3 ms·

the article talks about evidence which has always been present in evaluations of Roman concrete which was "disregarded as merely evidence of sloppy mixing pract

the article talks about evidence which has always been present in evaluations of Roman concrete which was "disregarded as merely evidence of sloppy mixing practices, or poor-quality raw materials," and this kind of thing REALLY infuriates me, as a layman. if you don't know how to make Roman concrete, don't assume anything about what you see in Roman concrete while you're trying to figure out how it was made. The modern-day belief that we are superior to humans thousands of years ago is just an absolutely insane idea, to me. we are more technologically advanced because we have more shoulders of giants to stand on, and we are NOT smarter or more clever than humans of 5000-10000 years ago. we just aren't. as soon as you believe that we are superior to our ancestors, you dismiss the evidence you are looking for as "sloppy mixing practices, or poor-quality raw materials" and you prove modern-day humans as inferior, or at least you prove your own efforts as careless and incomplete. leave no stone unturned when you are trying to understand something you do not understand; your lack of understanding could be due to your false assumptions.

sogen 4y ago
An extremely good example of Chesterton’s fence?
sarchertech 4y ago
That depends on the what you mean by smarter. At least some component of what we consider intelligence is cultural. Just one example is that the ability to write/draw allows you to solve problems that are impossible without it.
- HPsquared 4y ago
  Being literate definitely means some faculties get less practice. Practically nobody today can recite epic poetry like the Odyssey, for example. That lack of rote memorization skill may have unexpected side-effects. https://daily.jstor.org/how-do-we-know-that-epic-poems-were-recited-from-memory/ https://daily.jstor.org/how-do-we-know-that-epic-poems-were-...
  - samstave 4y ago
    Thats a really good, succinct, statement that triggers thought - where ironically - being literate is required to reply to via the most advanced machine I have ever used... But there are so many skills lost due to the privilege of technologically enabled sedentary life-styles... can you imagine attemting to found a town/village/city in flat/cold/resource-constrained climates without electricity/supply-lines? Those people before us had balls and conviction of steel - and even more-so for the women. You would not exist without a woman (mother) and women are stronger than men.
    - Slava_Propanei 4y ago
      [dead]
  - sarchertech 4y ago
    That’s possible, but unlikely considering that numerous studies of literate vs illiterate people have shown that literacy correlates with improved working memory not the inverse. Studies of using mnemonic techniques to memorize long sequences (similar to what oral performers were doing) have also not shown much promise in increasing cognitive abilities.
trynewideas 4y ago
From the study: > In addition to the features described above, aggregate-scale relict lime clasts, also referred to as remnant lime or lime lumps, are a ubiquitous and conspicuous feature of both architectural and maritime Roman concretes. The presence of these distinctive bright white features has been previously attributed to several scenarios including incomplete or over-burning during the calcining of lime (20), carbonation before concrete preparation (30), incomplete dissolution during setting (12), or insufficient mixing of the mortar (14). 20: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0008884605003145 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00088... 30: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1475-4754.1997.tb00786.x https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1475-4754.... 12: https://www.amazon.com/Building-Eternity-Technology-Concrete-Engineering/dp/1789256364 https://www.amazon.com/Building-Eternity-Technology-Concrete... 14: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-roman-archaeology/article/abs/reproducing-a-roman-maritime-structure-with-vitruvian-pozzolanic-concrete/E45CF9F36785D1995D1EEF5D9895E93C https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-roman-arc...
spacemark 4y ago
I agree with the spirit of what you're saying but you go too far, ironically asserting without any supporting logic that the intelligence of homo sapiens has remained static for the last 2,000 years. But I suppose the disagreement hinges on what is meant by intelligence. Here's a thought experiment: if you removed all technology (tools, writing, vast stores of knowledge) from a human child and raised them in this vacuum, would they be more or less intelligent? Would they understand their place in the solar system and the structure of the cosmos? Would they know how to protect themselves from sickness (germ theory)? Would their vocabulary and ability to express themselves be less or more? Of course these questions don't have definitive answers and you can play the game the other way, arguing that modern humans would die in a couple weeks if transported back to caveman times. But it's a poor model to view intelligence as some static property independent of technology, environment, gene mutation, sexual selection and all the other strings in the web of existence.
- naikrovek 4y ago
  "intelligence," as I used it, is the ability to learn, to use what you've learned to solve problems, and to accurately predict the future outcomes of today's decisions. my knowledge of the horsehead nebula has no positive or negative effect on my ability to learn how to make concrete or to use that knowledge to actually make thae concrete. intelligence is not simple memorization of fact, it is a collection of understanding, and the ability to both grow that understanding and to use it to accomplish things that you don't yet know how to do. we are continuously surprised by what we learn about ancient cultures, because we assume they were intellectually inferior to us. the Lycurgus Cup is a great example of something that some people still view as a lucky accident. Anyone who has actually learned to make physical things and worked to refine their skill in making things will know in their soul that the colors in that cup are clearly intentional and the product of intelligence and time. our belief that only contemporary humans have control over and understanding of the their world is just simply wrong, I think. we discover new evidence from ancient civilizations which surprise us all the time. is there enough evidence to prove that we aren't smarter than people 100-200 generations ago? I don't know. there certainly is a lot of evidence that ancient civilizations knew more than we believe they knew, and that is significant when you think about how long that evidence needs to last to be discovered today, and that those things which do last long enough are recognized for what they are before they are discarded because of a bad assumption. how much evidence has been lost? we only see a tiny fraction of the evidence that would have existed at the time. these discoveries happen frequently enough for me to have no problem believing that there is a great deal about ancient civilizations that we think we know which we actually do not know. that's a rambly comment but it's all I have time for before the edit window closes.
c7b 4y ago
> if you don't know how to make Roman concrete, don't assume anything That's not useful guidance for doing research at all. It's similar to some 19th-century physicists/philosophers saying 'if you can't see atoms, you can't possibly know anything about them or whether they even exist'. We also can't make supernovae or supermassive black holes, yet we can still try to learn about them through a combination of available data and educated 'assumptions' (ie theories). What this research has done is replace one theory with another, and that theory might be replaced by another one later, that's just how science works.
- naikrovek 4y ago
  eh, I disagree. hypothesizing that atoms exist allows and encourages you to design experiments which can prove or disprove their existence. assuming that they exist, and never experimentally verifying that is not research and it is not science. assuming that some feature of a product that you do not understand exists for any reason is at most an hypothesis, and dismissing the hypothesis without experimental evidence disproving it is simply bad science. Roman concrete is not something far away that we can not interact with. we can verify by experiment. for years we chose not to validate the assumption that the white specs were accidental, and that delayed our understanding of Roman concrete. I just want scientists and historians that take the time to recognize their assumptions and to prove them correct or incorrect, if possible, instead of just relying on them as immutable facts; assumptions are often wrong. I write software for a living, and the number of times that my assumptions about the cause of any particular problem have been correct approximately 0% of the time. whether it's a logic bug or a performance problem or a usability problem. despite decades of experience in this field, I am still almost always wrong about the cause of any particular problem I encounter, unless I have seen that exact same issue previously, which is rare. historians, some of them at least, would probably benefit quite a bit from making fewer assumptions and by experimentally proving the assumptions they do make. if it isn't possible to prove or disprove your assumption, then you must never forget that it is an assumption and not proven fact. I've seen so many scientists and historians say they know things which they simply do not know. things like "we know dark matter exists." no, we don't. we know that the currently accepted theories of our observations require dark matter to exist in order for our observations to make sense. that is not proof of dark matter. dark matter may exist! I don't know, but for a scientist to say that it exists is incorrect because we've never observed it directly, and have devised no tests which can prove that it does exist. our theories which require it in order for our observations to make sense could be wrong. our observations may not be as accurate as we assume. we may be observing things that we aren't aware of which look like something that we are aware of. etc. I'm saying that professing that you know something without proof is folly. just like the white specs in the concrete were assumed to be accidental impurity without that hypothesis being proven is folly. these things set us back as a scientific community that wants to understand its environment.
insane_dreamer 4y ago
> modern-day belief that we are superior to humans thousands of years ago is just an absolutely insane idea, to me totally agree that kneejerk response when we see something that doesn't match our current methods is "those people didn't know what they were doing" is both potentially incorrect and certainly unhelpful to the advancement of science

sogen 4y ago

An extremely good example of Chesterton’s fence?

sarchertech 4y ago

That depends on the what you mean by smarter. At least some component of what we consider intelligence is cultural. Just one example is that the ability to write/draw allows you to solve problems that are impossible without it.

HPsquared 4y ago
Being literate definitely means some faculties get less practice. Practically nobody today can recite epic poetry like the Odyssey, for example. That lack of rote memorization skill may have unexpected side-effects. https://daily.jstor.org/how-do-we-know-that-epic-poems-were-recited-from-memory/ https://daily.jstor.org/how-do-we-know-that-epic-poems-were-...
- samstave 4y ago
  Thats a really good, succinct, statement that triggers thought - where ironically - being literate is required to reply to via the most advanced machine I have ever used... But there are so many skills lost due to the privilege of technologically enabled sedentary life-styles... can you imagine attemting to found a town/village/city in flat/cold/resource-constrained climates without electricity/supply-lines? Those people before us had balls and conviction of steel - and even more-so for the women. You would not exist without a woman (mother) and women are stronger than men.
  - Slava_Propanei 4y ago
    [dead]
- sarchertech 4y ago
  That’s possible, but unlikely considering that numerous studies of literate vs illiterate people have shown that literacy correlates with improved working memory not the inverse. Studies of using mnemonic techniques to memorize long sequences (similar to what oral performers were doing) have also not shown much promise in increasing cognitive abilities.

trynewideas 4y ago

From the study: > In addition to the features described above, aggregate-scale relict lime clasts, also referred to as remnant lime or lime lumps, are a ubiquitous and conspicuous feature of both architectural and maritime Roman concretes. The presence of these distinctive bright white features has been previously attributed to several scenarios including incomplete or over-burning during the calcining of lime (20), carbonation before concrete preparation (30), incomplete dissolution during setting (12), or insufficient mixing of the mortar (14). 20: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0008884605003145 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00088... 30: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1475-4754.1997.tb00786.x https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1475-4754.... 12: https://www.amazon.com/Building-Eternity-Technology-Concrete-Engineering/dp/1789256364 https://www.amazon.com/Building-Eternity-Technology-Concrete... 14: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-roman-archaeology/article/abs/reproducing-a-roman-maritime-structure-with-vitruvian-pozzolanic-concrete/E45CF9F36785D1995D1EEF5D9895E93C https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-roman-arc...

spacemark 4y ago

I agree with the spirit of what you're saying but you go too far, ironically asserting without any supporting logic that the intelligence of homo sapiens has remained static for the last 2,000 years. But I suppose the disagreement hinges on what is meant by intelligence. Here's a thought experiment: if you removed all technology (tools, writing, vast stores of knowledge) from a human child and raised them in this vacuum, would they be more or less intelligent? Would they understand their place in the solar system and the structure of the cosmos? Would they know how to protect themselves from sickness (germ theory)? Would their vocabulary and ability to express themselves be less or more? Of course these questions don't have definitive answers and you can play the game the other way, arguing that modern humans would die in a couple weeks if transported back to caveman times. But it's a poor model to view intelligence as some static property independent of technology, environment, gene mutation, sexual selection and all the other strings in the web of existence.

naikrovek 4y ago
"intelligence," as I used it, is the ability to learn, to use what you've learned to solve problems, and to accurately predict the future outcomes of today's decisions. my knowledge of the horsehead nebula has no positive or negative effect on my ability to learn how to make concrete or to use that knowledge to actually make thae concrete. intelligence is not simple memorization of fact, it is a collection of understanding, and the ability to both grow that understanding and to use it to accomplish things that you don't yet know how to do. we are continuously surprised by what we learn about ancient cultures, because we assume they were intellectually inferior to us. the Lycurgus Cup is a great example of something that some people still view as a lucky accident. Anyone who has actually learned to make physical things and worked to refine their skill in making things will know in their soul that the colors in that cup are clearly intentional and the product of intelligence and time. our belief that only contemporary humans have control over and understanding of the their world is just simply wrong, I think. we discover new evidence from ancient civilizations which surprise us all the time. is there enough evidence to prove that we aren't smarter than people 100-200 generations ago? I don't know. there certainly is a lot of evidence that ancient civilizations knew more than we believe they knew, and that is significant when you think about how long that evidence needs to last to be discovered today, and that those things which do last long enough are recognized for what they are before they are discarded because of a bad assumption. how much evidence has been lost? we only see a tiny fraction of the evidence that would have existed at the time. these discoveries happen frequently enough for me to have no problem believing that there is a great deal about ancient civilizations that we think we know which we actually do not know. that's a rambly comment but it's all I have time for before the edit window closes.

c7b 4y ago

> if you don't know how to make Roman concrete, don't assume anything That's not useful guidance for doing research at all. It's similar to some 19th-century physicists/philosophers saying 'if you can't see atoms, you can't possibly know anything about them or whether they even exist'. We also can't make supernovae or supermassive black holes, yet we can still try to learn about them through a combination of available data and educated 'assumptions' (ie theories). What this research has done is replace one theory with another, and that theory might be replaced by another one later, that's just how science works.

naikrovek 4y ago
eh, I disagree. hypothesizing that atoms exist allows and encourages you to design experiments which can prove or disprove their existence. assuming that they exist, and never experimentally verifying that is not research and it is not science. assuming that some feature of a product that you do not understand exists for any reason is at most an hypothesis, and dismissing the hypothesis without experimental evidence disproving it is simply bad science. Roman concrete is not something far away that we can not interact with. we can verify by experiment. for years we chose not to validate the assumption that the white specs were accidental, and that delayed our understanding of Roman concrete. I just want scientists and historians that take the time to recognize their assumptions and to prove them correct or incorrect, if possible, instead of just relying on them as immutable facts; assumptions are often wrong. I write software for a living, and the number of times that my assumptions about the cause of any particular problem have been correct approximately 0% of the time. whether it's a logic bug or a performance problem or a usability problem. despite decades of experience in this field, I am still almost always wrong about the cause of any particular problem I encounter, unless I have seen that exact same issue previously, which is rare. historians, some of them at least, would probably benefit quite a bit from making fewer assumptions and by experimentally proving the assumptions they do make. if it isn't possible to prove or disprove your assumption, then you must never forget that it is an assumption and not proven fact. I've seen so many scientists and historians say they know things which they simply do not know. things like "we know dark matter exists." no, we don't. we know that the currently accepted theories of our observations require dark matter to exist in order for our observations to make sense. that is not proof of dark matter. dark matter may exist! I don't know, but for a scientist to say that it exists is incorrect because we've never observed it directly, and have devised no tests which can prove that it does exist. our theories which require it in order for our observations to make sense could be wrong. our observations may not be as accurate as we assume. we may be observing things that we aren't aware of which look like something that we are aware of. etc. I'm saying that professing that you know something without proof is folly. just like the white specs in the concrete were assumed to be accidental impurity without that hypothesis being proven is folly. these things set us back as a scientific community that wants to understand its environment.

insane_dreamer 4y ago

> modern-day belief that we are superior to humans thousands of years ago is just an absolutely insane idea, to me totally agree that kneejerk response when we see something that doesn't match our current methods is "those people didn't know what they were doing" is both potentially incorrect and certainly unhelpful to the advancement of science