Archaeology: Reading Ancient Texts With Cutting Edge Technology
Recent advances in artificial intelligence and computation have enabled an impossible feat dreamed about for thousands of years – the recovery of lost texts from antiquity. In this talk, we will describe how a library destroyed in the famous eruption of Mount Vesuvius is on track to being understood after 1700 years underground and 270 years of mostly failed attempts. Combining high resolution synchrotron X-ray CT scanning and a race to develop software, the effort yielded thousands of characters on Epicurean philosophy, with the promise of millions more to come.About the speakers:
Casey Handmer is the founder of Terraform Industries, a company building synthetic natural gas from sunlight and air. He has worked on optics, gravitation, magnetic machinery, astrophysics, GPS, planetary mapping, and scrolls.Julian Schilliger is a Digital Archeologist. Digital archeology started for him as a balance during his studies at ETH Zurich (BSc Computer Science, MSc Robotics) and became a full-time job after winning the Vesuvius Challenge. He develops software that restores CT scans of ancient, rolled-up scrolls. He enjoys working with visual computing, machine learning and algorithms of all kinds. He develops new algorithms most efficiently outdoors in nature, for example on a hike.
Youssef Nader is an Egyptian computer scientist and a PhD student at the Freie University of Berlin, working on explainable AI and self-supervised learning. In 2023, Youssef led the Vesuvius Grand Prize winning team and developed 3D image segmentation models capable of retrieving more than 2,000 characters from ancient burnt scrolls.
- SRF Einstein – Römische Geschichte – Teil 1 (7.11.2024) – Mit dieser tödlichen Waffe eroberte das Römische Reich die Schweiz
- SRF Einstein – Römische Geschichte – Teil 2 (14.11.2024) – Neue Erkenntnisse über die Eroberung der Schweizer Alpen
Im idyllischen Bündner Oberhalbstein, in der Nähe von Savognin, könnte eine wichtige Schlacht der römischen Geschichte stattgefunden haben. Die Legionen Roms sind bekannt für ihre dokumentierten Feldzüge, doch die Eroberung der Alpen im Jahr 15 vor Christus liegt teilweise noch immer im Dunkeln. Das ändert sich allerdings gerade: Neue archäologische Funde im Bündnerland brachten Waffenteile, Katapultgeschosse, Schuhnägel, Artefakte und hunderte Schleuderbleie zutage. «Einstein» begleitet die Forschenden bei ihrer Suche nach Spuren aus der Vergangenheit. Und dabei stehen im ersten Teil dieser zweiteiligen Serie vor allem die Schleuderbleie im Fokus. Die auf dem Schlachtfeld gefundenen Bleie erzählen eine überraschende Geschichte über eine Waffe der Römer, über die man erst wenig weiss.
Julius Caesar is the most famous Roman of them all: brutal conqueror, dictator and victim of a gruesome assassination on the Ides of March 44 BC. 2,000 years on, he still shapes the world. He has given us some political slogans we still use today (Crossing the Rubicon), his name lives on in the month of July, and there is nothing new about Vladmir Putin’s carefully cultivated military image, and no real novelty in Donald Trump’s tweets and slogans.
Mary Beard is on a mission to uncover the real Caesar, and to challenge public perception. She seeks the answers to some big questions. How did he become a one-man ruler of Rome? How did he use spin and PR on his way to the top? Why was he killed? And she asks some equally intriguing little questions. How did he conceal his bald patch? Did he really die, as William Shakespeare put it, with the words Et tu, Brute on his lips? Above all, Mary explores his surprising legacy right up to the present day. Like it or not, Caesar is still present in our everyday lives, our language, and our politics. Many dictators since, not to mention some other less autocratic leaders, have learned the tricks of their trade from Julius Caesar.
Ein Buch für eine halbe Ewigkeit: der Papyrus aus dem 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. mit Versen aus zwei verlorenen Stücken von Euripides.
88 Theaterstücke hat Euripides geschrieben, 19 sind erhalten. Ein in Ägypten gefundener Text gibt jetzt Einblick in zwei verlorene Werke des griechischen Dichters aus dem 5. Jahrhundert v. Chr.
Quelle: NZZ, 4.11.2024: Art. : Mordende Mütter, wahnsinnige Könige: Ein neu entdeckter Papyrus enthält 97 Verse aus bisher unbekannten Tragödien von Euripides. (Autor: Heinz Hofmann, Prof. em. für lateinische Philologie an der Universität Tübingen.)
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