Full disclosure: When this editor read the Golden Compass, he had no idea that an antikythera was an actual real-world object. Sue me.
A post on Greek Reporter says that scientists have solved the secret of the ancient mechanism, with which users could predict astronomical positions and eclipses decades in advance. Using the one-third of parts found and contemporaneous written descriptions engraved on the mechanism itself, researchers from University College London used 3D modeling to recreate a complete antikythera.
The complete device is staggeringly more complex than researchers ever envisioned, and required advanced astronomy, mathematics, metallurgy, and engineering in its creation. In essence, it’s a 2200 year old computer.
What ideas does this prompt? What additional discoveries might scientists make about the antikythera? How might history have changed had this technology not been lost for centuries? Who created it and how? What happens next?
