The New Seven Wonders of the World

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You know, that brings up a pretty good point. There was no reason to limit this list to seven, just because there were 7 wonders of the ancient world. I mean, in the original list, they probably didn't limit themselves to 7 - it was more likely that they just found 7 to be worthy. If there was an eighth great wonder, they would not have been required to drop one of the initial seven off the list.

 

The old seven were listed by some dudes that written the first "Let's go Greece" or such. The original writings were lost. The information was inferred through other surviving records. You can see that they were all Greek or Greek at the time.

 

Cheyenne Mountain really ought to be one.

If only because the power it represents is so damn impressive.

 

Okay, the original wonders were pretty oldskool, but it intrigues me that when we decide to take a renewed look at the crowning achievements of human history, we don't look at things like the internet or putting a man on the moon, but rather some random statue somebody built for basically no reason. Am I the only one who finds really big carvings of jesus rather less impressive than the fact that I can talk you you lot?

 

Good point, SimDing0.

 

Play Civilizations One through Four, there are all your wonders. There don't have to be seven, the human race has accomplished more than only seven fantastic feats of design and construction.

 

I was waiting for someone to cite 'The Gospel according to Meier'

But let's take Civ II, for example (probably the most ubiquitous game of the series) - that had a total of twenty eight Wonders, Seven for each Age.

I liked that Sid et al. DID include some intangible Wonders, like "Cure for Cancer", "Women's Suffrage" and "Darwin's Voyage". And if you think about it - some of the more 'physical' Wonders still are symbols of less tangible ideas and concepts that had a big influence on society - "Adam Smith's Trading Company" representing economics, for instance.

ANYWAYS, I still refuse to limit MY list to seven; the ancients probably just ended up with that number by chance, but I've seen plenty more things since that are worthy of mention...

 

I'm quite content with:

Pymamids of Egypt*
Lighthouse at Alexandria
Gardens of Babylon
Colossus of Rhodes
Temple of Artemis
Statue of Zeus
Mausoleum at Maussollos

However, since only one of these is still standing it is quite common to see reasonable substitutes:

The Great Wall*
The Acropolis
The Colosseum*
Taj Mahal*
Teotihuacan

* - on new list.

I don't think Machu Piccu or Christ the Redeemer belongs on this list. Teotihuacan is more impressive than Chichen Itza. Petra is absolutely amazing -- I hope to see it someday (I agree with the inclusion on the new list).

Christ the Redeemer should be compared to other modern marvels (all built in the same timeframe), such as:

The Empire State Building
The Golden Gate Bridge
Hoover Dam
Panama Canal

Clearly, against these four, there is nothing noteworthy about the building of Christ the Redeemer.

 

All patrotic bias aside, is there any reason why Mt. Rushmore seems to be universally excluded from consideration here? I find it quite remarkable, really.

 

It's truly impressive (along with the yet to be completed Crazy Horse), I was thinking of adding it to my list of modern marvels, but I believe Petra covers that base quite remarkably (and was done 500 years earlier).

I do think Mt Rushmore is more of an engineering marvel than Christ the Redeemer.

Going along the lines of je and Abom, I have always seen three lists:

Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
Seven Wonders of the Modern World
Seven Natural Wonders of the World

Seems to make more sense to have multiple lists....

 

Totally agreed.