Lack of technological progress in late Roman Empire

[Eleatic Guest]

Next round. When were cross-bladed scissors, those with a joint, invented and how widespread were they vis-a-vis the type in the pic below?

One of the first recorded mentionings of cross-blade scissors, however, was in the Fifth Century. The scribe Isidore of Seville described a cross-bladed shear, with a center pivot, used by barbers and tailors. These scissors did not gain widespread use in Europe until the 1600's.

Short History of Scissors

Shear, Ancient Trebizond, northeastern asia Minor, 2nd century A.D., Bronze, Metropolitan Museum in New York City in 2006[/i]

[Eleatic Guest]

Another invention of late Roman times - who would have thought that - is the book! Apparently, the Christian element was decisive in its spread and ultimate replacement of the roll.

During the first two centuries AD, only the roll was used for literary works. Martial (84-86 AD) is the first to mention a parchment codex.[4] He points out that it is more convenient for a traveler and how much space it saves in a library. He even gives the name and address of a publisher where one may purchase texts in codex form. However, it seems that this experiment failed, as there are no further references to the codex in this context for a whole century. In about 220 AD, lawyers began to concern themselves with the definitions for various kinds of books. In the Digest of Ulpian we find that the codex is an established and acceptable kind of book, but it was certainly not fashionable.[5] Indeed, the extant evidence from Egypt of Greek literary and scientific texts indicates that only by 300 AD did the codex achieve parity with the roll. However, if we examine the extant Christian works, a very different picture emerges. Of the surviving 172 Biblical texts that can be dated before 400 AD, 158 are in the form of the codex and only fourteen are in the form of the roll. All eleven of the second-century books are papyrus codices. As far as we know the early Bible was always written in the codex form. Of the non-Biblical Christian works, eighty-three are codices and thirty-five are rolls. Clearly the adoption of the codex was associated with the rise of Christianity.

http://web.ku.edu/~bookhist/medbook1.html

[Eleatic Guest]

I am looking into the case for the newspaper being a Roman invention. Has anybody ever asked himself why a certain Julius Caesar is not credited to be the inventor of the newspaper? Yes, you read right.

According to Wikipedia and also Microsoft Encarta, he introduced in 59 BC the so-called Acta Diurna. Their publishment fulfills in my understanding all four common criterias for being a newpaper:

Periodicity: According to French Wiki the Acta Diurna were continued to be published until Augustus' time, according to German Wiki until 235 AD and at English Wiki even until "the seat of the emperor was moved to Constantinople". So, in all cases by far long enough to fulfill the criteria.

Actuality: All four sources (Wiki=Encarta) agree unanimously on the news character of the Acta.

Universality: The Acta also comprised all kinds of news. Legal announcements, Senatorial acts, military notices, outcome of trials, marriages, deaths, announcements of public games, in short a wide array of information of public interest.

Publicity: All sources agree that the Acta Diurna were presented "in message boards in public places like the Forum of Rome."

Voila, that makes fulfillment of four out of four criterias and I do not think that it needed some bending and twisting to make the evidence fit.

One problem, though, arises: Caesar may not have been the first to publish the Acta Diurna, but only expanded on an already long standing institution.

Is anybody having by chance some literary references, primary or secondary, on the subject? What do you think, can old Jule be claimed to be the inventor of the newspaper?

I am serious about it. If you look in which dubious ways in the history of technology other individuals or cultures have been generally credited with certain inventions, then I think we should give Julius Caesar's textbook fulfillement of established criterias a serious consideration. In other words, why not give Caesar what is due to Caesar?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acta_diurna
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acta_diurna
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acta_Diurna

[Eleatic Guest]

All right, folks. If by tomorrow the same time I am not getting some useful posts with golden rim attached, I am going to deploy my personal 300 pound steam powered catapult (type 'Archimedes') against the central server of RAT and even if this means also destroying access to the Playboy hunny bunny page! I mean what are you doing all the time in the office? Working or what?

"RATe, RATe responsa redde!"

[size=59:l1tuf8ik]Edit: Small declination error. :oops: [/size]

[Robert Vermaat]

I mean what are you doing all the time in the office? Working or what?

Today's a sunday, you know...

[Goffredo]

The issue of whether Romans were not open to technological progress is interesting. Similar closure to technological progress was not a prerogative of the Romans. The Chinese were closed, and the Islamics too. For different and maybe similar reasons. The discussion is potentially interesting.

The roman world had many elements in it. The greek alexandrine "scientific" tradition was still in place and I do not think it was systematically suppressed or ignored by the Romans. Probably it was just sterile and exhausted what not much could be done with the technology and "science" of those days without major conceptual and technological breakthroughs. Those simply could not occur. The Heron "engine" is an example that kind of shows my point. The Heron "engine" IS completely useless! It is very VERY inefficient and has no power. If you read about the story of the invention of the steam engine (or any other other invention) you will learn that it is not at all obvious how to make an engine (or an invention). You just don't wake up one morning and say to yourself: "today I am going to invent something that does this and that".

You must not let yourself be fooled by how much we know now. It took many centuries of erratic observations and odd inventions to allow the piecing together of a working steam engine. A lot of technology and science had to be learned and many dead-end paths were taken. There was NOT a tradition of hopeful engine builders trying to invent the damn thing. Instead the invention was a non-obvious creative convergence of many pieces taken opportunistically from a variety of odd sources. It could occur only when certain basic things could be mastered, and even then it still was not obvious. You still needed someone with a problem to solve, the right know-how, the resources, and a very creative mind.

So I wouldn't blame the Romans for not developing Heron's toy. The Islamics did nothing with it too. But I am not blaming them either. In fact nobody did anything with heron's toy! The working steam engine of the English industrial revolution is very VERY much more than a toy and very VERY little, if nothing, comes from Heron.

From my point of view the moral is: Sociology explains much, such as why a society does or does not allow or encourage certain types of "research". The Chinese around 1450, with the most powerful fleets of all times, decided to cut off further sea exploration simply because they were not interested! They were self sufficient and the external world was not interesting. But not everything is social. Nature has objective laws that are not social constructs. (There are extremist sociologists that would challenge this, but I think they are idiots!). An invention does not occur not only because there is a state or a culture that does not encourage "research", but also because the necessary aspects of nature have not been mastered or are completely unfounded (i.e. "nature does not work the way it should to make this damn invention work"). Humans castrate themselves with all kinds of weird conventions (its "human nature"), but the physical world, nature, has real rules that we can't avoid.

[Theodosius the Great]

Stephen,

Great example : the book. I heard of that too, books being as old as the first Bible (early IV century). I guess I'm just so fixated on warfare technology. :wink:

Goffredo,

The Romans managed to harness the powers of both water and fire. But harnessing steam was beyond their grasp ?



Was it physically impossible to build on Heron's invention ? Or are you saying that cirsumstances prevented them from doing so ? As I said earlier, the Romans used boilers to harness Greek Fire in the VI century.

The issue of whether romans were not open to technological progress is interesting. Similar closure to technological progress was not a prerogative of the romans. The chinese were closed, and the islamics too. For different and maybe similar reasons. So I wouldn't blame the romans for not developing Heron's toy. The islamics did nothing with it too. But I am not blaming them either.

I think you can place blame depending of whether the people in question were either actively or passively closed-minded toward innovation. The Romans were passively so, I believe, unlike the islamics or Chinese (depending on the time period).


Theo

[Endre Fodstad]

Next round. When were cross-bladed scissors, those with a joint, invented and how widespread were they vis-a-vis the type in the pic below?

These scissors did not gain widespread use in Europe until the 1600's.

That makes no sense at all. I work daily with samples of such scissors from norwegian viking urban 9th century contexts, and I've seen the type from digs as far back as pre-roman iron age gaul (La Téne culture). They are also depicted in tons and tons of later medieval illuminations. I don't really see how they can be considered not to have gained widespread use before the 17th century...

[Goffredo]

Re-reading what I wrote regards Herons' toy I do believe I was clear enough.
Ciao

[Carlton Bach]

Next round. When were cross-bladed scissors, those with a joint, invented and how widespread were they vis-a-vis the type in the pic below?

These scissors did not gain widespread use in Europe until the 1600's.

That makes no sense at all. I work daily with samples of such scissors from norwegian viking urban 9th century contexts, and I've seen the type from digs as far back as pre-roman iron age gaul (La Téne culture). They are also depicted in tons and tons of later medieval illuminations. I don't really see how they can be considered not to have gained widespread use before the 17th century...

The thing in the picture is a very elaborate pair of shears. These are an extremely traditional design that goes back at least to pre-Roman times. If I understand correctly, the question asked refers to scissors proper, twin blades hinged at mid-point and operated by handles past the hinge point. These may also be an older design, but the earliest certain find I know of comes from Fatimid Egypt, 11th century. I can't comment on Isidore other than that I heard the quote interpreted both ways, but I wouldn't be surprised. There is plenty of stuff that we think of as medieval Western, Byzantine or Islamic that is actuallly Roman, but was not recognised as such until recently.

BTW, shears are in no way inferior to scoissors in performance. THe problem lies in the production process. Scissors are easier and cheaper to make, and lower maintenance.

[Carlton Bach]

The Romans managed to harness the powers of both water and fire. But harnessing steam was beyond their grasp ?

Was it physically impossible to build on Heron's invention ? Or are you saying that cirsumstances prevented them from doing so ? As I said earlier, the Romans used boilers to harness Greek Fire in the VI century.

Steam power is actually not an easy thing to develop. It requires all kinds of materials and techniques, an understanding of complex physical processes (not necessarily in theory, but in practise) and oodles of experience. Look at it this way: from the first experimental models (already far advanced on Heron's toy which - this can not be said often enough - was not really as much steam engine as a jet engine) to the first desiogn that was capable of fulfilling more than one clearly circumscribed function took 200 years. For 100 of those, engiones were prodfuced in large numbers and used for pumping water, the only thing these were good for. This was in the social context of the early industrial revolution , with a clear idea of the goal and huge profits awaiting the developer. Expecting the Romans to duplicate that without clear need, without the social structures to ensure profitability, and with much less developed physical sciences and metalluirgy, is a bit demanding, I should say.

[Theodosius the Great]

So, the answer to my last two questions is "yes." Everything was against them - too many technological limitations and lack of social/economic inducements. I stand corrected. Thank you for your detailed answer, Volker


Theodosius

[Goffredo]

Hello Bach.
If possible I would be curious to know from you how you think it is possible to accomplish any "...understanding of complex physical processes, not necessarily in theory, but in practice."
The invention of the steam engine was less obvious than what you succeeded in making Theodosius think! It wasn't only due to technological limitations, and lack of social/economic inducements (quoting Theo's summarizing thoughts).

By the way I feel this thread should be in OFF TOPIC.

[Carlton Bach]

Hello Bach.
If possible I would be curious to know from you how you think it is possible to accomplish any "...understanding of complex physical processes, not necessarily in theory, but in practice."

I mean understanding such things as, for example, that seawater will corrode iron much faster than freshwater, that hot water corrosion can be a real threat to the stabiolity of a boiler without being visible on the surface, that different expansion/contraction rates of metals make certain combinations unsafe, that brass and iron do not combine well, that you get much better efficiency by increasing the surface of contact between the fire and the boiler, that water is practically incompressible while steam is easily compressible, and not least, that at a certain temperature, water will flash into steam no matter how confined. To successfully build and operate steam engines, you need to know all these things, but you can know them without understanding Brownian motion, elctrolysis, or molecular science. However, that kind of knowledge tends to accumulate slowly and is often dear-bought (the thing about flashpoint temperature took a long time and thousands of egineers' lives).

[Goffredo]

Hi Bach.
Thanks for your answer.

I am very much aware that "to successfully build and operate steam engines, you need to know all these things, but you can know them without understanding Brownian motion, electrolysis, or molecular science". "Molecular science" started to be understood at the end of the 19 century and "molecules" where finally accepted to be real only after Einstein's explanation of brownian motion in 1905. Indeed it still true that almost all engineers can get on with their jobs knowing only classical thermodynamics, without knowing any statistical physics, and simply saying that they read somewhere that atoms exist. I teach physics to engineers and the issue of what is sufficient for them comes up every year in faculty meetings.

Bitterness aside your reference to sophisticated concepts such as expansion/contraction rates, compressibility and temperature is adding to the confusion. They were not at all obvious to invent and are difficult to use. I think you are underestimating the distorting effect of looking back at history of technology and science with what we know now.

But appart from these points I feel you are making it seem "easier" than what is was, making it seem that the invention of the steam engine was due to an accumulation of experience and facts. I claim that the worst way one can hope to dream up a science, concieve a new concept or just build a useful invention is to accumulate facts. It just doesn't work that way. And even to have a clear goal and resources does not garentee success. The goal might simply be impossible (see perpetual motion machines) and you might drown in an ocean of facts.