It seems fair to estimate that the people eating these locusts would have known how many legs they really had
Any large text that makes scientific claims makes errors. A modern science textbook averages about 14 errors. Ancient Greek texts are full of erroneous factual claims that they could have easily checked. Aristotle claimed that men had more teeth than women. Had such a claim been in the Torah, there would be later commentary explaining that in women, certain teeth don’t count as teeth.
Being fair to Aristotle, it may be the case that empirically, in Ancient Greece, or in whatever sample he used to check his claim, the women did actually have fewer teeth on average. Worse nutrition, more stress on the body due to pregnancy, whatever. If you check ten women and ten men in a non-modern community you might easily get such a result by sheer chance.
Since a large part of what he did was checking empirically, I don’t think your opinion is justified. Really, the most likely explanation is that he checked empirically—the same way he observed that the kidneys filter urine, that some sharks give birth to live young, and numerous other biological discoveries that were obtained in part through first-hand vivisection.
Any large text that makes scientific claims makes errors. A modern science textbook averages about 14 errors. Ancient Greek texts are full of erroneous factual claims that they could have easily checked. Aristotle claimed that men had more teeth than women. Had such a claim been in the Torah, there would be later commentary explaining that in women, certain teeth don’t count as teeth.
Being fair to Aristotle, it may be the case that empirically, in Ancient Greece, or in whatever sample he used to check his claim, the women did actually have fewer teeth on average. Worse nutrition, more stress on the body due to pregnancy, whatever. If you check ten women and ten men in a non-modern community you might easily get such a result by sheer chance.
I don’t think that Aristotle did check empirically, though.
Since a large part of what he did was checking empirically, I don’t think your opinion is justified. Really, the most likely explanation is that he checked empirically—the same way he observed that the kidneys filter urine, that some sharks give birth to live young, and numerous other biological discoveries that were obtained in part through first-hand vivisection.