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Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

bbc.com

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Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#11

Post by jedberg »

crispyporkbites wrote: post #8
jedberg wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about being far advanced in the past, but we've certainly lost knowledge along the way. - Scientists still debate exactly how the pyramids were built. They have a pretty good idea, but don't know exactly. - More recently, we're not sure we could even recreate the engines that powered Apollo and took us to the moon. It appears that some of the critical knowledge was institutional, passed from one to the n…

That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. Just because the specific methodology became obsolete doesn’t mean we lost anything along the way

> and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones

The F-1 (the engine in the Saturn V, used in the Apollo missions) remains the most powerful rocket engine ever built. [0]

So no, we can't build them bigger, or even as well as, we used to.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_orbital_rocket_e...

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#12

Post by guerrilla »

crispyporkbites wrote: post #8
jedberg wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about being far advanced in the past, but we've certainly lost knowledge along the way. - Scientists still debate exactly how the pyramids were built. They have a pretty good idea, but don't know exactly. - More recently, we're not sure we could even recreate the engines that powered Apollo and took us to the moon. It appears that some of the critical knowledge was institutional, passed from one to the n…

That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. Just because the specific methodology became obsolete doesn’t mean we lost anything along the way

> That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones.

You seemed to have missed a couple of points there. Of course we can build the pyramids, but can we do it with the same level of technology that we think they had? Of course we can build better engines than the Apollo ones but can we recreate exactly those? These were the questions post to highlight that we have lost knowledge before.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#13

Post by crispyporkbites »

guerrilla wrote: post #12
crispyporkbites wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. Just because the specific methodology became obsolete doesn’t mean we lost anything along the way

> That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. You seemed to have missed a couple of points there. Of course we can build the pyramids, but can we do it with the same level of technology that we think they had? Of course we can build better engines than the Apollo…

Can you recreate the exact breakfast I just made? Can you crack an egg the same way twice? Entropy always increases.

It's knowledge that we don't necessarily need, if we really needed to made pyramids in the same way, we'd figure it out.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#14

Post by jedberg »

crispyporkbites wrote: post #13
guerrilla wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. You seemed to have missed a couple of points there. Of course we can build the pyramids, but can we do it with the same level of technology that we think they had? Of course we can build better engines than the Apollo…

Can you recreate the exact breakfast I just made? Can you crack an egg the same way twice? Entropy always increases. It's knowledge that we don't necessarily need, if we really needed to made pyramids in the same way, we'd figure it out.

> if we really needed to made pyramids in the same way, we'd figure it out.

We've been trying to figure it out for a century and still haven't. Why do you think we could now?

Same with the engines. We've been trying to make an F-1 for over a decade. In 2013 they even tore one down to figure out how it was made [0]. They still haven't figured it out.

[0] https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/146829-nasa-resurrects-i...

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#15

Post by thaumaturgy »

dragonwriter wrote: post #10
thaumaturgy wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a tantalizing idea ripe for nerd sniping, but there are practical limits to how advanced previous civilizations could have become. If all of humanity were catastrophically wiped out right now, and 50 million years from now, another species was investigating the planet, they'd find microplastics in rock and ice strata around the world, all at approximately the same age. There's no natural explanation for this…

You don't present an argument for an upper limit on how advanced past civilizations can have been without detection but for an excluded middle, because, sure, a civilization at our level would be easily detectable, but one that developed to where it could operate without environmental pollution and which could clean up the pollution that it made on the way to it's advanced state would not be so detectable.

This is a line of thinking that wanders away from intellectual curiosity and into intellectual madness. You're describing a process that would somehow "undo" micro- and macro-scopic effects and chemistry in rock and ice records around the world -- including those on the ocean floor -- without, itself, leaving any trace. It would be like peeling the skin off an onion, running that layer through a food processor, and then delicately gluing it all back on, and not being able to tell the difference under a microscope.

That's wizard wand technology, not fusion.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#16

Post by guerrilla »

crispyporkbites wrote: post #13
guerrilla wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That’s a silly argument, we could build pyramids 100 times bigger than the Egyptian ones if we wanted to today, and we can build engines that are far more efficient and powerful than the Apollo ones. You seemed to have missed a couple of points there. Of course we can build the pyramids, but can we do it with the same level of technology that we think they had? Of course we can build better engines than the Apollo…

Can you recreate the exact breakfast I just made? Can you crack an egg the same way twice? Entropy always increases. It's knowledge that we don't necessarily need, if we really needed to made pyramids in the same way, we'd figure it out.

> Can you recreate the exact breakfast I just made? Can you crack an egg the same way twice? Entropy always increases.

This is a false equivalency because you're confounding a uncontrollable natural process with things that could easily come with an instruction manual and be as replicate as a cake or science experiment. Identity is not the goal but sufficient similarity to meet specific requirements.

> It's knowledge that we don't necessarily need, if we really needed to made pyramids in the same way, we'd figure it out.

This moves the goal post and changes the subject because the original point was whether or not we lose knowledge, not whether or not that is acceptable.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#17

Post by dragonwriter »

thaumaturgy wrote: post #15
dragonwriter wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't present an argument for an upper limit on how advanced past civilizations can have been without detection but for an excluded middle, because, sure, a civilization at our level would be easily detectable, but one that developed to where it could operate without environmental pollution and which could clean up the pollution that it made on the way to it's advanced state would not be so detectable.

This is a line of thinking that wanders away from intellectual curiosity and into intellectual madness. You're describing a process that would somehow "undo" micro- and macro-scopic effects and chemistry in rock and ice records around the world -- including those on the ocean floor -- without, itself, leaving any trace. It would be like peeling the skin off an onion, running that layer through a food processor, and t…

> This is a line of thinking that wanders away from intellectual curiosity and into intellectual madness.

When we’re talking about the prospects of a more advanced human civilization in a time from which we have artifacts (but, obviously, not ones that are more obviously advanced than standing stones into which people read improbable histories), if you aren't going to lean hard into intellectual madness, what's the point?

> That's wizard wand technology

I prefer “sufficiently advanced” to “wizard wand”, but the former is, as they say, indistinguishable from the latter.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#18

Post by fit2rule »

sixothree wrote: post #6
apaz037 wrote: post #2

I'm of the firm belief at this point that we are a species with severe amnesia. I find it significantly more plausible that cataclysmic events we no longer remember occured in our past and wiped away a rich history in which we may have feasibly been far more advanced technologically than we currently are.

So maybe the simulation was reset?

Mass Corona Ejection is the one theory that I find sticks in my mind most, when the question "what could possibly have reset things so drastically that none of the survivors would remember ancient civilisation?" is asked.

Its like the Degauss'ing of our planet. I can imagine even we wouldn't survive such an event unscathed.

Re: Stonehenge: Neolithic monument found near sacred site

#19

Post by thaumaturgy »

dragonwriter wrote: post #17
thaumaturgy wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a line of thinking that wanders away from intellectual curiosity and into intellectual madness. You're describing a process that would somehow "undo" micro- and macro-scopic effects and chemistry in rock and ice records around the world -- including those on the ocean floor -- without, itself, leaving any trace. It would be like peeling the skin off an onion, running that layer through a food processor, and t…

> This is a line of thinking that wanders away from intellectual curiosity and into intellectual madness. When we’re talking about the prospects of a more advanced human civilization in a time from which we have artifacts (but, obviously, not ones that are more obviously advanced than standing stones into which people read improbable histories), if you aren't going to lean hard into intellectual madness, what's the p…

Heh. I tend to pretty rapidly lose interest in subjects when they go from "huh, that's kinda neat" to young-adult fantasy storytime. It's a mental self-defense against the kinds of ideas that sneak up on clever people and trick them into believing dumb things.
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