> a series of trigonometry tables which scientists claim are more accurate than any available today.
Given that we are able to calculate the exact value of any trigonometric function, the above sentence is pretty meaningless. Not to mention, if we wanted to calculate any trig function to some given arbitrary precision, we can do that pretty much instantly these days.
I'm sure this is a really cool find. I just wish they'd be a little more careful with their wording.
There are two kinds of "cranks" in math and science:
1. People who are flat out nuts. Their understanding of the field is broadly wrong on many different levels.
2. People who have a good understanding of the field, but disagree with specific things that are widely accepted by mainstream practitioners. In all but that area where they disagree, they often are accomplished respected practitioners with perfectly "normal" books and papers to their credit.
These areas of disagreement are often down in the foundations of mathematics, such as over what axioms to accept, or how to construct mathematical systems.
There are often multiple ways you can axiomatize and construct mathematical systems that provide everything we normally need for most or all applications of mathematics, so often both sides in these disagreements end up with mathematical systems that are equally useful from the point of view of everyone who is not working in the foundations of mathematics.
You could have type 2 cranks in science fields outside mathematics, but I think it is much less likely than in mathematics. Those fields tend to deal with things that objectively be proven or disproven. You usually only get "coherent cranks" in those fields when a major change in how we understand something is happening.
Wait, so this fellow came up with "rational trigonometry" more than a decade ago and just happened to find a Babylonian tablet suggesting that the Babylonians used his technique? That's... awfully convenient, isn't it?
If "rational trigonometry" was something completely weird and totally out of left field, then yeah, then that would be a little unbelievable.
But really, if you think about it, measuring angles by ratios of sides of right triangles is not weird if your primary interest in measuring angles is for practical applications rather than abstract theory.
Accurate rulers are easier to make than accurate protractors, and are easier to work with on the construction site. So it would not at all be surprising if some ancient peoples worked with sides instead of angles.
Since Wildberger advocates that kind of approach to trigonometry, it makes sense that he'd recognize when someone else might be using such a system.
Without commenting on the article itself I see nothing suspicious. Indeed, he may have come up with the idea while studying some forms of ancient computation then gone looking for more evidence.
> a series of trigonometry tables which scientists claim are more accurate than any available today.
Given that we are able to calculate the exact value of any trigonometric function, the above sentence is pretty meaningless. Not to mention, if we wanted to calculate any trig function to some given arbitrary precision, we can do that pretty much instantly these days.
I'm sure this is a really cool find. I just wish they'd be a little more careful with their wording.