The Mysterious Roving Rocks of Racetrack Playa

[lionking]

www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/roving-rocks.html

Leaving trails behind them, rocks are believed to ahev moved there at the deesert but 'normal' caused like wind, animlas assistance, aerthquakes were ruled out by scientists.
I read this article on anotehr forum where they were discussing moving rocks by sound vibrations or so as an explanation to building the pyramids and two persons were being debated, one of them is he builder of Coral Castle .
Controversial, but desrves comments. Any thaughts?

[archer17]

Geology.com has a nice piece on these 'sliding rocks' including a link to the above cited work of the LPSA interns here.

[lionking]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=94KzmB2bI7s&feature=player_embedded

this shows NASA experiment. it showed vibrations and how they move things. is it possible to move something as huge as rocks by similar technologies, thus explaining the building of pyramisd and Baalba;'s temple in Lebanon?
also read this :

Here is what this author says: “pyramid blocks are not natural stone. In fact, the blocks are extremely high quality limestone concrete – synthetic stone, cast directly on the spot … no cutting of stones, no heavy lifting or towing was not needed for the pyramid construction. ” Dr. Davidovits is not lonely in this category. British Andrew Collins launched the theory that the pyramids were built using sound vibrations. In an authoritative English newspaper Collins explained that when a massive body vibrates with a constant frequency, it is unstuck and can easily be pushed over great distances and heights. He refers to the old Arabic texts, which sees large stones for Egyptian pyramids were struck with a stick, rose in the air and push them off a shot with a bow. Indeed, such Arabic texts exist, but they should not be taken literally. When talking about the ancient heavenly “chariots” or “dragons”, they describe particular unexplained phenomenon, likened it to something understandable. None of us, his contemporaries, does not believe that the “Flying Saucer” is a dish that flies. So it is with this “bar”, which hit the ancient heavy stones to get them lifted. According to one Arab legend existed miraculous piece of paper with some sacred writings. Ancient builders placed on it already processed block, hit it with a hammer and block magically losing weight and only a few people were able to move. One of the most competent writers in this area – Max Toth notes that in any bias or story in the world has some truth. “I believe – he writes – because of an incorrect translation of ancient texts and misunderstanding of words in the story, handed down from generation to generation,” the piece of paper with sacred inscriptions “had been misinterpreted. It may have been a plate with an electronic circuit thin sheet, which indeed are placed on the stone. And the “hammer” could not do was knock a battery or energy cell, which in “touch” to certain sections of the electronic device (as opposed to “hitting”) it is activated, causing counteracting gravity. This seemed floating stone could easily be driven by a small group of workers and perhaps even raised as necessary. ”

greatpyramidsgiza.com/how-the-pyramids-were-built/

[Jason Thompson]

Amazing the lengths people will go to to explain things like the pyramids, rather forgetting that anything is possible when you have expendable slave labour to do the job for you....

[captain swoop]

So Arab writers tried to explain the Pyramids with magic.
People still do so today, doesn't mean they are right.

Some people just make things up

“pyramid blocks are not natural stone. In fact, the blocks are extremely high quality limestone concrete – synthetic stone, cast directly on the spot … no cutting of stones, no heavy lifting or towing was not needed for the pyramid construction. ”

Funny when the quarries that the stones were cut from are nearby.

He doesn't explain how you cast limestone either.

[Ian Pearse]

Aug 21, 2010 17:43:30 GMT -4 @lionking said:

www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/roving-rocks.html

Leaving trails behind them, rocks are believed to ahev moved there at the deesert but 'normal' caused like wind, animlas assistance, aerthquakes were ruled out by scientists.
I read this article on anotehr forum where they were discussing moving rocks by sound vibrations or so as an explanation to building the pyramids and two persons were being debated, one of them is he builder of Coral Castle .
Controversial, but desrves comments. Any thaughts?

Actually, that article didn't rule out wind assistance - they did rule out animals, gravity and earthquakes. Wind is still the favoured force being applied. The question is about how the friction between rock and surface is reduced enough to allow the wind to do the job. A fascinating study.

[PeterB]

Aug 24, 2010 5:30:48 GMT -4 Jason Thompson said:

Amazing the lengths people will go to to explain things like the pyramids, rather forgetting that anything is possible when you have expendable slave labour to do the job for you....

Well, this is the thing - the Egyptians didn't use slaves to build the pyramids, they used volunteers - mostly farmers during the months of the Nile flood who had nothing else to do.

Archaeologists have found the remains of the builders' towns, and what they found there shows the workers weren't slaves. Firstly, they found the graves of men who'd survived injuries as serious as leg amputations - not the sort of skill you'd use on a slave. Secondly, they found a lot of animal bones. These people ate a lot more meat than anyone in Egypt except the nobility - hardly food you'd waste on slaves. I'm pretty sure there's other evidence too.

[PeterB]

Aug 24, 2010 3:43:47 GMT -4 @lionking said:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=94KzmB2bI7s&feature=player_embedded

this shows NASA experiment. it showed vibrations and how they move things. is it possible to move something as huge as rocks by similar technologies, thus explaining the building of pyramisd and Baalba;'s temple in Lebanon?

No. The difference between the temples at Baalbek and other temples built in the Classical Greek style is only a matter of scale. If you accept that the Greeks could build the Acropolis in the 5th century BC, it's no great leap to imagine the Romans building larger temples in a similar style 500 years later.

also read this :

...In an authoritative English newspaper Collins explained that when a massive body vibrates with a constant frequency, it is unstuck and can easily be pushed over great distances and heights. He refers to the old Arabic texts, which sees large stones for Egyptian pyramids were struck with a stick, rose in the air and push them off a shot with a bow.

Remember that when the first Muslim Arab armies conquered Egypt, the pyramids were already more than 3000 years old. It's implausible they'd have discovered some secret about pyramid construction which had been missed by the Assyrians, Persians, Greeks and Romans.

Indeed, such Arabic texts exist, but they should not be taken literally. When talking about the ancient heavenly “chariots” or “dragons”, they describe particular unexplained phenomenon, likened it to something understandable. None of us, his contemporaries, does not believe that the “Flying Saucer” is a dish that flies. So it is with this “bar”, which hit the ancient heavy stones to get them lifted. According to one Arab legend existed miraculous piece of paper with some sacred writings. Ancient builders placed on it already processed block, hit it with a hammer and block magically losing weight and only a few people were able to move. One of the most competent writers in this area – Max Toth notes that in any bias or story in the world has some truth. “I believe – he writes – because of an incorrect translation of ancient texts and misunderstanding of words in the story, handed down from generation to generation,” the piece of paper with sacred inscriptions “had been misinterpreted. It may have been a plate with an electronic circuit thin sheet, which indeed are placed on the stone. And the “hammer” could not do was knock a battery or energy cell, which in “touch” to certain sections of the electronic device (as opposed to “hitting”) it is activated, causing counteracting gravity. This seemed floating stone could easily be driven by a small group of workers and perhaps even raised as necessary. ”

greatpyramidsgiza.com/how-the-pyramids-were-built/

Yes, well, I note that page quotes Herodotus as authoritative about the pyramids. That's unlikely too. His Egyptian sources almost certainly made up stories, perhaps to keep some secret, more likely because they didn't know themselves.

The size of the workforce needed is one example where Herodotus gets it badly wrong.

We know that the standard Egyptian pyramid work group was eight men, and we know the average weight of blocks in the pyramids is about 2.5 tons. That means each man is pulling a little over 300 kilograms - a lot but not impossible; I've pushed a car weighing well over a ton, and we know the Egyptians used mud under the sled runners to reduce friction.

Let's assume a typical work group can haul one block into place each day. That means 365 blocks in a year, or 7300 blocks in 20 years. Divide 7300 into the 2.3 million blocks in a large pyramid, and we get just over 315. That means 315 work groups, or about 2500 men, would be sufficient to haul into place all the blocks of a large pyramid in 20 years.

Now obviously the men didn't haul blocks every day for 20 years. There'd be delivery delays, down time, strikes, bad weather, and so on. But if these men were only 10% efficient, that still means a workforce of only 25,000 men.

So, no miracles needed.

[lionking]

it is not about miracles but about science . I ws askign if the sound vibrations are indeed able to do that. I read in the arabic article that there was a scietist named Ernest John Kelly [don't know if the name is written like that] who create machines on this theory but after his death someone baught the machines and everything ended there. I read als oabout another man [forgot if he is a scientist] who went to Tibet and saw this and fimed it, but the brisitsh as it is said took the video from him.
Of course these might not be true , but from the scientific point of view, is it possible to move rocks by vibrational means, specifically sound vibrations?

[echnaton]

Aug 24, 2010 9:08:20 GMT -4 @lionking said:

it is not about miracles but about science . I ws askign if the sound vibrations are indeed able to do that. I read in the arabic article that there was a scietist named Ernest John Kelly [don't know if the name is written like that] who create machines on this theory but after his death someone baught the machines and everything ended there. I read als oabout another man [forgot if he is a scientist] who went to Tibet and saw this and fimed it, but the brisitsh as it is said took the video from him.
Of course these might not be true , but from the scientific point of view, is it possible to move rocks by vibrational means, specifically sound vibrations?

It sounds like you need to read more reliable articles. As a hint, any time you read about a seemingly miraculous feat of engineering, that someone else bought and hid away, it is probably not true. The reason is that the laws of physics are there for everyone to discover. Once a discovery is made and an engine built to make use of them, it is virtually impossible to hide it from other knowledgeable engineers.

I don't know if it is impossible to move 2.5 ton blocks with sound vibrations today, but I doubt anyone has built a machine to do so. I will treble my doubt for any machine built in ancient times. There is simply no need to invent such a convoluted and un-parsimonious hypotheses to explain the building of any ancient structure. It was all possible to do with contemporary hand tools and copious amounts of labor.

Besides I've touched those stones, run my had along the smooth surfaces the those ancient men carved. They look like other limestone Ive seen and do not have the appearance of manufactured concrete.

[PeterB]

Aug 24, 2010 9:08:20 GMT -4 @lionking said:

it is not about miracles but about science . I ws askign if the sound vibrations are indeed able to do that. I read in the arabic article that there was a scietist named Ernest John Kelly [don't know if the name is written like that] who create machines on this theory but after his death someone baught the machines and everything ended there. I read als oabout another man [forgot if he is a scientist] who went to Tibet and saw this and fimed it, but the brisitsh as it is said took the video from him.

Such stories are a popular part of conspiracy theory (like the "I know someone who designed a car which could do 1000 miles per gallon but Ford bought him off for a million dollars and he's since disappeared" stories) but they make no sense from an economic point of view - there's no point suppressing such ideas.

Of course these might not be true , but from the scientific point of view, is it possible to move rocks by vibrational means, specifically sound vibrations?

I doubt it.

The thing is, objects have frequencies at which you can induce sympathetic vibrations (I'm thinking of the Mythbusters using a voice to shatter wine glasses). But rocks aren't homogenous like glass - the frequency would depend on a series of factors which would be different throughout the rock.

Also, I would have thought that the amount of energy required would be much more for a 2.5 ton rock than for a wine glass. That's a lot of noise to generate, just for one rock.

Finally, I would have thought that loud sounds at the right frequency would be more likely to shatter the rock than allow it to be moved.

Personally, I don't know enough about the subject to rule it out, but if people want to promote such a theory, I'd prefer they demonstrate it with something heavier than ping-pong balls.

[archer17]

One would think that if such a concept had merit and was demonstrated to work at least 3 times it wouldn't be relegated to the realm of pseudo-scientific lore with it's convenient excuses as to why it remains that way. I know that sound has been studied by many over the years for a variety of proposed uses - and this would obviously encompass generating "sound vibrations" - yet there hasn't been anything demonstrated that would validate the claims I've read here. It's a shame that, like the Apollo missions, some people just don't give us humans enough credit when we do something really impressive.

[gillianren]

Aug 24, 2010 9:00:41 GMT -4 PeterB said:

Yes, well, I note that page quotes Herodotus as authoritative about the pyramids. That's unlikely too. His Egyptian sources almost certainly made up stories, perhaps to keep some secret, more likely because they didn't know themselves.

Or for the ever-popular "messing with the foreign investigator" which so screws up studies of "primitive" cultures. Didn't Herodotus also say that an Egyptian princess essentially whored herself out for the stones? And, as I recall, he is known as both the Father of History and the Father of Lies.

[echnaton]

IIRC, Herodotus passed n numerous third party stories without critical review. What made him different from other writers is he gave his sources.

[Jason Thompson]

Aug 24, 2010 8:44:01 GMT -4 PeterB said:

Well, this is the thing - the Egyptians didn't use slaves to build the pyramids, they used volunteers - mostly farmers during the months of the Nile flood who had nothing else to do.

Well that I didn't know. You leanr somethng new every day.

It doesn't make much difference to the point that when you have a big enough labour force, big stones can be shifted by conventional means, and if they happen to be being shifted to commemorate an individual they believed was in some way divine, the motivation to do so is going to be quite high as well. A motivated labour force (whether that motivation be due to religious fervour or avoinding a flogging) can achieve remarkable things.

Yet somehow it seems easier for some people to believe weird and forgotten/alien technologies were employed than to believe people could ever have done it themselves. I find that quite sad, actually.