For example, the Archimedes’ work called On Sphere-Making is lost. We only know about its existence through references by other authors.
If our goal is to recover On Sphere-Making, we could try to reconstruct it from all the preserved information about it (the Method 2), using the references, historical data, a systematic search across all ancient parchments etc.
But if we have the tech that could directly retrieve information from the past (Method 3), we could just copy On Sphere-Making fromthefirst manuscript.
For example, the Archimedes’ work called On Sphere-Making is lost. We only know about its existence through references by other authors.
If our goal is to recover On Sphere-Making, we could try to reconstruct it from all the preserved information about it (the Method 2), using the references, historical data, a systematic search across all ancient parchments etc.
But if we have the tech that could directly retrieve information from the past (Method 3), we could just copy On Sphere-Making from the first manuscript.