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Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

thelydianstone.com

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Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#31

Post by jacquesm »

miki_tyler wrote: post #17
jacquesm wrote: post #16

Isn't there a massive contradiction here though, on the one hand the slave can't write on the lintel and be seen in the future proving their worlds are not connected (vol 1 page 18), on the other hand there are all these artifacts that get dug up, proving that they are. Or am I misunderstanding something?

Their universes disconnect the moment they make contact, but Marcus knows Pompeii well and escapes the eruption just before it happens. So he can point Ulyses to places where things will be buried or hidden. I also needed the relationship to go both ways, not just Marcus getting ideas from the future. That makes the plot more interesting.

Ah I see, so it's 'another earth' repackaged, except they're displaced in time. I see now. What a lot of effort this must have been.

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#32

Post by miki_tyler »

jacquesm wrote: post #31
miki_tyler wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their universes disconnect the moment they make contact, but Marcus knows Pompeii well and escapes the eruption just before it happens. So he can point Ulyses to places where things will be buried or hidden. I also needed the relationship to go both ways, not just Marcus getting ideas from the future. That makes the plot more interesting.

Ah I see, so it's 'another earth' repackaged, except they're displaced in time. I see now. What a lot of effort this must have been.

lol, yes, it was.

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#33

Post by Obscurity4340 »

sfRattan wrote: post #2

Reminds me of Lest Darkness Fall [1], a 1939 novel about an archeology professor who is transported back in time to Rome under the Ostrogoths on the eve of Belisarius' invasion to reconquer Italy for the Eastern Roman Empire under Justinian. The hero of the novel, Martin Padway, gets his start teaching Arabic numerals to a Syrian banker in Rome, and then distilling brandy. By the end of the novel he's running a newsp…

Thanks for the rec, sounds like a hoot

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#34

Post by jacquesm »

Animats wrote: post #28
cyberax wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude, wtf are you talking about? 1750 is freaking high-tech. They had large scale iron casting, gunpowder production, precision engineering good enough to make a clock that can provide accurate time after going around the world, most of the modern math foundations, telescopes, and even steam power.

Clockmaking goes way back, but for a long time was off in its own technological niche. People with tiny files working brass made clocks by hand. The first mass produced clocks appeared in the late 1700s. Precision didn't come to iron and steel until Maudsley's lathe, around 1800. It can be seen at the Science Museum, London. It looks like a modern lathe, but is quite different from its predecessors. It's on display,…

Groups still barely talk. There is a lot of money to be made simply by taking a 'well known' concept in one field and applying it to another.

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#35

Post by fc417fc802 »

cyberax wrote: post #29
fc417fc802 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The economics don't work only when compared to the modern alternative. The economics of a grindstone attached to a waterwheel don't work today but they did historically. A steam engine with low power output could still have been extremely useful in the right context despite not being up to the more strenuous tasks of historical variants.

Your steam engine will likely be less efficient than a pair of oxen. It'll need a lot of wood, water, and will always leak. If you want something truly revolutionary, try the modern horse saddle and horse collar (and bit).

Agreed, there's a lower bound set by the other available tech. I didn't do the best job articulating there. In the context of the thread my objection is that the economics of the finished product aren't the issue.

The problem is arriving at working knowledge of the tech in the first place. But that's clearly not a logical impossibility, merely expensive and dependent on lots of surrounding factors.

The obsession of a single rich elite, not economics, is precisely how much of early chemistry came to be.

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#36

Post by cyberax »

Starman_Jones wrote: post #30
cyberax wrote: post #4

This kind of fiction is pretty popular in Russia. So there are websites and forums that discuss the kind of hand-waving needed to make the stories interesting (I recommend https://www.popadancev.net/ ). And one thing that really stands out is that there are really not that many shortcuts. To build something like a steam engine, you need to invent advanced steelmaking, casting, advanced tooling (lathes, drills, etc.),…

> And one thing that really stands out is that there are really not that many shortcuts. Completely agree, but the one exception that really stands out to me is canning. Napoleon offered a large cash prize for a cheap and effective method of preserving food for use as army rations. The method used (canning) doesn't require any special equipment (glass jars or tin cans are nice, but not necessary). It would have theor…

One problem with canning is actually the material for cans. Without glass, you'll have to use ceramic jugs. They will be more difficult to sterilize and seal properly.

Definitely not impossible, but probably not discoverable without the knowledge of germ theory.

Re: Show HN: The Roman Industrial Revolution that could have been (Vol 2)

#37

Post by LastTrain »

userbinator wrote: post #22
LastTrain wrote: post #7

Creative content should be labeled as AI generated, assisted, or AI free up front.

I think people should find out themselves, but the OP was quite explicit about it.

That’s great that you feel that way!
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