To be fair to the romans they were hardly using "basic" tools or techniques. They had decent enough cranes, iron tools, knew how to use wood and metal connecting ties to reinforce masonry, all the architectural tricks the Greeks invented and, of course, Best Concrete. The dome of the Pantheon is amazing, and their piers still being in active use 2000 years later is just ridiculous.
Vespa
- Thread starter mp3.1415player
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verycoolname
Not actually cool
Some companies are looking into using a modified version of the old Roman recipe for concrete, so we could be seeing Best Concrete coming back into use.
GreydonCreed
Man of Culture
- Location
- United States
Apparently the recently discovered secret ingredient for Roman concrete is using salt water instead of fresh, even if they have to import it. The resulting concrete is to a certain extent self-repairing due to the lime that is part of the mixture reacting to the salt water which results in its longevity.
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Pretty sure that any bug spray even considered for use against HOUS (or any of her incredibly varied changer forms) would not only be lethal to bystanders, but toxic/caustic/destructive to the local environment (grass, roads, buildings, infrastructure, reality itself) before it even had half a chance to do her any actual damage. Oh sure, it might take the shine off her chitin armoring if she went swimming in it, but outside of that... it does have a nice scent to it.
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verycoolname
Not actually cool
I've never read anything about the ancient Romans using salt water. I was led to believe that it was the mixing process leaving 'lumps' in the form of lime clasts that would dissolve when exposed to water, only to reharden and seal up the cracks where water seeped in.
Adding salt water might help prevent the ocean from leaching minerals out of any structures exposed to water, but like I said; I haven't read anything about that.
- Location
- Earth, Sol System, Virgo Supercluster, Earth-1218
Crossposting this from the SpaceBattles thread, though this thread has more of a chemistry focus than the SB thread, which has more of a Bug focus.
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned the Goliathfucking Bird-Eating Spider given that Taylor's strength enhancement seems to scale with both the size of the original bug and the bug scales up with how long she uses it.
It's the largest spider by body size (up to 5.1 inches), and mass (6.2 oz or ~1/3 lb.) with a leg span up to 12 inches. As a bonus the females can live 15-25 years! That's as long as a normal housecat!
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned the Goliath
It's the largest spider by body size (up to 5.1 inches), and mass (6.2 oz or ~1/3 lb.) with a leg span up to 12 inches. As a bonus the females can live 15-25 years! That's as long as a normal housecat!
- Location
- I'll never tell...
Well now, that is an intriguing hook.🤔Taylor's unlikely to stumble across roman remains, of course. She may find something else though
There was a fairly significant publication in 2017 about Roman concrete composition reacting with seawater in ways believed to make it stronger when used in marine contexts. That's not the same as the concrete being made with seawater as an ingredient, though, I haven't found a source on that.
There are definitely modern experiments inspired by that result into concrete mixtures which use saltwater, though.
- Location
- Somewhere
Then we can simply go back further in time. Like Old Kingdom Egypt, where they built the pyramids, which are not minor engineering projects even by today's standards. Yes, we could build any one of the Great Pyramids in a fraction of the time, but each one would still be a project whose length is measured in years and be very costly. And the Temple at Karnak is still remarkably intact for a ruined large temple several thousand years old as well.
And those were made with bronze tools at best, but were more often were built with copper tools simply because even for a period of time named for the heavy use of bronze, copper was still more often used for tools by the general public because it was much more common and cheaper than the tin needed mix with copper to make the alloy that is bronze. The Bronze Age also required a degree of trade networks on a scale that wouldn't really be seen for almost a thousand years after the end of it.
The main reason the Romans are often considered the pinnacle of ancient engineering and construction is because of how many of their structures are still more or less intact, with some actually still in use even today even after more than two thousand years.
There is also the fact that animal blood, usually that of a bull, was often mixed in as well. And that has been tested and shown to make some effective and durable concrete.
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- Location
- Neptune
It's a Lemurian fleet base, isn't it? From before they buggered off and fled to Andromeda.Innsmouth? Arkham? Miskatonic U.? A 2 million+ word story about a girl and her greater demon who not only defeated an eldritch omnicidal space whale, but also a fairly useless conspiracy by confusing the daylights out of them and making them go [WTF?] / "What the fuck...?"?
We want to know!
Problem with Roman concrete is its very long curing time. No company wants to wait six month for the concrete to set and cure before they can continue with the next step of construction.
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
On the other hand, if you are willing to wait... what you end up with could theoretically still be usable two millennia later?
Wait, that's not a selling point to greedy CEOs. Any construction that "lasts forever" without maintenance means losing out on money made from preforming said maintenance and/or replacing of the structure.
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On the other hand, modern construction engineering has tools and methods which the ancient Romans lacked, so even Roman Concrete might not take 6 months to cure these days.
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verycoolname
Not actually cool
Governments would like it. Some parts of the government, anyway. And if your company is willing to give up any profits from maintenance in exchange for having a 'multi-lifetime guarantee' for their products?
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
Remember, to those who ascribe to the Greedy Weasel mindset, anything that isn't done with the goal of being a greedy weasel is not only a bad idea, but it's inconceivable that anyone could possibly actually support it. Any long term thought is to be avoided too, because long term thinking isn't Greedy Weasel thinking.
Case in point, certain Industries would love to get rid of all environmental protection regulations, because having to reduce their pollution output also reduces profits from Wildly Excessive to just Excessive. No thought to the long term profits gained from not killing off the environment (and by extension your customers) ever comes into the equation, because in the short term they could make more money Right Now, and the future doesn't matter. Only immediate profits matter.
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Hell, the video game industry is, by and large, now struggling with a crisis of their own creation. The big publishers went all in on short term Greedy Weasel business practices and jumping on every bandwagon that promised to make All The Money. Only for them to now be running into the fact that they can't make All The Money because the video game market only has so much room for micro-transaction riddled cash grabs. But in the rush to make All The Money, EA, Ubisoft, Activision, and others forgot about the very business practices that were making them money. A steady profit isn't Insane Profit, and the Greedy Weasel mindset insists that only Insane Profit counts. Which is how we end up with so many Live Service games that require selling 5-10 million copies at full price just to break even due to how much they cost to make. Only for said Live Service game to not sell enough to break even, and then go belly up because it's unfinished and thrown into an already over saturated market.
Case in point, certain Industries would love to get rid of all environmental protection regulations, because having to reduce their pollution output also reduces profits from Wildly Excessive to just Excessive. No thought to the long term profits gained from not killing off the environment (and by extension your customers) ever comes into the equation, because in the short term they could make more money Right Now, and the future doesn't matter. Only immediate profits matter.
EDIT:
Hell, the video game industry is, by and large, now struggling with a crisis of their own creation. The big publishers went all in on short term Greedy Weasel business practices and jumping on every bandwagon that promised to make All The Money. Only for them to now be running into the fact that they can't make All The Money because the video game market only has so much room for micro-transaction riddled cash grabs. But in the rush to make All The Money, EA, Ubisoft, Activision, and others forgot about the very business practices that were making them money. A steady profit isn't Insane Profit, and the Greedy Weasel mindset insists that only Insane Profit counts. Which is how we end up with so many Live Service games that require selling 5-10 million copies at full price just to break even due to how much they cost to make. Only for said Live Service game to not sell enough to break even, and then go belly up because it's unfinished and thrown into an already over saturated market.
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- Pronouns
- She/Her
This would be *amazing~* ngl
MWKillKenny84
Lurking from the Trauma Switch.
- Location
- Vado Ligure
Taylor's unlikely to stumble across roman remains, of course. She may find something else though
Let me guess, it is the 'ruins' of every iteration of the city of the game Bloodborne?
- Location
- Europe
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