
For all the technology that will go into orchestrating the Beijing Olympics this year, a new report in British science journal Nature is reminding the world where it all began: with a 2,100-year-old gadget that tracked dates of the ancient Olympic games.Known as the Antikythera Mechanism, the astronomical calculator was discovered by divers in 1901 as one of the artifacts collected from a shipwreck off the coast of Antikythera, Greece. With its 3,000 characters and 30 gears, scientists have come to conclude that the intricate and oncetechnologically advanced device calculated moon, sun, and planet locations for specific dates.
But most recently, the Associated Press reported Wednesday, experts have deciphered the word "Olympia" on the bronze device and discovered that one of its dials kept track of the four-year cycle of the Greek Olympic games.A researcher told British paper The Daily Telegraph that the team was surprised to find that such a technologically advanced mechanism kept track of an event that could be tracked relatively easily compared with such cosmic events as eclipses. The dial, he said, served not only mathematical purposes, but also represented the harmony between technology and culture.
Deciphering
the artifact has taken many years and progressed with thehelp of
Hewlett-Packard Labs' imaging technology. The company joined the
project in 2006 with its patented reflectance imaging. The HP
researchers took photos of the Antikythera Mechanism from a fixed point
and from 50 different light sources arranged over the object. When the
images were stitched together, they produced a clearer picture of the
writing on the device.
The research team also
reported that it discovered the names of other Greek games and possible
links to the town of Greek mathematician Archimedes on the gizmo, which
is no longer whole or functioning.
But who says you can't teach a (very) old gadget new tricks?
Copyright: CNET
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