Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
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Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
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Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#2I often like to fantasize how would I fare if I found myself suddenly transported into medieval times or earlier (spoiler: poorly).
Articles like this make me appreciate even more how little difference there is between us and humans thousands of years ago. I wouldn't have figured out how to make a working wheel, and I've seen one. I have no idea where I picked up the idea that "ancient civilizations were dumb", but the more I read, the more I appreciate how little difference there was.
BTW, if you haven't, you should definitely check the "Primitive technology" channel on Youtube.
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#3I often like to fantasize how would I fare if I found myself suddenly transported into medieval times or earlier (spoiler: poorly). Articles like this make me appreciate even more how little difference there is between us and humans thousands of years ago. I wouldn't have figured out how to make a working wheel, and I've seen one. I have no idea where I picked up the idea that "ancient civilizations were dumb", but t…
Two really good literature treatments of your fantasy are Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and Jules Verne's Mysterious Island. They both have as major plot elements a character who has a lot of knowledge of fabrication techniques, and recreate their technology in a primitive situation (one involves time travel, the other is stranded on a primitive island).
On another note, I've heard that the first thing you need to fabricate (beyond basic hand tools) is a lathe. Once you have that, you can make a better lathe, which can make various other machine shop tools, etc. until you have a whole workshop created. Although this probably assumes that you still have access to modern (as in the last couple hundred years) materials to work with.
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#4I heard the story differently. Wheels are only really useful if you have good enough streets to use them on and building streets is a huge upfront investment. It is also a chicken egg problem - wheels are only useful with streets and streets are only useful for wheels. Without streets you are better of carrying your stuff around than trying to push it around on wheels in natural terrain. That is also why the wheel first appeared in toys, because you can push them around on a flat table. So the wheel was probably well known before it saw widespread adoption for transportation which additionally to the lack of streets had to overcome the engineering problems mentioned in the article that come up when you scale the wheel from a toy to a wheel burrow.
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#5I heard the story differently. Wheels are only really useful if you have good enough streets to use them on and building streets is a huge upfront investment. It is also a chicken egg problem - wheels are only useful with streets and streets are only useful for wheels. Without streets you are better of carrying your stuff around than trying to push it around on wheels in natural terrain. That is also why the wheel fi…
Streets? Where we came from, we needed no.. streets ;)
I mean, didn't "streets" emerge really from commonly-travelled paths carved by feet and horse hooves and time, and really most non-paved paths are quite fine for most wheels? Perhaps they last longer on pavement, but other than that..
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#6Also, the wheel is not very helpful without compact, step-free pathes.
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#7The wheel is one part of a two part invention:
1) The wheel
2) smooth hard-ish surfaces that are large enough to be worth going anywhere
Without either, the wheel on its own isn't worth much. It turns out roads are a much older, more useful invention without which the wheel doesn't make much sense.
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#8If you think INVENTING the wheel took a long time, wait till you learn how long it took to put them on suitcases:
http://www.worldatlas.com/articles/did-you-know-that-we-went... (spoiler alert: we got to the moon first!)
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#9I often like to fantasize how would I fare if I found myself suddenly transported into medieval times or earlier (spoiler: poorly). Articles like this make me appreciate even more how little difference there is between us and humans thousands of years ago. I wouldn't have figured out how to make a working wheel, and I've seen one. I have no idea where I picked up the idea that "ancient civilizations were dumb", but t…
Two really good literature treatments of your fantasy are Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and Jules Verne's Mysterious Island. They both have as major plot elements a character who has a lot of knowledge of fabrication techniques, and recreate their technology in a primitive situation (one involves time travel, the other is stranded on a primitive island). On another note, I've heard that the…
I’ve heard of bootstrapping a machine shop from a lathe as well—apparently there’s a series about it, written by this guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_J._Gingery
Re: Why It Took So Long to Invent the Wheel (2012)
#10I often like to fantasize how would I fare if I found myself suddenly transported into medieval times or earlier (spoiler: poorly). Articles like this make me appreciate even more how little difference there is between us and humans thousands of years ago. I wouldn't have figured out how to make a working wheel, and I've seen one. I have no idea where I picked up the idea that "ancient civilizations were dumb", but t…
The "what would I try to invent?" question one is fascinating. If I found myself transported back to Roman times, I'd aim to make a lens. The Romans had glass so the raw material is there. With a lens you can fairly quickly go a telescope, which has immediate military application, so would perhaps be widely adopted. Astronomy might then follow, heading off the whole "Earth is the centre of Universe" thing that held back modern thinking. You can also make a microscope, which fairly quickly leads to the discovery of microscopic organisms, and perhaps the germ theory of disease.
For bonus points I'd give them the decimal number system.