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Nessus posted:I thought, well, there's going to be a huge abundance of stored data, indeed a violent surfeit of it, but there is the question of how much of this is going to be archived in a reliable and accessible way. The gripping hand to this is that I think people may underestimate how easy it will be to store things like codecs and old operating systems. One of the universities in my area has an interesting problem maintaining old computer models. For example, some PhD student creates a really useful model for, I dunno, some fish population in the Western Mediterranean. Fishing companies and scientists still use it umpteen years later because it turns out to be pretty accurate, but nobody knows how it works because the documentation is long since lost and the code was written in some obscure language and is running on hardware that wasn't even modern a generation ago.
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# ? Feb 23, 2020 22:32 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 04:14 |
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skasion posted:The Historia Augusta isn’t always boring, but some of it is. The stuff right before that (life of Severus Alexander) is this incredibly tedious and probably half bullshit exploration of the concept of the philosopher-king. Then you have a bit later on about a made-up emperor who ate ostriches. Yeah, the level of overt absurdity varies. The guy you're talking about, Firmus, is one of the better parts. There's actually another source mentioning his revolt (though it doesn't give his name), so he isn't totally fictitious, but he probably never proclaimed himself emperor, and almost every detail the Historia Augusta gives about him seems unlikely. Here is in its entirety (with the chapter/verse, page, and footnote numbers left in because , but the best parts bolded): Historia Augusta posted:2 1 For you know, my dear Bassus,5 how great an argument we had but recently with Marcus Fonteius,6 that lover of history, when he asserted that Firmus, who had seized Egypt in the time of Aurelian, was not an emperor but merely a brigand, while I, and together with me Rufius Celsus and Ceionius Julianus and Fabius Sossianus, argued against him, maintaining that Firmus had both worn the purple and called himself Augustus on the coins that he struck, and Archontius Severus even brought out certain coins of his and proved, moreover, from Greek and Egyptian books that in his edicts he had called himself emperor. 2 Fonteius, on the other hand, in his contention against us, had only the argument that Aurelian wrote in one of his edicts, not that he had slain a pretender, but that he had rid the state of a brigand — just as though a prince of such renown could properly have called so obscure a fellow by the name of pretender, or as though mighty emperors did not always use the term of brigand in speaking of those whom they slew when attempting to seize the purple! 3 I myself, indeed, in my Life of Aurelian,7 before I learned the whole story of Firmus, thought of him, p391 not as one who had worn the purple, but only as a sort of brigand; and this I have stated here that no one may think that I am inconsistent. 4 Lest I add too much, however, to a book which I promised to make very short, we shall now proceed to Firmus. Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 22:43 on Feb 23, 2020 |
# ? Feb 23, 2020 22:40 |
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drat this author seems like a wild ride. Passive aggressively badmouthing famous historians, recounting his arguments with his colleagues, and petulantly refusing to name people who he really doesn't like Do any other historians mention the woman who he refuses to name?
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# ? Feb 23, 2020 23:10 |
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My bet's on Livia.Ynglaur posted:One of the universities in my area has an interesting problem maintaining old computer models. For example, some PhD student creates a really useful model for, I dunno, some fish population in the Western Mediterranean. Fishing companies and scientists still use it umpteen years later because it turns out to be pretty accurate, but nobody knows how it works because the documentation is long since lost and the code was written in some obscure language and is running on hardware that wasn't even modern a generation ago. Can't wait until somebody's doing a PHD on digging up and rebuilding old decayed models left behind by earlier PHDs.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 02:07 |
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Jazerus posted:no, the romans did not understand macroeconomics at all. nobody did for over a thousand years after them, either. it's not really something you can reason about without either a very large number of historical examples of "king so-and-so did this, and then this happened", or statistics. both played a part in the establishment of economics as a discipline, and to this day it's one of the shakiest fields of academic study. roman medicine, on the other hand, actually kicked a lot of rear end. trust me, you'd rather be treated by a roman doctor than anyone else if you have to pick a pre-1900 doctor. Yeah, I figured as much re: economics. You surprise me, though, about medicine. I figured (thanks to Aristotle's theory about humors sticking around for so long) that it was more or less a direct line between Roman medicine and those awful 1800 doctors. What made Roman medicine better than what came after?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 02:39 |
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Medicine depends on what exactly was wrong. As far as injuries go, Roman doctors had a ton of experience and knowledge, as well as a reasonably good understanding of the body that wasn't surpassed until the Renaissance. Their tools were essentially identical to a surgical kit today, we have some solid explanations of techniques that make sense, and there's evidence from bodies of some pretty gnarly surgeries that the people survived. As far as disease goes, nobody really knew poo poo prior to the discovery of germs. Roman doctors did understand infection to an extent though, they had no theoretical model but had observed things like cleaning your medical instruments and using hot wine on wounds would reduce the chance of infection, and they knew of medical plants. I wouldn't say the Roman ability to treat disease was special though, it's more about what they could do with surgery and injury care.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 02:52 |
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cheetah7071 posted:drat this author seems like a wild ride. Passive aggressively badmouthing famous historians, recounting his arguments with his colleagues, and petulantly refusing to name people who he really doesn't like The “Marcus Fonteius” and other historians involved in the arguments are probably completely fictional. The Historia Augusta cites a suspicious number of otherwise unknown sources, and despite the different biographies comprising the Historia Augusta each being attributed to one of six different historians, modern scholars generally agree that they were all written by just one person. Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 04:07 on Feb 24, 2020 |
# ? Feb 24, 2020 04:03 |
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Grand Fromage posted:Medicine depends on what exactly was wrong. As far as injuries go, Roman doctors had a ton of experience and knowledge, as well as a reasonably good understanding of the body that wasn't surpassed until the Renaissance. Their tools were essentially identical to a surgical kit today, we have some solid explanations of techniques that make sense, and there's evidence from bodies of some pretty gnarly surgeries that the people survived.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 05:46 |
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Are there any references to the reign of Tutankhamun that discusses issues other than the treasures in his tomb? I am looking for an informative resource regarding this Pharaoh and I can't find anything.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:18 |
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Grand Fromage posted:The revisionist Nero view is fairly popular these days. He was definitely not a good emperor. The ones who gained power as teenagers almost always were not good, shockingly enough. But he wasn't terrible either. His reputation was tarnished by actions that pissed off the elite class and persecuting Christians. Even a few historians of the era mentioned that elites loved to slander Nero for no real reason, and he was popular enough among the people that multiple pretenders to the throne claiming to be Nero showed up, which was not a common thing. Sounds to me like the only young guy to get power and not abuse it was Scipio. Everyone else turned abusers/murderers as soon as they could.... Maybe Alexander Severus too?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:21 |
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Augustus deserves honorable mention for doing such a good job of youthfully abusing his power that he lived to be old and relatively chill
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:23 |
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Angry Salami posted:Trump being attacked by a bald eagle named Uncle Sam was clearly a metaphor, and you'd have to be a complete idiot to take it literally! Just in case a future historian reads this... This really did happen. It's not a metaphor, it's not an abstract concept. Please if you only believe one thing from the 21st century, believe this one because this really did happen. Thank you and Sorry for not having taken Global Warming more seriously while we could.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:24 |
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Dalael posted:Sounds to me like the only young guy to get power and not abuse it was Scipio. Everyone else turned abusers/murderers as soon as they could.... Scipio was never emperor so I'm not including him. Severus Alexander was one of the better teenage emperors. There were a few who weren't complete disasters, but as a general rule don't give imperial authority to teenagers. It usually doesn't go well, either for the obvious reasons of giving imperial authority to a teenager, or the court intrigue that surrounds a weak ruler.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:36 |
Starpluck posted:Are there any references to the reign of Tutankhamun that discusses issues other than the treasures in his tomb? I am looking for an informative resource regarding this Pharaoh and I can't find anything. How is a permabanned guy posting?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:38 |
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Grand Fromage posted:Medicine depends on what exactly was wrong. As far as injuries go, Roman doctors had a ton of experience and knowledge, as well as a reasonably good understanding of the body that wasn't surpassed until the Renaissance. Their tools were essentially identical to a surgical kit today, we have some solid explanations of techniques that make sense, and there's evidence from bodies of some pretty gnarly surgeries that the people survived. Impressive! I really wish the importance of hygiene in surgery had made it out of the Roman period.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:47 |
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Nebakenezzer posted:Impressive! I really wish the importance of hygiene in surgery had made it out of the Roman period. Yeah, we have the bodies of gladiators that even show wounds to the bone that had healed. If you got hosed up, Romans could fix you up, within obvious limits of not having modern mediciene. You might have to endure surgery with nothing more than booze as an aneasthetic but you had a decent chance of surviving.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:50 |
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They could also do poo poo you would not imagine working. We have skulls of people who had successful brain surgery and there's writing about cataract surgeries, though no way to verify those since there's no bone evidence. If you want to survive getting stabbed by a big ol sword anywhere in the premodern world, you probably want a Roman doctor. That said of course, all medicine before the understanding of germs and antiseptics was best avoided.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:56 |
Trephination's been pretty widely known, somehow.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 21:57 |
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Starpluck posted:Are there any references to the reign of Tutankhamun that discusses issues other than the treasures in his tomb? I am looking for an informative resource regarding this Pharaoh and I can't find anything. I thought one of the whole things about the treasures was that he was an utterly unimportant Pharaoh that did nothing of note and yet even he gets buried with so much cool poo poo
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:02 |
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My understanding is also that Tut was an irrelevant figure and only famous because his tomb was intact. The traditional religion was restored under him to erase the whole Akhenaten incident, but that would've happened no matter who it was. I'm not aware of anything else of importance that happened during his reign.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:05 |
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Koramei posted:I thought one of the whole things about the treasures was that he was an utterly unimportant Pharaoh that did nothing of note and yet even he gets buried with so much cool poo poo Do you think he may have asked for a smaller tomb? That would indicate he was a good King.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:06 |
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King tut recently covered by in our time https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000cng6
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:08 |
Grand Fromage posted:My understanding is also that Tut was an irrelevant figure and only famous because his tomb was intact. The traditional religion was restored under him to erase the whole Akhenaten incident, but that would've happened no matter who it was. I'm not aware of anything else of importance that happened during his reign. Yep. The vast majority of tombs with serious wealth in them got plundered almost immediately after they were sealed, sometimes by the very same guys who sealed them up (since obviously they would know where a big stash of treasure just got buried). Even that one was robbed at least twice and sealed back up afterward.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:17 |
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Good thing the Great Pyramid of Giza has a secret void that is 100% full of riches and the real mummy
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:18 |
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euphronius posted:King tut recently covered by in our time On 13:48 it mentions how his tomb was robbed in antiquity. The modern-curse associated with Tutankhamun has been generally debunked as myth when compared to the number of deaths and the number of people who visited his tomb back in 1922. What if, the people who were cursed were not simply visitors of the tomb, but rather people who actually stole something back in 1922? Recall the time period then was highly unregulated and not like today where it would be impossible to steal from a newly discovered tomb. Perhaps this can explain the intermittent deaths associated with the excavation of the tomb?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:18 |
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Starpluck posted:Do you think he may have asked for a smaller tomb? That would indicate he was a good King. No, it really looks like he died unexpectedly young and they just threw together what they had for the tomb.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:18 |
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Hmm. Mummy curses aren’t real.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:19 |
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euphronius posted:King tut recently covered by in our time King Tut, definitely somebody who was around in our time
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:20 |
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Grand Fromage posted:They could also do poo poo you would not imagine working. We have skulls of people who had successful brain surgery and there's writing about cataract surgeries, though no way to verify those since there's no bone evidence. If you want to survive getting stabbed by a big ol sword anywhere in the premodern world, you probably want a Roman doctor. Yeah Roman surgeons could allegedly perform phlebectomies to remove varicose veins, which is both impressive and horrifying to imagine.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:24 |
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Roman surgical tools. I am not a surgeon but have read from surgeons that all of these are immediately recognizable tools and more or less identical to what's in use today. Which isn't that surprising given anatomy hasn't changed, but they knew what they were doing.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:28 |
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The guy who got the surgery only got it on one leg though: it hurt too much to be worth doing the other
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:29 |
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Gaius Marius had varicose vein surgery if I remember right.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:30 |
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Grand Fromage posted:No, it really looks like he died unexpectedly young and they just threw together what they had for the tomb. If you were King, would you ask for a modest tomb or would you appear to compensate and ask for a tomb that you could get lost in? If I were King, I wouldn't ask for a large tomb, why is the idea of asking for a humble tomb seem unreasonable to some?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:32 |
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Because it's not about you. It's about the authority of the state and the authority of the role of the king. A modest tomb is announcing that the king isn't important and the state is unable/unwilling to provide. When you become king/emperor/whatever, your private existence and desires end. You are performing a function for the benefit of society. Bad rulers are the ones who are thinking about their own personal desires over those of the state. You have a grand tomb not because you want to show how big your dick is, but to show how big your empire's collective dick is.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:37 |
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dD12aw5KYug
Starpluck fucked around with this message at 09:23 on Oct 29, 2021 |
# ? Feb 24, 2020 22:45 |
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Starpluck posted:Then just ban me and let this small post be my tomb. Aren't you... already banned...?
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 23:18 |
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Supposed to be, it seems. I have asked the admins what's going on.
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# ? Feb 24, 2020 23:20 |
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chitoryu12 posted:How is a permabanned guy posting? Mummy's curse
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# ? Feb 25, 2020 00:06 |
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FreudianSlippers posted:Mummy's curse We never should have unearthed Pharoah Radium II.
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# ? Feb 25, 2020 00:30 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 04:14 |
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I'm the miniature spade in the top right
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# ? Feb 25, 2020 02:38 |