If the Library of Alexandria had not been destroyed Part I: If Hypatia had Lived...

For those of you who do not know, Hypatia was a Greek astronomer in Alexandria. Her prominent knowledge on conic sections notably attributes her to being one of the first to observe that the Earth revolved around the Sun in an ellipse. After her death, Ellipse- shaped orbits were not recognized until the 17th century, almost 800 years later! She excelled and was most known for her work in the fields of Mathematics, Philosophy, and Astronomy. The cause of Hypatia's death is widely attributed to the heated pressure between Prefect Orestes, and Saint Cyril of Alexandria. Had her work been complete, we may have understood the relation of the planets to the Sun in about 400 AD, give or take a few decades.

Could religion have had something to do with Hypatia's death? The answer is yes, partly due to Hypatia being a pagan in a world of Christians. The Saint is mostly to blame for her death, with the prefect being the one to blame for the Saint's actions. She was killed by Nitrian monks and Parabalani monks in AD 415.

Cyril at the time was known for being rigid and brutal in his actions, if he took any, that is. A strong belief in religion overpowered the force of science, as it has always done. This could be used for backing to state that the Church's sole purpose is to keep man behind GOD, or rather an idea used by powerful leaders to keep the masses behind. Whatever the case, The Church has always succeeded in demonstrating that they too have control in the relationship between knowledge and mankind, and that not even great political leaders are able to hold them at bay. Review

Nonetheless, man cannot survive without faith, nor science, but it seems to me that faith is starting to become too powerful too fast, to a point where only faith will determine the law, and only faith will govern our rights.

Part II: Advancement in Medicine coming soon.

The purpose of this thread is to explore the possibilty of the greek astronomer Hypatyia having lived through her life, and civilization possibly being centuries ahead of it's time.

If she have lived we would by then achieve one of the mightiest galactic civilizations . But then again we would have commit genocide against alien species

I long for the books. I don't think a year goes by without me thinking about her and the books several times. Curse the bastards who have hidden the books. Otherwise I don't know what to add but a Star and a Flag because this is a very cool topic.

reply to post by mr10k


Hypatia. What an important historical figure. And a woman to boot. One wonders,not much, how she is not better remembered in our male dominated histories.

There were tons of valuable information stored at Alexandria. All gone. Except of course for that information that was preserved within the Persian empire which finally filtered back into the closed minded European civilization. For instance our knowledge of ancient Greece. The Greeks knew the world was round and pretty much knew its size from their mathematics. All forgotten during and after the fall of the Roman Empire. We must indeed wonder how things might be different now. Maybe not at all.

Anyway I look forward to your next installment

reply to post by TerryMcGuire


Thank you, and I also wish the Library had been preserved. Who knows what accomplishments would have been made, or where we would be now. Probably cultivating other moons using sources of power unheard of, cataloging billions or even trillions of species. Ah, the ignorance of man. It really is a sad story.

Another example of that wrought by the influence of religion.

Very interesting thread. I'm looking forward to future installments.

If you haven't seen it, AGORA is a pretty good movie about her.



Christianity's spread threw us back so far.

I am afraid when the Christians figure out that the MUSLIMS have a MORE monotheistic version of their own religion, Islam will spread and then we'll go back again.

reply to post by mr10k


Who knows where we could be by now. But what happened in Alexandria is a crime against humanity. When I think of it, I think of Pythagoras' words, "When man needs laws he is no longer fit for freedom."

Mankind has repeatedly victimized itself for the personal gain of a few individuals who sought to fight the natural entropy of their span of influence. We are obviously not a species that is worthy of much, as we cannot even protect that which we already have.

Barbarians burn books.

Good times.

Alexandria undoubtedly had its VIP section for so called priests.

Divided we fall .

reply to post by mr10k

If Hypatia had Lived

She would now be roughly 2500 years old. That would one very wrinkly granny.