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5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

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Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#61

Post by MarkusQ »

robin_reala wrote: post #41
MarkusQ wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite frustrating how archeology swings over the years from "we'll believe anything" to "we won't accept any claim without a preserved example". While some of the excesses of the past were clearly excessive, drilled holes should have been sufficient evidence of drills, people living on islands should be sufficient evidence of boats, rope-worn bones should be considered evidence of rope and so forth.

people living on islands should be sufficient evidence of boats Historical sea levels were wildly different at different times, so not necessarily. For instance, the British isles were settled at a point when it was a part of the mainland: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Doggerland.png

Certainly. Land bridges are also a thing. As is swimming, in some cases.

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#62

Post by MarkusQ »

andrewflnr wrote: post #20
mojomark wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting thought. I wonder if you can quantify this belief? That Weibull (presumably) distribution would be an interesting and useful thing to know.

Quantify the belief that humans are biased toward sensationalism? No, I have no idea how to do that. Actually you could make an argument that it's a bit circular, that "sensationalism" is defined as the kind of ideas that humans are biased towards and which are therefore more able to cause a "sensation". But if you don't see how people yearn to believe in big dramatic things like conspiracies, aliens, bigfoot, or eve…

Unfortunately, you also sometimes throw out explanations like "they did X in substantially the same way as their descents were doing X up until the late 1800s" or "they used it for Y, just at it was used at other sites throughout the world."

At least in the case of things like migrations, we're starting to get overwhelming genetic evidence.

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#63

Post by timerol »

zkmon wrote: post #36

Indian carpenters always had a drill with large spindle around which a long rope is wound. A person pulls the rope back and forth spinning the drill. Another person holds the drill in position using a flat wood piece at the top with small hole to hold the drill axle. Same technique is also used for spinning a wooden churner to get butterfat out of curd. A standing woman would pull the rope back and forth for a few mi…

> always

Can you be more specific here? In an article about civilization 5300 years ago, where India has had a human population for at least 65,000 years, saying "always" is fairly vague

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#65

Post by dev_l1x_be »

thordenmark wrote: post #60

Conspiracy theorists have long pointed out the obviously drilled holes in stonework that was >5000 years old. Of course they want to attribute it to lost advanced technology, but the more believable answer is that ancient Egyptians had really refined mundane tools like a bow drill. I still want to know how the scoop marks were made in the ancient quarries. What tool could do that?

So they were right when questioning the chisel story?

Btw. the scoop marks are still a mystery. I would not classify people who are challenging the current narratives conspiracy theorists, they are skeptics really.

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#66

Post by dev_l1x_be »

toolslive wrote: post #2

It's what a lot of engineers have been saying for decades: Looking at the surfaces of the artefacts, it's obvious more advanced tooling, than what was claimed by archaeologists, must have been used. Oh irony, the bits were already lying about in the museum's archive for a century.

I am really curious about the scoop marks across the globe. The hole drilling story is only interesting because of the precision and feed-per-revolution which is probably why archaeologists does not understand how advanced those people creating this holes must have been.

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#67

Post by dev_l1x_be »

andrewflnr wrote: post #7
MarkusQ wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite frustrating how archeology swings over the years from "we'll believe anything" to "we won't accept any claim without a preserved example". While some of the excesses of the past were clearly excessive, drilled holes should have been sufficient evidence of drills, people living on islands should be sufficient evidence of boats, rope-worn bones should be considered evidence of rope and so forth.

Balance would be nice, yes, but I think the conservative approach is closer to correct, especially given the natural human bias toward believing sensational theories.

What is more sensational:

a, you can drill a hole and cut a 100 ton stone block with a chisel

b, you create a hole with a drill, you use some for of stone cutting technology that supports cutting 100 ton stone blocks?

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#68

Post by zkmon »

timerol wrote: post #63
zkmon wrote: post #36

Indian carpenters always had a drill with large spindle around which a long rope is wound. A person pulls the rope back and forth spinning the drill. Another person holds the drill in position using a flat wood piece at the top with small hole to hold the drill axle. Same technique is also used for spinning a wooden churner to get butterfat out of curd. A standing woman would pull the rope back and forth for a few mi…

> always Can you be more specific here? In an article about civilization 5300 years ago, where India has had a human population for at least 65,000 years, saying "always" is fairly vague

Sorry I was referring to mechanical techniques of spinning a drill in general, that I'm familiar with, in addition to the bow method described. I was not referring to any time scale.

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#69

Post by pinkmuffinere »

zkmon wrote: post #68
timerol wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> always Can you be more specific here? In an article about civilization 5300 years ago, where India has had a human population for at least 65,000 years, saying "always" is fairly vague

Sorry I was referring to mechanical techniques of spinning a drill in general, that I'm familiar with, in addition to the bow method described. I was not referring to any time scale.

I want to be as polite as possible, but explain the confusion that timerol was experiencing, just in case it was unclear. Because the article's focus is about the oldest "sophisticated drilling tool", and your comment said "Indian carpenters always had ...", the implication is that you're disagreeing with the article being discussed. The information you share is interesting, but it's slightly off topic from the main point of discussion (ie, the age of sophisticated tooling). You can avoid confusion like this by explicitly acknowledging when you're going to go off-topic. Eg, you could say "Not related to the age of the tool, but I saw similar tools used in India -- Indian carpenters always had..." I hope that explanation is polite and maybe helpful :). Apologies if I over-explained.

Somewhat relevant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle

Re: 5,300-year-old 'bow drill' rewrites story of ancient Egyptian tools

#70

Post by pinkmuffinere »

dev_l1x_be wrote: post #67
andrewflnr wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Balance would be nice, yes, but I think the conservative approach is closer to correct, especially given the natural human bias toward believing sensational theories.

What is more sensational: a, you can drill a hole and cut a 100 ton stone block with a chisel b, you create a hole with a drill, you use some for of stone cutting technology that supports cutting 100 ton stone blocks?

It can be legitimately unclear. Relatively-advanced technology being available to early humans is remarkable. Likewise, achieving difficult tasks without the relatively-advanced technology is remarkable. Some prototypical examples of this:

- Incan stonework with stones 'perfectly' cut to fit without mortar -- did they have advanced tools to support that? Or just persistence?

- Greek fire -- is there some lost mechanism here? Or just the growth of legends?

- the pyramids (I think not so controversial among academics, but certainly in pop culture)

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