VoxRat

[Ahem]
I did request that link.
Now, when you say "I could supply the link upon request", are you choosing your words "carefully"? Are you going to fall back on "I didn't say I will, I said I could"?

Because I predict - perhaps I should say retrodict - that you have misrepresented the exchange.

Dave Hawkins

I don't think ANY of them were designed by God, gods, or aliens. Yes, there is a continuum. But the later ones are more like cheap imitations.

Withered

I am completely uneducated regarding the pyramids, beyond what i have had the opportunity to see on the Science and Discovery channels.

perhaps some one here could help me by answering this question, or pointing me in the direction of an answer:

Given what we now know about how the pyramids were constructed, including the techniques they used for moving stones to the site, cutting and fitting them, etc. How many laborers would have been availabe to build the pyramids, and consequently, how much longer would it have taken the builders to construct.

My point is that the population of egypt could not have been completely re established in the interim, so a smaller workforce would increase the time taken to construct the pyramids by some degree, Correct?

Would determining that information shed any light on the non plausibility of the biblical flood?

Thanks folks,

W.

Dean Anderson

Actually, there is a third alternative:

There was no flood at all. The story is a mere myth or metaphor.

Incorrect. The values that Smyth and others produce showing this are the result of fiddling the numbers, and no more. There is no evidence that the Egyptians either had this knowledge or built it into the dimensions of the Pyramid.

Yes, the Egyptians knew all about PI and used it in their calculations. There is nothing controversial about this.

Again, there is nothing controversial about this. The Sothic dating system is based on this.

Again, this is a result of the fudging of numbers by modern "Pyramidologists". There is no evidence that the Egyptians had this knowledge.

As the pre-eminent trading empire of their age, of course the Egyptians possessed such.

Believe me, I have given it very careful consideration and analysis.

You misunderstand. I didn't say that the diagram had nothing to do with Smyth's writings on the pyramid. I said that it has nothing to do with the relevant measurements of Smyth - the ones he uses to "calculate" the age of the Pyramid.

Even if you were to somehow prove that the original perimeter of the pyramid was as shown in those diagrams (which you can't, because it wasn't) - that would not give any support to the Pyramid having been built in 2170 BCE.

As you can see in both this thread and my previous debate, I have done no such thing.

I have critically analysed his work on this subject - and found it to be an exercise in wishful thinking and utterly lacking in substance.

It doesn't matter whose figure it is. It is still wrong.

No, it didn't. Have you seen the pyramid? I don't mean in dubious photos like the one you present here. I mean the actual pyramid. It is simply not "perfectly concave with all four sides running from the peak to the center of each side of exactly the same amount with no irregularity whatsoever" and any claim that it is like that is laughable.

I am also very amused to see that this description of yours not only contradicts the actual shape of the pyramid, it also contradicts the diagram you posted in your previous post!

Yes, that picture does stretch credulity somewhat.

The perfect "shadow" on that picture contradicts both Davidson's diagram and other aerial photography of the pyramid (such as in Google Maps.

Personally, I think that it has been airbrushed to give a false impression. Don't forget that even according to your description, the angle of the concavity of the pyramid is much less than half a degree - and would not show up on such an aerial photograph.

It is neither logical nor straightforward.

The casing stones are 34" thick. If Petrie is right, and the pyramid was originally square, the corner-to-corner distance of one side of the pyramid should have double that thickness added to it to work out how long it would have been with the casing stones on it - and this is precisely what he does.

If Smyth is right, and the pyramid was not originally square, the corner-to-corner distance of one side of the pyramid should still have double the thickness of a casing stone added to it to work out how long it would have been with the casing stones on it.

But Smyth/Davidson choose to arbitrarily add on the extra 36" when there is no need to do so. It is neither straightforward nor logical to do this, unless you wish to artificially increase the length in order to make it fit a "significant" value.

Which Lisht pyramid? There is more than one. And please detail exactly how this is supposed to "confirm" anything - you have made this assertion twice now but never explained it.

Again you misunderstand me. I said that Petrie's survey assumed a square design, not that Smyth and Davidson assumed a square design.

Again, it is neither natural nor logical to assign this extra value at the corners.

It is the assumption that the concavity is both by design and perfectly symmetrical that is the strange one.

Utter rubbish. Petrie did not confirm Smyth's measurements. Not only did he not confirm these measurements of Smyth's (Davidson's fudging of the numbers aside), he also did not confirm Smyth's internal measurements of the pyramid - and those are the ones that Smyth based his 2170 BCE date on.

I have to ask why you are concentrating on these measurements to support your case, rather than the measurements that Smyth actually based his 2170 BCE date on? They seem irrelevant.

Why are you not presenting the actual measurements that Smyth used? Even if Smyth was correct in these external measurements (which he wasn't), that does nothing to support your theory.

Utter codswallop.

These measurements - whether right or wrong - have absolutely nothing to do with whether your numbered points at the beginning of this post are correct or not.

As it happens, three of your points are correct - but their veracity is mundane and does not help your case one bit.

These measurements do nothing to support the other two of your points.

And even if all your points were correct, they would do nothing to support your date for the building of the Pyramid - which is based on Smyth's date (which is in turn based on his subjective reading of some internal measurements of the pyramid as a metaphor for Biblical Prophecy, due to his belief that the architect of the pyramid was none other than God himself!)

No it should not. Even if these measurements by Smyth were correct, that would be akin to the acknowledgement that David Icke knows his stuff when it comes to football (being a former football player) causing us to consider carefully his ideas about reptilian shapeshifters.

Your stance can be anything you feel like. It doesn't make Smyth's date correct, and none of your arguments have gone any way towards convincing anyone else that Smyth's date is correct.

Indeed, the very fact that you are concentrating on trying to prove minor points of Smyth's that are not connected with his dating, rather than presenting evidence for the dating itself gives us the - possibly erroneous - distinct impression that you are aware of how little support Smyth's dating has, and you are trying to do a bait-and-switch by trying to convince us that some other measurements of his are correct and then saying "Now that we have proved Smyth correct..." as if his dating would have also been proved correct by this.

Dean Anderson

Smyth does - yet you accept his dating (based on the belief that the pyramid was designed by God) because it suits your purposes whilst at the same time trying to distance yourself from such belief.

What about the earlier ones? Were they cheap imitations too?

hyzer

So the early ones and the later ones were designed and built by humans.

But the "great pyramid" wasn't? What is so tough about stacking stones? "Cheap imitations"????

BWE

Dean Anderson,

Could you please provide a reference demonstrating a knowledge of pi? I was under the impression they didn't know it. I'm not demanding I'm just surprised.

VoxRat

I'm a little confused about this concavity question.

I was under the impression we were talking about the kind of more or less evenly distributed curvature you might expect from "settling".

That photo seems to indicate a nice sharp crease right down the middle.

Constant Mews

The photo either has an odd shadow or is retouched - most probably the latter - note the odd angle of the base of the shadow on the face.

The concavity mentioned by Dave would not produce that shadow.

SpaghettiSawUs

It has me puzzled too Voxy,
but then the google satellite(click on satellite, then zoom in) image is pretty clear: seems like that photo has been doctored in some way, or else it's an effect of the shadow at the time of day (check out the angle of the sun). It could be the settling you describe, I can't be sure if the shadow falls exactly straight from the angle taken.
I did a transform to get close to face on and I think the result is interesting:

If there was some bowing then the shadow should show a curve no? This seems very straight, indicating a consistent angle throughout the side, i.e. no curvature but instead a crease as you describe. An obvious question is how such a shadow can be produced at all given the angle of the sunlight.
Another thing to note is how the two shadows on each pyramid appear to diverge, is that due to the lie of the land? Doesn't appear to be an optical illusion?
If it is neither then I wonder how they diverge so. The length of the lower shadow would suggest a falling away of the land, so a decent map of the layout would be interesting.
I had a look at some of the photos on google images (great pyramid aerial) and saw no grooves.
Regards
Spags