is followed by the above.
In fact, the development of astronomy is not only crucial to agriculture and mathematics, but also indispensable for navigation. In ancient and early medieval times, it was impossible to accurately calculate distance and direction in the sea without accurate navigation charts and navigation equipment. At that time, navigation mainly relied on personal experience, wind direction, tides, ocean currents, and depth of offshore waters. Fish, birds, and marine animals found in specific waters were based on coastal characteristics and even from rocks, sand or mud at the bottom of the ship. Of course, there were many other difficulties to limit human distant navigation, such as wooden hulls could not resist the erosion of shipworms, food could not be stored for a long time, and the hygiene and living conditions on the ship were very poor. In short, the long-distance ocean navigation was very dangerous at that time, and if you were not careful, you would be buried at the bottom of the sea.
After the 11th century, astronomy began to be applied to navigation, and people navigate by observing the height of the noon sun, the North Stars or the relative orientation of stars in the sky.
The brightest star in the night sky, the North Star
12th century China invented the compass and applied it to navigation. The compass was introduced to Arabia in the 13th century, and the compass was introduced to Europe in the 14th century, and the compass was introduced to Europe from Arabia in the 15th century, and European navigators had generally used the compass. The application of
compass in navigation is revolutionary. It allows boats that could only travel during the day to travel at night. More importantly, it greatly improves the safety of maritime navigation and plays an irreplaceable role in geographical discovery and promoting maritime trade.
empty words. For example, in 1453, Constantinople was defeated by Ottoman Turkey, and the trade between the East and the West was monopolized by the Arab world. The West wanted to open up a new waterway to the East. The navigator at that time Columbus thought that since the earth was round, if it could go east, and in turn, it wouldn't it be possible to reach the destination? As a result, he discovered the New World of America. Without the compass, Columbus's idea would not be implemented.
Let me say that even with a compass, people mainly sail on fixed routes along the monsoon and ocean currents. If you want to explore freely from the coastline and explore the ocean, you must know your latitude and longitude. It is easier to measure the latitude. Use a rope to tie a piece of wood, and then use this vertical rope to measure the angle with a certain celestial body to know the latitude. However, how to accurately measure longitude has always troubled navigators, because there must be an instrument that can accurately time the sea, which cannot be done with the technology at that time.
In order to solve this problem, all major European sailing countries have issued high rewards.
British Parliament even set up a special ocean longitude committee in 1714. This committee provided a bonus of 20,000 pounds for a timing system with an accuracy of less than 30 miles. This was an astronomical figure at that time. At that time, ordinary British people earned less than 10 pounds a year, as the saying goes, rewards are a miracle.
1765, British watchmaker John Harrison spent forty years making astronomical clock , thus winning the prize.
So far, humans have established an spherical coordinate system on the earth. The difficulty of ocean navigation has been reduced by several levels, and the safety factor has also risen sharply. It can be said that the invention of the astronomical clock is of epoch-making significance for ocean navigation. The only regret is that the great geographical discovery movement at this time has come to an end.
In fact, astronomical clocks are essentially a clock, but they are more complicated. They also come from the zodiac signs of ancient Babylon, which is why the clocks are displayed today are 12 hours. I wonder if you have noticed that many old-fashioned clocks have a small circle on the hour hands, which actually represents the sun. The dial of the clock actually simulates the change in the position of the sun around the rotation of the earth.
It is precisely in order to make this little sun move that Western scientists have successively invented pendulums, clockwork, and complex gear + connecting rod transmission systems.
The most critical component of the Watt steam engine is the gear + connecting rod transmission mechanism. With this rotatable transmission mechanism, the application scenario of the steam engine can be multiplied, and the automatic textile machines, trains, ships and other iconic machinery were born.
From the perspective of the development of Western science and technology, one thing is very important, that is, the inheritance of Western knowledge has not been interrupted, and there are three reasons.
- There are many Western countries, and exchanges between various countries are very frequent. Local wars have destroyed the inheritance of the place, and the inheritance of other countries is still there.
- Although Europe is the region with the most frequent wars in humans, religion has always been stable, and religious forces have retained scientific inheritance for the West.
- The Arab world has preserved the ancient Greek and Roman civilization fire for the West, and specifically referred to the century-old translation movement.
But in contrast, China has done very poorly in this regard. Although China's culture and historical heritage are excellent, science and technology are considered to be strange and lewd skills and are classified into the lowest level.
To give a few examples, the core structure of modern clocks is escapement , and the Western escapement is William of the British in 1670. Clement invented, but the water transport instrument meter 4 created by 1088 in the Northern Song Dynasty and the water transport instrument meter 4 created by Han Gonglian and others have used the escape structure, which was six hundred years earlier than the West. However, from the creation of the water transport instrument to the destruction of the Song and Jin War, the water transport instrument only lasted for 37 years. At the time of the Southern Song Dynasty , the imperial court wanted to remade a water transport instrument, but it could not be done. It was not until 1958 that the new China was remade successfully. In fact, there are still many such things in which a wheel was repeated.
Remade Sinan story. When the Sino-Soviet diplomatic relations was established, Guo Moruo was hosted to replicate the four major inventions for the Soviet Union, papermaking, movable type printing, gunpowder were all very simple to copy. Only Sinan puts a disk and a spoon, which seems to be the simplest thing. After replicating, it was impossible to guide the guide. At that time, researchers did not find Sinan's production method after searching through history books. Many ancient Chinese documents are like this. For example, although historical documents record Zu Chongzhi calculates the seven decimal places after the pi, it does not record his calculation method. This is a tragedy without inheritance.
