Sounds more like "reconstruction" than "restoration". I appreciate many original parts may be too damaged, but it risks becoming an archeological Disneyland.
Ancient Mesopotamia is, in my view, one of the most exciting fields out there, simply because their written records are imperishable. There's thousands of years of history, not pre-history, there. Much of it has already been discovered but, for want of money, not yet fully studied. Not yet deciphered. Not yet understood.
We know the approximate locations of important cities that have yet to be found. We know roughly where they are, but they're not in easy places to access due to remoteness as well as political instability and violence. We currently only have records from other places to tell us they exist, but we could find entire libraries and hear from these ancient people in their own words.
There are few other frontiers in all of archaeology that offer such potential for gaining intimate knowledge of ancient human societies. Anything that can inject a little much-needed funding into the field is welcome.
Rome at peak power around year 100. And why? To finally see the gladiators Zuckerberg vs Musk celebrity deathmatch obviously.
NGL, would love to see techbros battle to the death for our entertainment.
Hey, if we're already near the fall of the empire, we might as well get some bread and games out of it.
Though Suck and Bezos would easily kill Musk since Zuck is a martial arts expert and Bezos is roided out of his mind, while Musk is kinda doughy like a human slug monster.
If you really believe it then please go out in the world and engage people in a positive way. Go do some volunteering. Not to make a change in the world but in yourself.
If you don’t believe this and are just repeating a meme for clout or whatever then just stop. It’s toxic and unfunny. Like “locker room talk” or whatever other lame justifications are offered for people to say gross things nobody needs to hear.
When you put down all the dots and they form a line that trends in one direction, it's just reality. Ignoring it and calling it "self fulfilling" as if it's a thing that you personally have control of, IS what's ignorant.
>If you really believe it then please go out in the world and engage people in a positive way. Go do some volunteering. Not to make a change in the world but in yourself.
Being a decent human being does not undo the politically induced global economic issues related to the "late stage capitalism" you mentioned. It's two orthogonal things that are unrelated.
What I hate about these tired memes is that they suggest there’s nothing we can do to move those dots. We do still live in a functional democracy regardless of what internet commenters suggest. It is possible to make changes.
Saying otherwise is ignorant (of our own power) and toxic (by perpetuating the wrong belief that we are powerless).
Also, the article barely mentioned this but the biggest source of damage to these specific ruins actually isn't being adjacent to major battles in two modern conflicts, it's Saddam-era "restorations". The reason why the zigguraut looks so much more pristine than any other ancient ruins is that what you're looking at was built in the 80s on top of the actual ancient ruins. It wasn't a particularly accurate restoration either; they used concrete and Saddam even made them stamp his face on some of the bricks so future generations would associate him with nebuchanezzar.
It also makes me think of a reddit question the other day - why did people cover up their beautiful wooden flooring with carpets? The answer is that they didn't have epoxy sealants and the like back then so it was maintenance heavy.
You mean they need to be true believers of Anu, Enlil and Istar? Yeah, that would likely help the spirit of restoration efforts..
"why did people cover up their beautiful wooden flooring with carpets?"
Don't carpets also provide good insulation? When you are cold and do not have automatic heating build into the ground ... most people appreciate warm feed over aesthetics.
For a minute there i thought you were talking about the 70s.
Considering the Greek's love of what modern people consider garishly colored statues, my first instinct would have been that it's for decorative reasons.
The entire history of this exercise is basically one in which it’s never done faithfully. Not due to bad faith. But because we don’t know everything yet.
Better than reconstructing in situ is rebuilding elsewhere, as in your ship analogy.