Scope - 5 levels
In a study of Babylonian astronomy, Asger Aaboe distinguished three levels of skywatching activities, to which we can add a fourth and fifth. These levels of astronomy are as follows:
- Naming and Recognition of basic celestial phenomena.
- Recognition of various cycles, patterns, or periodic rules.
- Arithmetical schemes to predict future phenomena with minimal ongoing observational feedback (quantitative control of phenomena).
- Geometrical schemes to explain phenomena, even if only qualitatively.
- Realistic cosmological models capable of accurate predictions.
The first two levels could take place in any nomadic or settled community, and are evidenced from peoples and locations all over the globe. The first two or three levels characterize archaeoastronomy, and astronomy in Mayan and Babylonian civilizations by the time of the 4th century B.C.E. The fourth level represents early Greek astronomy and the fifth astronomy after Ptolemy in medieval Latin, Islamic, and early modern European traditions (for which see Crowe and other recommended resources in the history of science).
We will explore the skywatching practices or celestial arts of priests in their temples and ziggurats, of poets and sailors, of farmers and shepherds in their fields, of Arabian nomads in their desert caravans. That is, we will identify the basic celestial phenomena that require unsophisticated observing skills to name or to recognize.
If we were a stone age community living night after night unsheltered from the sky, all of this would be common knowledge. Knowledge of these phenomena in varying degrees would be found in almost any ancient community nearly anywhere in the world, whether literate or not -- and perhaps even in a small university town at the beginning of the third millennium.
Discussion:
Why might an average American in the 21st century be less familiar with "Basic Celestial Phenomena" than the average ancient Babylonian, Mayan or Egyptian?