• JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    The duomo took 600 years to be mostly complete and still has work being done though mostly restoration and maintenance. It has a marble quarry dedicated solely to it. Absolutely magnificent building, I did all the tours a few months ago, loved it.

    That is why we don’t build buildings like it anymore, insanely expensive and time consuming. Plus our current rich people would rather rape kids on their massive yachts and private island than commission beauty to be admired by wider society like the wealthy of old.

  • frezik@midwest.social
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    2 days ago

    The Large Hadron Collider and the International Space Stations are amazing wonders. It used to be that humanity’s most expensive projects were religious temples. Now it’s machines for scientific research. Some people apparently have a problem with this, and they’re generally not the sort of people I like to be around.

  • xwolpertinger@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    “This meme was brought to you through a single piece of glass several thousand miles long, at the bottom of the ocean”

    • SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      Single piece of glass that runs on electric pulses which travel trough a neatly arranged mineral structure.

      • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        More like light pulses travelling through an amorphous silicon dioxide mineral structure, but apart from that you’re entirely right.

    • ayyy@sh.itjust.works
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      2 days ago

      Undersea cables do have repeater stations, but your point still stands because those are also an engineering marvel.

  • bad_alloc@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    2 days ago

    RIch people used to comission great works, but today it seems like they have abandoned that one duty they have.

  • Queue@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    2 days ago

    In late game, Wonders are for culture and not science victories. We need to put more into one and get the other, as Canada just stole Einstein from me.

  • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    Edit: (not directed at OP)

    Bro have you seen the size of the bridges, stadiums and skyscrapers we build? Fuck it, have you seen the LHC?

    Should we start adding spires and arches to hospitals and train stations to get support from the RETVRN crowd?

      • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml
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        2 days ago

        We could build more, better, more beautiful infrastructure, or we could buy more bombs and let the free market deal with that.

    • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Unironically yes, please build spires and arches and gargoyles on everything. I want Gothic architecture everywhere please.

    • _stranger_@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Seriously, we started building things so massive that you literally can’t see all of it at the same time unless you’re in the air, riding in a magical skychair.

        • nyctre@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          That’s cool and all, but not sure if that counts as a thing we built as much as a thing we drew.

        • _stranger_@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          Exactly, yes! The LHC is so much more (larger isn’t the right word, maybe massive?). If it was on the surface instead of being buried, and the earth was perfectly spherical, you wouldn’t be able to see it standing in the middle of it, because the ring would be on the other side of the horizon all around you.

      • eestileib@sh.itjust.works
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        2 days ago

        JWST is insane. Not quite as insane as Apollo or Voyager relative to current mainstream tech, but still, holy shit.

      • TheAlbatross@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        2 days ago

        The ones in DC are pretty inspiring, too, in a Brutalist kind of way.

        They’re lit from below, so you can tell when a train is at a platform by the shadow it casts on the ceiling, which perfectly aligns with the recessed concrete blocks that make up said ceiling.

        Really impressive.

        • rtxn@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          I looked up photos of about a dozen separate metro stations in DC, and… they’re all the same design. I get pragmatism, but those are downright depressing. The only one I liked was Anacostia because the yellow overhead lights and the bright blue advertisement screen made interesting patterns reflecting off the water-damaged walls.

          Compare that to Moscow: underground palaces. Marble, statues, reliefs, arches and columns, chandeliers everywhere. Hate the Soviets all you like, but they knew how to build beautiful.

          I even like the ancient 81-series rolling stock, if only because of nostalgia.

    • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      Every giant stadium is about the same.

      A monument to the arrogance of some developer (et al), who then bilk the state/city for the cost.