Monday, May 17, 2010

The Antisjnkhnfsjkdhfsduihuisasomething Mechanism

This HERE is flipping my wig, and I don't even really understand what the fuck it is. And to me, I don't know what's more amazing: that something that can be labeled an "analog computer" may have been built 2,000 years ago, or that 2,000 years later we can apparently reconstruct it. Amazing.
The Antikythera Mechanism is an ancient artifact discovered circa 1900 CE on a shipwreck known as the Antikythera wreck. The Mechanism is thought to be the world’s oldest analog computer yet discovered (dating, scientists think, to the 1st or 2nd century BCE). The Mechanism apparently calculates calendar cycles and positions of celestial bodies using a shockingly intricate system of clockwork-style gears — though its purpose has been the subject of debate for decades, as gears can be used for lots of stuff. The Mechanism is enormously complex, and analyzing it is difficult because of its age, its condition (we just have a crusty fragment that spent roughly two millennia on the sea floor), and the need to create reconstructions in order to see it operate.
Dont fret, there's no sound, it ain't your speakers.

1 comment:

Kiko Jones said...

http://www.cracked.com/article_18533_the-6-most-important-things-humanity-just-plain-forgot.html