Lost Discoveries: The Ancient Roots of Modern Science--from the Babylonians to the Maya
- Book Review,
by Dick Teresi
Amazon.com
Did Nicolas Copernicus steal his notion that the earth orbited the sun from an Islamic astronomer who lived three centuries earlier? "The jury is still out," writes Dick Teresi, whose intriguing survey of the non-Western roots of modern science offers several worthy arguments that Copernicus in fact ripped off Nasir al-Din al-Tusi. Common belief is that Westerners have been the mainspring of most scientific and technical achievement, but in Lost Discoveries Teresi shows that other cultures had arrived at much of the same knowledge at earlier dates. The Babylonians were using the Pythagorean theorem at least 15 centuries before Pythagoras drew his first triangle, and in A.D. 200 a Chinese mathematician calculated an incredibly accurate value for pi. The Mayans and other Mesoamericans were outstanding sky watchers and stargazers. The greatest advances occurred in math and astronomy, though Teresi also devotes chapters to physics, geology, chemistry, technology, and even cosmology. Sometimes he is a bit overeager to ascribe great thoughts to long-dead people (he casually suggests that "many ancient cultures had inklings of quantum theory"), but on the whole his book is a reliable and fascinating guide to the unexplored field of multicultural science. --John J. Miller
From Publishers Weekly
Science journalist Teresi (coauthor of The God Particle) has combed the literature to catalogue the scientific advances made by early non-Western societies and to determine their impact on Western science. His work spans millennia and encompasses the full extent of the globe. He points out, for example, that five millennia ago the Sumerians concluded that the earth was round. He also provides information on cultures of the Middle East, India, China, Africa and Oceania, as well as a host of New World cultures, predominately those of Mesoamerica. Throughout, readers learn that scientific knowledge of various sorts in diverse forms has been a part of all cultures. In chapters on mathematics, astronomy, cosmology, physics, geology, chemistry and technology, Teresi makes a convincing argument that Western science has often been indebted to advances made elsewhere (mineralogy was studied in Africa as early as 5000 B.C.). Teresi is at his strongest in the section on mathematics, where he discusses the evolution of Arabic numerals from the ancient Indians and the earliest conceptualizations of zero and infinity. Much less compelling are his assertions that early societies foreshadowed the ideas of quantum mechanics. Although a bit uneven, Teresi offers a great deal of fascinating material largely ignored by many histories of science.Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
What a terrific read! Teresi, a reviewer, essayist, and cofounder of Omni magazine, brings to light the many fascinating advances made by ancient, non-Western cultures. If you think that modern science is rooted in the golden age of Greece, you owe it to yourself to read his book. Supported by exhaustive research and a board of expert advisers, the author details the rich intellectual gifts from peoples whose histories are often neglected by our Eurocentric culture. He explores important contributions in the areas of mathematics, astronomy, cosmology, physics, geology, chemistry, and technology made by Pacific Islanders, Africans, Chinese, Indians, Arabs, and others. While it is an excellent multidisciplinary text for college-level classes, Teresi's work will also appeal to readers interested in science and intrigued by cultural histories. Extensive notes and a selected bibliography are organized by discipline. A wonderful addition to both academic and public libraries. Denise Hamilton, Franklin Pierce Coll. Lib., Rindge, NHCopyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
This is a compendium of premodern knowledge of the natural world. Teresi structures his exploration into the science of Sumerian, Babylonian, Mayan, Chinese, and other non-European, premodern cultures around the thesis that classical Greece is not the sole fount of Western science. Certainly this pertains to mathematics--the Indians (and Mayans) invented the zero, Islamic scholars invented algebra, and the Chinese were the first to engage in observational astronomy. Teresi's presentation here is persuasive; it is also convincing when it turns to physics, chemistry, and geology, where he successfully contrasts erroneous ancient Greek ideas with better ones conceived elsewhere. On the other hand, the impression lingers that the lineage of Western science back to ancient discoveries is tenuous at best: precious few ancient ideas or inventions, Greek or otherwise, are involved in modern scientific research. Such impressions won't dampen the popularity of Teresi's tome, however, because curiosity about ancient civilizations is perennial. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
Leon Lederman Winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics and coauthor of The God ParticleWow, Teresi's Lost Discoveries is a romp through the history of mathematics, astronomy, cosmology, physics, geology, chemistry, and technology. Teresi must have pored through tons of ancient manuscripts and scholarly compendia to unearth a rich mine of historical achievements of largely non-Western civilizations that preceded and enabled the Golden Age of Greece. For science buffs who are curious about 'How do we know?' and 'How did we learn?' this is a spectacular canvas, and it illuminates the power of cultural diversity. Yes, there were peaks in the progress of science, but today science is the only universal culture, the same in the West, East, North, and South. Teresi's important book helps to explain why.
Book Description
Lost Discoveries, Dick Teresi's innovative history of science, explores the unheralded scientific breakthroughs from peoples of the ancient world -- Babylonians, Egyptians, Indians, Africans, New World and Oceanic tribes, among others -- and the non-European medieval world. They left an enormous heritage in the fields of mathematics, astronomy, cosmology, physics, geology, chemistry, and technology. The mathematical foundation of Western science is a gift from the Indians, Chinese, Arabs, Babylonians, and Maya. The ancient Egyptians developed the concept of the lowest common denominator, and they developed a fraction table that modern scholars estimate required 28,000 calculations to compile. The Babylonians developed the first written math and used a place-value number system. Our numerals, 0 through 9, were invented in ancient India; the Indians also boasted geometry, trigonometry, and a kind of calculus. Planetary astronomy as well may have begun with the ancient Indians, who correctly identified the relative distances of the known planets from the sun, and knew the moon was nearer to the earth than the sun was. The Chinese observed, reported, dated, recorded, and interpreted eclipses between 1400 and 1200 b.c. Most of the names of our stars and constellations are Arabic. Arabs built the first observatories. Five thousand years ago, the Sumerians said the earth was circular. In the sixth century, a Hindu astronomer taught that the daily rotation of the earth on its axis provided the rising and setting of the sun. Chinese and Arab scholars were the first to use fossils scientifically to trace earth's history. Chinese alchemists realized that most physical substances were merely combinations of other substances, which could be mixed in different proportions. Islamic scholars are legendary for translating scientific texts of many languages into Arabic, a tradition that began with alchemical books. In the eleventh century, Avicenna of Persia divined that outward qualities of metals were of little value in classification, and he stressed internal structure, a notion anticipating Mendeleyev's periodic chart of elements. Iron suspension bridges came from Kashmir, printing from India; papermaking was from China, Tibet, India, and Baghdad; movable type was invented by Pi Sheng in about 1041; the Quechuan Indians of Peru were the first to vulcanize rubber; Andean farmers were the first to freeze-dry potatoes. European explorers depended heavily on Indian and Filipino shipbuilders, and collected maps and sea charts from Javanese and Arab merchants. The first comprehensive, authoritative, popularly written, multicultural history of science, Lost Discoveries fills a crucial gap in the history of science.
About the Author
Dick Teresi is the author or coauthor of several books about science and technology, including The God Particle. He is cofounder of Omni magazine and has written for Discover, The New York Times Magazine, and The Atlantic Monthly, and is a frequent reviewer and essayist for The New York Times Book Review. He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts.
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