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University students to live like ancient Roman gladiatorsThis article looks similar to something I saw on a German TV show last fall. To me the bigger question is do we really learn anything from experiments like this? My gut says no because living like the ancients for a few months does not compare to spending an entire life like that. At best, this kind of thing is an interesting exercise but we wont really gain any new knowledge from it.
Naturally we can't learn deep truths about gladiatorial life through this. Yet, I wager the students involved will learn more about such life than they could by merely studying about it in books. The knowledge may be more anecdotal than academic, but it's still worth something. Because it's being funded by a wealthy patron as a "hobby", I think it's being staged more because it's a neat, novel idea than anything else.
