6th Grade Honorable Mention - Archimedes

This writing competition is difficult to judge, because many, many essays were very well researched and very well written. Spencer's essay on Archimedes must be included in the best of the best. Great Job Spencer, this is awesome. Kylie

Spencer
Ecker Hill
6th Grade

If I Could Meet Anyone...

If I could meet anyone in the world, from any country, during any time period, it would be Archimedes. I want to meet Archimedes because he is one of the greatest mathematicians of all time. Archimedes was also a physicist, engineer, inventor, and astronomer. He discovered and created many things in his lifetime. His discoveries were even more miraculous considering he lived in Ancient Greece.

I would want Archimedes to feel comfortable so I would insist we meet at Syracuse, Sicily. It is important we meet here because when he was alive people didn’t know about the new world. I wouldn’t want to overwhelm him with a lot of new sights. Archimedes lived in Syracuse for most his life. If we met there he might even be able to find some buried historical sites. I could also ease Archimedes into modern life. I wouldn’t want to take Archimedes to his house though, he was killed there by a Roman soldier who didn’t know who he was.

I would then show him modern day cars and odometers. He invented the first odometer so he would be fascinated by modern day ones. I would then show him images of outer space on the internet so he could see what astronomers now days do, him being an astronomer and all.

The first question I would ask Archimedes is, if there was anything he’d invented or discovered that was never recorded. I would ask that question because it could change history, if someone stole one of his ideas they could be credited for it. It could also change some of the modern day theories. Who know’s he may have discovered some freaky source of fuel that is twice as efficient as fossil fuels. He might have invented a machine to make metal twice as strong, it may have been destroyed when Syracuse was overrun by Romans. I would also ask him if there was anything he could tell us about history. I would ask that question because people don’t know that much about history. He might say that the Persians conquered India but where driven back by war elephants. He might say that there was actually was a library full of secret documents about Atlantis and aliens, under the Sphinx.

The third question I would ask Archimedes would be how was life in ancient Greece. This question is personal, I am really fascinated by ancient Greece and Sparta. The other two questions were for the sake of history. I’d really like to see a window into the past, he might even be able to right some really good books. We’d have to translate them from Ancient Greek into English. That question would also help more people understand Ancient Greece as well.

Those are just some of the many, many, many questions I would ask the great mathematician Archimedes, if I ever met him.

I would like Archimedes to know how his life changed history. Archimedes changed the world in many ways, probably the most famous way was by creating a way of formulating the mass of an irregular shape. There is a story that goes along with his formula. The king of Syracuse had a crown, he wanted to find out how much gold was in it, but he couldn't damage the crown. The king decided to go to the brilliant Archimedes. Archimedes couldn’t think of a way to find out the crown’s mass. So he decided to take a bath, as he got into it he noticed that the water rose. Then he realized he could use the same technique to find out the crowns volume. That is the same technique we use nowadays to calculate the volume of an irregular shape.

Archimedes also created the Archimedes screw, an efficient way to raise water. It is a revolving screw shaped blade inside a cylinder. You turn a crank at the bottom to make the screw turn and it moves the water up the pipe. The Archimedes screw pump is still used today to move solids like coal and grain. It was used to irrigate the Hanging Gardens of Babylon as well.

Archimedes created the odometer. If he had not invented the odometer the world would be at a loss and it would be much harder to take a car into a body shop for an annual repair. Nowadays people take their cars in every time it has another 5,000 miles and without the odometer we wouldn’t be able to do that. He originally put it on a cart attached with a gear mechanism that dropped a ball into the container every mile. I do not know why he created the odometer considering you don’t need to repair a wagon until it breaks. People might have just thought it cool back then. His invention of the odometer changed the world as we know it.

Archimedes invented the block and tackle pulley system too. It is when one uses two pulleys and a rope to lift heavy objects. That technique is often used today to lift heavy objects as well. It is most often used on boats. In conclusion, that is how Archimedes changed the world.

Now you can obviously see why if I could meet anybody in the world it’d Archimedes.