cladking Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
>
> Anything they put in a counterweight would have to
> be lifted
> atop the pyramid. They needed something that was
> already at
> or could be directed to this place. While stones
> and debris
> would make handy counterweights, there was still
> the problem
> of lifting them to a useable level and then
> clearing them away
> at the bottom.
The debris would have been a part of the ongoing process of lifting and shaping the stones in this model. They didn't have to put them up perfectly square, and the shavings could have worked as the counterweights on the way back down. You only need a fraction of the weight, since workers and sledges could have been added to the weight to bring the next block back up. I've seen that diagrammed somewhere as well. An 8 man team to drag the block, as well as the sledge, would have produced a good 2000 pounds of counterweight.
> They could, of course, reuse the
> same material
> by relifting it and this would solve the problem
> of lack of ev-
> idence for ramps.
Why relift? Send the workers back down and let them walk back up. That just costs a loaf of bread and a few beers.
>
> The evidence for counterweights is actually fairly
> good. There
> are the inward sloping sides of the pyramid
That's not evidence of a counterweight. That is a fact for which there are other, better explanations.
> and
> the reports that
> stones were moved forward a bowshot (300') at a
> time.
Who reported this?
Can you give the citation?
> There are
> grooves in the center and at quarter way distances
> of these slop-
> ing sides.
See above.
> These grooves can be explained by the
> action of count-
> erweights making many thousands of lifts.
Only if you are relying upon friction wearing them down. You would lose your rope much sooner than your stone.
>
> The evidence for water is even stronger.
Correction: the evidence for water is non-existent.
> It
> should not be over-
> looked that the grotto is a natural cavern which
> had to have been
> carved by water
Considering we're talking about a sedimentary stone created under the floor of an ocean, the grotto could have been millions of years old when it was formed. Shaky contention to say it is any younger, without the slightest bit of evidence for another source of this water.
> and that an even larger cavern
> lies parallel to
> the north face of the pyramid base.
Citation?
> Indeed, a
> line running from
> the ascending passage would just about intersect
> with the middle
> of this cavern. Even Herodotus said that they
> constructed a canal
> to Giza
He made no such claim. Please read it again more carefully, but this time do it with an understanding of Egyptian cosmography. You'll realize he was saying something entirely different.
> and that the ancints were prone to tunnel
> for water to save
> the effort of building a canal.
Citation?
> In a land where
> water was everywhere
> as per Horapollo there was less need to do a lot
> of tedious digging.
Clean water is not the same as water.
Anthony
You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him think.