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Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

arstechnica.com

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Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#51

Post by otabdeveloper4 »

pbj1968 wrote: post #10

Would have been better had they gotten machinists or rural people that otherwise work with their hands to do this. A bunch of scientists playing make believe chopping wood and scraping bone doesn’t convince me much. We would have been just as specialized back then as we are now. And don’t we have 30,000 year old jewelry with intricate carvings? Why the amazement at “wow, this pointy stone chops wood, man?”

Knowing how to make stone tools is a standard part of an archaeologists's job description. Not sure you can call doing their job "make believe".

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#52

Post by defrost »

otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #50
matt3210 wrote: post #9

Who first decided to melt the rocks and get the iron?

The temperature required to melt iron ore is quite a bit more than anything you can get out of a conventional fire.

This is why people char coal and make bloomery furnaces from clay | mud | etc.

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#53

Post by otabdeveloper4 »

defrost wrote: post #52
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The temperature required to melt iron ore is quite a bit more than anything you can get out of a conventional fire.

This is why people char coal and make bloomery furnaces from clay | mud | etc.

Yeah, but this is all firmly in the realm of "engineering", and not "throw stuff into the fire for the lols".

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#54

Post by XorNot »

Qwertious wrote: post #43
WalterBright wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To make use of telegraphy, one would need to know how to read & write. The most useful inventions in history: 1. reading & writing 2. paper 3. printing press 4. computers & networking Note that they're all about preserving and sharing information.

Weird how that list doesn't include the state, coinage, or farming. Or animal domestication. Or smelting iron. Or steam engines and machine tools. Computers are basically irrelevant but networking would be huge - being able to communicate near-instantly across large distances was possibly the single biggest limiting factor for the size of empires in agrarian societies (other than food).

I'd argue the long term fixed preservation of knowledge outdoes almost every other invention.

The value of being able to have a book you distribute which describes how to do all those other things, is immense.

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#55

Post by defrost »

otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #53
defrost wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why people char coal and make bloomery furnaces from clay | mud | etc.

Yeah, but this is all firmly in the realm of "engineering", and not "throw stuff into the fire for the lols".

Sure; 4,500 year old "engineering" that evolved from playing around with fire and melting more and more things with higher and higher melting points.

Who, aside from yourself, actually mentioned "throw stuff into the fire for the lols". ?

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#56

Post by ramon156 »

defrost wrote: post #55
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but this is all firmly in the realm of "engineering", and not "throw stuff into the fire for the lols".

Sure; 4,500 year old "engineering" that evolved from playing around with fire and melting more and more things with higher and higher melting points. Who, aside from yourself, actually mentioned "throw stuff into the fire for the lols". ?

> The moment men learned to make fire, be sure there was some guy there that put everything to the fire to see what happened.

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#57

Post by selestify »

ahazred8ta wrote: post #31
pavel_lishin wrote: post #8

Obligatory link to Primitive Technology on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@primitivetechnology9550 Although, he doesn't recreate past technology - I think he researches what technology could have existed, given the knowledge of our time. Things like his blowers, and his iron smelting processes. Of course, there's only so much you can do with rocks & sticks, so most of what he makes ends up being pretty similar to h…

There was one fellow who smelted copper ore and tin ore, made copper wire and a vinegar battery, and made a working telegraph that could have been built any time since 3000 BC.

Do you have a link I can read? I’m having trouble finding mentions of this

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#58

Post by readyman »

Qwertious wrote: post #43
WalterBright wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To make use of telegraphy, one would need to know how to read & write. The most useful inventions in history: 1. reading & writing 2. paper 3. printing press 4. computers & networking Note that they're all about preserving and sharing information.

Weird how that list doesn't include the state, coinage, or farming. Or animal domestication. Or smelting iron. Or steam engines and machine tools. Computers are basically irrelevant but networking would be huge - being able to communicate near-instantly across large distances was possibly the single biggest limiting factor for the size of empires in agrarian societies (other than food).

>being able to communicate near-instantly across large distances was possibly the single biggest limiting factor for the size of empires in agrarian societies

Seemingly, yes, but this hasn't been proven quite yet. The American empire appears to be losing dominance since the proliferation of the internet, for example. However, the American empire certainly gained tremendous power from broadcasted electronic mediums.

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#59

Post by ahazred8ta »

selestify wrote: post #57
ahazred8ta wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was one fellow who smelted copper ore and tin ore, made copper wire and a vinegar battery, and made a working telegraph that could have been built any time since 3000 BC.

Do you have a link I can read? I’m having trouble finding mentions of this

Jamie O'Shea's Immaculate Telegraphy video series (2009) - "It's the ultimate salvagepunk experiment" -- https://www.tumblr.com/immaculatetelegraphy -- https://www.google.com/search?q=immaculate+telegraphy

But also Lewis Dartnell (The Knowledge: How to Rebuild our World from Scratch) https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-make-a-telegraph-from-scr... -- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Knowledge:_How_to_Rebuil... -- "a great read, even if civilization does not collapse"

Re: Scientists built their own Stone Age tools to figure out how they were used

#60

Post by tame3902 »

defrost wrote: post #52
otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The temperature required to melt iron ore is quite a bit more than anything you can get out of a conventional fire.

This is why people char coal and make bloomery furnaces from clay | mud | etc.

Nitpick: Bloomeries generally don't melt iron. They are just hot enough to reduce iron oxide to iron. Melting iron is a relatively young technology. From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloomery):

"Inside the furnace, carbon monoxide from the incomplete combustion of the charcoal reduces the iron oxides in the ore to metallic iron without melting the ore; this allows the bloomery to operate at lower temperatures than the melting temperature of the ore."

and

"As a bloomery's size is increased, the iron ore is exposed to burning charcoal for a longer time. When combined with the strong air blast required to penetrate the large ore and charcoal stack, this may cause part of the iron to melt and become saturated with carbon in the process, producing unforgeable pig iron, which requires oxidation to be reduced into cast iron, steel, and iron. This pig iron was considered a waste product detracting from the largest bloomeries' yield, and early blast furnaces, identical in construction, but dedicated to the production of molten iron, were not built until the 14th century."

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