Science's greatest fear

May 28, 2008

The paranormal and science have an uneasy relationship. The occasional scientist is courageous enough to take the plunge into researching the paranormal, but in the main, the subject is anathema. This has led to what could be called a ‘paranormal phobia’ amongst those who claim to be rational. The world is explained through individualism, atheism, materialism and specialization.

The paranormal doesn’t fit into any of these, so forget it

And science does a marvelous job at doing so. Indeed, many scientists become evangelical in their manic need to show that they are right, and paranormalists – well, mad.

They’ve even recruited an army of groupies – non-scientific types who nonetheless have absolute belief in the wrongness of the paranormal. Forming sceptic societies the world over, they do a marvelous job of publicizing paranormalists, even being responsible for some careers.

This manic need is interesting

They doth protest too much, me thinks. And when someone exhibits this kind of fundamentalist mentality, we really must ask if the reason is not ‘rationality’ based, but an exhibition of fear.

If we go into the history of science, it is clear that it grew out of mysticism and philosophy. Even just over 400 hundred years ago, many scientists were of a mystical bent. Think Keplar and Newton. Even in the 19th century, it was a monk – Mendel – who defined genetics.

But somewhere along the way, science crossed the line

It divorced itself from mysticism, and the absolute idea of inquiry it entailed. This seriously reduced the things it could study – namely, the definite physical world, if such a thing actually exists.
At first, they could be comfortable with this, for society was still religious enough to allow science a repository for things they could not explain. Some things could still be the preserve of God.

But as God was banished from the universe, it had to change.

And the repository for awkward ‘bits’ was taken away. And once this occurred, science did something that was the exact opposite of the rational.

It created what I call ‘anti-superstition’. You can see it at work all the time in statements from scientists such as: ‘There is no evidence for this.’ Now, think about what is being said here.

The vast majority of people accept science as the last word on an issue. Science itself accepts the world works based upon their theorizing. But the above statement suggests that what ‘is’ is defined by what science can investigate and explain.

All else is non-existent. Thus, the world becomes not a reality, but an image created by the ‘thought-form’ which becomes scientific consensus. Only as a scientist sees a place for other things do those other things exist.

But the reality is, those things still existed. It is just that science was not yet up to the task of explaining them. Which leaves us existing in a world virtually ignored through science’s fear of non-explanation and superstition.

The paranormal is just one casualty of this mentality. Who knows what dangers may be creeping up on us through their fear.

© Anthony North, May 2008

Source: http://beyondtheblog.wordpress.com

The Hole at the Pole

May 27, 2008

The disc's roundness obviously squares with the common understanding that the sky is circular, if not spherical. But why does it have such a conspicuous aperture in the middle?

Chinese jade disc symbolizing the sky. Credit: Rens Van der Sluijs

Shown here is a so-called bi disc, a Chinese jade disc with a hole in the middle. Such discs, often with a ‘pockmarked’ surface identified as a ‘rice grain’ pattern, have been produced in China at least from the Neolithic period (±2500 BCE) onwards, particularly in the region of Shanghai in southeast China. Certainly during the Zhōu and Hàn dynasties (12^th century BCE to 3^rd century CE), they symbolized the sky or the cosmos.

Chinese cosmology prominently features the region of the pole star as the center of the cosmos. Yet, surely the Chinese did not envision a gaping hole at the celestial pole? The idea of a hole in the fabric of the circumpolar sky may not have been attested directly in Chinese sources, but abundant traditions from many other parts of the world, such as the Chukchi in northeastern Siberia, postulate precisely that.

The Old Turks used to call the pole star ‘a smoke hole of the sky’. Communities throughout North America subscribed to a belief in “the hole of the sky”, which at least the Lakota and the Blackfoot people specify as being situated “in the northern circumpolar star world”. Gods and goddesses, legendary ancestors and heroes, and the souls of shamans alike are often imagined to use the cosmic hole as a gateway between worlds, a ‘door’ or ‘window’ without which there is no way denizens of the sky can travel to earth and vice versa.

Stargazers may have a hard time trying to figure out just what aspect of the heavenly north pole could have prompted the popular folkloristic image of an opening in the sky. A crucial pointer is the repeated association of the hole with the axis mundi or ‘world axis’: the tip of the tree, mountain, pillar, ladder or rope that ties the regions of the universe together passes through the hole in the sky, and not infrequently the column itself is presented as a hollow object, too.

The Maya people of Yucatán, for example, describe “seven celestial planes, each with a central hole through which the cosmic Ceiba tree extends its branches ….” The sky hole emerges as a property of the complex morphology of the axis mundi.

Intensive collaboration between plasma physicists, electrical engineers and comparative mythologists has recently led to the hypothesis that the mythology of the world axis is convincingly explained as a high-energy auroral z-pinch that formed on the boundary between the Paleolithic and the Neolithic periods, at a time of profound geomagnetic instability.

At times of intense electric flux, this auroral column could have appeared to human eyes as a colossal hollow tube. Visible particles traveling through this tube could have been conceived as animated mythical entities voyaging between the extremities of the cosmos. In this light, the perplexing notion of a hole in an otherwise solid firmament gains plausibility and strikes one for its accuracy in the face of ‘common sense’ observation of the heavens today.

Contributed by Rens Van der Sluijs

Source: http://thunderbolts.info

Fruits, Vegetables And Teas May Protect Smokers From Lung Cancer, Researchers Report

May 31, 2008

Tobacco smokers who eat three servings of fruits and vegetables per day and drink green or black tea may be protecting themselves from lung cancer, according to a first-of-its-kind study by UCLA cancer researchers.

UCLA researchers found that smokers who ingested high levels of natural chemicals called flavonoids in their diet had a lower risk of developing lung cancer, an important finding since more than 90 percent of lung cancers are caused by tobacco smoking.

The study was published recently in the journal Cancer.

"What we found was extremely interesting, that several types of flavonoids are associated with a reduced risk of lung cancer among smokers," said Dr. Zuo-Feng Zhang, a researcher at UCLA's Jonsson Cancer Center and a professor of public health and epidemiology. "The findings were especially interesting because tobacco smoking is the major risk factor for lung cancer."

Flavonoids are water-soluble plant pigments that have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, both of which can counteract damage to tissues. For the UCLA study, researchers looked at 558 people with lung cancer and 837 people who did not have lung cancer and analyzed their dietary history.

Researchers found that study participants who ate foods containing certain flavonoids seemed to be protected from developing lung cancer. Zhang said the flavonoids that appeared to be the most protective included catechin, found in strawberries and green and black teas, kaempferol, found in Brussels sprouts and apples, and quercetin, found in beans, onions and apples.

So should smokers run out and stock up on the teas, apples, beans and strawberries? Quitting smoking is the best course of action, Zhang said, but eating more fruits and vegetables and drinking more black and green teas won't hurt.

"Since this study is the first of its type, I would usually be hesitant to make any recommendations to people about their diet," Zhang said. "We really need to have several larger studies with similar results to confirm our finding. However, it's not a bad idea for everyone to eat more fruits and vegetables and drink more tea."

Zhang said flavonoids protect against lung cancer by blocking the formation of blood vessels that tumors develop so they can grow and spread, a process called angiogenesis. They also stop cancer cells from growing, allowing for naturally programmed cell death, or apoptosis, to occur.

The antioxidant properties found in the flavonoids also may work to counteract the DNA damaging effects of tobacco smoking, Zhang said, explaining why they affected the development of lung cancer in smokers but not in non-smokers.

"The naturally occurring chemicals may be working to reduce the damage caused by smoking," Zhang said.

The next step, Zhang said, are laboratory-based studies of flavonoids on cell lines and animal models to determine how they are protecting smokers from developing lung cancer. And in addition to larger studies to confirm these findings, other studies need to be done to see if the protective effects of flavonoids extend to other smoking-related cancers, such as bladder, head and neck and kidney cancers.

Zhang and his team also plan to study which types of fruits and vegetables have the highest levels of the flavonoids found to be helpful in this study and what the optimal number of servings per day might be to provide the greatest protection.

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Adapted from materials provided by University of California - Los Angeles, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.






Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com

Study confirms ancient Chile settlement is 14,000 years old

May 8, 2008

Scientists have confirmed that the famed Monte Verde archaeological site in southern Chile is about 14,000 years old, making it the earliest known human settlement in the Americas, the journal Science reported Thursday.

The age of Monte Verde has been the subject of controversy over the years, since estimates appeared to conflict with other archaeological evidence related to the settlement of North America.

The new findings support not only the age of the Monte Verde site, but also the coastal migration theory currently ascribed to by most scholars, which hypothesizes that people first entered the New World through the Bering land bridge more than 16,000 years ago.

The study, based on the first data compiled about the Monte Verde site in about a decade, identified nine species of seaweed and marine algae used as food by the settlement's inhabitants.

Carbon dating put the age of the seaweed samples at between 13,980 and 14,220 years old, confirming that the site was occupied some 1,000 years earlier than any other known human settlements in the Americas. The study appears in the May 9 issue of Science.

Discovered in 1976, Monte Verde is located in a peat bog about 500 miles (800 kilometers) south of Santiago, Chile.

Researchers say it could have supported between 20 to 30 people in a dozen huts along a small creek.

A wide variety of food has been found at the site, including extinct species of llama and an elephant-like animal called a gomphothere, shellfish, vegetables and nuts.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com

Authentic Viking DNA Retrieved From 1,000-year-old Skeletons

May 28, 2008

Although "Viking" literally means "pirate," recent research has indicated that the Vikings were also traders to the fishmongers of Europe. Stereotypically, these Norsemen are usually pictured wearing a horned helmet but in a new study, Jørgen Dissing and colleagues from the University of Copenhagen, investigated what went under the helmet; the scientists were able to extract authentic DNA from ancient Viking skeletons, avoiding many of the problems of contamination faced by past researchers.

Analysis of DNA from the remains of ancient humans provides valuable insights into such important questions as the origin of genetic diseases, migration patterns of our forefathers and tribal and family patterns.

Unfortunately, severe problems connected with the retrieval and analysis of DNA from ancient organisms (like the scarcity of intact molecules) are further aggravated in the case of ancient humans. This is because of the great risk of contamination with abundant DNA from modern humans. Humans, then, are involved at all steps, from excavation to laboratory analyses. This means that many previous results have subsequently been disputed as attributed to the presence of contaminant DNA, and some researchers even claim that it is impossible to obtain reliable results with ancient human DNA.

Using freshly sampled material from ten Viking skeletons from around AD 1,000, from a non-Christian burial site on the Danish island of Funen, Dissing and colleagues showed that it is indeed possible to retrieve authentic DNA from ancient humans.

Wearing protective suits, the researchers removed the teeth from the jaw at the moment the skeletons were unearthed when they had been untouched for 1,000 years. The subsequent laboratory procedures were also carefully controlled in order to avoid contamination.

Analysis of the Viking DNA showed no evidence of contamination with extraneous DNA, and typing of the endogenous DNA gave reproducible results and showed that these individuals were just as diverse as contemporary humans. A reliable retrieval of authentic DNA opens the way for a valuable use of prehistoric human remains to illuminate the genetic history of past and extant populations.

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Journal reference:

1. Melchior et al. Evidence of Authentic DNA from Danish Viking Age Skeletons Untouched by Humans for 1,000 Years. PLoS ONE, 2008; 3 (5): e2214 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0002214

Adapted from materials provided by Public Library of Science, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.






Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com

10 500BC ~ 2012AD, Fragments of a Lost Civilisation

May 2008

Over the last few decades, monuments have been found under the sea, which were covered up for 12 000 years. These monuments could be much older still. Considering that there are numerous ancient monuments on land that point to 10 500BC, this further reinforces the evidence for a prehistoric civilisation that people are only now rediscovering.

The undersea monuments featured in this video are outposts of something much bigger.

Source: http://uk.youtube.com

Stonehenge builders had geometry skills to rival Pythagoras

26 May 2008

Stone Age Britons had a sophisticated knowledge of geometry to rival Pythagoras – 2,000 years before the Greek "father of numbers" was born, according to a new study of Stonehenge.

Five years of detailed research, carried out by the Oxford University landscape archaeologist Anthony Johnson, claims that Stonehenge was designed and built using advanced geometry.

The discovery has immense implications for understanding the monument – and the people who built it. It also suggests it is more rooted in the study of geometry than early astronomy – as is often speculated.


Mr Johnson believes the geometrical knowledge eventually used to plan, pre-fabricate and erect Stonehenge was learnt empirically hundreds of years earlier through the construction of much simpler monuments.

He also argues that this knowledge was regarded as a form of arcane wisdom or magic that conferred a privileged status on the elite who possessed it, as it also featured on gold artefacts found in prehistoric graves.

The most complex geometrical achievement at Stonehenge is an 87-metre diameter circle of chalk-cut pits which mark the points of a 56-sided polygon, created immediately within themonument's perimeter earthwork.

Mr Johnson used computer analysis and experimental archaeology to demonstrate that this outer polygon was laid out using square and circle geometry. He believes the surveyors started by using a rope to create a circle, then laid out the four corners of a square on its circumference, before laying out a second similar square, thus creating an inner octagon. The points of the octagon were then utilised as anchors for a surveyor's rope which was used to "draw" arcs which intersected the circumference so as to progressively create the sides of a vast polygon.

Indeed, his work has demonstrated that a 56-sided polygon is the most complex that can easily be created purely through square and circle geometry using a single piece of rope.

It is likely that this basic limitation determined the number of sides of Stonehenge's outer polygon – and may also have led to the 56-sided polygon concept becoming important within wider European religious belief. Ancient Greek classical mythology associated just such a 56-sided polygon with Zeus's great rival for divine supremacy, the weather god Typhon.

Johnson's research, published as a book this week, shows that Stonehenge derived its design from geometrical knowledge and features no less than six concentric polygons – a 56-sided outer one built around 2950BC; a regular octagon built around 2500BC) inside that; two concentric (though partly inaccurate) 30-sided polygons built around 1650BC, which were based on a series of hexagons; a 30-sided inner polygon (the sarsen stone ring which was built around 2500BC) also based on hexagonal geometry; and two probable 40-sided concentric polygons (probable former blue stone positions built around 2600BC) that were later modified to 30-sided ones. They also created the famous central stone "horseshoe" utilising the survey markers used to create the thirty-sided sarsen polygon.

The experimental archaeology demonstrates that most of the monument was pre-planned and that the great stones were pre-fabricated off-site and then installed by surveyor-engineers.

"For years people have speculated that Stonehenge was built as a complex astronomical observatory. My research suggests that, apart from mid-summer and mid-winter solar alignments, this was not the case," said Mr Johnson. "It strongly suggests that it was the knowledge of geometry and symmetry which was an important component of the Neolithic belief system."

"It shows the builders of Stonehenge had a sophisticated yet empirically derived knowledge of Pythagorean geometry 2000 years before Pythagoras," he said.

A leading British prehistorian, Sir Barry Cunliffe, from Oxford University, believes that Anthony Johnson's research is "a major step forward in solving the puzzle of Stonehenge".

Source: http://www.independent.co.uk

Creepy Mystic Eye Symbols in Subway Station beneath former World Trade Center

may 21, 2008

This is in the subway stop formerly named "World Trade Center."

It still connects directly to the site, but the part of the station closer has been re-built. A viewing platform has been set up in the closer area to view the "Big Lie Hole." It appears that the mosaic below was not destroyed or damaged and it dates from before the attack.

All over the walls there, single Eyes peer out at you. The mosaic below is an example.

Every subway station, or most in Manhattan, have a theme. The theme under the former Trade Towers are these Illumanati -style eyes.These particular mosaics were recovered and remounted back into the walls, since they were also the symbols of that subway station before the attacks of September 11, 2001.

This Artwork is built into the floor.
It is surrounded by a guard rail so you can't walk onto it.

It shows a map of the globe with an all-seeing eye at the center.

Someone walked on it to get this picture.

Use of images of public artwork by rights obtaining under Fair Use statute:
For discussion of implications, semiotics, politics and scientific details
surrounding the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York City
see: www.911researchers.com
911 Researchers

blockbush@blockbush.org
© blockbush.org

Source: http://www.blockbush.org

London Olympics 2012 : Zion : Street Plan

20 May 2008

For background reading please read my following posts:

1) London Olympics 2012 : Zion (The New Jerusalem)

2) London Olympics 2012 : The Logo's Creator

I shall start by stating my intentions. With my research, I do not intend to cause panic or fear, or to create a platform for prejudice and hate. As a spiritual person, I publish these views in order to simply raise awareness. To raise awareness on the grounds, that if indeed something does transpire during the London Olympics 2012, you can observe the event with a critical eye. It is my intention to ensure we shall not be duped!

Following my two previous articles concerning the Olympics 2012, I decided to cast my eyes into the air and look down again. You guessed it, out came Google Maps.

Here's a satellite view of the Olympics 2012 Site:

Stratford in London, is to become host to the Olympic village, which is undergoing massive regeneration due to the project. The site was claimed to be the last area of suitable waste land in London. Pretty lucky eh? Or maybe it was left alone for years for this very reason! I choose the latter.

And so... to the point. Take a look at the Olympic site with the Google Maps road view. On a first glance it looks like any other map view, but persevere... take a closer look at the road names (click to enlarge):

You will find that the entire site of the Olympic Village is surrounded by somewhat biblical and mystical road names. The New Jerusalem you ask?

The Roads

1. East Cross Route (actually the A12 or A'20'12) : ref. "The Eastern Cross"

The Eastern Orthodox cross (also known as Crux Orthodoxa, the Byzantine cross, the Eastern cross, and the "Russian" cross) can be considered a modified version of the Patriarchal cross, having two smaller crossbeams, one at the top and one near the bottom, in addition to the longer crossbeam.

Notice how the East Cross Route is also an A road - numbered A12.

Given the UK has hundreds of A roads, what's the likelihood that of all roads, the A'20'12 intersects the Olympic site?

Pause for a second and think about the shape of the letter A... yes it's a pyramid with a capstone. So symbolically the only major road which 'crosses' the Olympic site, is the A(Pyramid) (20)12.

2. Carpenter's Road : ref. "Joseph"

Joseph's profession is described in the Gospels as a τεκτων, a Greek word for a variety of skilled craftsmen, but Christian tradition has him as a "carpenter".

3. Great Eastern Road : ref. Eastern Star

The Order of the Eastern Star is the largest fraternal organization in the world that both men and women can join. It was established in 1850 by Rob Morris, a lawyer and educator who had been an official with the Freemasons.

As you can see the emblem for the "Order Of The Eastern Star" is a pentagram - similar to that found on the UK Passport. An acknowledgement of the pagan deity Satan / Saturn.

4. Angel Lane : ref. Angel Gabriel / The Holy Spirit

Angels visit Joseph and Mary. Angels announced Christ's birth to Mary and Joseph. The angel Gabriel visited Mary in Nazareth. She was engaged to Joseph. Gabriel told Mary she would give birth to the Son of God. Mary was a virgin. Gabriel told her God's power would make the conception possible. Gabriel said, "Nothing will be impossible with God".

5. Temple Mills Lane

Temple Mills were water mills belonging to the Knights Templar - "The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon".

6. Church Road (Update)

Although not shown on the above map (but please do look in Google), the road on the north east perimeter of the complex takes it's name from the Christian place of worship, a church.

The Location - Ley Lines

The Olympics 2012 site is situated between Leyton and Leytonestone. The "Ley" found in their names originates from the term 'Ley lines'.

For those who are in the dark:

Ley lines, or Leys, are alignments of ancient sites stretching across the landscape. Ancient sites or holy places may be situated in a straight line ranging from one or two to several miles in length. A ley may be identified simply by an aligned placing of marker sites, or it might be visible on the ground for all or part of its length by the remnants of an old straight track.

Our ancestors knew that ley lines, earth grids and vortexes were energy sources and centers that were to be considered holy.

A "Ley Line" is one a number of lines which form part of an energy grid which cross the Earth. The energy - metaphysical in nature.

So is there any documentary proof that 'Ley lines' cross near Leyton and Leytonestone? You bet there is...

The bender site, and the old yew tree in it, were the short-lived heart of Leytonstonia, decorated with a kerb-henge, a replica of Stonehenge made with kerbstones. (Some talked of the significance of the names Leyton and Leytonstone, of their relation to ley lines more generally, as though this might explain the energy of the protest sites. A brickhenge was made at Clarement Road, halfway between Leyton and Leytonstone.)

The Olympics site lies in an area synonymous with mystical - metaphysical - earth energy. Is this yet another coincidence or part of a plan for the 2012 Olympics which was put into motion way before the event was officially finalised?

Conclusions

It seems the Olympics 2012 site was picked for reasons which go far beyond that of 'spare waste land'.

The roads which encompass the site, contain biblical and Masonic references, lying dormant for years, as if to become part of some majestic ritual.

And if that wasn't enough, a new construction intersecting 'Angel Lane' looks to be forming a grand procession.

In the BBC interview "It will be a lasting legacy" with Jean Pickering, the former Olympic bronze medallist was quoted as saying:

I remember running along Angel Lane to get the train to work and hearing all the market stall holders cheering me on. That's true East End spirit.

References to 'lasting legacy', 'Angel Lane', and 'true spirit' sound ominous to me, given our 'Zion' street map.

Britain's spiritual landmarks - Stonehenge, Glastonbury Tor and Avebury, all rest upon 'ley lines' (areas of intense earth energy). Could it be any more bewildering that they have chosen such a site for our Olympic games? And that it just so happened to be vacant for the occasion?

To close I would like to end with a reference from the Bible. Note the chapter and verse numbers.

Mark 11:11

Then Jesus went into Jerusalem and into the temple and looked around at everything. Since it was already late, he went out with his twelve disciples to Bethany.

At 11:11 (find out more here), Jesus enters Jerusalem, or should that be the New Jerusalem - Zion!

Source: http://thecosmicmind.blogspot.com

The continent's true history

May 1st 2008

Protecting cave paintings can restore Africa's pride in its history

Africa, Arise

SO LATE to be “discovered” by the rest of the world—Henry Stanley made the continent's first crossing only in 1877—Africa, it can be forgotten, is probably the cradle of humanity. Palaeoanthropologists, archaeologists and, more recently, geneticists have all bolstered the “out of Africa” theory, which holds that early man wandered out of the Rift Valley. Yet little is known of pre-colonial African cultures. Some vanished out of history, along with their languages and beliefs, before they ever came to be named. That is one reason why Africa's rock art is so precious. The faintest ochre scratches of prehistoric antelope in a cave open a rare window into Africa's—and humanity's—distant past.

Africa may have 200,000 rock-art sites, more than any other continent. The oldest known site, in Namibia, is between 18,000 and 28,000 years old. Several African universities now have programmes to decipher the paintings and carvings. They are being helped by the Kenya-based Trust for African Rock Art (TARA), which seeks to discover and digitally archive as much of the art as it can for future scholars.

The best is in the Sahara desert, particularly in Niger's Air mountains, in the Tibesti mountains of northern Chad and southern Libya, and in south-east Algeria's Tassili n'Ajjer range. Such desert sites are too remote to be damaged by graffiti, though wars involving the local Tuareg have resulted in some being shot up or smashed apart for sale to foreign collectors. David Coulson, one of TARA's founders, raves about a recent find in the Tassili n'Ajjer range: an anatomically perfect four-metre-long carving of a hippo hunted by an Egyptian-looking figure with a superbly sinuous bow. This in a region that dried up several thousand years ago.

Elsewhere in Africa, rock art often chronicles the hunting magic of Bushmen and Pygmies. Not much rock art survives in western Africa, and in eastern and central parts of the continent more recent but still invaluable paintings have been poorly preserved.

But there is progress. Locals are being encouraged to see the value of showing off their sites to tourists. National museums are being overhauled, with new displays of lost peoples. New history textbooks may follow. New finds are being made. A sensational discovery in a cave in Kenya is being kept under wraps until it can be properly dated.

Some think African rock art should provide a pan-African rallying point, free of politics or religion. A rich rock-art heritage could connect Libya and South Africa, two of the African Union's biggest backers, which sometimes struggle to find anything in common. Kofi Annan, a former UN secretary-general, is a big rock-art fan. He reckons it represents nothing less than the earliest record of the human imagination.

Source: http://www.economist.com

Pi, Phi and the Great Pyramid

may 11, 2008

We can forget all the ideas crediting Atlanteans or space aliens with building the Great Pyramid of Giza, and instead imagine ourselves travelling back in time in H G Wells's time machine to try and work out not how the ancient Egyptians built this enormous edifice, because this lies beyond our present understanding, but rather what we can best judge to be its most appropriate proportions. Then, however, there were no electronic calculators, only ropes and rods.

Constructing right angles at the four corners of a pyramid is easy. To do it, history tells us that the Egyptians were aware of the ratios 3:4:5 as the side-lengths of a right-angle triangle. Many old kingdom pyramids adhere to these ratios. The Egyptians also knew a rough value of Pi (the value, not the symbol) as the ratio between the circumference of any circle and its diameter. They worked out that 3 _ is less than Pi, and Pi is less than 3 1/7, i.e. Pi lies between the rational number 22/7 and the Babylonian value. This can be done by constructing a circle of diameter AB and laying the latter on its circumference, starting from A, once until C then D then E, to conclude that Pi is greater than 3. The remaining part EA from the circumference is laid down again on the diameter AB, so seven times EA is less than AB which in turn is less than eight times EA, or EA/AB is greater than 1/8 and less than 1/7.

Read the full story at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2008/890/heritage.htm