Things we've known for a long time

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Recently, a British university performed acupuncture intended to relieve pain on people while they were having their brains scanned, and found that it worked. They haven't yet concretely identified the mechanism, but they showed that it works. One of those frozen-in-a-glacier people from Europe had tattoos all over his body, lines linked by small circles, each circle in a position used in acupuncture. And he died around 25,000 years ago. Another university found that honey, used for millennia in poultices, keeps wounds safe from infections if spread on the damaged tissues. We now know that drinking green tea regularly can reduce the chances of gastro-intestinal tract cancers by up to 75%.

It's a mistake to think people were stupid prior to our scientific age. They merely had different technologies. Trial and error, developing methods over centuries, was always there; people have spent countless millennia doing various things that we in technologically developed nations no longer do, and obviously it worked, since they survived and progressed. No doubt many of their beliefs were wrong, or at least unsubstantiated by our standards. But how many right things, which worked for millennia, have now been lost?

I saw in the news just a few days ago that some people made water go uphill. Even better, they made it climb steps. Drops of water on a boiling piece of metal with steps on it. the steam carried the drops up the steps. Think about it. This experiment could have been done thousands of years ago. The technology to do it has been with us for a very long time. We know the first steam engines were made more than two thousand years ago by the greeks. Since experiments such as this were possible millennia back, is it possible that this has been discovered before? Perhaps knowledge lost in Alexandria's library or such? Seriously, consider the implications. This is an experiment which anyone could have performed at any time over thousands of years of our history. Technology which was available to our distant ancestors. Yet we seem to have discovered it only recently. How much else is out there that might be seen as rather simple, easy to discover after the fact, yet somehow has evaded our notice completely thus far? I mean, maybe people really did have some simple mechanism (other than slaves) for raising pyramid blocks, for example. Something so basic that when/if we eventually discover it, we'll all slap our foreheads at how stupid we've been. This new experiment and other things such as the Mpemba effect demonstrate that much of the most basic physical reality around us is still unknown to us, yet could easily have been known to our ancestors.

It is a mistake to view this in a black & white way, thinking that there is a modern age and a non-modern time before that. In reality, there is no such clear dividing line. There has been a GRADUAL increase in learning, knowledge, intelligence, technology, etc. We have made advances by building on top of our ancestors advances, bit by bit. Therefore it is unsurprising to discover that our ancestors knew some useful stuff. Obviously it is impossible to just suddenly jump from being primitive to being modern humans in 1 step.



No, we have not just suddenly discovered technology recently. Human technology has been building up and increasing for a long time. It only seems like it happened recently because you have no memory of earlier times, seeing as you were not alive then.

Actually there is a huge difference. Prior to the industrial revolution, people generally used technologies which were refined over many generations. Then with the advent of mass production by machines, economic forces demanded manufacturers produce faster and cheaper. Old methods were simply abandoned, and cheap, fast methods introduced. Paper is a good example. Paper from prior to machined mass production is simply better; lasts longer, oxidises slower, et cetera. Thta's the difference.


Actually we are discovering things very suddenly. The transistor has no relation to any object used prior to the last century. Heck, even the common radio transceiver was a new discovery. Simply because it utilises theories developed by people beforehand, and uses wires which we've had for millennia, doesn't mean we've had radio for millennia. You might as well say that a new book isn't a new book because we've had English for a long time.

Paper is a good example of what I was saying. It is another thing that was not just suddenly developed. It has been progressively improving for a long time. IIRC, the ancient egyptians wrote on a primitive type of paper made from papyrus reeds.



Nonsense. Transistors are another example of what I was saying. Transistors are an improvement over vacuum tubes. Here is a quote from Britannica:

"Vacuum tubes also take time (from a few seconds to several minutes) to heat up to operating temperature. This is at least an inconvenience and in some cases a serious limitation to their use. These shortcomings motivated scientists at Bell Laboratories to seek an alternative to the vacuum tube and led to the development of the transistor."
(Britannica)

So transistors are built upon other older technologies, such as vacuum tubes and electricity. Electricity has been progressively developing for a long time.

"According to Thales of Miletus, writing at around 600 BC, a form of electricity was known to the Ancient Greeks who found that rubbing fur on various substances, such as amber, would cause a particular attraction between the two. The Greeks noted that the amber buttons could attract light objects such as hair and that if they rubbed the amber for long enough they could even get a spark to jump."
(wikipedia)

Also your comment "The transistor has no relation to any object used prior to the last century" again demonstrates your black & white thinking, as if there is a modern time and non-modern time. It is ridiculous to think like that -- time is PROGRESSIVE, there is not just a sudden sharp dividing line between modern and primitive times. Transistors are related to an object used prior to them (vacuum tubes), and vacuum tubes are related to an object used prior to them, and that object is related to an object used prior to them, and so forth, stretching far back in time to the Ancient Greeks in 600 BC with their Amber.

We have a long continuous glorious history of progressively advancing technology, knowledge, science, etc, which extends and builds upon previous achievements. And would not have been possible without those previous smaller achievements.

Regarding your comments on the significance of the industrial revolution, here is a quote from Britannica:

"It has long been a commonsensical notion that the rise of modern science and the Industrial Revolution were closely connected. It is difficult to show any direct effect of scientific discoveries upon the rise of the textile or even the metallurgical industry in Great Britain, the home of the Industrial Revolution, but there certainly was a similarity in attitude to be found in science and nascent industry. Close observation and careful generalization leading to practical utilization were characteristic of both industrialists and experimentalists alike in the 18th century. One point of direct contact is known, namely James Watt's interest in the efficiency of the Newcomen steam engine, an interest that grew from his work as a scientific-instrument maker and that led to his development of the separate condenser that made the steam engine an effective industrial power source. But in general the Industrial Revolution proceeded without much direct scientific help. Yet the potential influence of science was to prove of fundamental importance."
(Britannica)

You missed the point. Paper developed over time, improved over time. Then we hit the modern age and mass producers literally abandoned all that knowledge, in favour of producing whatever they could pump out cheapest. Paper production is an example of the difference between the past and the modern age.


Yes, they are better than vacuum tubes. But being better than them doesn't make them an improved version of vcauum tubes. They are completely different things. What you're suggesting is that a motorcycle is an improved version of the foot.


No, transistors were not built upon vacuum tubes, and no, your article does not say they were.


I'm not sure what that is supposed to prove. But even back before the Greeks, the Egyptians are thought to have figured out some basics of electricity.


Thus the mention of paper. Until machined mass production: improvement over centuries of trial and error. After that: cheapest method possible.


Unless some huge change in thinking leads people into abandoning what came before, and doing something completely different. As with paper.


Transistors are not improved vacuum tubes. Please get over that idea. They are an entirely different device. To say one is an improved version of the other is precisely equivalent to saying a MacDonald's menu is an improved version of Chaucer because they're both in English. It is simply untrue.


Which changes what I said how?

I'm not sure what you're trying to prove with that quote. Obviously the industrial revolution improved our knowledge of mechanics and related fields.

I did not literally mean built upon. I meant it figuratively. Transistors would not have been developed without the prior development of vacuum tubes. Vacuum tubes paved the way for transistors. The quote I provided makes this clear. It is ridiculous to suggest that transistors came out of nowhere -- the quote clearly tells us that transistors were developed in response to the problems of vacuum tubes. Therefore transistors are "built" (figuratively speaking) upon vacuum tubes.

And my point is that technological development is PROGRESSIVE. This should be frickin' blatantly obvious. The way you are talking would lead one to believe that computers were invented in a single step. Ridiculous. They are the result of progressive improvements, beginning thousands of years ago when the very first rudimentary observations about electricity were starting to be made. To suggest that they just suddenly appeared in recent times is to disrespect the thousands of people who made little advancements over the thousands of years, little advancements which have eventually culminated in the computers of today.

Cannot be bothered replying to the rest, sorry. I am satisfied with the clarity of my existing comments.