Tom Wujec demos the 13th-century astrolabe

http://www.ted.com Rather than demo another new technology, Tom Wujec reaches back to one of our earliest but most ingenious devices -- the astrolabe. With thousands of uses, from telling time to mapping the night sky, this old tech reminds us that the ancient can be as brilliant as the brand-new.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at http://www.ted.com/translate. Watch a highlight reel of the Top 10 TEDTalks at http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/top10

Category:

Science & Technology

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• Tom Wujec
• TEDTalks
• TED
• Talks
• astrolabe
• technology
• history
• sky
• astronomy

[shagster1970]

To all those negative comments- What message were you expecting? I bet you didnt know of the astrolabe! I learned something therefor it was of interest. Side note: Its interesting to see the evolution of man's progress in technology. And yes - I was amazed at how they could come up with this stuff even TODAY let alone so many years ago. I would wager not a single high school (students) in the USA could create such a device today if asked.

[YoLninYo]

intellectual dishonesty at its worst! In true orientalist fashion he completely skips over the 800 years of Arab/Muslim contributions to the science of astronomy, and the development of the Astrolabe. He mentioned Chaucer and yes, Chaucer actually used an Arabic manuscript as its source.

Very dissapointed in the intellectual dishonesty of people who get to present at TED. :(

[TheDragonCael]

What the hell is with all these negative comments? Get a life, people!

[ElGatoLoco698]

Chock this up to over rated and obsolete invention. What do you do when it's cloudy? The sun dial was a much more simple and served the same purpose.

I read someone said something about wagering that not a single high school student in the USA could create such a device. Is that really important? No one could replicate the antickethereiaidikeie (spelling) device either but it doesn't matter. We've invented much easier and more accurate and more reliable methods of measuring time.

[hijirikirishima]

@megalibra82

Would this be the same Wikipedia that says it was invented by the Greeks around 150BC?

[magnetocat]

@megalibra82 he did mention that they date from ~300 BC or so.

[megalibra82]

This is an invention made by the Arabs before this 13th century English dude...check wikipediea.

[LushForests]

He could get his point across without going on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about that astrolabe

[ericsandmeyer]

Why does he assume that EVERYONE has an iPhone and a Macbook Pro? Oh, because of the audience....nevermind.

[MrFungus420]

@SingleSpiral TED

Technology

Entertainment

Design.

This is incredible technology, It is entertaining and it involves something with incredible (and beautiful, in my opinion) design.

IT fits TED perfectly.

[danmorris23]

Those are beautiful, i want one ha ha :)