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From: berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Innovation in the Middle Ages and today
Message-ID: <1965@psuvax1.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 16-Jan-86 11:58:30 EST
Article-I.D.: psuvax1.1965
Posted: Thu Jan 16 11:58:30 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 18-Jan-86 17:47:37 EST
References: <28200477@inmet.UUCP> <396@ubvax.UUCP> <1346@mhuxt.UUCP>
Organization: Pennsylvania State Univ.
Lines: 32

> > Jan's right in pointing out that the deinstitutionalization (whew --
> > what a word!) of the state from antiquity to the Middle Ages was
> > a prod to local innovation.  But the other prod to innovation in
> > the Middle Ages was the development of a highly institutionalized
> > Church which preserved the learning of antiquity and built an
> > educational system, with universities at its summit, to teach and
> > expand that learning.
> > 
>     Surely you can't be talking about the same church that burned the
> library of Alexandria and tried Galileo?  Evidently not.  Just what
> church *are* you talking about?

> > Tony Wuersch
> Jeff Sonntag

Reference to the library of Alexandria is unclear.  Many people were
crediting with burning a library there.  Galileo was not tried during
the Middle Ages, but during Renessaince, when the church was not the
only center for learning anymore.

However, the Latin could be forgotten if not the Irish monks, who
were spared by the wars between barbarians.  Then for several centuries
the only education was provided by Church.  Characteristically,
Copernicus was a priest, and so were many logicians, matematicians,
historians etc.

Still, many innovations were made in a completely barbaric setting,
and other were made within trade assotiations and alike.
There was nothing like a doctor of industrial sciences who developed
a windmill.

Piotr Berman