Originally posted by fishmaster
I don't believe that these stories of advanced technologies in antiquity are all false. Archeologists have just found and ancient battery in Bagdad.
Now if such technology had existed, how would a so called "primative" civilization know of such thing in the first place.
fishmaster,
A wet cell battery is nothing but a galvanic cell. Galvanic cells occur anytime you have two dissimilar metals in close proximity with each other in
addition to water. Like a piece of copper and a piece of iron laying one on top of the other out in the backyard, followed by a rainy day. It's not
outside the bounds of imagination that the current produced in an "accidental" galvanic cell such as this could have been noticed. It is absolutely
certain that the corrosion from galvanic action would have been noticed. It's likely that the cause of this type of corrosion was looked into by the
people whose job it was to prevent corrosion of valuable metal items back in those days (armorers, etc.) It's a short, perfectly understandable and
logical step from this to the creation of an "artificial" galvanic cell such as the Bahgdad battery.
Originally posted by fishmasterThey would create things that were shown to them. The didn't just one day say "hey maybe i'll get a
jar and some acid and make a battery for my chariot". (a crude description i'm sure).
Your description is not crude in the least, you only left out the two dissimilar metals. This battery
is a jar presumably filled with an
electrolyte.
Please see if you can find out what the voltage would be on the vaunted "Bahgdad battery," which was not "just recently" found, by the way. I
seem to remember it could only have been a trickle, enough for a small electroplating process (that's the assumed use for the thing,) not enough to
run a chariot. Not to mention the "mysterious" absence of evidence for electric motors in ancient times.
Think of the value of a small battery like this to fraudulent salesmen, just electroplate a thin layer of gold over some small iron piece and charge a
price much higher than it's worth. Sounds a little more like reality.
Apparently you are under the impression that ancient peoples were stupid idiots. The truth is of course that ancient people were
exactly the
same as you and me. Your statement that "They would create things that were shown to them" is belied by the many known accomplishments of ancient
people.
You attitude toward ancient man will only get in the way of the possibility of any future understanding on your part of the roots of today's
civilization. Assuming, of course, that you wish to obtain such an understanding.
Harte