Egyptian discovery found in grand canyon suppressed?
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clubs_stink
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I do recall being quite impressed with the citations on this guy's site, I will try to find a link. He certainly was not fly by night.Digit wrote:I've heard it before Clubs. The evidence for being Jewish is quite stron but rest is abit of a pule. The route he took certainly suggests he knew where he was going, but he carried a letter to the Great Khan and a Chinese speaker. Did he con himself or everybody else?
I haven't seen this information before, and I don't think it was on the main news page either..but it is certainly interesting.
http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_143121108.html
speaking of hugging the coast...I'd think (imagining myself an explorer) that one would hug the coast if one was searching for or mapping/charting what they found. NOT that it was impossible for them to take a more direct route or that they would be cowards for coast hugging, but that they were DISCOVERING the land and area. Certainly on other trips they would have used more direct routes.
Actually Clubs for charting you would not hug the coast. You would measure angles and work by triangulation and a long base line increases accuracy. It depends of course what individuals mean by 'hugging'.
Where I live is on the coast of a semi circular bay and you can see by the color of the water that the bay is shallow to well out at sea. Sea going vessels pass some miles from the coast, also the prevailing wind is on shore, death to a sailing ship!
Where I live is on the coast of a semi circular bay and you can see by the color of the water that the bay is shallow to well out at sea. Sea going vessels pass some miles from the coast, also the prevailing wind is on shore, death to a sailing ship!
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Rokcet Scientist
In the absence of navigational tools – imo anything preceding the holocene – wannabe sailors need to be 'hugging the coast' to stay within sight of major landmarks for orientation. That would mean 5 to 10 miles out to sea max. And it had to be all within a halfday's sailing, because at night, disoriented, sailing was impossible.
Chubs is right, there is a big difference between a voyage of discovery and one meant to just get some place. ‘Hugging” the coast is staying close enough the see landmarks, find river outlets, etc but still not run aground. You draw maps of what you see and make notes of the locations.
Once those locations are made known it is possible to figure out the most efficient way to get there. Not always the most direct. Winds and currents can make a “long way around” the best.
Out of sight of land sailing is better at night because of being able to use the stars for navigation. Much more accurate then just a single noon sighting during the day. It was not uncommon to get into a kind of holding area off a intended location at night, then wait until daytime to come in.
Once those locations are made known it is possible to figure out the most efficient way to get there. Not always the most direct. Winds and currents can make a “long way around” the best.
Out of sight of land sailing is better at night because of being able to use the stars for navigation. Much more accurate then just a single noon sighting during the day. It was not uncommon to get into a kind of holding area off a intended location at night, then wait until daytime to come in.
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clubs_stink
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If I din't know or wasn't sure where I was going I'd hug the coast and map it, if I KNEW where I was going or at least thought I did, I'd strike out the fastest way. That sort of lends creedence to the idea that Columbus knew where he was going, but his ego took the map he had available to him and he thought, " that guy is wrong, it's the Indies, not some unknown place."kbs2244 wrote:Chubs is right, there is a big difference between a voyage of discovery and one meant to just get some place. ‘Hugging” the coast is staying close enough the see landmarks, find river outlets, etc but still not run aground. You draw maps of what you see and make notes of the locations.
Once those locations are made known it is possible to figure out the most efficient way to get there. Not always the most direct. Winds and currents can make a “long way around” the best.
Out of sight of land sailing is better at night because of being able to use the stars for navigation. Much more accurate then just a single noon sighting during the day. It was not uncommon to get into a kind of holding area off a intended location at night, then wait until daytime to come in.
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Rokcet Scientist
You infer that if they could see the sky they could navigate at night. Navigating at night requires knowledge and understanding of 'moving stars' and some sort of time keeping.Digit wrote:Agreed. Assuming they couldn't see the sky and hadn't yet invented the sea anchor of course.
I very much doubt that pre-holocene man had conceptual knowledge and understanding like that – not to mention time keeping!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigation ... navigation
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Minimalist
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We're running a couple of ideas together here.
Voyages of discovery are one thing. Mundane commerce along a well-defined sea lane is something else.
Voyages of discovery are one thing. Mundane commerce along a well-defined sea lane is something else.
Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed.
-- George Carlin
-- George Carlin
True for that far back.
I am talking in the European, "historical" time frame. Latitude was easy if you could see the North Star or the Southern Cross. Rediscovering longitude was a problem until they got good, portable clocks. The traditional way to find a place was to get on the right latitude, then sail east or west until you got there.
That was CC big problem. He believed, based on all kinds of new and old evidence, that the Earth was round. He was just way off on big around it was. He had no idea he would bump into something on his way to China.
His maps were of the China coast. That was what he was expecting.
He was pretty quick to adapt to the unexpected stuff that he learned, however.
That ability may have been in his genes. Most historians believe he was a good Catholic. But two or three generations back, his family was faced with the somewhat familiar problem of “convert or die or leave”.
Since they were pretty well off, and didn’t want to leave or die, they converted. They may have kept some of the old traditions alive though. I remember seeing a TV story about how, even today, in Mexico, some families still practice Jewish festivals. Often in secrete, and some not knowing what they are doing, but doing it because it is a “family tradition”.
I am talking in the European, "historical" time frame. Latitude was easy if you could see the North Star or the Southern Cross. Rediscovering longitude was a problem until they got good, portable clocks. The traditional way to find a place was to get on the right latitude, then sail east or west until you got there.
That was CC big problem. He believed, based on all kinds of new and old evidence, that the Earth was round. He was just way off on big around it was. He had no idea he would bump into something on his way to China.
His maps were of the China coast. That was what he was expecting.
He was pretty quick to adapt to the unexpected stuff that he learned, however.
That ability may have been in his genes. Most historians believe he was a good Catholic. But two or three generations back, his family was faced with the somewhat familiar problem of “convert or die or leave”.
Since they were pretty well off, and didn’t want to leave or die, they converted. They may have kept some of the old traditions alive though. I remember seeing a TV story about how, even today, in Mexico, some families still practice Jewish festivals. Often in secrete, and some not knowing what they are doing, but doing it because it is a “family tradition”.
I'll hazard a guess RS that you live in an urban area. My wife was city born and bred and she was amazed how bright the night sky is when there is no light pollution. In fact we have many millions of people here who apparently have never seen the Milky Way.
I live near the coast and night or day the sky dominates everything and in the northern hemisphere the Pole star was almost certainly known to all for many thousands of years.
And in any case, a sea anchor would hold reasonbly well at night.
Please do not assume that if there is something that you or I can not accomplish means that nobody else can.
I live near the coast and night or day the sky dominates everything and in the northern hemisphere the Pole star was almost certainly known to all for many thousands of years.
And in any case, a sea anchor would hold reasonbly well at night.
Please do not assume that if there is something that you or I can not accomplish means that nobody else can.
Digit:
A sea anchor is not a big deal.
Just draging a long rope will slow you down and point you out of the wind very well.
It is not so much an object to be invented as it is an idea to get your brain around. Once you have the concept, many things will do the job. You are inducing drag to slow you down. It is not meant to hold you in one place so much as it is to keep correctly oreinted to the wind.
Heavy weather sailing is often a balance between how little sail to put up and how much rope to put out.
Done right you will sail downwind between the waves and avoid cresting the one in front or being cought by the one behind. In real bad weather, it is not unusal to have no sail up and over a half mile of rope out.
A sea anchor is not a big deal.
Just draging a long rope will slow you down and point you out of the wind very well.
It is not so much an object to be invented as it is an idea to get your brain around. Once you have the concept, many things will do the job. You are inducing drag to slow you down. It is not meant to hold you in one place so much as it is to keep correctly oreinted to the wind.
Heavy weather sailing is often a balance between how little sail to put up and how much rope to put out.
Done right you will sail downwind between the waves and avoid cresting the one in front or being cought by the one behind. In real bad weather, it is not unusal to have no sail up and over a half mile of rope out.
Quite KB, so at night, providing the wind isn't blowing towards the land not seeing the sky is just a matter of awaiting the dawn.
I can't believe that it took thousands of years to find some of these thing out.
Even those early men with little knowledge of the sea should have known about the Pole star.
Strangly KB, in Britain and the US the method you mentioned,
The first man to sail single handedly around the world was, as you probably know, Sir Francis Chichester. Prior to that he was a pioneering aviator and he used the sailing method to find tiny land falls. The idea was considered so notable he was awarded (I think) the Henry the Navigator Medal.
Unfortunate Wiley Post apparently was unaware of the idea.
I can't believe that it took thousands of years to find some of these thing out.
Even those early men with little knowledge of the sea should have known about the Pole star.
Strangly KB, in Britain and the US the method you mentioned,
was unknown for many years to anybody but sailors.The traditional way to find a place was to get on the right latitude, then sail east or west until you got there.
The first man to sail single handedly around the world was, as you probably know, Sir Francis Chichester. Prior to that he was a pioneering aviator and he used the sailing method to find tiny land falls. The idea was considered so notable he was awarded (I think) the Henry the Navigator Medal.
Unfortunate Wiley Post apparently was unaware of the idea.
Actually, Digit, the trick of finding a latitude and then just going east or west may have been used by the Arab caravans for crossing the Sahara. Like the oceans it was pretty much “trackless”.
They traveled at night not only to avoid the heat, but to see the stars.
But other than them and their “ships of the desert” (so named not because of their swaying motion but because of the lack of landmarks where they were used) it does seem to be a waterman’s trick.
After all, when on land you can draw maps, write down landmarks, and locations don’t move on you. It is a whole lot easier.
They traveled at night not only to avoid the heat, but to see the stars.
But other than them and their “ships of the desert” (so named not because of their swaying motion but because of the lack of landmarks where they were used) it does seem to be a waterman’s trick.
After all, when on land you can draw maps, write down landmarks, and locations don’t move on you. It is a whole lot easier.