How advanced could Roman technology have gotten?

[acgoldis]

Could Heron's engine have been scalable and made something other than a toy? What about other technologies that appeared in the Middle Ages (or maybe in China at the time)?

The thing that prompted this was this Facebook post:

Do you know why the Romans didn't invent electronics? They messed up the equations:

1. The voltage V was always 5.
2. The current I was always 1. Squaring the current produced 2, not 1.
3. The inductance L was always 50.
4. The capacitance C was always 100.
5. The resistance R (V/I) was always 5.
6. There was a tendency for the variable x to be interpreted as 10.
7. Multiplying current by voltage could produce either 4 or 6 depending on whether the scribe was a righty or a lefty.

 

[Claudius]

Could Heron's engine have been scalable and made something other than a toy? What about other technologies that appeared in the Middle Ages (or maybe in China at the time)?

The thing that prompted this was this Facebook post:

Do you know why the Romans didn't invent electronics? They messed up the equations:

1. The voltage V was always 5.
2. The current I was always 1. Squaring the current produced 2, not 1.
3. The inductance L was always 50.
4. The capacitance C was always 100.
5. The resistance R (V/I) was always 5.
6. There was a tendency for the variable x to be interpreted as 10.
7. Multiplying current by voltage could produce either 4 or 6 depending on whether the scribe was a righty or a lefty.

That's so bad that it has a certain grandeur

 

[B-29_Bomber]

Don't trust Facebook.

They're almost always full of shit.

 

[wcv215]

The thing that prompted this was this Facebook post:

Do you know why the Romans didn't invent electronics? They messed up the equations:

First, that's amazing.

Second, it does actually (accidentally) bring up a major problem of the Romans, their numbering system really was garbage for advanced mathematics. For anything serious you really need the concept of 0 as an actual number rather than just as nothing.

 

[Emperor Norton I]

Technology as a concept of human development is an illusion. Technology exists on the basis of addressing needs and interests of the period, and evolving to address them, in tandem with economics, rather than existing simply for itself. If a need or desire is addressed properly by existing means, a technology will not develop. Need and desire is the horse, and technology is the cart. In brief, there is a concept that civilization is an upward development towards spaceships with certain steps that demonstrate progress, which is really no more true than the idea that evolution means a turtle will evolve into a human. Our technologies as we saw them is just what it happened to look like with the way things went.

 

[RamscoopRaider]

Heron's engine was not really scaleable from what I recall

Even if it was Rome's problem was that it doesn't really have the surplus to industrialize, it lacks the benefit of another 1000+ years of improvements to agriculture (better crop rotation, horse collar, heavy plow, improved crops among others) or that of the Colombian Exchange (lots of new crops). It also has poorer metallurgy than the Medieval era which would hinder making use of a steam engine. And for trade, its ships were not as efficient as later ones making transport costs higher, along with the lack of a proper horse collar hurting land transport

 

[GarethC]

If gunpowder had been known, IIRC you could get a Sten gun with Roman metallurgy.

But as RamscoopRaider says, the inefficiency of agriculture in man-hours to produce the food to feed one person is a biggie. In particular, the reliance on either slave labour (cf. Sicilian slave rebellions) and imported food (from Egypt and North Africa) mandates against seeking to vastly improve Roman agriculture through automation with draft animals, seed drills, crop rotation and the like, as it would devalue the asset holdings (i.e. field slaves) of the wealthy and the good.

 

[Krishna123]

If gunpowder had been known, IIRC you could get a Sten gun with Roman metallurgy.

But as RamscoopRaider says, the inefficiency of agriculture in man-hours to produce the food to feed one person is a biggie. In particular, the reliance on either slave labour (cf. Sicilian slave rebellions) and imported food (from Egypt and North Africa) mandates against seeking to vastly improve Roman agriculture through automation with draft animals, seed drills, crop rotation and the like, as it would devalue the asset holdings (i.e. field slaves) of the wealthy and the good.

Roman agriculture was efficient as far as it goes, it was very manpower intensive in some respects though on large estates mono-production and factory type production was common for the export market. Slave ownership outside of mines, quarries and other unpleasant occupations declined under the pre third century crisis Roman empire, due to a lack of cheap war captives. This led to a system of tenant farmers and large estates similar to the agricultural system of 18th century England but with cash crops instead of pure arable production. As the empire declined this turned into a system of serfdom without the military aspects of later European feudal system where the landowner protected his serfs from taxation and military conscription. While the state tried to protect them with barbarian mercenaries from barbarian invaders paid for by the taxes paid by the rich on imported luxury goods from the east. (only because all the poor people had either gone to the landowners for protection or joined the barbarians to escape the taxman)

 

[RamscoopRaider]

If gunpowder had been known, IIRC you could get a Sten gun with Roman metallurgy.

I'd like to see a source for the Sten gun claim. Some of the parts need high carbon steel that was only available in India at the time, from what I recall, not certain. This is of course ignoring that the techniques used to make the Sten either have not been invented yet or are not capable of being applied to iron and steel, they can be substituted for but much more labor intensive. This is ignoring that without percussion caps you can't fire it, and Nitric Acid, used to make them, was not discovered until the 1200's and not in decent purity for centuries after that

Roman Metallurgy could probably manage a matchlock, or if you allowed them to import steel from India, a flintlock. Anything greater, SOL

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

Heron's engine was not really scaleable from what I recall

No but if a practical application for steam can be found it can serve as a proof of concept to investors. It demonstrates that steam has the power to move objects.

 

[dandan_noodles]

No but if a practical application for steam can be found it can serve as a proof of concept to investors. It demonstrates that steam has the power to move objects.

Thing is, in steam engines that actually work, the steam isn't really moving objects. What's happening is that steam will gradually build up pressure, in a cylinder for instance; then cold water will call the air to rapidly condense, and the resulting change in pressure is what actually does the work. To make a steam engine like this, they would have to understand the concept of atmospheric pressure; the idea that we're all essentially swimming in a vast, invisible ocean is very counterintuitive.

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

And yet that same leap of understanding was made in the late 1600's by a society that was in many ways less advanced than that of ancient Rome.

 

[wcv215]

And yet that same leap of understanding was made in the late 1600's by a society that was in many ways less advanced than that of ancient Rome.

Such as?

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

Rome made extensive use of water power on an industrial scale. Plumbing, Hygene, Military, Medicine, social organisation were all superior to that of the 17th century. No 17th century European city could have amassed the population of Rome or Alexandria before suffering a massive epidemic to hugely reduce the numbers. Yes the Romans had poorer plows, worse ships no compass and had not explored the world ocean but taken as a whole the Empire was more advanced than Europe 1200 years after it's fall in the west. What held them back was that the universal use of slaves removed the incentive to make things less labour intensive.

 

[Nik]

IIRC, there was some spectacular use of water power, with tiers of water wheels for grinding corn...

Of course, grinding such quantities requires that much to be available at one time and in one place, with a market. Which meant grain-ships...

Slightly off-topic, but I vaguely remember a long running feud between the archaeologists who claimed many of UK's Roman forts were supplied by water, and those who said there was no evidence for the necessary river locks & weirs. The arguments died when a tenacious investigator found where the Romans *had* built locks, but not of the familiar swing-gate type. No, their design slid gates up and down a bridging frame like a guillotine or sash-window. Much, much less infrastructure required. And a logical extrapolation of field irrigation by inserting / removing a board. Also, less depth, as those Roman bargees used shallow punts rather than 'narrow-boats' or barges of the bigger continental rivers. Think Fenny Country rather than Venetian...

Back to the subject: Steam power was developed for mine-pumping, in an environment where any increase in efficiency was rapidly compounded. Mine pumping gave access to deeper, richer ore and coal seams, and an industrial 'singularity' developed...

 

[Dunning Kruger]

Rome made extensive use of water power on an industrial scale. Plumbing, Hygene, Military, Medicine, social organisation were all superior to that of the 17th century. No 17th century European city could have amassed the population of Rome or Alexandria before suffering a massive epidemic to hugely reduce the numbers. Yes the Romans had poorer plows, worse ships no compass and had not explored the world ocean but taken as a whole the Empire was more advanced than Europe 1200 years after it's fall in the west. What held them back was that the universal use of slaves removed the incentive to make things less labour intensive.

Dont underestimate the role of the printing press as a means of sharing knowledge. Having all that knowledge in Rome, Athens or Alexandria is irrelevant if the guy with the brains to make the intellectual leap doesnt know the key information because he's in Spain or England.

 

[RGB]

Plumbing, Hygene, Military, Medicine, social organisation were all superior to that of the 17th century.

In what ways were Roman medicine or military more advanced than the 17th c.

It's only arguable at a very wide stretch if you mean "they had more permanent infrastructure around". 17th c. military technology was light years ahead of the Romans.

No 17th century European city could have amassed the population of Rome or Alexandria before suffering a massive epidemic to hugely reduce the numbers.

Rome was basically constantly in conditions that could be described as epidemic and shed a mid-size city in population every year in excess deaths by some estimates. They made up for it by importing more slaves and immigrants. This is similar to how the Italian city republics operated before the black death.

but taken as a whole the Empire was more advanced than Europe 1200 years after it's fall in the west.

It wasn't? Not least because medieval Europeans had the tools to keep investigating their world and innovate really quickly, whereas the Romans had such poor understanding of both experimentation and mathematics that they barely made any progress in anything during the 300 years they hogged half of the planet's resources.

 

[wcv215]

Rome made extensive use of water power on an industrial scale. Plumbing, Hygene, Military, Medicine, social organisation were all superior to that of the 17th century. No 17th century European city could have amassed the population of Rome or Alexandria before suffering a massive epidemic to hugely reduce the numbers. Yes the Romans had poorer plows, worse ships no compass and had not explored the world ocean but taken as a whole the Empire was more advanced than Europe 1200 years after it's fall in the west. What held them back was that the universal use of slaves removed the incentive to make things less labour intensive.

So, as long as we ignore everything Europe was more advanced in the Romans were more advanced. Got it.

I’d also challenge the idea Rome was more advanced some of those areas, in particular social organization and the military (cavalry and artillery in particular here). And knowledge in Europe was more widespread as well. Not to mention VASTLY superior metallury.

 

[Halcyon Dayz]

Technology exists on the basis of addressing needs and interests of the period, and evolving to address them, in tandem with economics, rather than existing simply for itself. If a need or desire is addressed properly by existing means, a technology will not develop. Need and desire is the horse, and technology is the cart.

Sometimes inventions are made serendipitously, which then turn out to fulfill a need we didn't even know we had.

 

[Emperor Norton I]

Sometimes inventions are made serendipitously, which then turn out to fulfill a need we didn't even know we had.

But the serendipity of steam did not create industrialization, nor did such with "Baghdad Batteries" lead to an electric age.