history of science Archives • Richard Carrier Blogs

Three Perspectives on the Life Sciences in the Roman Empire

Richard Carrier — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 22:03:52 +0000

I teach several online courses you can join every month. Two include a history of atheism (our western freethought heritage) and a history of ancient science and technology in the West. I highly recommend you check them out. It’s a great way to get in some guided self-learning, with a whole month of being able […]

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My Monthly Recommendation: From Catapults to Computers, Excellent Gifts for the Avid Intellectual Reader!

Richard Carrier — Tue, 28 Oct 2025 20:15:48 +0000

I’ve decided this month to talk about my three favorite books in ancient science. And they may surprise you! They actually cross into many different subjects that will fascinate any avid reader of history, science, or nonfiction generally. So they would make excellent surprise Christmas gifts for any such readers on your gifting list! Or […]

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My Monthly Recommendation: Sarton and Lehoux on the Whole Sweep of Ancient Science

Richard Carrier — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 14:57:51 +0000

To help make ends meet and help you understand the ancient origins of modern science better than Christians would ever let you if they had their way, each season I shall discuss a selection of books from my long-standing recommendations list on ancient science. And I am an Amazon Associate, so if you click through the sales link […]

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Ammon Hillman Is Not Telling You the Truth: The Gospels Do Not Describe Pedophilia, and No One Was Getting High on Vaginas

Richard Carrier — Mon, 01 Sep 2025 18:00:32 +0000

There is a classicist named Ammon Hillman (a.k.a. David Hillman) who wrote a decent dissertation on ancient pharmacology and then went on to make absurd claims about the Gospels and early Christianity that verge into pedophilia and an obsession with genitals. And yes, your intuition is working here: all his weird theories about this are […]

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The Weird Fruit Mystery (Correcting a Sentence in My Survey of Roman Science)

Richard Carrier — Sun, 30 Mar 2025 18:07:33 +0000

An attentive reader caught an error in my book on The Scientist in the Early Roman Empire (which was based on my Columbia university dissertation). It actually involves a Weird Fruit Mystery. So this article will serve as a corrective footnote, and a solution to the mystery! In my book I have a whole chapter […]

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My Monthly Recommendation: Ancient Science Starter Kit

Richard Carrier — Fri, 21 Mar 2025 15:28:34 +0000

Every month I will write about something I recommend buying and why. I am an Amazon Associate, so if you click through the sales link in any of these recommendation blogs (like today’s), or indeed any article or page here at all, I will get a commission on everything in your cart when you check out (even if you […]

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From Homer to Frontinus: Biased Translation Is Not Unique to Biblical Studies

Richard Carrier — Tue, 23 Jan 2024 19:48:44 +0000

I am often asked what the best Bible translation is. My usual reply is that there aren’t any. All translations are biased, they merely differ as to how or where. The best you can do is to read it in the original language (and I teach a course with a lecture on how you can […]

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Jesus Is an Extraterrestrial

Richard Carrier — Tue, 30 May 2023 17:34:00 +0000

There are two new books assessing the intersection of religion and astrophysics. Both are fantastic reads. First is Aliens and Religion: Where Two Worlds Collide, by Jonathan MS Pearce and Aaron Adair (Onus 2023), which explores the philosophical problems that “outer space” and the prospect of it being inhabited pose for all religions. But on […]

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Twelve Books at Herculaneum That Could Change History

Richard Carrier — Sat, 01 Apr 2023 04:02:13 +0000

There is a fabulous ancient treasure still buried at Herculaneum in the Bay of Naples. It is an actual ancient library that has been locked under a veritable rock of volcanic ash since 79 A.D. It likely contains thousands of scrolls, comprising hundreds of books. As I’ll explain shortly, a few hundred were recovered in […]

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What Exactly Was the Scientific Revolution?

Richard Carrier — Mon, 25 Jul 2022 00:45:14 +0000

The “Scientific Revolution” is often mentioned and discussed as a crucial development in human civilization that fundamentally changed the entire course of history. World society after and before that event looks consistently yet radically different. For thousands of years before the Scientific Revolution, Earth was essentially a world of clashing empires fighting with sword and […]

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