Greek Temples Had Visitors With Impaired Mobility

John Goodinson and John Svolos/Anasynthesis Project

Joel Kontinen 

 Many people tend to think that ancient men could not have been as clever as we are. This is in keeping with the Darwinian idea that humans evolved very gradually from ape-like creatures and learning was a slow hit-or-miss affair. intellectuall ape-like creatures and learning was a slow hit-or-miss affair.  They were not expected to accomplish much intellectually.

Features at  Greek sanctuary would have aided visitors with impaired mobility. Architects who built temples and sanctuaries in ancient Greece seem to have had access for people with disabilities in mind — thousands of years before such inclusiveness became a concern for modern societies. Stone ramps found at many Greek temples are thought to have allowed wheeled carts to deliver supplies and sacrificial animals.

 But Debby Sneed at California State University in Long Beach argues that many ramps, especially those at healing sanctuaries, served mainly to facilitate the access of visitors with impaired mobility. 

This would reject the views of evolution, according to which we only saw the need for things like that recently.

 For example, reconstructions of the Sanctuary of Asclepius at Epidaurus, dedicated to the Greek god of medicine, reveal ramp access to nine small and large structures on the site. The temple’s uncommonly generous supply of access aids, added during an expansion in the fourth century BC, provides strong evidence that the ramps were built mainly with disabled visitors in mind, she says. Ancient evidence such as vase paintings and skeletal remains suggest that arthritis and other ailments that impair mobility were common in ancient Greece, Sneed notes. 

 According to evolution, humans  started to look like us in the distant past and their views changed not so long ago. 

 Source: 

 Nation. 2020.This temple was equipped with accessibility ramps more than 2,000  years ago. Nature  24 July

Stonehenge, Pyramids and Sophisticated Devices Defy Darwinian Views of Ancient Man

Could there be a link between Stonehenge and ancient astronomy? Image courtesy of Andrew Dunn, CC BY-SA 2.0.





Joel Kontinen

Many people tend to think that ancient men could not have been as clever as we are. This is in keeping with the Darwinian idea that humans evolved very gradually from ape-like creatures and learning was a slow hit-or-miss affair. They were not expected to accomplish much intellectually.

However, the pyramids, Stonehenge and other ancient monuments and devices tell an entirely different kind of story.

In 2016 Science reported on the work of Mathieu Ossendrijver of Humboldt University in Berlin, who examined Babylonian clay tablets hailing from 350 BC to 50 BC.

Babylonian astronomers “also employed sophisticated geometric methods that foreshadow the development of calculus. Historians had thought such techniques did not emerge until more than 1400 years later, in 14th century Europe.”

Dr. Ossendrijver also published a report in Science entitled The Ancient Babylonian astronomers calculated Jupiter’s position from the area under a time-velocity graph.

The 2000-year old Antikythera Mechanism likewise challenges our views of ancient man. It is a multi-purpose calendar and computer. It could, among other things, be used to predict astronomical events such as solar eclipses and the timing of the Ancient Olympic Games.

A recent article in The Conversation examines the correlation of stars and ancient monuments and concludes that there might indeed be a link, but we cannot be sure of this.

Anyhow, even entirely oral cultures could have prodigious knowledge about constellations and stars.

In 2016 New Scientist wrote about Bill Yidumduma Harney, an Aboriginal Australian who could identify 3,000 stars in the night sky. How many astronomy professors could beat him in that game?


Sources:

Brown, Daniel. 2018. From the pyramids to Stonehenge – were prehistoric people astronomers? The Conversation (12 March).

Cowen, Ron. 2016. Math whizzes of ancient Babylon figured out forerunner of calculus. Science (28 January).

Darwin Was Wrong About Ancient Man

The .Greeks built the first computer over 2,000 years ago. Here's a model of it in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens.
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Joel Kontinen

Evolutionists tend to believe in progress from simple beginnings to more sohistication.

However, we often do not see this in the animal kingdom – or even in human history. An intruiging illustration is the very first computer, the The Antikythera mechanism, an invention that is over 2,000 years old.

The device was housed in a wooden box that measured 34 cm (13 inches) x 18 cm (7 inches) x 9 cm (3.5 in), or slightly smaller but thicker that the average laptop.

The Antikythera mechanism could, among other things, be used to predict astronomical events such as solar eclipses and the timing of the Ancient Olympic Games.

In other words, its technology was by far more advanced than anything inventors during Charles Darwin´s lifetime could come up with.

In real life, technology has often gone backward. This is something that Darwin would never ever have predicted.

Babylonian Astronomers Were Cleverer Than We Thought

Jupiter plays a major role in a recent discovery of the prowess of Babylonian astronomers. Image courtesy of NASA, ESA, and A. Simon (Goddard Space Flight Center), public domain.




Joel Kontinen

Many people tend to think that ancient men could not have been as clever as we are. This is in keeping with the Darwinian idea that humans evolved very gradually from ape-like creatures and learning was a hit-or-miss affair. They were not expected to accomplish much intellectually.

However, many discoveries suggest that this view is badly outdated. Homo Erectus, for instance, made engravings and Neanderthals were anything but the caricature presented by 19th century evolutionists, who portrayed them as stooping, grunting ape-men.

Cave paintings were astonishingly sophisticated. New Scientist even speculated that cavemen might have invented the cinema.

Then, the ruins of Göbekli Tepe in modern-day Turkey showed that instead of living in simple dwellings, hunter-gatherers could already build towns.

Stonehenge in Britain has also caused a rethink of evolution-based views.

Then there’s the Antikythera Mechanism. With at least 30 gear wheels and pointers, it was a mechanical computer for calculating the movements of the sun, moon and probably also some planets.

And it was built 2,000 years ago.

There’s more. Recently, astroarchaeologist Mathieu Ossendrijver of Humboldt University in Berlin examined Babylonian clay tablets at the British Museum. The documents, dated from 350 BC to 50 BC, were a great surprise to him and everyone else.

The journal Science summarises the findings, stating that Babylonian astronomers

“also employed sophisticated geometric methods that foreshadow the development of calculus. Historians had thought such techniques did not emerge until more than 1400 years later, in 14th century Europe.”

Ossendrijver also published a report in Science entitled The Ancient Babylonian astronomers calculated Jupiter’s position from the area under a time-velocity graph.

Jupiter was important for Babylonians, as they identified it with their chief god Marduk. It seems that astronomers wanted to know precisely where the planet was at each stage:

“Ossendrijver figured out that the trapezoid calculations were a tool for calculating Jupiter’s displacement each day along the ecliptic, the path that the sun appears to trace through the stars. The computations recorded on the tablets covered a period of 60 days, beginning on a day when the giant planet first appeared in the night sky just before dawn.”

Comparing the tablets to older Babylonian texts from ca. 1800 BC to 1600 BC, he was able to see that the Babylonians had developed “abstract mathematical, geometrical ideas about the connection between motion, position and time that are so common to any modern physicist or mathematician.”

The discovery also throws light on how Noah could build a big ocean-going vessel 4,500 years ago and how the wise men from the east were able to reach Bethlehem after the birth of Christ.


Source:

Cowen, Ron. 2016. Math whizzes of ancient Babylon figured out forerunner of calculus. Science (28 January).

Ancient Multi-Purpose Instrument Yields More Surprises

The Antikythera Mechanism. Image from Wikipedia





Joel Kontinen

When I took my first course in computer science I learnt that Charles Babbage (1791-1871) invented the mechanical computer. But now it seems that the Greeks already made sophisticated calculators over 2000 years ago.

In the first century BC a Roman ship sank near the Greek island of Antikythera. Its cargo lay hidden at the bottom of the sea for two millennia until in 1901 a sponge diver found the wreck. Among the statues that were discovered was also a mysterious device. Believed to date from ca. 100 BC, the Antikythera Mechanism, as it is called, is the most sophisticated scientific instrument of the ancient Greek world that has survived to our time.

The Antikythera Mechanism consists of at least 30 gear wheels and pointers. Previous research on the device disclosed that it was a mechanical computer for calculating the movements of the sun, moon and probably also some planets. It could be used for predicting eclipses, for instance.

A recent letter in the journal Nature by British mathematician Tony Freeth and colleagues brings to light more uses for the device. They studied the mechanism and its Greek inscriptions with microfocus X-ray computed tomography. They found out that the mechanics were also used as a four-year calender for the timing of the Olympic Games.

Freeth suggests that the device might have been made by a follower of Archimedes (ca. 287 BC – 212 BC).

The prevailing evolutionary view of man has often blinded scientists into thinking that ancient men had to be very primitive. Each generation tends to think that their forefathers were less advanced than themselves. However, recent findings have indicated that this is not necessarily true. The Neanderthals, for instance, were more civilised than we once supposed. The same is true of the Greeks. When it comes to technology, they were centuries ahead of their times.

Sources

Ball, Philip. 2008. Complex Clock Combines Calenders. Nature 454: 7204, 561 (31 July 2008).

Freeth, Tony; Jones, Alexander; Steele, John M. & Bitsakis, Yanis. 2008. Calendars with Olympiad display and eclipse prediction on the Antikythera Mechanism. Nature 454: 7204, 614-617 (31 July 2008).

Spinellis, Diomidis. 2008. Τhe Antikythera Mechanism: a Computer Science Perspective. Computer 41:5, 22–27.