package, or hit package": Yes, because hitting with "hammer" makes so much more sense to new users than double-whipping a slave that does "setups".
Antikythera zealots are far too forgiving when judging the difficultly of Antikythera configuration issues and far too harsh when judging the difficulty of slave storage issues. Example comments:
User: "How do I get Quake 0.03 to run in Antikythera?" Zealot: "Oh that's easy! If you have Redtoga, you have to smelt quake_3_rh_8_i686_010203_glibc.tin, then do chmod +x with a file.....
Parent
Physical Perl (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Physical Perl (Score:5, Informative)
They did.
From the article:
'... X-rays exposed writing on surfaces mashed together in the Mechanism, and never before seen... He declines to be specific about what the writing says. "But it was basically an instruction manual on using the mechanism, and what its purpose was," he says.'
Parent
Re:Physical Perl (Score:5, Funny)
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Like the Mormons' tablets... (Score:3, Insightful)
WTF
Re:Like the Mormons' tablets... (Score:5, Interesting)
Because it's kind of hard to read, even if you know Greek. Quite a lot of work needs to be done to get the text transcribed fully, even if parts of it are easy to read. Have you looked at the third image in the slide show? Could you make an accurate transcription of the text shown?
FWIW, I can read Greek, but all I can make out is some references to a "square showing a given" something, some numbers, and something about moving some bits of the mechanism but not others. The third line's got some words in it but I can't fit them together without context.
Parent
Re:Like the Mormons' tablets... (Score:5, Funny)
1. There's writing on it, but it can't be read with certainty. Instead of making guesses to its contents, the researchers are leaving their speculation to its purpose, which can be more easily deduced. This can be because of:
1a. They actually can't read enough of it to gather the content of the message. (i.e. "Turn the
1b. They have a translation of some sort, but aren't sure that it is correct, and are waiting for confirmation.
2. The researchers made the annoucement subject to a non-disclosure agreement. These agreements are fairly common when making announcements prior to the publication of an academic article. You can make you're annoucement of your findings, but can give specifics about your findings until the article has been published. Just wait until the article is published, and then read the translation yourself.
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Re:Like the Mormons' tablets... (Score:5, Funny)
Basically, they've found the EULA. They're worried the BSA will sue them under the PMCA (Pre-Millenium Copyright Act)...
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Getting less important (Score:4, Insightful)
Slide rules: very few still in use today, but they were very important from 1620's (when they were invented) until the 1970/1980s -- 350 years.
Now, a calculator older than 5 years is a historical curiosity (although I still use a 15-year old calculator on a day-to-day basis).
What we're seeing is a shortened lifetime for calculators, software, etc. which probably makes documentation less important (excpet for historical curiosity). You would not realisticly expect any software / device you design now to be in use 350 or 2000 years from now.
Parent
Just imagine... (Score:5, Funny)
Just goes to show... (Score:5, Interesting)
On the serious side, though... How much of our stuff will be unusable only 200 years from now?
Re:Just goes to show... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Just goes to show... (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Just goes to show... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Just goes to show... (Score:4, Funny)
There is, as any reasonable man can see, no american continent, the whole Columbus affair was a hoax, organized by the Portuguese government to cover up the fact that they are ruling the world.
I am sure you can appreciate the ingenuity of inventing a conspiracy theory to cover up a much more important conspiracy.
Parent
slownewsday (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, we need a new word, for news which isn't functional information, but just amusing/entertaining.
I wish they'd bloody well get round to publishing the full translation of the text, though!
Re:slownewsday (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"No comment."
Film next week.
Really, we need a new word, for news which isn't functional information, but just amusing/entertaining.
"Rupert."
KFG
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:slownewsday (Score:5, Funny)
Fox News?
Parent
And the clock stopped... (Score:5, Informative)
Actually this story is a little old, people have had the Antikythera device scoped out for a couple of years now. It's a sort of geared astrolabe using an epicyclic model (an astronomical paradigm adopted in Ptolomy's ptime) and the parts inside the corroded find were derived by some good ol'fashioned NMI scanning.
An astrolabe is basically a clock -- an analogue computer that correlates time, star position and latitude. Look 'em up -- they're beautiful instruments and very logically constructed. Each point indicates a star, the off-centre circles (al'mucanthers) are the projections of the celestial latitudes from the polar axis (think of a bunch of hoops on one spindle of a Tower of Hanoi model, then crank the spindle off the perpendicular by a few degrees, to give you an idea of the projection. Light source on top, your shadow rings are the al'mucanthers). Move the star pointer to one of those circles, then read the index off the rim of the device (the Mater). Because of their simplicity and elegance (the mathematical model, not the construction!) they were used up until Columbus' time. If the Antikythera device had been a better predictor, we might well have seen more of them. And a lot more gears. The only thing we still use from the development of the astrolabe today is the flat head screw, seen on one model in 1565.
Stargate plug (Score:5, Funny)
Just Goes to Show (Score:3, Funny)
wikipedia (Score:5, Informative)
Relative Difficulty (Score:4, Insightful)
To pull out the old quote, "It is twice as difficult to debug a program as to write it. Therefore, if you put all of your creativity and effort into writing the program, you are not smart enough to debug it."
Without any information even about what it's supposed to do, beyond being a series of gears, without knowing if it's even a fragment of a larger whole - or even knowing if it actually worked for the intended process (or was the ancient equivalent of a buggy program), that makes for quite a challenge.
I'm guessing, in the future, a massively advanced civilization that came across the ones and zeroes of Internet Explorer, without the O.S., without info about HTTP, without Windows or a computer based off that comical silicon technology they've only found fragments of, they wouldn't be able to figure it out either.
Heliocentric as well ... (Score:4, Interesting)
This is a heliocentric astrolabe style device from about 80BC; an advance from geocentric designs. Yet most people on
I guess at 1:43am I'm easily amused!
Re:Heliocentric as well ... (Score:4, Informative)
Huh? Which pope and incident are you referring to? If you are thinking of Galileo, that wasn't about the shape of the earth, it was loosely about heliocentrism. I say "loosely" because if you do a little research, you'll discover that the popularly accepted version of the story has been highly exaggerated and simplifed to force it into the "religion vs science" mold.
Perhaps this means that by the year 3500 the church will have accepted evolution.
Maybe you should read this [wikipedia.org].
Parent
Re:Heliocentric as well ... (Score:4, Insightful)
In short, I stand corrected on both the pope and the evolution comment, and am willing to serve as an example of just how powerfull myths can be.
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Link to Working Unit (Score:4, Interesting)
Everything is under control (Score:4, Funny)
already had it figured out (Score:4, Funny)
No, just an EULA (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
There is. The article gets to the point at the very end, and frustratingly turns out to be hype for the upcoming release of what it does. The point is that they found significantly more text (than had been previously found) by using x-ray tomography to show slices of its internals. The text they found included the manual which was conveniently written in greek.
Apparently it turns out that the previous attempts to r
Re:Nice! ... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If we all get wiped out by a comet or something and humanity has to start from scratch would we eventually end up using silicon? Or would we come up with a biological solution (like the human brain)? It's cool to think about.
Maybe we've already dug up things that are more advanced than what we ha
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They did, only no one could overstand the joyful tongueage it was scribated in. Press green button marked RED to activating your unit and with disdain you must...