these are pictures of the Antikythera Mechanism a mechanical analog computer from around 150 BCE. it is not known exactly who designed and/or built the machine. perhaps Archimedes or Hipparchus or someone else of the time. it is an amazing machine which could compute the positions of the Moon the Sun and the five planets{Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn} known to the ancient Greeks and predict eclipses of the Sun and Moon. nothing of comparable precision and technical sophistication is known until at least the 18th century. it was originally found around 1900 by a diver searching an ancient shipwreck. in later years more parts were found by archaeologists. the machine is now in a museum in Athens, Greece. the first picture is of a reproduction of the machine. the second picture is a more recent reproduction after more was known about the machine. the third picture shows all the fragments of the machine as found. the fourth is an x-ray of the major fragment and the last a computer simulation of what is thought to be the way it appeared in ancient times. if you would like to know more google the "antikythera mechanism research project". it has many more x-rays of the gears and parts which made up the machine. the ancients most likely had more of this sort of thing and other machines of which at this time we know little. these so far are the only surviving fragments of such mechanisms.
No comments:
Post a Comment