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What The Ancients Did For Us
''What the Ancients Did for Us'' is a 2005 BBC documentary series presented by Adam Hart-Davis that examines the impact of ancient civilizations on modern society. Production The series was produced in conjunction with the Open University and is a departure from the previous series not only in that each episode is an hour long rather than half an hour (though heavily edited half-hour versions have also been shown), but also in that it does not concentrate on a single period of history but rather one ancient civilization per episode including the Chinese, the Indians and the Greeks. Episodes Episode one: ''The Islamic World'' This episode features reports from Zain in Egypt, Spain and France elaborated by demonstrations from Adam Hart-Davis, Marty Jopson and expert guests that examine the ideas and inventions that emerged from the Islamic Golden Age. *The Astrolabe, demonstrated to Hart-Davis, was used by Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi and Abu-Mahmud al-Khujandi to develop Islamic a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Documentary Television Series
Television documentaries are televised media productions that screen documentaries. Television documentaries exist either as a television documentary series or as a television documentary film. *Television documentary series, sometimes called docuseries, are television series screened within an ordered collection of two or more televised episodes. *Television documentary films exist as a singular documentary film to be broadcast via a documentary channel or a news-related channel. Occasionally, documentary films that were initially intended for televised broadcasting may be screened in a cinema. Documentary television rose to prominence during the 1940s, spawning from earlier cinematic documentary filmmaking ventures. Early production techniques were highly inefficient compared to modern recording methods. Early television documentaries typically featured historical, wartime, investigative or event-related subject matter. Contemporary television documentaries have extended to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip of Palestine and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south, and Libya to the west. The Gulf of Aqaba in the northeast separates Egypt from Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Cairo is the capital and largest city of Egypt, while Alexandria, the second-largest city, is an important industrial and tourist hub at the Mediterranean coast. At approximately 100 million inhabitants, Egypt is the 14th-most populated country in the world. Egypt has one of the longest histories of any country, tracing its heritage along the Nile Delta back to the 6th–4th millennia BCE. Considered a cradle of civilisation, Ancient Egypt saw some of the earliest developments of writing, agriculture, ur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crusaders
The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were intended to recover Jerusalem and its surrounding area from Islamic rule. Beginning with the First Crusade, which resulted in the recovery of Jerusalem in 1099, dozens of Crusades were fought, providing a focal point of European history for centuries. In 1095, Pope Urban II proclaimed the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont. He encouraged military support for Byzantine emperor AlexiosI against the Seljuk Turks and called for an armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Across all social strata in western Europe, there was an enthusiastic response. The first Crusaders had a variety of motivations, including religious salvation, satisfying feudal obligations, opportunities for renown, and economic or political advantage. Later crusades were condu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran border, west, Turkmenistan to the Afghanistan–Turkmenistan border, northwest, Uzbekistan to the Afghanistan–Uzbekistan border, north, Tajikistan to the Afghanistan–Tajikistan border, northeast, and China to the Afghanistan–China border, northeast and east. Occupying of land, the country is predominantly mountainous with plains Afghan Turkestan, in the north and Sistan Basin, the southwest, which are separated by the Hindu Kush mountain range. , Demographics of Afghanistan, its population is 40.2 million (officially estimated to be 32.9 million), composed mostly of ethnic Pashtuns, Tajiks, Hazaras, and Uzbeks. Kabul is the country's largest city and ser ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Windmill
A windmill is a structure that converts wind power into rotational energy using vanes called windmill sail, sails or blades, specifically to mill (grinding), mill grain (gristmills), but the term is also extended to windpumps, wind turbines, and other applications, in some parts of the English speaking world. The term wind engine is sometimes used to describe such devices. Windmills were used throughout the High Middle Ages, high medieval and early modern periods; the horizontal or panemone windmill first appeared in Persia during the 9th century, and the vertical windmill first appeared in northwestern Europe in the 12th century. Regarded as an icon of Culture of the Netherlands, Dutch culture, there are approximately 1,000 windmills in the Netherlands today. Forerunners Wind-powered machines may have been known earlier, but there is no clear evidence of windmills before the 9th century. Hero of Alexandria (Heron) in first-century Roman Egypt described what appears to be a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Islamic Physics
The natural sciences saw various advancements during the Golden Age of Islam (from roughly the mid 8th to the mid 13th centuries), adding a number of innovations to the Transmission of the Classics (such as Aristotle, Ptolemy, Euclid, Neoplatonism).''Classical Arabic Philosophy An Anthology of Sources'', Translated by Jon McGinnis and David C. Reisman. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2007. pg. xix During this period, Islamic theology was encouraging of thinkers to find knowledge. Thinkers from this period included Al-Farabi, Abu Bishr Matta ibn Yunus, Abu Bishr Matta, Ibn Sina, al-Hassan Ibn al-Haytham and Ibn Bajjah. These works and the important commentaries on them were the wellspring of science during the medieval period. They were Transmission of the Classics, translated into Arabic language, Arabic, the ''lingua franca'' of this period. Science in medieval Islam, Islamic scholarship in the sciences had inherited Aristotelian physics from the Greeks and during the Is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ibn Al-Haytham
Ḥasan Ibn al-Haytham, Latinized as Alhazen (; full name ; ), was a medieval mathematician, astronomer, and physicist of the Islamic Golden Age from present-day Iraq.For the description of his main fields, see e.g. ("He is one of the principal Arab mathematicians and, without any doubt, the best physicist.") , ("Ibn al-Ḥaytam was an eminent eleventh-century Arab optician, geometer, arithmetician, algebraist, astronomer, and engineer."), ("Ibn al-Haytham (d. 1039), known in the West as Alhazan, was a leading Arab mathematician, astronomer, and physicist. His optical compendium, Kitab al-Manazir, is the greatest medieval work on optics.") Referred to as "the father of modern optics", he made significant contributions to the principles of optics and visual perception in particular. His most influential work is titled '' Kitāb al-Manāẓir'' (Arabic: , "Book of Optics"), written during 1011–1021, which survived in a Latin edition. Ibn al-Haytham was an early propo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Camera Obscura
A camera obscura (; ) is a darkened room with a aperture, small hole or lens at one side through which an image is 3D projection, projected onto a wall or table opposite the hole. ''Camera obscura'' can also refer to analogous constructions such as a box or tent in which an exterior image is projected inside. Camera obscuras with a lens in the opening have been used since the second half of the 16th century and became popular as aids for drawing and painting. The concept was developed further into the photographic camera in the first half of the 19th century, when camera obscura boxes were used to exposure (photography), expose photosensitivity, light-sensitive materials to the projected image. The camera obscura was used to study eclipses without the risk of damaging the eyes by looking directly into the sun. As a drawing aid, it allowed tracing the projected image to produce a highly accurate representation, and was especially appreciated as an easy way to achieve proper grap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Optical Physics
Atomic, molecular, and optical physics (AMO) is the study of matter-matter and light-matter interactions; at the scale of one or a few atoms and energy scales around several electron volts. The three areas are closely interrelated. AMO theory includes classical, semi-classical and quantum treatments. Typically, the theory and applications of emission, absorption, scattering of electromagnetic radiation (light) from excited atoms and molecules, analysis of spectroscopy, generation of lasers and masers, and the optical properties of matter in general, fall into these categories. Atomic and molecular physics Atomic physics is the subfield of AMO that studies atoms as an isolated system of electrons and an atomic nucleus, while molecular physics is the study of the physical properties of molecules. The term ''atomic physics'' is often associated with nuclear power and nuclear bombs, due to the synonymous use of ''atomic'' and ''nuclear'' in standard English. However, ph ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Islamic Geography
Medieval Islamic geography and cartography refer to the study of geography and cartography in the Muslim world during the Islamic Golden Age (variously dated between the 8th century and 16th century). Muslim scholars made advances to the map-making traditions of earlier cultures, particularly the Hellenistic geographers Ptolemy and Marinus of Tyre, combined with what explorers and merchants learned in their travels across the Old World ( Afro-Eurasia). Islamic geography had three major fields: exploration and navigation, physical geography, and cartography and mathematical geography. Islamic geography reached its apex with Muhammad al-Idrisi in the 12th century. History Islamic geography began in the 8th century, influenced by Hellenistic geography, combined with what explorers and merchants learned in their travels across the Old World ( Afro-Eurasia). Muslim scholars engaged in extensive exploration and navigation during the 9th-12th centuries, including journeys across the Mus ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Islamic Astronomy
Islamic astronomy comprises the Astronomy, astronomical developments made in the Islamic world, particularly during the Islamic Golden Age (9th–13th centuries), and mostly written in the Arabic language. These developments mostly took place in the Middle East, Central Asia, Al-Andalus, and North Africa, and later in the Far East and History of India, India. It closely parallels the genesis of other Islamic sciences in its assimilation of foreign material and the amalgamation of the disparate elements of that material to create a science with Islamic characteristics. These included Greek astronomy, Greek, Sassanid Empire, Sassanid, and Indian astronomy, Indian works in particular, which were translated and built upon. Islamic astronomy played a significant role in the revival of Byzantine science, Byzantine and Science in Medieval Western Europe, EuropeanSaliba (1999). astronomy following the Dark Ages (historiography), loss of knowledge during the early medieval period, notably ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abu-Mahmud Al-Khujandi
Abu Mahmud Hamid ibn al-Khidr al-Khojandi (known as Abu Mahmood Khojandi, Alkhujandi or al-Khujandi, Persian: ابومحمود خجندی, c. 940 - 1000) was a Muslim Transoxanian astronomer and mathematician born in Khujand (now part of Tajikistan) who lived in the late 10th century and helped build an observatory, near the city of Ray (near today's Tehran), in Iran. Astronomy Khojandi worked under the patronage of the Buwayhid Amirs at the observatory near Ray, Iran, where he is known to have constructed the first huge mural sextant in 994 AD, intended to determine the Earth's axial tilt ("obliquity of the ecliptic") to high precision. He determined the axial tilt to be 23°32'19" for the year 994 AD. He noted that measurements by earlier astronomers had found higher values (Indians: 24°; Ptolemy 23° 51') and thus discovered that the axial tilt is not constant but is in fact (currently) decreasing. His measurement of the axial tilt was however about 2 minutes too small, proba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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