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Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

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Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#11

Post by 6510 »

kragen wrote: post #5
bambax wrote: post #3

> The documents are laid out like a modern spreadsheet > a wonder of the ancient world Very slightly OT, but it's a shame history has been divided between "Ancient Times" and "our era", because it's obvious we are contemporaneous to these people who wrote down their daily activities in a journal and kept track of what was owned to whom on a paper table that looked like a spreadsheet. Not just contemporaneous: we are…

We use coinage and alphabets, transmute rocks into metal, have near-universal literacy, fly through the air like birds, bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies, walk on the Moon, transplant hearts and kidneys from one person to another, and bring forth plentiful harvests within glass temples in frozen wastelands. We craft elephants of iron that swallow us when we wish to travel from one city to another…

All of those things and more are described in ancient texts that we consider mythology. The only thing we can be sure of is that our stuff will leave little more than a trace given enough time. What silly stories they would make [say] after the next ice age?

If only we could see, just once more, those 5000 kg African elephants run though the desert pulling a multi ton brick (or the vimanas if that is what they used)... see, once more, how those ships are loaded and how they are build.

But just their spreadsheets isn't so bad. The logistics alone is enough to impress us.

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#12

Post by gherkinnn »

MichaelMoser123 wrote: post #4

This reminds me of a poem by Berthold Brecht: Questions From A Worker Who Reads Who built Thebes of the seven gates? In the books you will find the names of kings. Did the kings haul up the lumps of rock? And Babylon, many times demolished Who raised it up so many times? In what houses of gold-glittering Lima did the builders live? Where, the evening that the Wall of China was finished Did the masons go? Great Rome I…

I'm torn.

Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India. Same foot soldiers. Same cooks. But it was Alexander who got them there.

And yet we loose so much by glossing over the cooks and masons and smiths and horsemen. Stories lost. Lives lost. Knowledge lost. It's been a mere 70 years and the logistics that went in to D-Day are never talked about. It's all cliffs, Private Ryan, and Eisenhower. They put 150,000 men across the channel in a single day. And nobody seems to know about the how.

Original poem: https://lyricstranslate.com/en/bertolt-brecht-fragen-eines-l...

In Our Time on Persepolis, with a rather critical take on Alexander (the Great | of Macedon): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b4z075.

13 Minutes to the Moon, a BBC production about the moon landing. A good amount of detail about the invisible work that went in to the spectacular feat: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xttx2

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#13

Post by 6510 »

jd115 wrote: post #10
kragen wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We use coinage and alphabets, transmute rocks into metal, have near-universal literacy, fly through the air like birds, bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies, walk on the Moon, transplant hearts and kidneys from one person to another, and bring forth plentiful harvests within glass temples in frozen wastelands. We craft elephants of iron that swallow us when we wish to travel from one city to another…

This is the single best comment I have ever read on HN. Of course you won't see it glorified by HN folk, cause they're entirely elsewhere vibrationally. Too busy complaining. "Well, someone has to complain! Someone has to keep others accountable!" they cry. May be true, maybe not, but when all we do is complain, nothing gets done. Not for lack of effort and busyness, but for lack of faith and goodwill.

On the contrary, if no one complaints nothing will happen. Moaning always comes before invention. Its just not the moaners themselves who make anything happen but they are very much part of the delicate balance. You could invent something without moaners but no one would recognize it.

Take this one for example:

> bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies

The amount of moaning we still have to do about this? If we fail at that task, this fire stuff will be sure to be the end of us.

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#14

Post by C19is20 »

MichaelMoser123 wrote: post #4

This reminds me of a poem by Berthold Brecht: Questions From A Worker Who Reads Who built Thebes of the seven gates? In the books you will find the names of kings. Did the kings haul up the lumps of rock? And Babylon, many times demolished Who raised it up so many times? In what houses of gold-glittering Lima did the builders live? Where, the evening that the Wall of China was finished Did the masons go? Great Rome I…

The Egg, by Andy Weir.

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#15

Post by bambax »

kragen wrote: post #5
bambax wrote: post #3

> The documents are laid out like a modern spreadsheet > a wonder of the ancient world Very slightly OT, but it's a shame history has been divided between "Ancient Times" and "our era", because it's obvious we are contemporaneous to these people who wrote down their daily activities in a journal and kept track of what was owned to whom on a paper table that looked like a spreadsheet. Not just contemporaneous: we are…

We use coinage and alphabets, transmute rocks into metal, have near-universal literacy, fly through the air like birds, bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies, walk on the Moon, transplant hearts and kidneys from one person to another, and bring forth plentiful harvests within glass temples in frozen wastelands. We craft elephants of iron that swallow us when we wish to travel from one city to another…

All of what you're describing happened after the Industrial Revolution, and most in the last 20 years. Yet the cutoff between Ancient Times and "our era" (?) happened 2000+ years ago, for some reason.

Also, we don't fly "like birds". We are flown, crammed into metal tubes that are more similar to ancient galleries carved in mountains, mentioned in the OP, than to any bird.

Edit: As a matter of fact I don't understand your response (or your tone). I didn't say that nothing had changed since the building of the pyramids. I said we're the same, and is that in dispute? Has human nature changed more in the last 4,500 years than in the 500,000 to 1,000,000 years of its evolution? Or in the last 100 years? Because we drive cars?

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#16

Post by guerrilla »

gherkinnn wrote: post #12
MichaelMoser123 wrote: post #4

This reminds me of a poem by Berthold Brecht: Questions From A Worker Who Reads Who built Thebes of the seven gates? In the books you will find the names of kings. Did the kings haul up the lumps of rock? And Babylon, many times demolished Who raised it up so many times? In what houses of gold-glittering Lima did the builders live? Where, the evening that the Wall of China was finished Did the masons go? Great Rome I…

I'm torn. Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India. Same foot soldiers. Same cooks. But it was Alexander who got them there. And yet we loose so much by glossing over the cooks and masons and smiths and horsemen. Stories lost. Lives lost. Knowledge lost. It's been a mere 70 years and the logistics that went in to D-Day are never talked about. It's all cliffs, Pri…

> Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India

How do you know that? Leadership and management are real jobs but there's often existing demand, goals and plans that these people are employed by those around them for. I'm willing to go out on a limb and wager that's the way it always is actually. Everyone's a product of their environment and their times, standing on the shoulder of giants, workers and peasants alike.

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#17

Post by agumonkey »

gherkinnn wrote: post #12
MichaelMoser123 wrote: post #4

This reminds me of a poem by Berthold Brecht: Questions From A Worker Who Reads Who built Thebes of the seven gates? In the books you will find the names of kings. Did the kings haul up the lumps of rock? And Babylon, many times demolished Who raised it up so many times? In what houses of gold-glittering Lima did the builders live? Where, the evening that the Wall of China was finished Did the masons go? Great Rome I…

I'm torn. Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India. Same foot soldiers. Same cooks. But it was Alexander who got them there. And yet we loose so much by glossing over the cooks and masons and smiths and horsemen. Stories lost. Lives lost. Knowledge lost. It's been a mere 70 years and the logistics that went in to D-Day are never talked about. It's all cliffs, Pri…

You could add 'war is a racket' too

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#18

Post by bspammer »

kragen wrote: post #5
bambax wrote: post #3

> The documents are laid out like a modern spreadsheet > a wonder of the ancient world Very slightly OT, but it's a shame history has been divided between "Ancient Times" and "our era", because it's obvious we are contemporaneous to these people who wrote down their daily activities in a journal and kept track of what was owned to whom on a paper table that looked like a spreadsheet. Not just contemporaneous: we are…

We use coinage and alphabets, transmute rocks into metal, have near-universal literacy, fly through the air like birds, bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies, walk on the Moon, transplant hearts and kidneys from one person to another, and bring forth plentiful harvests within glass temples in frozen wastelands. We craft elephants of iron that swallow us when we wish to travel from one city to another…

I really love this comment, thank you

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#19

Post by guerrilla »

kragen wrote: post #5
bambax wrote: post #3

> The documents are laid out like a modern spreadsheet > a wonder of the ancient world Very slightly OT, but it's a shame history has been divided between "Ancient Times" and "our era", because it's obvious we are contemporaneous to these people who wrote down their daily activities in a journal and kept track of what was owned to whom on a paper table that looked like a spreadsheet. Not just contemporaneous: we are…

We use coinage and alphabets, transmute rocks into metal, have near-universal literacy, fly through the air like birds, bring the fire of the Sun to Earth to slay our enemies, walk on the Moon, transplant hearts and kidneys from one person to another, and bring forth plentiful harvests within glass temples in frozen wastelands. We craft elephants of iron that swallow us when we wish to travel from one city to another…

Wow this belongs in the comment museum, excellently written and insightful. It reminds me of the The Body Rituals of the Nacirema[1]. I wish more people wrote things like this, it gives a dash of objectivity to how things are.

I agree with both you and GP though, in some ways things really haven't changed at all despite these technological changes. If you can't see the constancy too then I don't think you see the big picture. All of this that we have is a product of the same work that began back then, all for the same reasons. You have to abstract to see the constancy. I think you really miss out if you don't see what GP is saying too.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacirema

Re: Monumental Record: the lives of the workers building the Great Pyramid of Giza

#20

Post by gherkinnn »

guerrilla wrote: post #16
gherkinnn wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm torn. Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India. Same foot soldiers. Same cooks. But it was Alexander who got them there. And yet we loose so much by glossing over the cooks and masons and smiths and horsemen. Stories lost. Lives lost. Knowledge lost. It's been a mere 70 years and the logistics that went in to D-Day are never talked about. It's all cliffs, Pri…

> Had it not been for Alexander the Great, the Greeks would not have stomped all the way to India How do you know that? Leadership and management are real jobs but there's often existing demand, goals and plans that these people are employed by those around them for. I'm willing to go out on a limb and wager that's the way it always is actually. Everyone's a product of their environment and their times, standing on t…

I don't. And you're right as in his exploits did not happen in a vacuum.

A pervasive theme is that time rumbles by and great men merely cling on and go with it at the right time. The Greeks were in the mood for a rampage and off they went. An Alexander born today won't start conquering foreign lands.

And yet, I can't shake the feeling that there must me something unique to Alexander and others.

Time passes, but not everybody massages it just enough to make a change.

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