The global population may be growing, but for developed countries where we get most of our news (I assume, at least I do), they're just starting to tip over into the shrinkage and dealing with the bulge of elderly people. The narrative is right for the political and economic interests that we hear from.
I imagine if we were consuming news from India, Egypt or Nigeria it would be a very different story.
Quick TLDR. They don't lift it, they dig under it. Either constructing a canal, and putting a weighted barge beneath it. Then remove the ballast so the barge lifts up the weight. For overland they do a similar thing, but with a sled, pour a lubricant under the sliders, and then pull. Apparently 2 people can pull 1 Ton this way. So 500 people pulling the sled. (They had approx 2000 people working on a similar project) Also they used shallow ramps over long distances to raise it up.
There was also a modern thing when they moved a lighthouse.
The 80 ton statue was difficult because they wanted to do it with minimal people, and with minimal disruption, and quickly. If you had 2000 people working 5 days a week, 3 years to do it in, and the legal ability to dig up the road/canal etc it can be done. The amazing thing to me is how much priority Ancient Egyptians gave building these monuments, seems like the most important thing they were doing. I guess it gets easier to deal with planning permission when your absolute ruler says "Do it".
> There are some granite blocks that weigh over 1000 tons. We’re told that these were transported from hundreds of miles away, across mountain and over a river. Historians are not engineers so they don’t understand what they’re saying.
I am still unsure which ancient blocks you're referencing though. Stonehenge? Could you link to them, or a picture, or where in the world they are so I can google it?
As far as I am aware, modern humanity is by far the most capable civilisation that has ever existed on earth as far as moving rocks is concerned. The only thing beating us right now is glaciers and tectonic activity.
I've seen a very good take that it is the ideal renewable fuel for large machinery such as farming or construction equipment. Batteries wouldn't work due to the cost and charging time (when you're using them you need them for long stretches), but weight (and therefore some of the complex/heavy containment). These places (at least in the UK) have their own diesel logistics infrastructure already.
You make some good points. But the Houthis have been being bombed by Saudi Arabia for years and haven't been crippled by it. Getting them to poke and prod some shipping could be and easy way to cause an outsized impact.
It could also be an internal thing for the Houthis that we (certainly I) don't know about. Being able to say "We're standing up to Israel and the US" could be big for their credibility in Yemen. That is pure speculation however.
> Given that the Houthis have said they are holding up ships they consider linked to Israel
They're stopping ships that they can, and it is in their interest to stop. Iranian ships seem to be passing through no bother, but ships flagged as Liberian, coming from Europe to Asia with a Filipino and Indian crew are stopped. You can consider any ship linked to Israel if you don't care how tenuous the link is.
> and that everyone in the UN bar the US and Israel are calling for a ceasefire.
Notably Hama's isn't calling for a ceasefire, and it takes two to tango, so even if Israel wanted a ceasefire there won't be one.
> wouldn't it be more useful to get a ceasefire, so then the Houthis can stop?
Since when did "Don't give in to terrorists" stop being a thing? Just throw ourselves on the good graces of a violent terrorist group.
Compared to who? Modern day, of course they weren't. 1500's Britain was quite poor, but not more so than many other places.
If you look at the general populace for basically anywhere before modern times, they all had bad hygiene nutrition and medial aptitude by modern standards. Looking at what the 0.1% could manage doesn't tell you much about a society.
I do use drugs. I have never seen spirits in a plastic bottle, even own brand super market vodka.
Boxed wine exists, and is a bit under half the market (by volume). Wine in glasses is still the majority of sales. Beer/cider/larger is sold in cans or bottles, with cans being about 2/3rd by volume.
I agree in theory with you. But you can 'bank' labour for later on. Building infrastructure (that will last) when you have a population bulge, means that the generations after can take advantage of that infrastructure, and have to do the lower amount of work, of maintaining it. This can go for things like education, investing in businesses, and generally any capital.
Of course you can also over build this capital that will never be used, but will need to be paid back (for example a local government pays to build a town that there are no people to fill it with) and the maintenance is too much, but you still have to look after the people who did the building.
Yeah absolutely! A local service that works well alongside a high speed intercity one would be greta, though may be better to build after the main route (don't want some small stations slowing down the main route build).
For the East/West corridor slower speed trains at the same stations allowing transfers would be preferable (cheaper and quicker to build, with minimal speed impact) to high speed rail.
That route at the top would make any high speed rail pointless. You would never get up to a speed to make it worth while. All to stop at places like Castle Rock population 2500. Going down to Eugene and Salem would make sense, but with the intent that they places would aim to grow in size considerably.
Places like Gresham to Forest grove are better for the Portland tram network, they are just part of the one metro area, they are not different metro areas like Seattle and Portland.
> I don’t see trains having a huge advantage over a clean grid and EV fleet. And the latter is much easier and faster to build.
The latter requires building millions of individual cars, each with large expensive lithium batteries, plus the road network and upkeep of that. Then building green energy, solar, wind, nuclear, hydro, plus storage!
The other includes building some train tracks and trains.
The planning system must be utterly dysfunctional, and the government incompetent when it comes to large projects, or tender for them, for the first to be anywhere near easier than the latter.
Not OP, but there are not enough resources for all of North America, Europe, China and India to live the lifestyle of the average US person. So I guess they are hopeful that India won't reach that level of consumption.
The replacements for some of those poisons (large amounts of artificial fertilisers) are animal products. In a world without artificial fertiliser you need to have animals to produce fertiliser.
The optimal for this would still be much less animal farming, and a massive shift in how and where it is done. But removing all animal products would be counter productive. (Perhaps this is what you meant by plant based though).
I imagine if we were consuming news from India, Egypt or Nigeria it would be a very different story.