Great pyramid of Giza -- Could we rebuild it?

Jiri said:
Where does such wild optimism come from? Today, if some key people go crazy, the world plunges into the nuclear abyss, entire races can be wiped out by designer micro-organisms, and humanity's actions make prophets out of those guys with signs "The End is Near!"
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That may be, but I was just referring to the fact that we don't build extravagant monuments to self-proclaimed gods. There's no wild optimism in that. On the other hand, your post is wildly pessimistic.
 
Nathyn said:
The thing is, though, is that they precisely cut and arranged rock in ways that were superior to what we know we can do with primitive tools... So, how'd they do it?
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The old stone cutters are much better at useing the primitive tools than modern archeologists who try to recreate the process. Give them a few generations to refine the techniques and we would have to see what happens.
 
Joshua Korosi said:
Are the two 40-ton blocks Rajaraja drug up his mile-long ramp not good enough?
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No. Why do you think "This Old Pyramid" tries to convince TV viewers that spiral ramps were used? Because straight ramps alone would have been impractical, and there is no evidence that mile-long straight ramps were used to build the Great Pyramid. Straight ramps are fine for placing capstones on structures, but not for the massive amount of work that was done on the Great Pyramid. A combination of smaller straight ramps and spiral ramps would be a promising explanation, if the Pyramid blocks were all modest-sized. But they aren't, and spiral ramps are completely impractical for raising 50-80 ton blocks.
 
ponderingturtle said:
The old stone cutters are much better at useing the primitive tools than modern archeologists who try to recreate the process. Give them a few generations to refine the techniques and we would have to see what happens.
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Exactly. When I went to school (a looong time ago), we were told that a stone axe took days to make. A smoothly ground stone axe was estimated to take weeks.

Then some archaeologists took the trouble to actually learn the technique (they had been finding stone chippings around temporary hunting camp sites in numbers that indicated a surprising productivity). Once you learn the trade, a crude stone axe takes 20 minutes. A finely polished one takes two days.

Likewise with boat building. They made early experiments reconstructing the stone-age dugout canoes, and took weeks to make a scaled-down and quite crappy specimen. Then somebody came home from South America and told them the Indians there made dugouts in a couple of days. After actually learning how to do it, they found out it was right.

Much of the controversies about "how did old-time people do this" comes from underestimating our ancestors. We need to remember that they were every bit as intelligent and inventive as us. Plus they had the time to refine their techniques to perfection.

Hans
 
Rodney said:
A combination of smaller straight ramps and spiral ramps would be a promising explanation, if the Pyramid blocks were all modest-sized. But they aren't, and spiral ramps are completely impractical for raising 50-80 ton blocks.
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Why? I'm assuming you see a problem with the corners, but why?
 
I'm having an experience of deja vu. Rodney do we seriously need to discuss all of this with you again? It was done to death in the thread that Kilik started over a year ago where you were making the same, tired, old objections to ramps despite the overwhelming evidence that ramps were used. At one time, didn't you even support the idea of using kites to lift the blocks?
 
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Rodney said:
No. Why do you think "This Old Pyramid" tries to convince TV viewers that spiral ramps were used? Because straight ramps alone would have been impractical, and there is no evidence that mile-long straight ramps were used to build the Great Pyramid. Straight ramps are fine for placing capstones on structures, but not for the massive amount of work that was done on the Great Pyramid. A combination of smaller straight ramps and spiral ramps would be a promising explanation, if the Pyramid blocks were all modest-sized. But they aren't, and spiral ramps are completely impractical for raising 50-80 ton blocks.
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Define impractical. You mean, takes too much time, too much man-power, too much money, too much space?

For a Pharoah who has the resources of one of the most powerful nations of the time at his disposal, legions of workers, miles of desert, and decades in which to build?
 
Why are ramps preferable to cribbing and leavers and such ways of lifting heavy objects?

Thinking on it, the main thing that I can think of is that leavers might be hard to find of the right size and such.
 
PixyMisa said:
Why? I'm assuming you see a problem with the corners, but why?
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As Margaret Morris noted in her review (see post #79 on this thread), as the pyramid blocks get bigger, spiral ramps become more and more impractical because engineering problems increase geometrically. Why do you suppose "This Old Pyramid" didn't attempt to move even a 10-ton block up its ramp? (And don't try and tell me they couldn't find one --they found a front-loader, didn't they? ;)) Why do you blindly believe that spiral ramps solve any of the monumental problems of building the Great Pyramid when there's no evidence that they were used?
 
Rodney said:
Why do you blindly believe that spiral ramps solve any of the monumental problems of building the Great Pyramid when there's no evidence that they were used?
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Blindly? Who has said anything about blindly believing? We have listed a number of possible solutions, one of which is spiral ramps. Any of them, or several of them, might have been used.

The point is that several methods exist by which ancient Egypians could have built the pyramids, with the knowledge and technology at their disposal.

If you want to discuss whether a particular method, either among the ones already mentioned, or some new suggestion, we can do that. However, then you need to present your theory, and your arguments for it.

This also applies if you want to suggest a more exotic theory, like aliens, or somesuch. However, you cannot build your argument for such a theory but claiming that it is implausible for the Egyptians to have built them, since that has been shown not to be true.

We don't know how they did it, but we know that they could have done it, since several possible methods were at their disposal.

Hans
 
Rodney said:
As Margaret Morris noted in her review (see post #79 on this thread), as the pyramid blocks get bigger, spiral ramps become more and more impractical because engineering problems increase geometrically.
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Hang on, why do you need beams for the ramp at all? Why not just build it out of dirt? Dirt is cheap, plentiful, and something that ancient peoples were intimately familiar with.
 
I have mentioned it once but let me repeat and ellaborate. Some time ago a archaeologist (sorry) began wondering about some strange wooden things found on a museum i Egypt. They looked like pulling sleds but they was shaped like the bottom of a rocking chair. He began thinking and discovered that if they used 8 of theese, tied around a block (and they fitted) you could roll the block like a wheel. Very few men could roll the blocks up a very steep ramp, making spiral ramps absolutely plausible. They tried it and found it astonishing easy to haul large blocks that way even up rather steep slopes.

But off course, space men using anti gravitation or liquid granite in moulds sounds more exiting... :)
 
I wonder what Margaret Morris would make of this theory...
 

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MRC_Hans said:
We don't know how they did it, but we know that they could have done it, since several possible methods were at their disposal.

Hans
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Could have? I'd say we know a bit more than that; I'd say we know that they did do it. I mean, there they are. They're kind of hard to miss.
 
PixyMisa said:
Hang on, why do you need beams for the ramp at all? Why not just build it out of dirt? Dirt is cheap, plentiful, and something that ancient peoples were intimately familiar with.
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Do you really think ancient people could move a 50-80 ton block 160 feet up a spiral dirt ramp? If so, get a few Randi participants and try moving a 10-ton block 20 feet up such a ramp. If you can do that, I'll begin to take your idea seriously.
 
Rodney said:
Straight ramps are fine for placing capstones on structures, but not for the massive amount of work that was done on the Great Pyramid.
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This statement has no basis in any kind of fact.

But I suppose I should be used to it by now.
 
Just thinking about the maths side of ramp building. If you want to double the height of a ramp you need to multiple the amount of sand by four. It would need moving to the right area as well. That would need a lot of effort. I do not see any advantage in using spiral ramps. The amount of sand required would be almost the same. Then you have the issue of getting the blocks around the corners.
 
Rodney said:
Do you really think ancient people could move a 50-80 ton block 160 feet up a spiral dirt ramp? If so, get a few Randi participants and try moving a 10-ton block 20 feet up such a ramp. If you can do that, I'll begin to take your idea seriously.
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Why shouldn't they be able to?

If this one guy can do it, why can't thousands?

 
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