Hacker News Reader

hennytingon Egypt's pyramids may have been built on a long-lost branch of the Nile

You can tell Wally was done with fools claiming that modern tools couldn't do x and y. "Just a big teetertotter with a big kid on one side"

hennytingon New Aztec Codices Discovered: The Codices of San Andrés Tetepilco

Because the natives joined in with them. The Aztecs were hated and ruled through military subjugation. They had a strict class system where the warriors were always trying to expand the empire and held most of the power. They required tributary and glory for the warriors (Aztecs started out as mercenaries). They'd invade their neighbors and bring in captives for human sacrifices... During one of their big holidays they "sacrificed" over 20,000 people by ripping open their chests with rudimentary knives.

And they also ritualistically tortured, killed and cannibalized children during the dry season. https://www.eiu.edu/historia/Thoele.pdf

That was extreme and insane to most of the native inhabitants. And it was even more outrageous to Europeans (or Asians). The Spanish weren't hero's and they exploited the natives and unwittingly spread disease but the Aztec civilization had to go and it died just as much from internal revolt than from the small amounts of European men that Cortes commanded. I have more respect for the Pueblo's than I do for the Aztecs. They survived harsher environments and had impressive self-taught farming and structural engineering skills.

hennytingon Goodbye Spotify

I've used Pandora for years but I'm switching to Spotify. Pandora's catalogue is tiny in comparison. And I don't care if they sponsor "questionable" podcasters (A.K.A Joe Rogan). In fact, that honestly makes me want to invest more in Spotify. I can listen to the latest obscure NYCHC and know that my music provider isn't being censored by CISA.

hennytingon How were gladiators portrayed in ancient Rome?

Guy has an extremely surface level and superficial take on American Football. His diatribe against football sounds like something a 15 year old faux-marxist would write...Football is a complicated sport. It's incredibly difficult to piece together the real chess game that's taking place but once you do, and once you understand the orchestration that goes into play calling (defense and offense), it unlocks the incredible nature of the sport. It's a real time war-game that's orchestrated by coaches and players on the field... You have a coach that invents defensive schemes on the fly (Bill Belichek) vs a coach that will scour the history of teh sport and call a play last seen in a 1940's rose bowl (Andy Reid).