Cement and the Book of Mormon

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_beastie
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _beastie »

Brant Gardner wrote:Only if you require absolute deforestation instead of massive deforestation. As for how he did it, remember that the entrada into Tikal is AD378. There is information about Teotihuacan coming rather forcibly to the south.


Brant - the same issues I've raised with complete deforestation, which is what he describes, would apply to massive deforestation.

Can you present a single source that asserts that massive deforestation impacted Teotihuacan around 400 AD, before their most escalated period of growth and building?
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_beastie
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _beastie »

by the way - New England was suffering a period of deforestation during Joseph Smith's time.

http://books.google.com/books?id=0ru1Xf ... on&f=false
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_Paracelsus
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _Paracelsus »

It is uncertain where it was first discovered that a combination of hydrated non-hydraulic lime and a pozzolan produces a hydraulic mixture (see also: Pozzolanic reaction), but concrete made from such mixtures was first used on a large scale by Roman engineers.

Many excellent examples of structures made from these concretes are still standing, notably the huge monolithic dome of the Pantheon in Rome
Image
and the massive Baths of Caracalla.
Image
The vast system of Roman aqueducts also made extensive use of hydraulic cement.
Image

Some (existing) cultures have remains. See pictures above.

Some nonexisting ones have, too. See pictures below. Sorry, I didn't find older ones than 19th century.

Image

or :

Image
Brigham Young Nauvoo Home
Nauvoo, Illinois

Visit the home of Brigham Young, the second President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, leader of the Church's movement to the West, and first territorial governor of Deseret, later named Utah.
Constructed from 1843-44, this brick home provided a dwelling for Young's family of seven children and his wife, Mary Anne.

or the Lion's house for his very large family:
Image
The Lion House was built in 1856 by Brigham Young in order to accomodate his very large family. It gets its name from the statue of a lion over the front entrance, made by William Ward. The lion design is modeled after one located at a prominent home in Vermont where Brigham Young spent some of his childhood.

The House was partly designed by Truman O. Angell, who also designed the Salt Lake Temple, and was built with adobe and sandstone which came from City Creek Canyon. (Adobe? Cement, if I may ask!)

Before its use as a reception and banquet center, the Lion House was used, of course, as Brigham Young's home, as a home economics center for Latter-day Saint University, and a social center for the Young Women's Mutual Improvement Association.



by the way using the Lion House as a social center for the Young Women's Mutual Improvement Association ...
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_Joseph
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _Joseph »

We can't find much real cement left because it all eroded away under the pile of pull tabs from the soft drink cans that were made during the great times peace was upon the land. The Nephites and Lamanites weren't real tidy and that explains it.
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_Jatinbhalla
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _Jatinbhalla »

Nice information shared. Thank you for help.
_moksha
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _moksha »

Yahoo Bot wrote:...the massive pre-Columbian city of Cahoika ...

Image
Stone tablet portrait of Elder Francois Cement at the
Cahoika regional airport lounge. His parting word was "Adieu".
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_Physics Guy
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Re: Cement and the Book of Mormon

Post by _Physics Guy »

An old thread conjured back from the grave by an adbot for a college in India, apparently. Huh.

I skimmed the old thread though and found it interesting. An idea was raised early and then seemed to be dropped: that the absence of "timber" might have meant absence of thick enough logs to use in building, not the absence of burnable wood.

That might seem like arbitrary hairsplitting to readers today, but from remembering how my grandfather talked, I have an idea that people in Joseph Smith's time might well have found the distinction between "timber" and "firewood" important and obvious. I don't think my grandfather would ever have talked about burning timber as fuel: timber was a building material. So I think it might really well be that a jungle full of dandy firewood had no timber.

I don't suppose that this really shows the Book of Mormon is authentic. I do wonder why Smith would have specified that his Nephites found timber scarce and restorted to cement. Was there a contemporary theory that the Moundbuilders had used cement because of lack of timber? Were there any cement ruins from Moundbuilders?
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