Lack of technological progress in late Roman Empire

[Eleatic Guest]

Good job on debunking myths once again. Could you explain what would be the great significance of absence of such cranks (e.g. did it mean Romans were anti-technological and pro-slave again?), as well as perhaps any examples of polemical medievalist writing putting this absence to good use?

In a nutshell, the crank is necessary for transmitting rotary motion into linear one (or vice versa) and as such has been a prerequisite for many, if not most mechanical automated processes of the Industrial Revolution.

Richard Lefebvre des Noëttes, a retired French officer who devoted his time to the study of ancient traction systems, was used by both Lynn White and Joseph Needham as a crown witness for the perceived technological backwardness of the ancient world exemplified in the influential (and wrong) image of ancient horses choked by Greek-Roman harnesses. At the height of White's influence, even classicists adopted his views, such as here: David W. Reece - The Technological Weakness of the Ancient World (1969)