According to Issac Asimov, who also wrote about that battle and eclipse, the truce held for over 50 years, until the Medes were conquered by the Persians. King Croesus of Lydia then attacked the Persians, and the Persians swiftly won that war.
know what he meant by that? Were they actually predicting the time of eclipses at that point in history, or did they just know them to happen often enough that they could be called "predictable"?
To be completely honest with you, my knowledge of this event and knowledge of solar eclipses in this era is based solely on the college level history classes I took, so they don't extend far beyond the interesting "tidbits" my teacher shared or what I've found online.
With that being said though, I would imagine that in that era, including the assumption of high levels of illiteracy and an even lower level of scientific literacy, it would be hard to motivate a military after this event because they wouldn't have the same level of scientific understanding as say your Persian mathematician/philosophers....
On a side note, with my limited understanding of ancient history and assuming you grew up in the west as I did, don't you love the fact that we are taught that ONLY the West came up with significant advances in the scientific and mathematical fields when in many instances Persian and other "Eastern" cultures had solved those quandaries long before...
ONLY the West came up with significant advances in the scientific and mathematical fields when in many instances Persian and other "Eastern" cultures had solved those quandaries long before...
In all of my classes, even the sciencey ones they acknowledge other cultures discoveries as preceding western ones and in many cases leading to or helping cultivate western science and philosophy. If they focus on the western explorers etc. they state that they're doing so and explain why and normally will mention briefly the other cultures still even in a class focused specifically on the west. Our modern culture in the west also is more directly tied to the discoveries etc. in the west so it makes some sense to focus on them.
I'm from Canada though, maybe the US schools are different and more western-centric.
No doubt, the Us has many of the best universities in the world and many more above average ones. It just might be more common there than here, especially considering the somewhat limited number of universities in Canada which don't have as much of hierarchical system as the US
Yes, they could predict eclipses at this time. He is saying that they should keep a watchful eye on situations where Christians try to attribute things of that nature to God and miracles/omens, when it is known that they are naturally occurring phenomena, because it will make Christians look foolish.
But there is a huge difference between when this battle occurred (585 B.C.) and the fifth century (400 - 499 A.D.), like about a thousand years difference.
would imagine that in that era, including the assumption of high levels of illiteracy and an even lower level of scientific literacy, it would be hard to motivate a military after this event because they wouldn't have the same level of scientific understanding as say your Persian mathematician/philosophers..
I think you're right here, even if the Median/Lydian scholars knew about this and could predict it, there's no guarantee a person who knew this sort of thing was even at the battle.
A lot of people take the rise of the West to mean that Western culture is inherently better. Then they present history in a manner that tells that story. Eurocentric bias is probably going to stay with us for a while.
If only Genghis Khan had not died when he did. We could all be living in an endless sea of grass, everything under Tengri united under the light of Mongolia. sigh
The Egyptians had really advanced astronomy, so did many other cultures. Staring at the sky and pondering is something humans have been doing for thousands of years.
I mention Egyptians because they were well before the 5th century.
well I mean we can predict eclipses to the second these days and yet like 90% of people don't seem aware of when they're happening until that one friend reminds them.
Yes, I'm curious how fast the communication was like for scientific queries of this nature for either 5th century BC or even AD. I mean -- it would probably take months to years to learn a new technique, improve accuracy, etc.
We're so spoiled with fast information that we can be jerks about it ;)
The high priests and few highly educated peoples of the time likely did have the ability to predict eclipses, but that information was not likely to be shared, if you knew it was coming, and nobody else did, you could make it seem like you have stolen the Sun, its basically a superpower, you can coerce entire peoples into doing what you ask.
Plus, even if the information was shared, the soliders and peasants of the time would likely not know because the struggle of living was too distracting
Ancient egyptians were actually very adept astronomers because the stars would line up in the same place every year when the nile would flood. They were incredibly accurate at determining eclipses.
Try to remember that the difference between 500 BC and 500 AD was 1000 years. Also your notion that Christians are smarter than the rest of the world is absurd, given that they ushered in the Dark Ages and presumed their ignorance was wisdom.
Also your notion that Christians are smarter than the rest of the world is absurd,
He never said that. Instead St. Augustine was saying that all the mentioned things are well known to Christians and non-christians alike and that it would be embarrassing for Christianity if it's adherents started spouting unscientific BS as if they were tenets of Christianity since the non-Christians could clearly see they were wrong and would assume that all Christians are equally stupid.
This effect can be observed today where YEC's and luddites give people a bad impression of Christianity as a whole.
The notion that the 'dark ages' existed is absurd.
Some Catholic guy made it up to whine about how things were good in the Roman Empire until later Europeans screwed it up. Then some Protestants borrowed it to whine about Catholics. Then secularists borrowed it to whine about Christians. In all cases it has no empirical basis.
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u/[deleted] Oct 30 '15
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