¶ Secrecy: Secrecy of Mathematical Knowledge: Navigation (2)
Index Entry
Mesopotamia. And they began to memorialize their navigational capabilities upon the land. They go up on the land and using the same kind of navigational capabilities they navigate across the land to get to the Mediterranean. Then they go northward down the Nile and they come to the Mediterranean. And there they build the same kind of boats built out of the patterns they can carry in their head. And they go on with what we call this lateen sailing in the Indian Ocean and it gets into the Mediterranean. We find, then, this navigating moving westward, and the men who became the great priests are the men who are monopolizing this very secret information which makes it possible to do this very powerful wealth making through trade which is controlled through navigation. You can take a lot of sailors to sea with you but they don’t know where they have been-- just in a lot of water. So it is very easy to keep your secret. So these navigators began to make pyramids and other forms. You will find them in India and we find in Babylon, the beginnings of our very important kind of mathematics: of the 60-degree angles, of the 360 degree concept, of the 60-minute seconds, and so forth. The first real handling of time and angles-- which are the very
