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Re: Flat Earth



At 5:26 -0500 2/12/02, John S. Denker wrote:

The dark ages really were dark!

-- Do not assume that the progress of science (or
of high culture in general) is monotone.

-- Do not assume that scientific observation will
prevail over religious orthodoxy.

-- Do not assume that a cosmopolitan culture will
prevail over parochialism and factionalism.

-- Do not assume that a literate, urbanized culture
will prevail when attacked by hordes who live in
caves and tents and think everybody should live in
caves and tents.

There are counterexamples throughout history.

Jack, you're putting words in my mouth. I made no such assertions,
and I know these cautions as well as you do. I also made no claims
that the knowledge was continuous throughout history. Lots of Greek
science was lost to us until the Arabs started translating the
documents in their libraries. But Jim had asked a question, and I was
giving what I thought (then, and still do) was a reasonable, if
conjectural, response. Now it turns out he was looking for evidence
from even earlier than Eratosthenes. I have no opinion on that.

I also made no claims that this knowledge was, even in Eratosthenes
time, was "common" in the sense that "everybody" knew it, only that
it was likely to have been known among the educated elite, to whom
Eratosthenes was well known. I suspect, that mariners, aside, most
landlocked peoples, especially of the uneducated classes "knew" the
world was flat.

With regard to my conjecture about the ancient mariners, I still
regard it a likely that they had made some connection with the way
ships (and rocks, and cliffs, and other things that they needed to be
able to estimate distances to) moved past the horizon. After all, to
a pretty good extent, their lives depended upon their being able to
make rational decisions about those things, so they would be
carefully observing the details. Especially after they started
venturing routinely out of sight of land. During the centuries before
the thirteenth, as the Norsemen sailed southward, and the Polynesians
sailed northward, and they both observed the behavior of the pole
star, and considering the distances they actually traveled, it is not
inconceivable that some among them realized the implications of that
behavior.

And while Ptolemy died in the 3rd century C.E., the map I pointed to
was published in the 13th century C.E., so I think it qualifies as
more than just an exception (BTW, just what is the difference between
an "exception" and a "counterexample"). Several of the sites I
visited during my search had quite a few Ptolemaic maps whose
publication dates were spread all through the intervening years.

Hugh
--

Hugh Haskell
<mailto://haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto://hhaskell@mindspring.com>

(919) 467-7610

Let's face it. People use a Mac because they want to, Windows because they
have to..
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