Atheist knowledge

[M61A1]

Q. Is having sex with a prostitute and then not paying her Rape or Shoplifting? Just asking for a friend.

If a woman get drunk and masturbates, then regrets it, can she charge herself with rape?

 

 

[dutchroll]

I think there's a bit of difference between the perception of the "perfection" of pyramid construction and the reality.

 

Great Pyramid of Giza Is Slightly Lopsided

 

No-one disputes the Egyptians had impressive technical skills for the day. But could they manage it with more precision than in the modern day? Probably not. Do minor variations in civil construction precision matter in the modern day? Not really.

 

 

[facthunter]

They did in the Westgate Bridge that collapsed during construction over the Yarra and killed about 35 workmen. If the two halves of the "Coathanger" in Sydney hadn't met exactly you wouldn't get the final rivets in. It had to fit in UP DOWN and by length. The sun heating it must have made a difference. Even the wind. Any load causes a deflection in most metals. Engineers do amazing work. Engine drivers drive trains. Nev

 

 

[turboplanner]

I think there's a bit of difference between the perception of the "perfection" of pyramid construction and the reality.Great Pyramid of Giza Is Slightly Lopsided

 

No-one disputes the Egyptians had impressive technical skills for the day. But could they manage it with more precision than in the modern day? Probably not. Do minor variations in civil construction precision matter in the modern day? Not really.

The Flinders Petrie surveyed dimensions, when more of the pyramid was intact showed an 8 inch variation between the longest side and the shortest side, which is a variation of a fraction of 1%, something you don't find in buildings today. The corner angles are even more precise, but the geographic placement of the pyramid is stunning. What was at first to be an error from the round number was actually precisely correct when parallax was factored in.

 

I just checked the link you provided and this was the comparison. The current team checked several points and then used software to estimate the lengths

 

SIDE FLINDERS PETRIE DASH-LEHNER

 

West 755.7629' 755.833 < 756.024'

 

East 755.8745' 755.561 < 755.817

 

What is very interesting here is that Mark Lehner is an Egyptologist and the egyptologists fought the early researchers of about 20 years ago, disputing every discovery, but this has settled down to some reasonable research. I note that he is still attributing the Greater Pyramid to Khufu and the age to 4500 years, when the only link with Khufu and the age is a single cartouche of very suspicious history, which appears to have been debunked in the last couple of years by a family claiming a witness saw Vise paint it on (to keep the money flowing).

 

What they didn't mention is that the stone blocks are arranged on each side in an almost imperceptible concave 'V" so that when you look at the pyramid from a distance, the side look flat, rather than slightly bulged.

 

 

[dutchroll]

Well I probably should've said minor variations don't always matter. Sure they do sometimes, depending on what you're building.

 

Still, the Egyptians' ability to do these things was not perfect, though admittedly quite phenomenal, but........so what?

 

 

[turboplanner]

Well I probably should've said minor variations don't always matter. Sure they do sometimes, depending on what you're building.Still, the Egyptians' ability to do these things was not perfect, though admittedly quite phenomenal, but........so what?

Quite a large percentage of the population today wants everything summed up in a 30 second statement; that's not going to happen when you get involved in the history of a complete civilisation.

 

So what? Well I get a kick out of drawing up a product to roughly meet the design requirement, then doing the small amount of work to get the lengths and widths and radii in harmony to make it not only functional, but great looking - and that came straiight from Egyptian skills.

 

And when I'm trading I know not to buy into a Fibonacci level, and to use a sell target just before one, and those numbers don't belong to the Italian Fibonacci at all, but the Egyptians.

 

And on the farm in setting up a fence at 90 degrees I just measure 30 metres, 40 metres and 50 metres........which came from the Egyptians.

 

It's not until you get interested in their knowledge that you realise what an impact they had on our way of life.

 

 

[facthunter]

They were built so the exalted inhabitants (deceased) could last forever and not have their treasures robbed from the site.. Failed on both counts so a bit of a wasted effort. A good result is some of the artifacts of a significant ancient society are preserved for our scrutiny and edification. Nev

 

 

[turboplanner]

They were built so the exalted inhabitants (deceased) could last forever and not have their treasures robbed from the site.. Failed on both counts so a bit of a wasted effort. A good result is some of the artifacts of a significant ancient society are preserved for our scrutiny and edification. Nev

The "pyramids for tombs" era is almost over, except for the Egyptologists. You can go on line and see photos of the Great Pyramid's Grand Gallery with its tapers and grooves and specialised structures at the top and see there's an engineering use. There has been an explosion or backfire of some sort in the King's chamber which has displaced the walls neatly outwards, chemical stains, anda Japanese research party found piston type wear on the grand gallery grooves, but no one's figured it all out yet.

 

The library of Alexandria, which held most of the history of the world might have provided some answers, but the Christians burnt it to the ground.

 

 

[PA.]

If a woman get drunk and masturbates, then regrets it, can she charge herself with rape?

Only if she has a hand in the offense.

 

 

[Bruce]

The burning of the library at Alexandria might just have been a boon to science. Most of the lost works were full of superstitious nonsense, and time spent on research there would have been detrimental to any scientific advance.

 

Funny how an atrocity can have a good side in retrospect.

 

 

[turboplanner]

The burning of the library at Alexandria might just have been a boon to science. Most of the lost works were full of superstitious nonsense, and time spent on research there would have been detrimental to any scientific advance.Funny how an atrocity can have a good side in retrospect.

I've never seen a list of the contents, figured they were all gone so no point looking. If the Catholics wanted to burn them that tells you something. The lighthouse was one of the eight wonders of the world though, fry your eyeballs.

 

 

[Bruce]

There certainly were some gems though.. Erastothenes was the chief librarian there when he worked out the the size of the planet, and his method was right. He just didn't know the correct distance from Alexandria to that well up the Nile where the sun reflected the surface on one day of the year. This fooled Columbus about a thousand years later.

 

So there were the beginnings of navigation.

 

 

[Marty_d]

Quite a large percentage of the population today wants everything summed up in a 30 second statement; that's not going to happen when you get involved in the history of a complete civilisation.

So what? Well I get a kick out of drawing up a product to roughly meet the design requirement, then doing the small amount of work to get the lengths and widths and radii in harmony to make it not only functional, but great looking - and that came straiight from Egyptian skills.

 

And when I'm trading I know not to buy into a Fibonacci level, and to use a sell target just before one, and those numbers don't belong to the Italian Fibonacci at all, but the Egyptians.

 

And on the farm in setting up a fence at 90 degrees I just measure 30 metres, 40 metres and 50 metres........which came from the Egyptians.

 

It's not until you get interested in their knowledge that you realise what an impact they had on our way of life.

I'm not disputing that the Egyptians had some highly developed skills. My point is if they didn't come up with them, somebody else would have. And as you know when using the examples of nano-tech and circuit printing, I was responding to your general comment that they worked to an accuracy we can't achieve today; we can achieve incredible accuracy where it's needed, I would argue that skinning a building does not require accuracy you need a micrometer for.

 

I don't think it was all beer & skittles in ancient Egypt, especially if you were at the bottom of the heap. Life expectancy was 35 for men and 30 for women. Slavery was common, and taxes on farmers could be up to 60% of their crop.

 

 

[DonRamsay]

The skills to build the great pyramid were not acquired overnight but over centuries if not millennia of trial and error and progressive development. Early pyramids just fell down. Later the stepped pyramids were more successful.

 

I would love to see a pyramid at Giza restored with its polished limestone outer casing and the gold cap. What a sight that would be. Guess that will never happen due to cost and damage to the pyramid. However, perhaps one of the mega rich could build a pyramid using modern technology and cladding that in limestone with a gold cap.

 

The treasures that came from Tut Ank Ahmun's ("The image of Ahmun) tiny tomb are spread all over the top floor of the Cairo museum and are a thing of wonder in themselves.

 

A rival to the pyramids might just be the tomb of the first Chinese emperor Qin. The warriors are well known but the vast underground city has yet to be touched. There are suggestions of underground rivers of mercury and that might just make it a very difficult proposition.

 

 

[turboplanner]

The treasures that came from Tut Ank Ahmun's ("The image of Ahmun) tiny tomb are spread all over the top floor of the Cairo museum and are a thing of wonder in themselves.

Watch the news over the next 12 months or so, one group believes, because of his sudden death, that he was buried in one of the entrance rooms of his mothers tomb two independent tests have indicated there's a cavity behind one of the walls of Tut's tomb.

 

The problem is that on that wall are priceless paintings, so all involved are trying to come up with a method of getting into the sealed of tomb, which will make Tut's look like a street stall.

 

No one is going to be putting so much as a Ryobi drill to to the wall unless there's a fail-proof solution, and that in itself is great news following the political demis of Zawi Hawass in the political upheaval. Hawass protected the monuments like a hawk.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Why not cut down into the suspected hidden main tombs from outside Tut's section? Trouble is, the place seems to be a rabbit warren. Wherever you dig you're likely to blunder into something. A good argument for hastening slowly until better ground-penetrating technology is available. Who says we have to uncover the whole lot in our time? We should leave a few treasures for future generations to discover... and out of sight of destructive religious nutters.

 

 

[bexrbetter]

A rival to the pyramids might just be the tomb of the first Chinese emperor Qin. The warriors are well known but the vast underground city has yet to be touched. There are suggestions of underground rivers of mercury and that might just make it a very difficult proposition.

People know the area, Xi'An (shee an), better for the Terracotta Warriors who were crafted to stand outside the gates of the "vast underground city".

 

Indeed Qin's tomb, which has the world's largest pyramid footprint but not height, is encased in mercury to stop grave robbers taking his treasures, they have drilled down to confirm with samples.

 

If anyone wants to visit the Terracotta Warriors, which are boring on their own, you need to take in a whole tour to get the entire story to understand why the Warriors exist, that's all very interesting and the diaroma of the old city explains the Warriors positioning well, and dare say that makes the Pyramids look small in terms of floor plan, we are talking a completely buried city here.

 

 

[turboplanner]

Why not cut down into the suspected hidden main tombs from outside Tut's section? Trouble is, the place seems to be a rabbit warren. Wherever you dig you're likely to blunder into something. A good argument for hastening slowly until better ground-penetrating technology is available. Who says we have to uncover the whole lot in our time? We should leave a few treasures for future generations to discover... and out of sight of destructive religious nutters.

Better idea than destroying the paintings for sure.

 

 

[Yenn]

Turbs, since when has modern construction not been able to work to a fraction of 1%. That is 10mm per meter. I worked for many years in the construction industry and we would never have got any work approved at that standard.

 

 

[turboplanner]

Turbs, since when has modern construction not been able to work to a fraction of 1%. That is 10mm per meter. I worked for many years in the construction industry and we would never have got any work approved at that standard.

Well 1% is not a fraction of 1%, but yes, poorly worded: "The Flinders Petrie surveyed dimensions, when more of the pyramid was intact showed an 8 inch variation between the longest side and the shortest side, which is a variation of a fraction of 1%, something you don't find in buildings today."

 

The actual fraction is available, it's 0.02% in 750 feet ("The Great Pyramid" John Romer P61. - it's a 564 page book with a massive amount of detail)

 

If that doesn't knock your socks off:

 

• The mean corner angle error is 12 seconds of arc
   
  
• In setting the pryamid to true north, the builders found they had made an error with the stone construction, so re-orientated it by cutting the limestone casing stones to finish up with an error of only 5 seconds of arc from True North.
   
  
• The relationship of the base perimeter to the height of the pyramid is 2Pi, and thge measurements include the golden section and the Fibonacci series.
   
  
• A huge block of fine white limestone which stands at the top of the Grand Gallery has been set precisely at the point on the pyramid's vertical axis where the area of the base of the pyramid above the block is exactly half the area of the base of the pyramid.
   
  
• The block is also linked precisely to the main axis of the pyramid, and thus, through the four cardinal points to the stars of the night sky (but we won't go near God tonight).
   
  

 

 

[turboplanner]

Could we?

 

And if we could, could we do it on a normal production run?

 

Bear in mind the human eye can't tell a corner is out of square below about 3 degrees, that's 10,800 seconds of arc, and they were building to an error of 12 seconds of arc, as well as achieving all the concurrent dimensions mentioned in #3820.

 

Not only that, but they were doing it in a routine production run.

 

The archaeologists have been able to tell us the Great Pyramid was built by 20,000 workers over about 20 years and laid 2.3 million stone blocks averaging 2.7 tonnes at the rate of 1 block every five minutes working 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

 

The did this working on an angle of 51 degrees 30 minutes up to a height of 146.709 metres.

[bexrbetter]

Turbs, since when has modern construction not been able to work to a fraction of 1%. That is 10mm per meter. I worked for many years in the construction industry and we would never have got any work approved at that standard.

Only have to watch a Brickie going with a bit of string and a level to see the simplest of simple accuracy within a few mms, and corrected on the next row.

 

 

[turboplanner]

Well as we have seen above, we are talking about an error of 0.02% in 750 feet, not 10 mm per metre.

 

 

[DonRamsay]

People know the area, Xi'An (shee an), better for the Terracotta Warriors who were crafted to stand outside the gates of the "vast underground city".

Indeed Qin's tomb, which has the world's largest pyramid footprint but not height, is encased in mercury to stop grave robbers taking his treasures, they have drilled down to confirm with samples.

 

If anyone wants to visit the Terracotta Warriors, which are boring on their own, you need to take in a whole tour to get the entire story to understand why the Warriors exist, that's all very interesting and the diaroma of the old city explains the Warriors positioning well, and dare say that makes the Pyramids look small in terms of floor plan, we are talking a completely buried city here.

I agree it is important to understand that the warriors are just the tip of the iceberg but I can't agree that the warriors are "are boring on their own". We were very privileged to be invited down into the Pit. The invitation came with a very stern warning "not to touch".

 

[ATTACH]47999._xfImport[/ATTACH]

 

[turboplanner]

The skills to build the great pyramid were not acquired overnight but over centuries if not millennia of trial and error and progressive development. Early pyramids just fell down. Later the stepped pyramids were more successful.I would love to see a pyramid at Giza restored with its polished limestone outer casing and the gold cap. What a sight that would be. Guess that will never happen due to cost and damage to the pyramid. However, perhaps one of the mega rich could build a pyramid using modern technology and cladding that in limestone with a gold cap.

The problem in dating the pyramids is that only one piece of wood had been found in an intact pyramid, the Great Pyramid, and that piece of wood was lost, so we can't date them.

 

The Egyptologists patter is that the Saqqara pyramids were the practice run will initial collapses, then a stepped pyramid, then a shallow angle at about the halfway point, then the real thing, which sounds good, but the Saqqara location and the dimensions and orientation had none of the sophistication of the real thing and the thinking lately is that these were later attempts to emulate the Giza pyramids.

 

We do have a date for the Unas pyramid, which definitey was built after the Giza pyramids, and this is what it looks like.

 

[ATTACH]47998._xfImport[/ATTACH]

 

I'm inclinded to agree with this thinking, because among the Saqqara pyramid efforts is the "temple" of Serapeum, which the Egyptologists claim to be chambers for burying bulls.

 

This "temple" consists of "crypts" tunnelled out of limestone bedrock.

 

In each crypt is placed a 65 ton box with 35 ton top lid on each side of a corridor tunnelled out of the rock

 

The granite boxes measure 3.96 metres x 2.3 metres x 3.35 metres

 

At the end of the tunnell there is no room to manually slide the last boxes into position.

 

The sides and stop of the box and bottom of the lid were checked by a toolmaker using a straightedge and flashlight, and found to be perfectly flat.

 

In other words the quality in the "temple" was right up to the Giza standard.

 

There is general consensus that the Egyptian civilization came into being virtually overnight; one minute they were hunter-gatherers, the next minute they had all these skills; the question is which civilization came along, showed them what to do, then left.

 

The Ark of the Covenant is another enigma, which as we know Moses took, or was given for his trip out of Egypt. The Egyptians in his time didn't seem to know what it was, or if they did, were not telling, but it burnt half his face off.