Steve Gray
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Ping - Nigel
Sep 03, 2003, 16:53
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This topic has now moved from General to Stonehenge. Was that your doing, in which case how did you do it, or are higher forces at work? I would have liked to rename my "Computer Model Update" topic to be "Stone-Dropping Computer Model" but I haven't found a way to do it.
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FourWinds
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Alternatively ...
Sep 03, 2003, 17:08
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... you could just strap 10 flying pigs to the stone!
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GordonP
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Re: Ping - Nigel
Sep 03, 2003, 17:50
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Hi Guys
Just got in from work and caught up with the conversation. I agree entirely that stone rowing is the most important aspect for the archaeologists, the trouble is it's to good. Coming from one of their own it would be hard for them to swallow, coming from a jumped up little chippie it will be impossible. By all means make it a two parter, one for the archaeologists (stone rowing) and one for the newspapers (the impossible erection) but even if we succeed with both don't expect praise. There is only one reason I continue with this and that is to prove it to myself, am I right or am I wrong? Once I have the answer the world can think what it likes.
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nigelswift
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Re: Alternatively ...
Sep 03, 2003, 18:09
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I agree with every word you both say about stone rowing. No-one can ever prove it, it's just another theory.
But it has something that propels it into the superstar category amongst theories: it works better than anything else - perhaps ten times better - and no-one will ever find a more efficient way, unless they find neolithic frictionless ointment.
So, the only question is, did a race that spent a lot of it's time shifting stones stumble across this method? Or, more to the point, can anyone put up the slightest argument why they wouldn't have?
No, grumble and wriggle all they like, Gordon's won and he only has to give them a demonstration.
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nigelswift
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Re: Ping - Nigel
Sep 03, 2003, 18:13
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I invoked the magical powers of the wizard Holy.
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nigelswift
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Last Try
Sep 03, 2003, 19:10
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Right, well I’m not quite giving up yet, because no-one has actually addressed what I’m saying. Steve suggested it’s a question of undesirable dumbing down, but that’s certainly not what I meant. Jim says he has some reservations, and I’m encouraged by that as he has a good eye for this sort of thing and knows a lot about Stonehenge.
What worries me is this: in my opinion the method proposed is probably not the one they used. It’s tailored to show there could have been small numbers of participants, whereas there’s no evidence for that. The reverse, probably. The “small numbers” parameter seems to have come by way of default from the stone rowing issue, where it’s triumphantly vindicated, but what has that to do with stone erection? So I’m sure the establishment will say our approach is based on and tailored to a false hypothesis, and that we’ve gone to considerable trouble to design a system to demonstrate something that didn’t happen. (This is the same establishment to whom a prudent would-be sponsor will turn for advice).
If we think in terms of larger numbers we can all think of other ways the erection could have been done, probably quicker and safer. Maybe less sexy but in my opinion more likely. Most of them centre round “dump it in a hole and wedge and haul it up”, with variations. Following on from rowing the stones into place, I think that would be a pretty impressive enterprise and we don’t need to end with an academically controversial flourish. Let's do absolutely nothing to besmirch the good name of stone rowing, it's too perfect to be put at risk.
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FourWinds
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My problem (well the one I'll admit to)
Sep 03, 2003, 19:30
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I think Gordon's method actually applies much better to saying that the many tombs and circles in, say, county Cork or the Scottish Recumbents could have been 'Family Monuments' rather than 'Community Monuments'.
i.e. that a small group could have transported the stones (which are quite big in most cases) easily and there was not a need for a whole village.
I can not believe myself that building something like Stonehenge was done by a few people.
*******
I also thought about this the other day. The people of Easter Island totally deforrested the island just to move and erect their statues. There aren't all that many really, but they are huge (there is an incomplete one in a quarry that is over 60foot long). They obviously had great skill at moving and erecting these. Surely they would have come up with the same method, too. If they did have such a 'wood-cheap' method, then why was the island deforrested?
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nigelswift
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Re: My problem (well the one I'll admit to)
Sep 03, 2003, 19:38
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They have the honourable position of being half as good as Gordon. In some cases they are believed to have used "Stone Walking". You know, like you do with a piano. They put the stones on wooden rafts and had to build special smooth roads for them.
It's also thought they transported some of the statues standing up.
Gordon.....?
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baza
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Re: Last Try
Sep 03, 2003, 19:57
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Firstly, I`d just like to repeat this:
>I`ll try not to mention this again, but you should settle for moving a 40 ton stone
>over Salisbury Plain, an enormous task, first. If you can do that, you`ll get the
>funding for tackling the far more difficult and expensive problem of raising a trilithon.
:o)
I presume that I`ve already got a reputation on this thread for being negative, that`s why I`ve shut up for a bit. I suppose that it`s my matter-of-fact style of writing that gets people`s goat and my way of expression just alienates people to what I`m saying.
Secondly, err....I disagree (LOL) with what your saying about whether they would have erected the stones in this way. Once you`ve mastered the theory of moving large weights horizontally with the lever method, it seems to me that the logical progression would be to attempt to apply it vertically, too. It must be a lot easier than any other method. Don`t forget, Gordon suggests that his method was used to build the pyramids, too.
baz
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Steve Gray
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Re: Ping - Nigel
Sep 03, 2003, 20:24
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Ah!
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