The Secret Architecture of France’s Capital

**skippy** · 23rd September 2013 06:30

Posted by araucaria (here)
The main feature of this particular monument, the Arche de la Défense, according to my author, is as I indicated in the opening post, the use of wind, generated amid the surrounding skyscrapers so as to funnel through the grand arch.

Another interesting element at play here is light. Located on the extreme west on the historical axis, it's pretty impressive to see the sun rising over Paris (when leaving the underground in the morning, walking over the main square in front of the Arche), illuminating the east-west axis right into La Defense. The views are stunning. In addition, everything is done to accentuate the free flow of light. Most skyscrapers have mirror-like windows, and the light is bouncing back and forth. The heat is finally captured (and radiated during the day) by huge concrete floors. Because of this feature, on hot days, the temperatures on the main square, are much higher than elsewhere in the city. Sometimes, it feels like you are walking in a baking oven...

**skippy** · 26th September 2013 20:08

As we are still in the La Defense district, let’s sum up:

The Swamp: Water
The Underground: Earth
The Fohn: Air
The Sun: Fire

Now, the 4 elements and the 4 Ages are a recurring theme in the architecture of Paris. For example, the famous 4 Ages ("les 4 Temps") shopping mall right in front of the Grande Arche.

From the ejaculation point at the terminus of the underground, a small way, without any specific interest, takes you to a crystal staircase right under the Arche. Moving up the stairway, gives birth, to one of the most stunning views of Paris. The volatile elements, fire and air, are being transcended by an open elevator that takes you to the rooftop of the Arche. Standing in the middle of a tremendous marble zodiac, cosmic (re)birth is what comes to mind..

It seems that the zodiac on the rooftop of the Arche is visible with Google Earth, but I didn't check that out.

**araucaria** · 12th October 2013 10:44

I have not had time lately to add to this thread, apart from working on this post (divided into several posts) and thinking about where to take this. Also, I have just got back from a rare trip to Paris, when I got the chance to check out one or two things for myself and take a few photos.

Below is a map of the Défense district located between the triangular plot of the three-sided CNIT building and the Arch square. Since much of what I have to say deals with connecting threes and fours, it seems an appropriate place to start, along with a picture of one of the side walls to which I shall be restricting my initial comments.

My original idea was simply to translate the masonic material as described from the unsympathetic viewpoint as set out in the book François Mitterrand, Grand Architecte de l’Univers. However, we have headed straight to the Arche de la Défense, last but not least of the monuments along the axe historique and in some ways the weakest link in the negative argument, because the perturbing aspects are largely external, as Skippy has explained: air (wind), fire (heat & light), water and also earth (the underground, death with two cemeteries nearby). By this time, the actual use of sacred geometry itself has become self-evidently negative for the author.
http://www.grandearche.com/rubrique27.html

To add a couple of elements to the above: 1) regarding earth/death: the Arche has a ‘crypt’ (the word used) on three levels, entered via a stairway in a glass circle right in the middle of the arch. 2) light: the speed of light (300,000 km/s) is encoded in both the total weight of the arch, 300,000 metric tons, and the weight of the roof section, 30,000 metric tons.

Adding quite a bit of my own data leads me to decide that a more personal and more neutral approach is preferable. For example there is a choice between two words to describe certain numbers (see below). These numbers can be called ‘divine’ or simply ‘triangular’. The author systematically chooses the former term; unsurprisingly therefore, his emotions get in the way. I prefer the latter. Numbers relate to each other in a progression, which is not necessarily progress (or regress). I would suggest that harmony is about progressing in both directions at once, for example by moving towards larger numbers and discovering their relationships with smaller ones. This is the harmony that keeps buildings standing. Those that failed to tap into that harmony have long since collapsed.

The fact that numbers have first and foremost mathematical rather than mystical properties, and linear before translinear properties, is encapsulated in the first sentence of a typical Wikipedia entry:

(153) One hundred (and) fifty-three is the natural number following 152 and preceding 154.

I just corrected a typo in the above: I first wrote ‘scared geometry’. Sacred geometry is of course fearless, and based on the numbers that govern the operation of the universe, or our local sector at the very least. While the matrix has led to a false component of that, which needs to be stripped away, the basic number system is sound. To say that sacred geometry is itself suspect is to accept total confiscation of the entire mathematical system, without which we no longer have a leg to stand on. The deception at this level consists in confiscating and contaminating literally everything. Part of our task therefore is to reclaim what is good and allow the rest to fall away. Like disinformation, the greater part would be good, were it not contaminated by the rest. This situation is reminiscent of the ‘curate’s egg’, after the priest who after being served a bad egg said politely that ‘parts of it were delicious’ – except that, unlike the egg, which is a one-way ticket from all good to all bad, humanity is a maze that can take you either way.

**araucaria** · 14th October 2013 19:19

We have to look to nature for authenticity and beauty to guide us. Phi (φ) is a proportion derived from the Fibonacci sequence that we see in the growth of shells and plants and galaxies etc. The use of φ in art and architecture is not to be sullied in this way. When you aim your camera at a landscape so as to have sky in roughly one third (or two thirds) of the picture because the result will be more aesthetically pleasing, this is an elementary application of φ.

Similarly, pi (π), the relation between a straight line and a curve (a diameter and a circle), is seen in nature in various ways, one being the meanders of a river. If the straight course to the sea is one unit long, then the meandering river will measure 3.14 units. In other words, π is the natural relationship between gently flowing water and loose earth. The fact that this is also the proportion between the Louvre Pyramid and the courtyard in which it is set is not sinister; it is artistic, i.e. aesthetically pleasing.

To build a rounded arch, for example, on the basis of π is a reflection of this natural relationship and harmonious as a result. What is an arch? It is a wall constructed with potentially the minimum amount of building materials: a wall that you can walk through! The history of cathedral building is notably about getting higher and higher with less and less stonework, through increasingly sophisticated knowledge of load-bearing geometry.

I would suggest that, going back in the other direction, possibly the most primitive form of this would be the solid pyramid. The Great Pyramid is a paradox, combining this simplest of designs with the most sophisticated precision mathematics ever applied to architecture. Even the dimensions of the empty space of the inner chambers are exquisitely accurate. Arguably an even simpler design however, is the obelisk: a single stone placed on its end to attain maximum height with minimum stonework. These two constructions mark the difference between a monument and a building: a building has an inside, a monument or stela probably not. (I shall at some stage illustrate the concept of a building with no inside

). Bridging the gap between the two, we have the arch, where in the basic configuration, the inside is on the outside.

The Arche de la Défense adds complexity to both these aspects. First, it is both a monument and a building: a twin tower block. Secondly, it offers a nested inside/outside setup: what is being suggested by emphasizing the fact that Notre-Dame Cathedral would fit under the arch is that the Arch’s inside-on-the-outside can accommodate the outside-with-an-inside of this other large building. In other words, this is a less abstract attempt at presenting the idea of the tesseract or 4D hypercube.

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesseract

Incidentally, there is another similar building at the Futuroscope theme park in Poitiers, L'Imax 3D Dynamique, a 35m cube (the Louvre pyramid sits on a 35m square, also encoded in the Grande Arche).

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There are several ways of viewing any public building programme. It may be architects seeing how far they can go towards overcoming an architectural difficulty. Such an attitude may or may not be viewed as a hubristic attempt to build a Tower of Babel; I find it unhelpful to claim that many Paris monuments are variations on the Tower of Babel theme. Alternatively it can be set in a broader religious context. In Sacred Places of Asia: Where Every Breath is a Prayer, Jon Ortner offers photographic evidence of Hindu temples being originally inspired by the Himalayan mountains, as a primary source of man’s animist sense of the sacred. It is interesting, therefore, to note that the Project Avalon founder is a keen mountaineer!

http://www.amazon.com/Sacred-Places-.../dp/0789207052

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This is confirmed by David Astle, and by Joseph Farrell citing him in Babylon’s Banksters, to the effect that the hegemony of the bankster families

very early in its history, realized that all ancient pantheons and myths were more or less identical, and thus that religion itself not only held profound clues to the reconstruction of the lost science they sought to recover, but that it could function as a powerful tool of social manipulation to assist in that agenda. p.296)

**araucaria** · 23rd October 2013 12:44

One major parameter of any building project is site specificity: it should fit in with its surroundings, which is what the Hindu temples do. A national monument of global standing seeks to fit in with its global surroundings through a geodetic component – and beyond that achieve site specificity in relation to the entire solar system if not beyond. The Great Pyramid is the ultimate example of this, and the Georgia guidestones are probably an excellent counter-example. What we are being invited to do by rejecting sacred geometry on the grounds that it is masonic is to accept and prefer nondescript architecture that resonates with nothing.

Site specificity means that we are not going to build mountain-temples on the flatlands of north-west Europe. Interestingly though, a mountain grows from the bottom up, like other things that grow, including certain mathematical features. The European equivalent of the temple would be Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona, where the pillar design imitates trees and branches.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia

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Regarding mathematical features, sacred geometry is a more universal language than geographical features are, be they trees or mountains. The power of the apex of the pyramid and the tetraktys comes from the potentially endless accumulation underneath, from which no number is absent. The tetraktys is another sacred figure, a geometrical presentation of the sum of 1+2+3+4 in the form of a triangle. Hence 10 is a triangular number.

.

. .

. . .

. . . .

Etc.

This seems to me to be where the name “Frères Trois Points”, as French freemasons are called, really comes from. It is the apex of the pyramid, of which it forms a microcosm, being itself a pyramid, just as the tetraktys is the apex/microcosm of a larger pyramid triangular numbers.

Three points in a triangular form are placed after letters in a Masonic document to indicate that such letters are the initials of a Masonic title or of a technical word in Freemasonry, as G:.M:. for Grand Master, or G:.L:. for Grand Lodge. It is not a symbol, but simply a mark of abbreviation. The attempt, therefore, to trace it to the Hebrew three yods, a Cabalistic sign of the Tetragrammaton, or any other ancient symbol, is futile. It is an abbreviation, and nothing more; although it is probable that the idea was suggested by the sacred character of the number three as a Masonic number, and these tree dots might refer to the position of the three officers in a French Lodge. Ragon says (Orthodoxie Maçonnique, page 71) that the mark was first used by the Grand Orient of France in a circular issued August 12, 1774, in which we read "G:. O:. de France." A common expression of anti-Masonic writers in France when referring to the Brethren of the Craft is Fréres Trois Points, Three Point Brothers, a term cultivated in their mischief survives in honor because reminding the brotherhood of cherished association and symbols. The abbreviation is now constantly used in French documents, and, although not accepted by the English Freemasons, has been very generally adopted in other countries. In the United States, the use of this abbreviation is gradually extending. http://forum.mastermason.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=3604

Coming now to the third and fourth layers, we will see later on the three and four (adding up to seven) as dimensions, which is basically the story of the modern axe historique – at the Louvre, you have two-dimensional triangles (3) grouped in fours to form three-dimensional pyramids. At La Défense, you have two-dimensional squares (4) grouped in sixes (3x2) to form a three-dimensional cube and a four-dimensional hypercube.

Continuing the list started with phi and pi in my previous post, the Pythagorean numbers 3, 4, 5 (leading to 7 (3+4), 9 (4+5) and 12 (3+4+5)) are seen indirectly in nature as the right-angle relationship between the horizontal (the horizon) and the vertical (trees etc.). They were of practical assistance to stonemasons because this is how they would obtain a right angle: take a piece of string of any length, divide it into twelve equal parts, then tie the ends together. Mark off 3 units and another 4 units along the string, then form a triangle with the string around 3 nails placed at the two marks and the end knot. The resulting 3-4-5 triangle contains a perfect right-angle which can then be used to shape your blocks of stone or check your masonry angles.

Likewise, a number like 86,400 seconds, which happens to be the length of an earth day, is based on a natural unit. It is natural because, as Maurice Chatelain has demonstrated, the Nineveh Constant is a multiple in seconds of all the orbital periods of everything in the solar system. The second is therefore a fundamental unit. Interestingly it is found in humans, since the heart rate of a reasonably fit and healthy male is typically 60 beats per minute. That this number should be used for the acreage of the Place de la Concorde (see videos post #3) is in itself harmless and harmonious.

The fact that the diameter of the Sun in miles (864,000) is a harmonic of a day in seconds is an interesting correlation between space and time. Similarly the moon’s diameter (2160 mi) correlates with the length of an age of precession (2160 years), i.e. the passage through the 30° of a constellation at a rate of 1° every 72 years. Again see the videos, although these numbers also apply to the Grande Arche.

Taken in years, 864,000 is the length of the Dwapara-Yuga and twice the length of the Kali Yuga. Alternatively, since the Sun is 400 times larger than the Moon, it follows that years corresponds to 400 ages of precession, or, dividing by twelve, 33 1/3 Great Years (864,000/25920 = 33.33333). This is presumably where the masonic 33 and the reputed age of Jesus both originate (not one from the other). Born at the winter solstice and dying sometime after the spring equinox, the mythological Jesus would be almost precisely 33 1/3 years old.

A harmonic of 400, the Earth’s circumference is 40000 kilometers. Notice how we have changed units, from imperial to metric. This is legitimate, because the relationship here is very nearly equal to phi (1.618) - 1 mile = 1.609344 kilometers - and 1/phi (0.618) - 1 kilometer = 0.621 miles. Converting back, the Earth’s circumference is 24840 miles, which is 23 times the Moon’s radius (1080 mi; 23*1080=24840).
24840 is also a multiple of 24 (=23*24*45). The relationship of adjacent numbers is theorized by the tetraktys. Every number n has a corresponding triangular number of n rows. For example, in the tetraktys, ten is the triangular number of four. It is easy to work out how to calculate it. First and last rows add up to the last row plus one (here 5). Second and second last rows also add up to the last row plus one (2+3=5). Hence the total will be last row plus one multiplied by last row divided by two (5*2=10). This can also be expressed by multiplying adjacent numbers and halving: 4*5/2=10. In the above numbers 23 and 24 you get 23*24/2=276, another triangular number also obtainable by the formula 1+2+…23. Hence the triangular number is obtained by n = x*(x+l)/2 where x is the row number.

To find the triangular number corresponding to 1+2+…17, you have 17*18/2=17*9=153. This is a ‘sacred number’ appearing in the gospel as a number of fish. If you had that number of panes of glass, and they were the right shape, you could use them to form the triangular side of a glass pyramid. Hence 153 is encoded into IM Pei’s Louvre pyramid. And so is (indirectly) the number 666, another triangular number corresponding to 1+2+…36 or 36*37/2=18*37. In other words, it is in the nature of triangular geometry to use these numbers. Before being the number of the beast, and before we think that this beast may be man himself, 666 is a mathematical animal.

Multiplying and then halving is the method for calculating the area of a triangle. If the number (n) is multiplied by itself, the triangle is half a square (n²/2). What happens when you multiply n by n+1? I don’t know what is supposed to happen, but what I find is that as the numbers increase, you get increasingly closer to the square of (n + 0.5). For example: 4*5=20, root 20 = 4.47; 5*6=30, root 30=5.48; 17*18=306, root 306=17.493, 36*37=1332, root 1332=36.4966.

Something interesting happens when you get to 666: 666*667=444222 (hence the triangular number 1+2+…666=222111). The square root of 444222 is 666.49981245. Obviously there is a recurring mechanism at work, meaning that 6666*6667 will add another 4 and another 2, and another 9 to the decimal: root 4444422222 = 66666.499998… ad infinitum.

We then discover what mathematicians surely know, namely that by adding successive triangular numbers, you get the square of the second: e.g. 528 + 561 = 1089 or 33²; 630 + 666 = 1296 or 36². It’s obvious once you’ve seen it. The first few numbers are 1, 3, 6, 10, 15, 21, 28, 36, which added in pairs give (1) 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64…

It’s easy to see what is going on here. We are converting a one-dimensional string of numbers into a two-dimensional surface. Imagine each number as a square unit. If we place two triangles we create slightly more than a square: a rectangle of 20 (4*5=2*10) units; hence the 4*4 square is smaller at 16 (06+10).

01 10 09 08 07
02 03 06 05 04
04 05 06 03 02
07 08 09 10 01

We can look at this another way. Instead of drawing a straight-edged triangle, we have drawn the side of a step pyramid. This is illustrated here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangular_number

**Midnight Rambler** · 23rd October 2013 14:27

Posted by skippy (here)
It seems that the zodiac on the rooftop of the Arche is visible with Google Earth, but I didn't check that out.

I did check it out and here is the result. You are correct. If you look at the four square holes in the arc you can see parts of the zodiac.

**araucaria** · 23rd October 2013 15:08

Posted by Midnight Rambler (here)

Posted by skippy (here)
It seems that the zodiac on the rooftop of the Arche is visible with Google Earth, but I didn't check that out.

I did check it out and here is the result. You are correct. If you look at the four square holes in the arc you can see parts of the zodiac.

Yes, and you can see how the arch fits in with the squares on the surrounding area, which show how it is 6° out of alignment. More on the surroundings later. You can also check the height on google earth: 110 m.

The zodiac is by contemporary artist Jean-Pierre Raynaud. I'll have something to say about him too at some stage.

**ulli** · 23rd October 2013 15:19

The four visible symbols seen in that Google Earth image are Aries, (fire), Cancer, (water), Libra, (air), and Capricorn (earth),
representing each of the four elements.
These four signs are what is called the 'Cardinal' signs of the Zodiac; they represent initiative and creative activity.
Each signs starts at the beginning of one of the four seasons...the solstices and equinoxes.

**araucaria** · 23rd October 2013 15:31

Now let’s see how my above comments apply to the Grande Arche de la Défense. My author Setzepfandt tells me it is made to sound like it has 36 floors. Hence the two towers = 36*2 = 72, plus the roof, 36, plus the ground, 72, would total 144. He quotes Revelations as stating the number of the elected to be 144,000. However, he says, the actual number of floors is 35, with the side towers clearly showing 5*5=25 squares of 7*7=49 windows. He points out that a triangle drawn on the base of 35 would contain 630 windows, leaving a remainder of 595.
Setzepfandt further points out that 5²*7²=1225, which is the sum of the ‘divine numbers’ of 35 and 34, i.e. the triangular numbers 630 and 595. This can be visualized by drawing a step pyramid with one block at the top and 35 at the bottom, for a total of 630 blocks. This would leave an inverted step pyramid with one block at the top and 34 at the bottom, for a total of 595 blocks. (See illustration).
Setzepfandt misses a couple of tricks at this point, however, because he mentions, but only in passing, that 1225 is itself a triangular number, the ‘divine’ number of 49, i.e. equal to 1+2+…49; so the number 49 is being flagged – and in more ways than one, because I further discovered that each of the 7*7 windows covers four panes on the inside (2*2), the same panes as are visible on the inside of the arch towers (see photo). Hence the total number of windows becomes 2²*5²*7²=4900 (=1225*4). The number 4900 is interesting, being the square of 70, and so the sum of 2415 + 2485, the ‘divine’ numbers of 69 and 70. 4900 itself is not a triangular number, but being exactly midway between 4851 and 4950, which are, and correspond to 1+2+…98 and …99, we can see that 4900 would be the triangular number of 98.5. Check by doubling 4851: 4851*2=9702; the square root of 9702 is 98.498730...

In other words, 49 is equivalent to one half, just as 6667 is equivalent to two thirds. We have immediate confirmation since 49 is one half of 98.

Interestingly, 98.4 is the temperature of human blood in °F – we seem to be drawing blood from stone. Compared with the centigrade scale, starting at 0° as the melting point of water, and 100° its boiling point, with a round number for the human body (37°), the Fahrenheit scale is a strange animal. Breaking the ice so to speak at +32 suggests a masonic connection, with a change of state at 33° and higher degrees. Interestingly, 98.4 is a close harmonic of π² (9.88) or the square of 22/7 (9.86). While 98.8 is not mathematically the same as 98.4, medically speaking it is equivalent and perfectly normal. The point here being that the outside walls of the Grande Arche under discussion also encode an approximation to the number π². Here’s how.

Given that the monument is 110 meters in every direction (not exactly), then each of the five panels of 7*7 squares is 22m by 22m (110/5). Hence one window section amounts to 22/7 (pi). This is notionally true, but not exact mathematically: the arch is actually 112 meters long, and there is the equivalent of five squares of edging material, so the actual figure is slightly smaller. But symbolically, each window has a width and height equal to π and therefore an area equal to π². Also, if the diameter of a circle is drawn through the centre, then the circumference of that circle would also equal π². This is one method of ‘squaring the circle’.

There is something else here. Counting the marble squares on the edging shows that one window is the size of 16 of these squares (see photo in post #). Dividing 9.88 by 16 therefore gives 0.6175, very close to 1/φ (0.618), the golden ratio. The power of sacred numbers is that everything ties in. In architectural terms, this makes for solidity. In energy terms, it makes for power. And in political terms it makes for control. It is no use simply condemning buildings using sacred geometry as the work of evil men. We need to see them for what they are and wrest back that power and control for all.

**skippy** · 23rd October 2013 16:52

Posted by Midnight Rambler (here)

Posted by skippy (here)
It seems that the zodiac on the rooftop of the Arche is visible with Google Earth, but I didn't check that out.

I did check it out and here is the result. You are correct. If you look at the four square holes in the arc you can see parts of the zodiac.

Fascinating, thanks. Why on earth do you want to realize a marble zodiac on a concrete roof of a 110 meter high building?

To come back to the numbers build into the monument. One time, during lunch break, I decided to count the number of windows on the inside panes of the Arche: 666. In fact, 2 times 666 with exactly the same number of windows on the opposite panel inside the cube. Now, standing in the middle of the Arche, surrounded by the number 666 (and the wind blowing in your face), there is a clear invitation to move UP via an open-air elevator. The decoration in the top panel is clearly referencing celestial dimensions with 3*3 large panels with 7*7 smaller panels. Then off-course there is this mysterious marble zodiac on the rooftop. And this all in plain sight, but seemingly invisible for the shopping masses below. Here an image of the inner panels of the cube with the elevator in the middle.

**araucaria** · 23rd October 2013 19:04

Posted by skippy (here)
To come back to the numbers build into the monument. One time, during lunch break, I decided to count the number of windows on the inside panes of the Arche: 666. In fact, 2 times 666 with exactly the same number of windows on the opposite panel inside the cube. Now, standing in the middle of the Arche, surrounded by the number 666 (and the wind blowing in your face), there is a clear invitation to move UP via an open-air elevator. The decoration in the top panel is clearly referencing celestial dimensions with 3*3 large panels with 7*7 smaller panels. Then off-course this mysterious marble zodiac on the rooftop. And this all in plain sight, but seemingly invisible for the shopping masses. Here an image of the inner panels of the cube with the elevator in the middle.

Skippy, thanks for that; I agree, but I think you missed a window

Horizontally you have 3*7 plus one on either side = 23
Vertically you have 3*7 plus four at top and bottom = 29
29*23 = 667
Is there perhaps a missing window (there are missing squares in the roof to accomodate the elevator)?
(Then you have 23 doors, total 690)

**skippy** · 23rd October 2013 19:32

Posted by araucaria (here)
Skippy, thanks for that; I agree, but I think you missed a window

One window more or less

What's the point. Never understood this obsession of these guys with those numbers. Sorry Araucaria to have held this thread up at La Defense. Wonderful thread by the way. Keep it coming.

Skippy

**araucaria** · 24th October 2013 16:45

Posted by skippy (here)

Posted by araucaria (here)
Skippy, thanks for that; I agree, but I think you missed a window

One window more or less

What's the point. Never understood this obsession of these guys with those numbers. Sorry Araucaria to have held this thread up at La Defense. Wonderful thread by the way. Keep it coming.

Skippy

No worry Skippy, the plan for this thread was never cast in stone

One window more or less actually makes all the difference in the world. These guys are obsessed with those numbers because they either think or pretend that they all fit in together perfectly when in actual fact they all fit in together not quite perfectly. To have designed and built such a mathematically intricate monument to the number six and multiples thereof in which the number… 667 features so prominently is a major fail that I find hilarious, although these guys have no sense of humour.

Imagine rewriting Revelation 13:18 like this:

Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666 plus or minus one.

No wonder people pass through without batting an eyelid: they don’t see 666 windows because there aren’t 666 windows for them to see. This botched magic doesn’t work. The mathematics of harmony are ever so slightly off; hence it is not made for the ‘psychorigide’, as we say in French: you need to show a little flexibility, as you do. Perhaps the best way into this is through musical harmony as explained by Joseph Farrell in Babylon’s Banksters. There is a kind of in-built glitch called the ‘Pythagorean comma’ illustrated in the graph below. This gap was closed in western music by the introduction of ‘the well-tempered clavier’ which Farrell calls the ‘the well-TAMPERED-WITH keyboard’ because the true note values have been tweaked.

[IMG]file:///C:\Users\John\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtmlclip1\06\clip_image002.png[/IMG]

The Pythagorean comma shown as the gap (on the right side) which causes a 12-pointed star to fail to close, which star represents the Pythagorean scale; each line representing a just perfect fifth. That gap has a central angle of 7.038 degrees, which is 23.46% of 30 degrees. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagorean_comma

what happened within Western music, precisely as a result of the esoteric tradition during the Renaissance, was that that tradition was applied to music and to the tuning of musical instruments, particularly keyboards, so that the naturally occurring harmonic series was deliberately tampered with, and a slight mathematical adjustment was made to the notes of the musical scale, so that each note was exactly an equal interval apart, allowing all notes to function as overtones of all other notes, and thus allowing a piece of music to change keys during a piece to the most distant keys without having to stop and retune the whole instrument! (…) Rather than each note now having its own unique harmonic series which did not overlap with other notes, each note could now function as any harmonic of any other note. Joseph Farrell, Babylon’s Banksters, p.280

In a somewhat similar vein, the Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens is the best example of the difficulties involved in producing a visually pleasing architecture: despite appearances, there are not two identical blocks in the building 70,000 pieces.
Optical tricks of the Parthenon https://youtube.com/watch?v=vzhA3yiEofI excerpted from
Secrets of the Parthenon https://youtube.com/watch?v=GE7d8YFNssg
Contrast this with the Arche de la Défense, which as far as one can tell, is built almost entirely of mass-produced elements.

This notion of the slight imperfection is a common theme in much modern French fiction. Take for example Michel Butor’s L’Emploi du temps (1956, Passing Time). This is a complex narrative, a diary written over the last five months of a twelve-month period, ending in failure as time runs out before the crucial events of Feb 29th have been recorded. Or take Georges Perec’s La Vie mode d’emploi (1978, Life A User’s Manual), which describes the 10*10 grid of an apartment block in… 99 chapters. Perec and others’ term for what is going on here is ‘clinamen’, a word taken from Lucretius: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinamen
This is the grain of sand in the works, or to put it in a more positive light, it is the play (in the sense of slack) that is crucial to the creative process. There is a mechanical aspect to the plot of having the hero paint 500 pictures turned into as many jigsaw puzzles which are later completed, and still later radically undone. This fine mechanism breaks down in the execution, and he ‘is 16 months behind in his plans, and he dies while he is about to finish his 439th puzzle. Ironically, the last hole in the puzzle is in the shape of the letter X while the piece that he is holding is in the shape of the letter W.’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_A_User%27s_Manual

We are not talking here about the difference between theory and practice; it is worse than that: even the theory doesn’t quite work. This fictional outcome is an exact prediction of what was to happen with the Arche de la Défense. The last hole in the puzzle is in the shape of the number 666 while the piece that the architects were left holding is in the shape of the number 667. Not even close, when you think that the one is a multiple of 18*37, the other the product of 23*29.

Why is the masonic pyramid always truncated? Because they’re stuck: the apex won’t fit

**skippy** · 24th October 2013 18:46

Posted by araucaria (here)