The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier

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• 
  dchant
  July 16th, 2022
  

  

  Thank you kindly

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier
• 
  caesar963
  July 16th, 2022
  

  Interesting. That should really be “natural philosophy” rather than science. The Romans were great engineers & soldiers, very pragmatic; they revered the Greeks in their incomparable intuitions & achievements (presence of Greek slaves as tutors in patrician households), but did not really follow them. This knowledge quickly became calcified - the Golden age itself endured only briefly.

  Substantial practical obstacles: as a “Latin exercise” - try multiplying or dividing with Roman numerals (infinite sets would be infinitely difficult). Such developments required a certain context & climate (adoption of Indian numerals, for inst), which occurred later. Such as the Church’s creation of the university, Roger Bacon’s (a Franciscan friar) development of the scientific method, the contributions of one’s peers (facilitated by the printing press), a dedicated intellectual class, etc. From the 2nd century AD, the population of the Roman Empire was in serious decline (Antonine Plague onwards).

  Such conjecture is intriguing, but it’s always akin to the imponderable dynamic of seeking to separate the dancer from the dance. There’s also the hazard of ideology being a driver & motivator, but that’s almost too obvious to mention.

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier
• 
  zbigniewryszard
  July 18th, 2022
  

  Ancient civilisation fell from invading barbarians. Medieval christianity preserved some elements of it.

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier
• 
  Eddiej1880
  October 12th, 2022
  

  

  Christianity only kept elements of civilization alive because it was easier to influence and control people in larger groups as opposed to smaller ones. It’s much easier to spread your message to a large group and then let them go off and share that information with their friends and families. Christianity wasn’t interested in the advancement of mankind, only tightening its grip on control of it. Perfect example is how the church reacted to many scientific discoveries that first contradicted, then refuted many of the churches claims.

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier
• 
  caesar963
  March 20th, 2023
  

  Nah, too ideologically reductive. There was no overwhelmingly powerful, overarching structure. Christianity spread a civilised message (actual civilisation this time, we would certainly not regard the Roman Emp as “civilised” - horrendously cruel & brutal, in truth) but in discrete, decentralised manner. A simple reality of the time - communication was astoundingly difficult, slow & hazardous. Population was also significantly reduced. Although, the early centuries of Christianity were primarily urban in character.

  As to the scary “control” model, and being opposed to advancement: the Church created, inter alia, the university; spread literacy, learning & knowledge; preserved ancient texts in scriptoria; created the concept & doctrine of human rights; developed the hospital; cared for the poor & sick - when no one else would (incl many outcast maladies, such as leprosy); created the most effective & unprecedented charity networks, famine relief; developed a concept of equality wholly unknown to the Roman world; drove four renaissances; spearheaded developments in art, architecture, science, mathematics, economics, music, philosophy; introduced agricultural reforms which generated higher yields, in order to feed more people, & support a (finally) growing population; created the first mass peace movements in history (Peace of God, Truce of God); gave rise to international law & the first international human rights treaty/covenant/instrument, etc. etc.
  This - finally - was something like civilisation.

  “wasn’t interested in the advancement of mankind!” - Yeah, that’s right.

  The “Church reacted to many scientific discoveries” - reacted to them, often by actually discovering them. Roger Bacon (a Franciscan friar) developed the scientific method (thx, Rodge!). St. Augustine proposed that life developed along evolutionary lines. Nicolaus Copernicus was a priest. Gregor Mendel (an Augustinian friar & abbot) founded the modern science of genetics. He furthermore established many of the rules of heredity, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance.

  Jean Picard, priest & first person to measure the size of the Earth to a reasonable degree of accuracy; also developed what became the standard method for measuring the right ascension of a celestial object; the PICARD mission, an orbiting solar observatory, is named in his honour. Not actually named after the Star Trek lad.
  Nicolas Steno, bishop, called the father of geology and stratigraphy, & is known for Steno’s principles.

  The Jesuits achievements in the sciences - in all branches of learning - is utterly remarkable, & that was merely one order within the entire Church (seismology also described as “the Jesuit science.”). Roger Joseph Boscovich, a Jesuit physicist, astronomer, mathematician, philosopher, diplomat, poet, theologian, & polymath, produced a precursor of atomic theory & made many contributions to astronomy, incl the first geometric procedure for determining the equator of a rotating planet from 3 observations of a surface feature & for computing the orbit of a planet from 3 observations of its position. In 1753 he also discovered the absence of atmosphere on the Moon.

  Fr. Georges Lemaître (also educated by Jesuits) was a theoretical physicist, mathematician, astronomer, & professor of physics at the Catholic University of Louvain. He was the first to theorise that the recession of nearby galaxies can be explained by an expanding universe, which was observationally confirmed soon afterwards by Edwin Hubble. He first derived “Hubble’s law”, now called the Hubble–Lemaître law by the IAU, & published the first estimation of the Hubble constant in 1927, 2 years before Hubble’s article. Lemaître also proposed the “Big Bang theory” of the origin of the universe, calling it the “hypothesis of the primeval atom.”

  In addition (& just because I like the guy), William of Ockham, another Franciscan friar, philosopher, theologian; considered to be one of the major figures of medieval thought & was at the centre of the major intellectual & political controversies of the 14th c. He is commonly known for Occam’s razor, the methodological principle that bears his name, and also produced significant works on logic, physics and theology.

  There are countless such vital contributions.

  Also - the Church created the university, of course. Where do we imagine that scientific speculation & developments took place?

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier
• 
  reimersholme71
  April 16th, 2023
  

  Does anyone have the companion volume “Science education in the early roman empire!?

  The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire - Richard Carrier

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