IIRC, the aeolipile provided less than 1⁄100,000th of the torque provided by Watt’s steam engine. Practical steam engines are orders of magnitude more complex than Hero’s toy steam turbine. It took a century or more of concerted effort on the part of inventors to develop them.
The whole point here is the idea that society was simply not ready for such innovations. Who needs steam power? You have cheap slaves. Plenty of them. Glorious Roman steel can even bring you more, and so on.
This is not about pure mechanics or mathematics. This is about social development. Civilsational development.
What “civilizational development”, as you refer to it, would you say that The Netherlands lacked during the Dutch Golden Age? What hindered them from industrializing 200 years before England?
Dutch? We are talking about Late antiquity. Again, my point is that Roman empire was a totally different world. In all senses.
About the Netherlands. Do not understand your question. I do not know a lot about Dutch trade empire, but my knowledge is sufficient to conclude that they were a technological leader. Their emipre stretched from Moluccas to South Africa, they basically invented capitalism as it is and created first full-time stock exchange.
But the idea of steam-powered engine was not unknown to Greek philosophers. Of course it was just a mere toy. Still, first commercially developed steam engine (James Watt) had, as far as I remember, something like 1,5 percent of energy conversion efficiency.
IIRC, the aeolipile provided less than 1⁄100,000th of the torque provided by Watt’s steam engine. Practical steam engines are orders of magnitude more complex than Hero’s toy steam turbine. It took a century or more of concerted effort on the part of inventors to develop them.
The whole point here is the idea that society was simply not ready for such innovations. Who needs steam power? You have cheap slaves. Plenty of them. Glorious Roman steel can even bring you more, and so on.
This is not about pure mechanics or mathematics. This is about social development. Civilsational development.
What “civilizational development”, as you refer to it, would you say that The Netherlands lacked during the Dutch Golden Age? What hindered them from industrializing 200 years before England?
Turns out ACOUP’s last week post is precisely about this question. https://acoup.blog/2022/08/26/collections-why-no-roman-industrial-revolution/
I swear half my comments on the Internet these days are just links to that blog...
Dutch? We are talking about Late antiquity. Again, my point is that Roman empire was a totally different world. In all senses.
About the Netherlands. Do not understand your question. I do not know a lot about Dutch trade empire, but my knowledge is sufficient to conclude that they were a technological leader. Their emipre stretched from Moluccas to South Africa, they basically invented capitalism as it is and created first full-time stock exchange.
Please elaborate what do you want to ask here.
But the idea of steam-powered engine was not unknown to Greek philosophers. Of course it was just a mere toy. Still, first commercially developed steam engine (James Watt) had, as far as I remember, something like 1,5 percent of energy conversion efficiency.