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Elaboration 54
Naturally, little boys and grown-ups in Homer's days must
have observed drops of water on their own skin (swimming,
bathing, etc.) and the magnification by them. Real interesse
also would soon lead to dissecting (sacrificial) animal's
eyes. In bright daylight, when one looks at another person's eye from the side on, one can clearly see what a lens is
like. Besides, coin makers even actually 'used' drops of
water to examine their products. A glassy substance was
amply possible in the days of Cicero. The same goes for
printing. Herodotus mentioned Croesus as having known
coinage, there were seals in existence, all of which 'is'
printing. Wells even wonders why in Alexandria nobody set
himself to invent a rolling mechanism for their clumsy
books, avoiding the sweaty fingers that had to roll on and
off in order to find a certain passage. A simple wooden
case with two axles could have done the trick. No wonder
Democritus had to laugh. Wells also paints accurately the
result of the absence of printing for tedious tasks in the
copying of books (by slaves). Even in the case of pictures
(maps, etc.) could they not have invented a wooden stamp of
some sort? Natural inquisitiveness was practically dead in
Herodotus' time. The two necessities for it, leisure time
and general absence of the pressure by overpopulation (war)
were either allocated to a few or not at all. Without continuous war,
war-threat or armistice, like we still suffer
from today, all persons could have been fed and clothed by
co-operative work of six months per year. The estimate for
today may be even four or three months. But then, we must
have (mentally) different humans.
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Ven
2007-09-11