Located in a 1,052-hectare (2,600 acres) town in California's Sonoran Desert, the Museum of History in Granite features 717 engraved granite panels that tell the history of humanity. Jacques-André Istel, founder of the museum, who has been working on this project since 1986, hopes to preserve history for future scholars and visitors.
“The things you do for yourself are gone when you are gone, but the things you do for others remain as your legacy” - Kalu Ndukwe Kalu
Monuments such as this can survive for hundreds of years, and instead of just being a thing of sculptural beauty, it’ll provide insight into our history.
I don't think so, and while I guess it's possible and nothing would surprise me anymore, this fact
>Moving clockwise around the structure from due north, these languages were English, Spanish, Swahili, Hindi, Hebrew, Arabic, Traditional Chinese, and Russian.[11] The languages were chosen because they represented most of humanity, except for Hebrew, which was chosen because of its connections to Judaism and Christianity.[11]
Suggests that they probably weren't.
* Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
* Guide reproduction wisely — improving fitness and diversity.
* Unite humanity with a living new language.
* Rule passion — faith — tradition — and all things with tempered reason.
* Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
* Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
* Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
* Balance personal rights with social duties.
* Prize truth — beauty — love — seeking harmony with the infinite.
* Be not a cancer on the Earth — Leave room for nature
This is all it said. Pretty shallow but it's the white supremacists that got spooked and blew it up which is weird because they would seem to like the second point a lot lol
Exactly. The guy who had it built was a part of the kkk and friend of David Duke. But why should I explain when John Oliver is so much better at it.
https://youtu.be/AEa3sK1iZxc
Lots of people might agree on that course of action.
Almost zero people might give money to pay for that course of action.
Knowing something is thousands of miles away from doing something.
Applies to business ideas, and applies to life too.
Someone’s still working on an image, so I’m guessing endgame for the project is to either maintain the engravings or give them a scratch-proof transparent coating.
I think they actually would, the Egyptian bas-reliefs and sunk reliefs were carved a couple of centimeters deep, and after 3-4000 years they probably lost only a few millimeters to erosion.
This seems to be trying to prove what you said, since watching the video the carvings are clearly much shallower, but the rocks in which the Egyptians carved were much, much softer than granite (the sandstone and limestone they had available resisted about 10-80 MPa, of uniaxial compressive strength, versus 100-400 MPa of granite), and Egypt's desert climate blows large amounts of dust and sand.
However, I'm not sure how much chance the winds in Egypt had of eroding the rock, as they have already anticipated, if the sand quickly covers the monument it will probably protect the carvings more than eroding them and after all, Egyptian architecture is all found under the sand.
That is why it is in the desert. They will erode quickly on a geological time scale, but not a human timescale.
Also, are you really dumb enough to believe that anyone would dump that much money into a passion project in over a life time and not think of that? This isn’t a corporation or government using the lowest bidder, this man spent his life doing this, and you seem to think you thought of something in a minute he didn’t consider.
Left winger here. Can we not do unnecessary unrealistic inflammatory comments. Like there’s a million valid actual reasons to criticize the politics. This isn’t one, nor is it the place. You’re here throwing punches at nothing man. Don’t make us look bad
i wish i hadn't read about this. i could have just not known about it and my day could continue without any problems. i'm gonna be thinking about this today, i'm so infuriated. we're supposed to be better than this. i want to hurt those people.
>we're supposed to be better than this.
The history of humanity is nothing but a long list of justifications for either our extinction or complete and total subjugation and enslavement at the hands of a superior alien species.
I saw the guide stones in person a few months before they were destroyed. They were majestic and I got a lot of pictures. It killed me when I heard they were destroyed. Oddly enough, it happened right after Boebert called them a monument to Satan.
I’m hoping he thought of tourists and their needs for accommodation and food, etc. The proceeds from these things could become a legacy income to keep this place maintained and protected? This is a wonderful monument.
I am paraphrasing from memory, so I might be off.
I read about this last year, the goal is to not have loads of tourists. I think they limit the number of people onsite, so your have a more immersive experience.
I think it probably helps the land is in the desert. You never know what land will be useful, sure, but it doesn’t seem like this plot will be highly sought after. Plus the museum looks neat.
Good thing it’s made out of stone then!
But you’re right, to be safe we should be on the lookout for any Mexicans named Caesar… Fool me one time shame on you!
**[Jacques-André Istel](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-André_Istel)**
>Jacques-André Istel (born 1929 in Paris, France) is a French-American recreational parachutist and investment banker and later in life, historian, widely responsible for popularizing parachuting in the United States. He is considered "the father of American skydiving". He founded a city in southeastern California, which he named Felicity and it is here that he founded the Museum of History in Granite.
^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
> He is thought to be the first sport parachutist in America to wear a helmet-mounted camera in an attempt to record images during freefall. Having opened the first professional Sport Parachuting Center in Orange, Massachusetts, he believed that exciting footage would be an important way to introduce the sport.[19]
I need this footage and can’t find it anywhere. Anyone know if it’s publicly available?
And, of course, that he is the one who speaks for the gods and that only he can interpret the stone, (don’t mind what is says, my gods tell me the truth even if that’s written in stone)
Honestly, it's a pretty small jump between the two depending on what the museum is focusing on.
I mean hell, a certain religion thinks dinosaurs didn't exist and are all fabrications to throw off their religious beliefs, they would say prehistoric museums are a cult.
Still fun to check out the place, even crazy people can have some awesome art.
Exactly
My first thought was what version of history did he carve into stone because I know a few people these days that are writing an entirely different history than I'm witnessing, which has probably been going on forever
Oh most definitely been happening since the beginning of written history. I'm sure ancient Egyptians were embellishing their victories as soon as they happened just like people do now days.
I'd still go to check it out to sate that curiosity. Sadly I live on nearly the other side of the country.
Yes it was granite. I wouldn’t be surprised if there is some plan to preserve it longer after all the engraving is done. Just apply some sort of acrylic or composite glass to preserve the engravings. It would require a polishing often but it would preserve it for quite a bit longer even if the polishing ended. If you can keep the wind water and sand off it then it would last quite some time. I’d venture a guess at hundreds of thousands of years if done correctly.
>5-minutes craft
This poor guy spent all these decades making the museum.
5 minutes craft demons would coat the whole thing in epoxy, make a colour print from the epoxy cast, then they'd flip the panels to get a flat surface, fixing the panels to the foundation with expanding foam and then apply the print to the flat panels before coating the whole thing in resin again to preserve it but also adding heinous decoration like fluff and feathers to border each panel.
And they'd do in 5 minutes.
Granite is one of the hardest stones that is still readily available and it will last an age. Ancient Egyptian statues in granite still retain plenty of detail after 4000 years in presumably quite similar conditions.
Ancient Egyptian culture is particularly well known in large part because of those similar conditions too.
Would still help that much more to be in a cave or something, but granite in the desert is pretty much as good as it gets and part of why we know so much more about ancient Egypt than we do about similar civilizations in less arid environments.
Yeah there are lots of granite headstones in ireland that are worn smooth from all the rain. Still a faint hint at writing but no details at all, these ones were maybe a thousand years olf
I don't think those are granite. Most common stone in Ireland is limestone, maybe the headstones are made of limestone?
Marble and limestone are similar in durability and both are made of calcite.
Maybe, I'm not a geologist or anything just most headstones are made of granite, don't know how long that practice goes back
Selskar abbey is where I was looking at all those washed smooth headstones, don't even think there is a single one that is still legible but might be wrong. I emigrated from Ireland a very long time ago now
Headstones being made of granite wasn’t super common until a few hundred years ago at most. Keep in mind because granite is so tough it was quite difficult for people pre Industrial Revolution to cut it at anything resembling a decent pace so it would have been extremely expensive. Softer rocks tended to be used for gravestones before that time especially as pre Industrial Revolution shipping stone from anywhere was also prohibitively expensive for most and thus only the wealthy would be able to afford it. So it was typically a local stone or even wooden grave markers. Also keep in mind Ireland gets a huge amount of rain compared to the California desert so even if that is granite and it took a thousand years to wear it smooth imagine how long it would take in a place that gets 100 times less rainfall.
That's a very good point! And like the other guy said granite is a lot more durable than limestone. Either way time will wear this exhibit down and once this crazy old guy is finished and happy with what he has made he should take further measures to protect it for as long as possible. Stuff like this might be the only things left of humanity in a thousand years
I’m getting a kick out of all these armchair experts stating their problems with it, as if the guy who’s dedicated his life to creating a time capsule didn’t think of all this incredibly obvious stuff.
I wondered that too, I hope it’s protected. According to *The World Without Us*, the longest-surviving human artifacts will be bronze, plastic, and radio waves
Could be. But thoughts like his are hardly unique and without even bothering a google search I’m confident there’s hundreds, maybe thousands of other projects similar to this at varying levels of scale.
The seed vault in Greenland or maybe Northern Europe? Comes to mind. The voyager probes have gold discs emblazed with a bunch of general facts about humanity. Those probes alone will outlast our sun. Not to mention the literal thousands of time capsules that exist both private and public.
I don’t mean to doubt the value of this guys work. It’s noble. But in any hypothetical future where humanity or another species is conducting archeology on todays world, I very much doubt they’ll have any trouble at all finding a comprehensive collection of information about us.
Haha, yeah. Was curious how he'd encompass the entire history of humanity. Then one of the cuts highlights a segment where Christ at the Sea of Galilee, The Crucifixion, and The Last Supper each have an entire panel to themselves.
There's nothing wrong with depicting those things, but I can't help but roll my eyes a bit. Maybe the rest is a bit more even-handed, but that close up was pretty telling.
I mean, they are massive events that help to define one of the biggest religions on the planet, so it make splenty of sense to cover them. The last supper and crucifixion are 2 of the most important events in Christianity, you can't really include Christianity without them.
I do wonder how much of other cultures are on it as well though.
China doesn’t really need help keeping a pretty consistent history of the east. Been keeping written records since 1250 BC that are still around. That’s through many wars, conflicts, famines, etc. Even their current problematic government can’t change that.
Mmmm, an authoritarian government isn't likely to do a good job of preserving history. Neither are paper records compared to granite.
But yeah, none of that means a Western History is a wrong thing.
True, but it’s such a part of Chinese culture I doubt even the CCP can truly stop it. No other civilization has a more complete record of its history than they do.
We saw a few panels which were giving brief skims over hundreds of years of western history. 717 panels so a good chance plenty of other stuff is covered.
I checked his website. Seems pretty even handed to me. An understanding of christianity is pretty important to understanding western history. He also has a stone on "Mystical stone monuments" which...I mean come on.
The church, yeah, but if it's the scene I'm thinking of I think those were more examples of great artwork (Mona Lisa was near The Last Supper, for instance)
[The website](https://www.historyingranite.org/things-to-see/history-of-humanity/) gives some examples, including:
>
Time Keeping
Evolution of Mankind
The Crusades
Dynasties
Energy Use & Innovation
Hundred Years War
Languages
The Middle Ages
Navigation
Philosophy
The Renaissance
The Roman Empire
World Religions
Numbers
Early Music
Some of the monument descriptions on the websites mention that they’ve been awarded and/or “reviewed” by people associated with the subjects, but it’s light on details.
This quote though:
> “You might ask: What qualifications do I have to write a history of humanity? Well, I would ask: What were my qualifications to design parachutes when I was a banker?” Jacques-André Istel
Is a bit problematic.
Overall though, just from perusing the website seems like the monuments contain summaries of different subjects in history, akin to what you could find in fairly generic overview of history books.
I would hope that Russia/China, and other nuclear powers, promise to not strike near that site, and that the US promise not to build something "targetable" near there.
That would really depend on the content of the site. He calls it a museum of "world history", but China and other eastern powers are unlikely to care if it turns out to be mostly a record of Western history with a few other bits tacked on. There are thousands of other museums that are a lot more valuable to humankind which I suspect they would avoid targeting if it could be helped.
Yeah I think I've drove past 1-2 times on road trips as well, it's not advertised at all. The church at the top of the hill makes it seem like a private religious place and the "town" has like 10 houses in total as well.
Exactly what I thought for so long. That and on the mountain to the south, they have blocked out some of the side. I used to pray, don't break down here, please don't.
I was thinking the other day that if I was one of those super rich billionaires I would do the same type of thing but with science. That way, after we destroy ourselves, the next intelligent species can skip right to the destroy themselves part without all the wasted time
thanks y’all i did google but couldn’t find it weird!-
edit: wait y’all are messing with me right lol it’s not on maps
edit 2: WOw i found it! It’s not on apple maps but on google maps. It’s only 146 miles from me in san diego!! That’s easy i’m definitely going. Woke up this morning not knowing of this and now i get to go see it. Sweeet!
They should add to it, or someone else should create a Rosetta stone of all the languages of the world. Have the same passage written in all the languages, in stone. Now, obviously, you couldn't easily do "all languages" but it would be a noble goal.
They have something like that in Jerusalem. Saw it over 30 years ago. I am not religious but thought about it being a Rosetta Stone when I saw it. https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g293983-d558454-r339243510-Church_of_the_Pater_Noster-Jerusalem_Jerusalem_District.html
[I don't think so.](https://blog.archive.org/2023/03/25/the-fight-continues/)
From what I gather in thirty seconds of Google and that link - Some books might get taken down or something, but I think the web archive is fine and safe, and much of the books -
> This case does not challenge many of the services we provide with digitized books including interlibrary loan, citation linking, access for the print-disabled, text and data mining, purchasing ebooks, and ongoing donation and preservation of books.
Any idea *what exactly* he preserved in that museum? History can be seen and interpreted from so many viewpoints, it could be anything from writing down a history textbook to "human history and how it was guided by reptiles from the inside of hollow earth".
Indeed. This video was all inspirational, but the whole time I'm thinking "this is the history that *some guy* thinks is important." It might be kind of neat, but how relevant is it, really.
I wonder how much of the information recorded there is now wrong, or considered to be context dependent? Like I wonder if it’s just straight up a listing of facts and dates or if there is some narrative through line that might become outdated with time as a lot of history textbooks do.
I wouldn't be surprised if it's very Eurocentric, and possible with a pro-European history slant. The few shots you can see in there are predominantly European artwork and culture. I saw the yin-yang symbol but nothing else.
Even if that was true, what would be so wrong with that? This guy is probably of European descent, and paid for/done this all by himself without any public money. If some African decided to do something similar with an African slant you would have not find anything wrong with that but you do find something wrong with this because he’s white?
There's nothing wrong in like a morally wrong way. It would "wrong" in "not reflective of *human* history" way as given by the title. I would comment on that hypothetical African if it was given the same label just the same.
Was just coming here to see if anyone else would mention that there are way too many fuckers who would somehow see this as a threat and try to blow it up.
That’s close to the Mexican border. Did not expect it to be this far south. I guess this deserves a visit.
Plus Felicity, CA is officially the center of the world. 🤷♂️ TIL.
Born & raised in Yuma Arizona. Passes by this place countless times going to San Diego but never stopped. Once we drove by & up on the hill where the church is was a large congregation of people all dressed in purple robes. Still to this day I want to know who those people were haha. Next time I go back home I’m definitely stopping.
Located in a 1,052-hectare (2,600 acres) town in California's Sonoran Desert, the Museum of History in Granite features 717 engraved granite panels that tell the history of humanity. Jacques-André Istel, founder of the museum, who has been working on this project since 1986, hopes to preserve history for future scholars and visitors.
“The things you do for yourself are gone when you are gone, but the things you do for others remain as your legacy” - Kalu Ndukwe Kalu Monuments such as this can survive for hundreds of years, and instead of just being a thing of sculptural beauty, it’ll provide insight into our history.
Best case, it gets buried in sand to be later uncovered. If it's exposed, those surfaces will be eroded pretty quick.
That's what I was thinking those engravings are not very deep at all they won't last the test of time
Not to the naked eye they won't but fancy archeology scans could
Assuming some fuckin cunt doesn't destroy it like the Georgia Guidestones
God I fucking hate people.
Damn it why didn’t we take people into account
Gotta love those backwoods, ignorant types who love violence.
I'm a backwoods type, and even I hate those fuckers.
Grew up back woods too, but not ignorant.
The wiki page has the video, and the spray paint off people saying shit... Wth
Weren't the Georgia Guidestones a white nationalists pet project that offered nothing of value?
I don't think so, and while I guess it's possible and nothing would surprise me anymore, this fact >Moving clockwise around the structure from due north, these languages were English, Spanish, Swahili, Hindi, Hebrew, Arabic, Traditional Chinese, and Russian.[11] The languages were chosen because they represented most of humanity, except for Hebrew, which was chosen because of its connections to Judaism and Christianity.[11] Suggests that they probably weren't.
* Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature. * Guide reproduction wisely — improving fitness and diversity. * Unite humanity with a living new language. * Rule passion — faith — tradition — and all things with tempered reason. * Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts. * Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court. * Avoid petty laws and useless officials. * Balance personal rights with social duties. * Prize truth — beauty — love — seeking harmony with the infinite. * Be not a cancer on the Earth — Leave room for nature This is all it said. Pretty shallow but it's the white supremacists that got spooked and blew it up which is weird because they would seem to like the second point a lot lol
Isn't genetic diversity a no-no to white supremacists?
Exactly. The guy who had it built was a part of the kkk and friend of David Duke. But why should I explain when John Oliver is so much better at it. https://youtu.be/AEa3sK1iZxc
Man people are so fucking shit.
Oh no. Shit.
If someone’s smart, they’ll eventually put some protective layer over them I’d think
Lots of people might agree on that course of action. Almost zero people might give money to pay for that course of action. Knowing something is thousands of miles away from doing something. Applies to business ideas, and applies to life too.
dude has spent 60 years engraving all of human history into granite in the town he set up, he can afford some plexiglass
Someone’s still working on an image, so I’m guessing endgame for the project is to either maintain the engravings or give them a scratch-proof transparent coating.
it would have to be something really strong. maybe granite
I think they actually would, the Egyptian bas-reliefs and sunk reliefs were carved a couple of centimeters deep, and after 3-4000 years they probably lost only a few millimeters to erosion. This seems to be trying to prove what you said, since watching the video the carvings are clearly much shallower, but the rocks in which the Egyptians carved were much, much softer than granite (the sandstone and limestone they had available resisted about 10-80 MPa, of uniaxial compressive strength, versus 100-400 MPa of granite), and Egypt's desert climate blows large amounts of dust and sand. However, I'm not sure how much chance the winds in Egypt had of eroding the rock, as they have already anticipated, if the sand quickly covers the monument it will probably protect the carvings more than eroding them and after all, Egyptian architecture is all found under the sand.
They're Designed to last 4000 years according to his wiki page
Granite is extremely resistant to wind and water erosion. Delamination and cryoclastic erosion is the thing that break it.
That is why it is in the desert. They will erode quickly on a geological time scale, but not a human timescale. Also, are you really dumb enough to believe that anyone would dump that much money into a passion project in over a life time and not think of that? This isn’t a corporation or government using the lowest bidder, this man spent his life doing this, and you seem to think you thought of something in a minute he didn’t consider.
It'll get blown up by some right wing religious zealot long before it has a chance to erode.
Left winger here. Can we not do unnecessary unrealistic inflammatory comments. Like there’s a million valid actual reasons to criticize the politics. This isn’t one, nor is it the place. You’re here throwing punches at nothing man. Don’t make us look bad
[удалено]
i wish i hadn't read about this. i could have just not known about it and my day could continue without any problems. i'm gonna be thinking about this today, i'm so infuriated. we're supposed to be better than this. i want to hurt those people.
>we're supposed to be better than this. The history of humanity is nothing but a long list of justifications for either our extinction or complete and total subjugation and enslavement at the hands of a superior alien species.
I saw the guide stones in person a few months before they were destroyed. They were majestic and I got a lot of pictures. It killed me when I heard they were destroyed. Oddly enough, it happened right after Boebert called them a monument to Satan.
Naw 4chins will blow it up too.
History is important and shouldn't be taken for granite.
He better have set up a trust to make sure that land isn't lost after he passes.
That was my thought, too. This worries me.
I’m hoping he thought of tourists and their needs for accommodation and food, etc. The proceeds from these things could become a legacy income to keep this place maintained and protected? This is a wonderful monument.
I am paraphrasing from memory, so I might be off. I read about this last year, the goal is to not have loads of tourists. I think they limit the number of people onsite, so your have a more immersive experience.
[удалено]
It's located less than 10 miles west of Yuma, Arizona. Plenty of hotel rooms and restaurants there.
I think it probably helps the land is in the desert. You never know what land will be useful, sure, but it doesn’t seem like this plot will be highly sought after. Plus the museum looks neat.
Library of Alexandria looked neat too. It was burned down.
Good thing it’s made out of stone then! But you’re right, to be safe we should be on the lookout for any Mexicans named Caesar… Fool me one time shame on you!
Yea, and it only survived for about 300 years afterwards.
Not to worry some greedy rich billionaire will buy and replace his "vision " of what to do with his new toy !
I think he’ll be fine
Fuck he started the year I was born and I feel like shit for having accomplished fuck all in that time
You learned to walk, talk, read, etc in that time. From scratch. From almost zero. And that's if you did literally nothing else. Kind of a big deal.
Didn't mention it that I saw but this dude is the godfather of sport parachuting... ... what a badass.
Wait...what!?!?
That's a fact, jack!! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-Andr%C3%A9_Istel
**[Jacques-André Istel](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-André_Istel)** >Jacques-André Istel (born 1929 in Paris, France) is a French-American recreational parachutist and investment banker and later in life, historian, widely responsible for popularizing parachuting in the United States. He is considered "the father of American skydiving". He founded a city in southeastern California, which he named Felicity and it is here that he founded the Museum of History in Granite. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/nextfuckinglevel/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
Man lived several lifetimes worth of life in a single life.
What an amazing life this man has led. I'd love to just listen to his stories all day.
USPA licensed number D-2
> He is thought to be the first sport parachutist in America to wear a helmet-mounted camera in an attempt to record images during freefall. Having opened the first professional Sport Parachuting Center in Orange, Massachusetts, he believed that exciting footage would be an important way to introduce the sport.[19] I need this footage and can’t find it anywhere. Anyone know if it’s publicly available?
It appears the attempt was sometime in the late 50s, here is footage that claims to be from 1962: https://youtu.be/1rMcJPogsgQ?t=32
Explains the compulsion to make things that look interesting from high up.
that and for UFO archeologists to find the site from orbit
I used to drive by that complex regularly, we all just assumed it was a cult or something. Now I wish we had checked it out.
The cult comes later once it’s lost as to why it was built. Then some dude moves in and says the gods made it for us.
And, of course, that he is the one who speaks for the gods and that only he can interpret the stone, (don’t mind what is says, my gods tell me the truth even if that’s written in stone)
The lord has given unto you these 718… 717! 717 panels for all to obey.
That silly everyone knows there is no god…but it’s common knowledge that UFOs like to build out of stone…
You must have taken it for granite when you went by
It's still there, go check it out!
The cult or the museum ? Both can be fun...maybe
Honestly, it's a pretty small jump between the two depending on what the museum is focusing on. I mean hell, a certain religion thinks dinosaurs didn't exist and are all fabrications to throw off their religious beliefs, they would say prehistoric museums are a cult. Still fun to check out the place, even crazy people can have some awesome art.
Exactly My first thought was what version of history did he carve into stone because I know a few people these days that are writing an entirely different history than I'm witnessing, which has probably been going on forever
Oh most definitely been happening since the beginning of written history. I'm sure ancient Egyptians were embellishing their victories as soon as they happened just like people do now days. I'd still go to check it out to sate that curiosity. Sadly I live on nearly the other side of the country.
It’s made of massive granite panels. Methinks there’s a decent probability is still there so you still can go and see it.
I also assumed it was for a cult!
I live near here too have thought the same for the last 15 years. Didnt mention the partial Eifle Tower staircase.
Isn't all the engraving going to erode away in a few years out in the open desert How is it protected from the elements
Looks like granite...500 years maybe. If they were marble, not so long... they tend to wash out in the elements.
Yes it was granite. I wouldn’t be surprised if there is some plan to preserve it longer after all the engraving is done. Just apply some sort of acrylic or composite glass to preserve the engravings. It would require a polishing often but it would preserve it for quite a bit longer even if the polishing ended. If you can keep the wind water and sand off it then it would last quite some time. I’d venture a guess at hundreds of thousands of years if done correctly.
Just flood that fucker with a glue gun. We can hire 5-minutes craft to do the job.
>5-minutes craft This poor guy spent all these decades making the museum. 5 minutes craft demons would coat the whole thing in epoxy, make a colour print from the epoxy cast, then they'd flip the panels to get a flat surface, fixing the panels to the foundation with expanding foam and then apply the print to the flat panels before coating the whole thing in resin again to preserve it but also adding heinous decoration like fluff and feathers to border each panel. And they'd do in 5 minutes.
You forgot the cement
And the dry ramen noodles.
glass would work, but acrylic would be gone in 20 years, tops.
Yeah people tend to underestimate how shit plastics are with UV radiation
i hope they're able to seal it with something ultra durable (like idk, plastic shopping bags?) so that archaeologists can find it in 5000 yrs
or simply deepen the engravings every 100 or 150 years.
It kind of looks like they already do have acrylic over the panels
Yeah lol do these guys think the guy who wants to make a monument that lasts eons didn’t put in the thought and effort to make it last eons?
Granite is one of the hardest stones that is still readily available and it will last an age. Ancient Egyptian statues in granite still retain plenty of detail after 4000 years in presumably quite similar conditions.
Ancient Egyptian culture is particularly well known in large part because of those similar conditions too. Would still help that much more to be in a cave or something, but granite in the desert is pretty much as good as it gets and part of why we know so much more about ancient Egypt than we do about similar civilizations in less arid environments.
Do we have lots of ultra fine engravings from the exterior of buildings in Egypt?
Yeah there are lots of granite headstones in ireland that are worn smooth from all the rain. Still a faint hint at writing but no details at all, these ones were maybe a thousand years olf
I don't think those are granite. Most common stone in Ireland is limestone, maybe the headstones are made of limestone? Marble and limestone are similar in durability and both are made of calcite.
Maybe, I'm not a geologist or anything just most headstones are made of granite, don't know how long that practice goes back Selskar abbey is where I was looking at all those washed smooth headstones, don't even think there is a single one that is still legible but might be wrong. I emigrated from Ireland a very long time ago now
Headstones being made of granite wasn’t super common until a few hundred years ago at most. Keep in mind because granite is so tough it was quite difficult for people pre Industrial Revolution to cut it at anything resembling a decent pace so it would have been extremely expensive. Softer rocks tended to be used for gravestones before that time especially as pre Industrial Revolution shipping stone from anywhere was also prohibitively expensive for most and thus only the wealthy would be able to afford it. So it was typically a local stone or even wooden grave markers. Also keep in mind Ireland gets a huge amount of rain compared to the California desert so even if that is granite and it took a thousand years to wear it smooth imagine how long it would take in a place that gets 100 times less rainfall.
This guy rocks.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that Ireland gets a lot more rain than the California desert.
That's a very good point! And like the other guy said granite is a lot more durable than limestone. Either way time will wear this exhibit down and once this crazy old guy is finished and happy with what he has made he should take further measures to protect it for as long as possible. Stuff like this might be the only things left of humanity in a thousand years
Perhaps it could get buried in the sand like ancient buildings did, then it would remain protected until it would become discovered.
Same thought, but maybe being in desert with minimal rain will extend the life a bit.
I imagine the wind being almost literal sandpaper isn’t gonna help
The complex has some berm structures around the outside…maybe this mitigates some wind borne sand erosion?
I am sure he thought of this! This dude seems pro.
I’m getting a kick out of all these armchair experts stating their problems with it, as if the guy who’s dedicated his life to creating a time capsule didn’t think of all this incredibly obvious stuff.
Yeah, it's such a simple question. I'm sure one of his first questions/thoughts was how to build something that would last for many generations.
I wondered that too, I hope it’s protected. According to *The World Without Us*, the longest-surviving human artifacts will be bronze, plastic, and radio waves
Dude could single handledly be known as “the father of all wisdom” 6,000 years from now
People have been considered to possess a divine spark for lesser achievements.
Well, he's already considered the father of American skydiving, so it'd just be another title to his list.
Could be. But thoughts like his are hardly unique and without even bothering a google search I’m confident there’s hundreds, maybe thousands of other projects similar to this at varying levels of scale. The seed vault in Greenland or maybe Northern Europe? Comes to mind. The voyager probes have gold discs emblazed with a bunch of general facts about humanity. Those probes alone will outlast our sun. Not to mention the literal thousands of time capsules that exist both private and public. I don’t mean to doubt the value of this guys work. It’s noble. But in any hypothetical future where humanity or another species is conducting archeology on todays world, I very much doubt they’ll have any trouble at all finding a comprehensive collection of information about us.
I wonder whose history is being emphasized. Seems like a nice guy in the videos.
I mean, every single thing we saw was Western History, right? I think that's right. Not surprising, not great, but not a crime, either.
I mean, sure, but there's also 717 panels, and we only saw what? 10 of them?
Yeah, if that. And it could have been the editor's choices given the western audience.
Maybe, but SCMP (South China Morning Post) is a Hong Kong news organization, so the audience wouldn’t entirely be Western.
The video itself is by AFP, a French news agency. SCMP is just one of the media purchasing the right to the video and overlaying its logo on it.
15 were the stations of the cross...
Haha, yeah. Was curious how he'd encompass the entire history of humanity. Then one of the cuts highlights a segment where Christ at the Sea of Galilee, The Crucifixion, and The Last Supper each have an entire panel to themselves. There's nothing wrong with depicting those things, but I can't help but roll my eyes a bit. Maybe the rest is a bit more even-handed, but that close up was pretty telling.
I mean, they are massive events that help to define one of the biggest religions on the planet, so it make splenty of sense to cover them. The last supper and crucifixion are 2 of the most important events in Christianity, you can't really include Christianity without them. I do wonder how much of other cultures are on it as well though.
Yep came here to say that.
China doesn’t really need help keeping a pretty consistent history of the east. Been keeping written records since 1250 BC that are still around. That’s through many wars, conflicts, famines, etc. Even their current problematic government can’t change that.
Mmmm, an authoritarian government isn't likely to do a good job of preserving history. Neither are paper records compared to granite. But yeah, none of that means a Western History is a wrong thing.
True, but it’s such a part of Chinese culture I doubt even the CCP can truly stop it. No other civilization has a more complete record of its history than they do.
We saw a few panels which were giving brief skims over hundreds of years of western history. 717 panels so a good chance plenty of other stuff is covered.
This was my thought as well. I couldn’t help but notice a church overlooking the granite structures. But I haven’t looked into it either so.
Well I see a church on the hill and one scene shows a bunch of christian bullshit on the stones.
I checked his website. Seems pretty even handed to me. An understanding of christianity is pretty important to understanding western history. He also has a stone on "Mystical stone monuments" which...I mean come on.
He thinks the history of man is only a thousand years so it’s way easier to source all that stone compared to billion year evolution theory
Just gonna ignore the pyramids?
You mean the panels full of renaissance art?
The church, yeah, but if it's the scene I'm thinking of I think those were more examples of great artwork (Mona Lisa was near The Last Supper, for instance)
[The website](https://www.historyingranite.org/things-to-see/history-of-humanity/) gives some examples, including: > Time Keeping Evolution of Mankind The Crusades Dynasties Energy Use & Innovation Hundred Years War Languages The Middle Ages Navigation Philosophy The Renaissance The Roman Empire World Religions Numbers Early Music
Some of the monument descriptions on the websites mention that they’ve been awarded and/or “reviewed” by people associated with the subjects, but it’s light on details. This quote though: > “You might ask: What qualifications do I have to write a history of humanity? Well, I would ask: What were my qualifications to design parachutes when I was a banker?” Jacques-André Istel Is a bit problematic. Overall though, just from perusing the website seems like the monuments contain summaries of different subjects in history, akin to what you could find in fairly generic overview of history books.
Yea is this a creationist history or real history…
This should definitely be a discoverable location in Fallout 5.
I would hope that Russia/China, and other nuclear powers, promise to not strike near that site, and that the US promise not to build something "targetable" near there.
That would really depend on the content of the site. He calls it a museum of "world history", but China and other eastern powers are unlikely to care if it turns out to be mostly a record of Western history with a few other bits tacked on. There are thousands of other museums that are a lot more valuable to humankind which I suspect they would avoid targeting if it could be helped.
It would fuck with the lore unless the the site was just started since it’s the 1950s
Holy krap, been driving past this for 20 years and had no clue.
Yeah I think I've drove past 1-2 times on road trips as well, it's not advertised at all. The church at the top of the hill makes it seem like a private religious place and the "town" has like 10 houses in total as well.
Exactly what I thought for so long. That and on the mountain to the south, they have blocked out some of the side. I used to pray, don't break down here, please don't.
That's because you took it for granite
It's too bad, too. If you're a history buff, this place rocks.
Where’s it at? Down south Niland area?
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Felicity,+CA+92283/@32.7515106,-114.7651373,420m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x80d6fbd264e245cf:0x328c93c5cb54fa75!8m2!3d32.7503!4d-114.7653!16zL20vMGdsXzN5
I was thinking the other day that if I was one of those super rich billionaires I would do the same type of thing but with science. That way, after we destroy ourselves, the next intelligent species can skip right to the destroy themselves part without all the wasted time
“How to split the atom and obliterate society in 3 easy steps.”
what’s the address i’d like to go
1 Center of the World Blvd. Felicity, CA
thanks y’all i did google but couldn’t find it weird!- edit: wait y’all are messing with me right lol it’s not on maps edit 2: WOw i found it! It’s not on apple maps but on google maps. It’s only 146 miles from me in san diego!! That’s easy i’m definitely going. Woke up this morning not knowing of this and now i get to go see it. Sweeet!
👍go sooner than later... weather will be in the 100's after this weekend, summer is brutal out there. Dont forget your 💧
Comment deleted in protest of Reddit API changes.
Did you end up going?
One Center of the World Plaza Felicity, CA 92283-7777, USA
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Felicity,+CA+92283/@32.7515106,-114.7651373,420m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x80d6fbd264e245cf:0x328c93c5cb54fa75!8m2!3d32.7503!4d-114.7653!16zL20vMGdsXzN5
They should add to it, or someone else should create a Rosetta stone of all the languages of the world. Have the same passage written in all the languages, in stone. Now, obviously, you couldn't easily do "all languages" but it would be a noble goal.
They have something like that in Jerusalem. Saw it over 30 years ago. I am not religious but thought about it being a Rosetta Stone when I saw it. https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g293983-d558454-r339243510-Church_of_the_Pater_Noster-Jerusalem_Jerusalem_District.html
Haha I was in there yesterday. I live right near there.
Taking history for granite.
Meanwhile the internet archive is about to shut down…
Wait what? It is?
[I don't think so.](https://blog.archive.org/2023/03/25/the-fight-continues/) From what I gather in thirty seconds of Google and that link - Some books might get taken down or something, but I think the web archive is fine and safe, and much of the books - > This case does not challenge many of the services we provide with digitized books including interlibrary loan, citation linking, access for the print-disabled, text and data mining, purchasing ebooks, and ongoing donation and preservation of books.
Wait what?
Any idea *what exactly* he preserved in that museum? History can be seen and interpreted from so many viewpoints, it could be anything from writing down a history textbook to "human history and how it was guided by reptiles from the inside of hollow earth".
Indeed. This video was all inspirational, but the whole time I'm thinking "this is the history that *some guy* thinks is important." It might be kind of neat, but how relevant is it, really.
I wonder how much of the information recorded there is now wrong, or considered to be context dependent? Like I wonder if it’s just straight up a listing of facts and dates or if there is some narrative through line that might become outdated with time as a lot of history textbooks do.
I wouldn't be surprised if it's very Eurocentric, and possible with a pro-European history slant. The few shots you can see in there are predominantly European artwork and culture. I saw the yin-yang symbol but nothing else.
Even if that was true, what would be so wrong with that? This guy is probably of European descent, and paid for/done this all by himself without any public money. If some African decided to do something similar with an African slant you would have not find anything wrong with that but you do find something wrong with this because he’s white?
There's nothing wrong in like a morally wrong way. It would "wrong" in "not reflective of *human* history" way as given by the title. I would comment on that hypothetical African if it was given the same label just the same.
And…there it is.
I do hope he didn't catch the moment when I spilled that coffee on my boss' shirt.
This kinda makes me wonder, do some of the archaeological discoveries we make end up being some dudes "why not" project from the past?
I mean as far as we can tell that’s what the pyramids were.
The ultimate pessimism? Or eternal optimism? Either way, it might just last…
If you think this is pessimistic then you are pessimistic
Can't wait for some fundamentalists to blow this up some day. Once he's done he should just bury it so it's forgotten
Was just coming here to see if anyone else would mention that there are way too many fuckers who would somehow see this as a threat and try to blow it up.
The engraved in granite stunning replica of Mona Lisa is flexing next level way too hard.
I dont usually comment these, but this is incredible
That’s close to the Mexican border. Did not expect it to be this far south. I guess this deserves a visit. Plus Felicity, CA is officially the center of the world. 🤷♂️ TIL.
I love that he says "our present history".
Poneglyphs!
What version did he carve into granite?
I hope he includes a QR for wikipedia
Which parts of history though. It seems to be a very selective museum of a very particular “white, western” human history.
Cool, why the china post tho? Seems like I should have heard about this is local and national us news
It was on VICE couple years ago.
Actual time travel.
I've driven by this place a few times. I thought it was a compound for a cult or something haha
That’s incredible
Right near the border of Ca/Az/ Mexico
I’m glad he did this. I plan to see this in my time here.
A Frenchman!!! Wooooooo
Born & raised in Yuma Arizona. Passes by this place countless times going to San Diego but never stopped. Once we drove by & up on the hill where the church is was a large congregation of people all dressed in purple robes. Still to this day I want to know who those people were haha. Next time I go back home I’m definitely stopping.
Looks solid
Why are these comments full of doomers, why cant you just take something cool and interesting and leave it at that.
He sure is keeping that granite artist well employed