3 ms·

People are encouraged to post facts, not lazy, random speculation. Please read the posting guidelines.

verisimi 3y ago
At least you are expressing something about your discontent - so thank you for giving me the opportunity to respond. Perhaps its random speculation to you, but I cannot read what was written on burnt paper. I don't think the idea that some software/hardware fix can or ever could read what was written on burnt paper is viable. However, I'm not just criticising the purported facts. I'm also offering a suggestion whereby I can be shown to be wrong, as I suggest a verifiable way to prove this idea works. I'm saying that you should surely test this system out on something that you can prove works, before rolling the idea out onto actual historical artefacts and adding to the ancient works on the bookshelf. I just don't see what's objectionable to what I'm saying - it seems entirely based in common sense. However, I think it upsets people, as it snaps them out of a 'merry daydream' they have about how wonderful technology is.
- angiosperm 3y ago
  What is objectionable is that you are just making shit up. Calling it "common sense" does not help. It is a fact that actually-ancient manuscripts are vanishingly scarce; almost everything you cite on bookshelves today is from copies of copies of copies. And, extended text has already been extracted from charred scrolls from that very site, albeit destructively. So, what you insist is impossible has already been done. The goal is to do it better. You could have found out all this yourself with a tiny amount of reading, and not wasted everybody's time.
  - verisimi 3y ago
    Is it ok with you if I base my thoughts on my own experiences, rather than this or that claim on a website? In your experience, can you really read text on paper, once it has been pyrolysed/burnt?
    - angiosperm 3y ago
      Think any way you like. I doesn't make the rules for what you can post without getting dinged. I have read text on undisturbed burnt paper, in the past. (Of course, what they have is not paper.) If you believe you cannot, then you certainly cannot, but you are not asked to. They have been doing it, and will continue. Among modern marvels you accept daily without demur, it does not stand out.
      - verisimi 3y ago
        Does reading an academic text trump personal experience?
        angiosperm 3y ago
        Your personal inability to read text off charred, rolled paper tells us literally nothing about whether the people actually doing it can. If a paper implied that nobody could, but you were doing it, that would be of interest provided you could explain how.
        verisimi 3y ago
        The point I'm making and that you're missing, relates to one's hierarchy of knowledge. If you have personal experience of something, and then someone comes along and says something that is the antithesis of your experience, which source should you accept? Your experience or the other person? What if the other person is not a person, but a famous science journal - which source should you accept then? The answer, if you are authority of yourself - is your own experience, every time. This trumps all other sources. It is the only golden source you have. Of course it can be fallible, but you do not intend to deceive yourself. Other external sources can claim whatever they like! There are lots of incentives and mistakes that can be made. But it should not count for you more highly than your personal experience. For your own sanity, you must be aligned with your own experience - the other is that you are susceptible to any provided story.
        3y ago

At least you are expressing something about your discontent - so thank you for giving me the opportunity to respond. Perhaps its random speculation to you, but I cannot read what was written on burnt paper. I don't think the idea that some software/hardware fix can or ever could read what was written on burnt paper is viable. However, I'm not just criticising the purported facts. I'm also offering a suggestion whereby I can be shown to be wrong, as I suggest a verifiable way to prove this idea works. I'm saying that you should surely test this system out on something that you can prove works, before rolling the idea out onto actual historical artefacts and adding to the ancient works on the bookshelf. I just don't see what's objectionable to what I'm saying - it seems entirely based in common sense. However, I think it upsets people, as it snaps them out of a 'merry daydream' they have about how wonderful technology is.

angiosperm 3y ago
What is objectionable is that you are just making shit up. Calling it "common sense" does not help. It is a fact that actually-ancient manuscripts are vanishingly scarce; almost everything you cite on bookshelves today is from copies of copies of copies. And, extended text has already been extracted from charred scrolls from that very site, albeit destructively. So, what you insist is impossible has already been done. The goal is to do it better. You could have found out all this yourself with a tiny amount of reading, and not wasted everybody's time.
- verisimi 3y ago
  Is it ok with you if I base my thoughts on my own experiences, rather than this or that claim on a website? In your experience, can you really read text on paper, once it has been pyrolysed/burnt?
  - angiosperm 3y ago
    Think any way you like. I doesn't make the rules for what you can post without getting dinged. I have read text on undisturbed burnt paper, in the past. (Of course, what they have is not paper.) If you believe you cannot, then you certainly cannot, but you are not asked to. They have been doing it, and will continue. Among modern marvels you accept daily without demur, it does not stand out.
    - verisimi 3y ago
      Does reading an academic text trump personal experience?
      - angiosperm 3y ago
        Your personal inability to read text off charred, rolled paper tells us literally nothing about whether the people actually doing it can. If a paper implied that nobody could, but you were doing it, that would be of interest provided you could explain how.
        verisimi 3y ago
        The point I'm making and that you're missing, relates to one's hierarchy of knowledge. If you have personal experience of something, and then someone comes along and says something that is the antithesis of your experience, which source should you accept? Your experience or the other person? What if the other person is not a person, but a famous science journal - which source should you accept then? The answer, if you are authority of yourself - is your own experience, every time. This trumps all other sources. It is the only golden source you have. Of course it can be fallible, but you do not intend to deceive yourself. Other external sources can claim whatever they like! There are lots of incentives and mistakes that can be made. But it should not count for you more highly than your personal experience. For your own sanity, you must be aligned with your own experience - the other is that you are susceptible to any provided story.
        3y ago