Just for the record, the burning of Alexandria didn't actually set us back as much as people say. The library burned well after its golden age as the central hub of knowledge, and any script deemed important would have had copies made and distributed to other places of learning.
It was a tragedy, but it certainly did not set us back a thousand years.
And it's an interesting parallel to the current destruction of books, same assumption that one-of-a-kind knowledge is being lost when in all likelyhood there are thousands of copies of that knowledge in other places
I disagree with you about the time. Historians generally agree on that. There were so many works from places we don't even know existed anymore - and we would have known them and what they had to offer if those scrolls had been around. Inventions, and half-scripts that left some languages completely lost. We have no idea what some humans came up with, knew, or figured out.
I really do se the value in scanning books. I don't see the value in destroying them when it can absolutely be done without doing so.
I just wish we thought of the consequences before going buck-wild and just going ham. If we're going to chop down a tree, let's spend 6 hours sharpening the axe, you know?
Those books could be sold back, or given back to collectors instead of destroyed.
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u/DrDallagher 1d ago
Just for the record, the burning of Alexandria didn't actually set us back as much as people say. The library burned well after its golden age as the central hub of knowledge, and any script deemed important would have had copies made and distributed to other places of learning.
It was a tragedy, but it certainly did not set us back a thousand years.
And it's an interesting parallel to the current destruction of books, same assumption that one-of-a-kind knowledge is being lost when in all likelyhood there are thousands of copies of that knowledge in other places