New Info - Was the Antikythera Mechanism the world’s first computer?

The famous mechanism has been given the 3-D x-ray treatment and this has helped confirm what it actually is. The really cool part of this story is that it seems to prove that the ancient Greeks were quite a bit more advanced than we give them credit for.

Antikythera Mechanism - New Info

Thank you for posting that link. It's a wonderful, although long, study of the object. It is amazing how conventional knowledge clings on even when presented with stronge contrary evidence.

I just really liked the fact that after years of conjecture and theory we actually get an answer as to what it is.

I had read so much about this over the years and was blown away to actually get solid "for real" info rather than another theory.

Oh yes, and the fact that this proves that the Greeks were about 1400 years smarter than we thought

Who's to say they didn't have similar devices for other purposes ie: a calculator. That would be handy for troginometry and geometry, eh? Damn Macedonian insurgents, the the Russi er Romans! Huh, don't mention those Romans!

[edit on 14-5-2007 by DuncanIdahoGholem]

The device is completely built around cogs that can display an impressive amount of astronomical data. I suppose one could call it a computer, but its still just mechanical movements.

On top of this chances are high it was made by Hipparchos, which was later than Archimedes (which was claimed to have built a similar device). So it most probably wasnt the first either

[edit on 14-5-2007 by merka]

linklink

Check it out. mechanical computers can still represent an on and off state.

is this the Sundisk they once found?? It seems to me it looks quitte the same but the rocky surface wasnt around it.

is this the Sundisk they once found?? It seems to me it looks quitte the same but the rocky surface wasnt around it.

Hi Spartanic, i dont think it is the same. The coating has always been part of the problem with identifying this item. As it had been sitting on the bottom of the med for such a long time it was coated with sediment, barnacles etc and couldn't be properly cleaned without damaging what was under the coating.

That was why the 3D x-ray was such a big deal.

Could this be what you were thinking of? Sundisc

Here is another link to the home page of the research project that has been dealing with the mechanism for a number of years.

Some nice pictures and reconstructions of what it may have looked like before spending decades on the sea floor.

Antikythera Mechanism Research Project

I don't know that I'd call an astronomical calculator a "computer", though it does compute in the purest sense of the world. If you use a definition like that, then the Chinese had the record beaten by over a thousand years, as did other civilizations with the Abacus.

School courses today don't focus on science as heavily as they once did. We learned that the ancient Egyptians made statues that moved and the ancient Greeks had coin operated machines that dispensed holy water as early as 200 BC (about 400 years before the mechanism).

I encourage folks to read up on what the ancients actually knew. We get a lot of "scientsts will be surprised to find out" and "historians discount..." statements that aren't true.

You'll be surprised at what we DO know!

Originally posted by Byrd

and the ancient Greeks had coin operated machines that dispensed holy water as early as 200 BC (about 400 years before the mechanism).

And you learn something new everyday, i sure didnt know about that. Thanks Byrd.

There have actually been some excellent docs lateley on the educational channels about historical machines and tech, and some of it is simply mind-blowing....colossal Roman ships with heated decks and pools, fascinating stuff.... The ancients were a LOT brighter than modern man gives them credit for....

Cheers Gazrok,

I hadn't heard about that, i'll have a dig around and see what i can turn up. Fascinating subject.

I think many people erroneously assume that we as a species today are smarter than we were thousands of years ago - sort of silly really, do we assume that say, cats or dogs today are smarter than they were then?

Yes, we have widespread education, and scientific method, as well as a large amount of recorded history, however, we are not the culmination of a continuum.. it's much more complex than that. Genetically speaking, I doubt we're very much different than people way back then, there's just more of us, so we can achieve more in shorter time periods..