Earlier quoted context omitted.
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What?
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A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
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Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#12This is the kind of stuff I love about ancient architecture. It seems they were full of such clever things (or maybe only the few constructions which survived until today). Its nice to see that some people still care about creating such thoughtful art for modern constructions. It seems that most building of our time are just optimized for fast and efficient construction. I hope there are many more out there, so that…
When you had no electricity to produce light pollution, when you have no TV, printing press, or any other thing to distract your attention, you had plenty of time to look at the night sky. When that also means you didn't have a way to have a shared calendar, you paid more attention to the sky to know when the seasons were changing. When the changing of seasons were key into surviving, you gave it a lot of importance. It's hard to put that into perspective when we can just look at an app to see the specific time/date of astronomical events well into the future.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#13I loved this. I wish I had the ability to do the same innocuous deep dive into a easter egg in code - but I fear it would never be discovered at this rate of which AI is generating similar stuff. But much like this article maybe there's a time and place.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#14> There is an angle for doubt, for sorrow, for hate, for joy, for contemplation, and for devotion. I’m so intrigued - what was going on inside Hansen's brain?
Makes sense when talking about human postures and emotions.
Victory/elation/worship corresponds to extending the arms above the head or in a "V" shape, sorrow/grief corresponds to dropping to the knees and holding the head in the hands, etc. These associations seem to persist despite language barriers and great spans of time.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
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What?
Wikipedia says similar [1]:
> The concept of "religion" was formed in the 16th and 17th centuries. Sacred texts like the Bible, the Quran, and others did not have a word or even a concept of religion in the original languages and neither did the people or the cultures in which these sacred texts were written
That said, GrowingSideways is mistaken. He is confusing the thing with the category of the thing.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#16For a hypothesis concerning the precession of the equinoxes and religious pantheons, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38761574
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You are confusing the thing with the category of the thing.
Religion the category is only a few hundred years old. The things that fall under that category go back at least as far as Neanderthal times.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#17> Having this one fixed point in the sky is the foundation of all celestial navigation.
Only in the northern hemisphere.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#18Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#19During DEF CON XX, I got bored/overwhelmed (it was not my first year attending) — so I decided to rent a car and visit Hoover Dam (this was before the bypass bridge was completed). I drove through the desert 100mph+, in my own little HST jaunt, searching for nothing but concrete's high water mark.
The statues in OP's article are absolutely beautiful examples of Art Deco / 1930s Americana (my local post office was built then, too, and has eaglettes of similar [but smaller] design). I had no idea they were out there until stumbling upon them, and they definitely leave a lasting impression of our forefather's imposing presence. America, fuck yeah!
Wish I had then-known about this "clock," which is definitely hidden in plain sight. Wish we had similarly-lavish federal budgets, today. But worth visiting, both article, statues & dam.
Re: A 26,000-year astronomical monument hidden in plain sight (2019)
#20In the extremely interesting book about water, cadillac desert, there is a great discussion with a scholar of some kind, I think an archeologist, about the large western US dams and the future. The gist is that the reservoirs will eventually silt up and disappear, but the dams will remain for thousands of years. The silted lakes will preserve clear evidence of their construction in the geologic record of these regions.
We will quite plausibly be known as the dam builder civilization, as these artifacts could very easily outlast the memory of what we call ourselves. It is fitting to embellish them in this way.