A while ago I read a theory that posultated something along these lines…
Pottery, and the potters wheel specifically, could operate as a crude recording device (spinning somewhat like Edison’s wax cylinder)… the upshot of which was that one could somehow “listen” to a piece of pottery and hear what was being said in the room at the time the piece was created.
Not suprisingly, this was held to be a huge boon to archeology.
I’m assuming this probably rates as some kind of pseudoscience… but is there any real basis for this? Does anyone still hold this belief or claim they have any “proof” of this phenomena?
um… that would be “postulated” not “posultated”
Wasn’t that an episode of The X-Files?
Ah, here it is.
I’ve read about it in David E.H. Jones’ Book The Inventions of Daedalus. It includes a letter by Richard G. Woodbridge, stating that he already had done research about what is described in the Daedalus column that appeared in New Scientist, 6. Feb 1969.
Searching for that name gives this page: http://members01.chello.se/christer.hamp/phono/archaeo/archaeo.html