I'm a retired commercial builder and the designed obsolescence for most commercial buildings today is about 50 years. This is not to say that the buildings will collapse after 50 years but that they will require a major overhaul at that point to update the building technology in them or the land on which they were built will no longer be utilized to the highest and best use. If the buildings were abandoned for 50 years with no ongoing maintenance then they would approach structural failure.
The great ancient monuments that survive today and have stood for at least several thousand years were built to last, without maintenance or updating and arguably they are still their highest and best use of the land. I think we would benefit greatly from a more objective study of ancient monuments, using multiple scientific disciplines working on an equal footing with archeologists and without being forced to work within the current framework of accepted theories that were largely developed over a century ago with a Western and Christian bias.
I am not suggesting that the aliens did it but I am suggesting that there are too many doctoral degrees in archeology that depend upon maintaining dated theories that do not advance our understanding of human history.
Posted by JoeBKite-like structures in the western Sahara Desert.
Posted by TriphidAn Aussie Indigenous Message Stick.
Posted by TriphidIndigenous Australian Aboriginal Rock art dated somewhere between 20 and 30 thousand years old.
Posted by TriphidIndigenous Australian Aboriginal Rock art dated somewhere between 20 and 30 thousand years old.
Posted by TriphidIndigenous Australian Aboriginal Rock art dated somewhere between 20 and 30 thousand years old.
Posted by TriphidIndigenous Australian Aboriginal Rock art dated somewhere between 20 and 30 thousand years old.
Posted by JoeBDortoka vremiri: A new species of Dortokid Turtle from the Late Cretaceous of the Hațeg Basin, Romania.
Posted by JoeBThe Cabeço da Amoreira burial: An Early Modern Era West African buried in a Mesolithic shell midden in Portugal.
Posted by JoeBMusivavis amabilis: A new species of Enantiornithine Bird from the Early Cretaceous Jehol Biota of northeastern China.
Posted by JoeBTorosaurus in Canada.
Posted by JoeBStone tools from the Borselan Rock Shelter, in the Binalud Mountains of northeastern Iran.
Posted by JoeBDating the Lantian Biota.
Posted by JoeBBashanosaurus primitivus: A new species of Stegosaur from the Middle Jurassic of Chongqing Municipality, China.
Posted by JoeBDetermining the time of year when the Chicxulub Impactor fell.
Posted by JoeBSão Tomé and Príncipe: Possibly the last country on Earth never to have been visited by a working archaeologist.
Posted by JoeBMambawakale ruhuhu: A new species of Pseudosuchian Archosaur from the Middle Triassic Manda Beds of Tanzania.