Nearly 3,000 years ago, ancient Babylonians began one of the longest-running science experiments in history. The goal: to predict eclipses. This singular aim has driven innovation across the history of science and mathematics, from the Saros cycle to Greek geometry to Newton’s calculus to the three-body problem. Today, eclipse prediction is a precise science; NASA scientists predict eclipses hundreds of years into the future.
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Read the Quanta article “How the Ancient Art of Eclipse Prediction Became an Exact Science”:
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Chapters:
00:00 Solving the Three-Body problem is key to predicting eclipses
00:52 Importance of eclipses to ancient civilizations
01:20 The lunar phase cycles, plane of ecliptic, draconic month, anomalistic month
02:18 Discovery of the saros cycle by the Babylonians
03:34 The Antikythera mechanism encodes the saros cycle
04:22 Newton’s discoveries lead to new calculations of the eclipse
00:48 How to solve the three-body problem
05:24 NASA’s solution to the three-body problem, location of the Earth, moon and sun
06:51 JPL Development Ephemeris
07:25 Predicting future eclipses
08:14 The end of the current saros series
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