s*** your teacher told you

[Balta1701]

Just imagine world population sizes without wars and plagues...

Wierd thing is...if there were no such thing as plagues...if there were such thing as human evolution...it would probably have happened where the average person would reproduce less on average, bringing things back into balance.

[knightni]

Wierd thing is...if there were no such thing as plagues...if there were such thing as human evolution...it would probably have happened where the average person would reproduce less on average, bringing things back into balance.

Humans have gotten larger in just the last 200 years. The average man in the early 1800s was 5'5" and 145lbs. Now, I'd say 5'9" and 170lbs.

[iamshack]

Actually...there are more recent studies which suggest that the presence of slavery was a moderate economic negative for most of the areas in the South where it was prevalent.

Well a negative for society as a whole, right? The key was placing wealth in the hands of just a few, and being able to keep as many as what, 65-80% of the rest of the people in abject poverty?

[CrimsonWeltall]

You don't need to know it at all, because the ratio of the two is all that matters. It doesn't matter if it was called feet, meters, cubits, or what. If the ratio is 1:12 for example, it doesn't matter what it is determined in, it will always end up being 1:12.

 

Which particular stat are you referring to?

[StrangeSox]

You don't need to know it at all, because the ratio of the two is all that matters. It doesn't matter if it was called feet, meters, cubits, or what. If the ratio is 1:12 for example, it doesn't matter what it is determined in, it will always end up being 1:12.

You need a unit of measure to determine the ratio and knowledge of their precision and accuracy capabilities. You can't measure the earth our the pyramid with out a unit of measure.

 

edit: that first page you linked to relies entirely on numerology ratios derived from the pyramid inch, a unit of measure for which there's no actual evidence other than "we need to invent it to make all these amazing ratios with arbitrary scaling factors work out, roughly, if we assign unreasonably high, micron-level precision to the unit"

Edited October 14, 2011 by StrangeSox

[NorthSideSox72]

The black death hit numbers on the low end of estimates (what took place post Columbus)in places in Europe (30-50%)

And ironically, the one place in North America where the black plague still exists and still kills people every year is the indian reservation complex in the Four Corners area.

 

[southsider2k5]

You need a unit of measure to determine the ratio and knowledge of their precision and accuracy capabilities. You can't measure the earth our the pyramid with out a unit of measure.

 

edit: that first page you linked to relies entirely on numerology ratios derived from the pyramid inch, a unit of measure for which there's no actual evidence other than "we need to invent it to make all these amazing ratios with arbitrary scaling factors work out, roughly, if we assign unreasonably high, micron-level precision to the unit"

 

The size of the earth and the size of the pyramid don't change. Their relationship is always the same. Their ratio never changes, no matter what the unit of measurement is.

[Balta1701]

Well a negative for society as a whole, right? The key was placing wealth in the hands of just a few, and being able to keep as many as what, 65-80% of the rest of the people in abject poverty?

Negative even for the local areas...because the slave population was unable to participate in the local economy.

 

Basically, it prevented the South from having any chance at diversification. The subsidy towards agricultural production provided by cheap labor meant that there was no reason to develop any other industry. That led to a lack of tax revenue, infrastructure development, and education, in addition to heavy indebtedness (due to the high startup costs of entering the agricultural sector).

 

The North didn't have the industrial might to win that war by accident. It had that industrial might compared to the South because the South had slavery.

[Balta1701]

The size of the earth and the size of the pyramid don't change. Their relationship is always the same. Their ratio never changes, no matter what the unit of measurement is.

How precise of a measurement and how long of a timespan are we talking?

[StrangeSox]

The size of the earth and the size of the pyramid don't change. Their relationship is always the same. Their ratio never changes, no matter what the unit of measurement is.

 

You need a unit of measure in order to measure something and compare it to the size of something else, and you need strong evidence that this is anything more than a coincidence.

[southsider2k5]

You need a unit of measure in order to measure something and compare it to the size of something else, and you need strong evidence that this is anything more than a coincidence.

 

The unit of measure is immaterial. The relationship between the two objects doesn't change.

[CrimsonWeltall]

The unit of measure is immaterial. The relationship between the two objects doesn't change.

 

What is the relationship?

[StrangeSox]

The unit of measure is immaterial. The relationship between the two objects doesn't change.

There's still no support for the Egyptians actually knowing this information or encoding it in the pyramids and nowhere else. It's just another flavor of numerology, and the search space for "something with an arbitrary whole number ratio to some cosmological dimension, if you fudge the numbers or assume extremely high precision" is virtually infinite.

[southsider2k5]

There's still no support for the Egyptians actually knowing this information or encoding it in the pyramids and nowhere else. It's just another flavor of numerology, and the search space for "something with an arbitrary whole number ratio to some cosmological dimension, if you fudge the numbers or assume extremely high precision" is virtually infinite.

 

There is also no proof they actually built the pyramids. We have no idea exactly how they did it, what they used to do it, and how they achieved architectural perfection that we today would struggle with. We have no problem accepting that they did it though, even though we simultaneously believe it was pretty much impossible for them to have such knowledge. The evidence is the same in both situations. It is there.

[StrangeSox]

There is also no proof they actually built the pyramids. We have no idea exactly how they did it, what they used to do it, and how they achieved architectural perfection that we today would struggle with. We have no problem accepting that they did it though, even though we simultaneously believe it was pretty much impossible for them to have such knowledge. The evidence is the same in both situations. It is there.

 

Not really. Egyptians lived in Egypt, pyramids were built, things were meticulously recorded. We have evidence that they built them because they physically exist.

 

That some 4000 years later we come back, measure the pyramids and can then derive arbitrary numerological ratios out of the dimensions doesn't offer any actual proof that the Egyptians knew those things. It's no different from any other form of numerology. Backing out rough approximations and arbitrary ratios and then finding cosmological matches to them is quite a bit different than "Egyptians built pyramids because there are pyramids in Egypt"

 

We can find similar ratios in modern buildings if we want, but that doesn't mean that the architects intentionally encoded those ratios. What it means is that when you have a very, very large search space, you're bound to find a match.

Edited October 14, 2011 by StrangeSox

[southsider2k5]

They have no records for the actual building of the pyramids. No plans, no schematics, no tools, etc. That is why we are still trying to figure out exactly how they did it.

[StrangeSox]

They have no records for the actual building of the pyramids. No plans, no schematics, no tools, etc. That is why we are still trying to figure out exactly how they did it.

 

They don't know how. They know that they were built, however.

 

That's not the same as "evidence" that Egyptians knew some of the Earth's dimensions but encoded them only in the pyramid and nowhere else.

[southsider2k5]

They don't know how. They know that they were built, however.

 

That's not the same as "evidence" that Egyptians knew some of the Earth's dimensions but encoded them only in the pyramid and nowhere else.

 

Our evidence that they built it, is that is it there and that they were there at the same time. That's it. The Egyptians don't even know how they were built. That is the same evidence as any of the relationships between layouts, distances, etc.

[NorthSideSox72]

Our evidence that they built it, is that is it there and that they were there at the same time. That's it. The Egyptians don't even know how they were built. That is the same evidence as any of the relationships between layouts, distances, etc.

Which brings up another sort of fascinating topic in history... technologies that were gained, then lost. Rome got real good at concrete, but I believe that after Rome fell, there was a period of a few centuries where the European world "forgot" how to make it, before "discovering" it again.

 

[Jenksismyhero]

Which brings up another sort of fascinating topic in history... technologies that were gained, then lost. Rome got real good at concrete, but I believe that after Rome fell, there was a period of a few centuries where the European world "forgot" how to make it, before "discovering" it again.

 

The problem comes down to specialization, and eventually when we hit the next dark age it'll be the same issue. Once a big chunk of the people with that knowledge die, having the technology around you doesn't really help. You need to go through the discovery process again.

Edited October 14, 2011 by Jenksismybitch

[southsider2k5]

Which brings up another sort of fascinating topic in history... technologies that were gained, then lost. Rome got real good at concrete, but I believe that after Rome fell, there was a period of a few centuries where the European world "forgot" how to make it, before "discovering" it again.

 

And the current generation just assumes that it is the smartest ever because of it.

[CrimsonWeltall]

Our evidence that they built it, is that is it there and that they were there at the same time. That's it.

 

And that they're clearly Egyptian, entombed Egyptian rulers, and were covered in Egyptian scripts, including some written by the laborers. Are you looking for a surviving papyrus with blueprints on it?

[StrangeSox]

And the current generation just assumes that it is the smartest ever because of it.

 

The theme of this thread and the books in the OP is a deliberate, intentional pushback against that sort of mindset. Jared Diamond started his work on Guns, Germs and Steel with an explicit rejection of technological advancement and intelligence, at least in the PBS documentary version.

Edited October 14, 2011 by StrangeSox

[southsider2k5]

And that they're clearly Egyptian, entombed Egyptian rulers, and were covered in Egyptian scripts, including some written by the laborers. Are you looking for a surviving papyrus with blueprints on it?

 

That isn't actually true. The Great pyramid contained no tomb, no mummy, no treasure, and no hieroglyphs inside the chambers. The only graffiti found was in breached areas.

[southsider2k5]

The theme of this thread and the books in the OP is a deliberate, intentional pushback against that sort of mindset.

 

I understand that, and fully support it.