I thought we were able to read some of these scrolls years ago?
I think some years ago they were starting to be able to read some words
An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
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Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#332Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#333Earlier quoted context omitted.
IIRC 99% of all of the existing scrolls are still in Italy's possession. I think the breakdown is something like ~350 are mostly in tact, another ~1000 are damaged but still "scroll like", and the remaining hundreds are shattered fragments.
did anything progress on trying to dig more out of the ground? i know that there was thinking that a lot of scrolls might still be down there
Not yet, as far as I am aware. Digging progress is decided by the Italian government at multiple levels and would be a many year long thing. We have our hands full for the forseeable future with the 30 or so scrolls we've already scanned. We're getting more and more efficient on the scanning and automation fronts, though, and are hoping that we can get our hands on the other 300 or so intact scrolls, but that in and of itself is a multi year long project that will require more money and time. As I've mentioned in a different comment, scanning is _not cheap_ and we pay for it ourselves from our own funding and donations in order to release the data for free with permissive licensing. We hope that we can improve our processes to be able to work with cheaper, lower resolution CT methods, but right now we are focused on extracting as much as possible from the best scan source in the world. Productization of cheaper scanning methods is a secondary to tertiary priority at the moment.
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#334[flagged]
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#335What if we want to put something on paper today for it to survive as long as possible? 1-minute research: Paper: 100% cotton rag or linen rag paper with alkaline reserve. Acid-free and lignin-free. Ink: Genuine carbon ink applied with a classic dip pen. Storage: ISO 16245 archival box, Less than 15°C, 30-50% humidity, dark, no oxygen exchange. Always store horizontally. Wear white 100% cotton gloves. Printing: If you…
Instead of pigmenting the paper, punch holes through it. Then you're relying on the physical durability of a single substance, instead of two.
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#336Lets reflect on Aristocreon, in about 200 BC, putting their thoughts down on a scroll. They would be aware that the scroll might be kept in a library for some time. Maybe they could have imagined it surviving for 300 years. But they never would have imagined that in 300 years a volcano might destroy the scroll, but in some way preserve it. And then that nearly two thousand years later future humans with machines made…
You don't have to go back to 200 BC for the story to be hard to imagine. Something around 1700 would work too. In 1800 they could already understand the "electricity" part at least.
Though the ancients did recognize as occult forces magnetism (Thales, according to Aristotle, gave the motive power of magnets as an example that even apparently inanimate objects have souls) and electricity (from triboelectic effects with amber, whence comes the name, and which Thales discussed as induced magnetism, also Plato mentions the stunning caused by electric rays), though it would be a while before the connection was made between these phenomena.
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#337Lets reflect on Aristocreon, in about 200 BC, putting their thoughts down on a scroll. They would be aware that the scroll might be kept in a library for some time. Maybe they could have imagined it surviving for 300 years. But they never would have imagined that in 300 years a volcano might destroy the scroll, but in some way preserve it. And then that nearly two thousand years later future humans with machines made…
> Can our sci-fi writers come up with something equivalent that is as dizzyingly far from what we know now, as now is from what Aristocreon knew? Sure they can, but as one of them once opined: any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. What we cannot do, is guess which things so different from our world are, and are not, magic. Are the probabilities in quantum mechanics themselves quantised…
If you can produce negative mass, you can (in theory) make a faster-than-light warp drive, so that would certainly have serious implications.
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#338Whats the message in it. Can't find link to it.
https://scrollprize.org/pdf/main.pdf#page=22
Pages 22-27
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#339The anti-dig faction of the archelogy internal war grows ever bolder and cursive.
Re: An entire Herculaneum scroll has been read for the first time
#340Lets reflect on Aristocreon, in about 200 BC, putting their thoughts down on a scroll. They would be aware that the scroll might be kept in a library for some time. Maybe they could have imagined it surviving for 300 years. But they never would have imagined that in 300 years a volcano might destroy the scroll, but in some way preserve it. And then that nearly two thousand years later future humans with machines made…
Horace said in 23 BC that he hates try-hard Persian luxuries, he predicted the G-Wagon