The Volokh Conspiracy - Wonders of the world:

The Washington Post has a cool photo gallery of candidates for the New Seven Wonders of the World. Take a look at the pictures, but don't pay that much attention to the descriptions.

For instance, apparently the "ancient city" of Machu Picchu was "founded by Yale University professor Hiram Bingham in 1911." That's pretty ancient! [UPDATE: This has now been corrected to "found."]

More significantly, Istanbul's Hagia Sophia is "a church that was first built in 537 B.C. as a Mosque when the city fell to the Ottomans." How many mistakes are there in that one line?

It was once a church, and it was once a mosque (though it was a mosque only after it was a church, not before), but now it's just a museum.
In fact, its construction was more like A.D. 537.
Not much chance of its having been built as a mosque even in A.D. 537 (to say nothing of 537 B.C.), since Islam wouldn't even exist for about another century after that.
And the city didn't fall to the Ottomans until about 900 years after the construction of the church (and the Ottomans arguably didn't even really exist as "Ottomans" until around 1300).

Anyway, pretty picture!

	[Sasha Volokh, March 13, 2007 at 10:07pm] Trackbacks Wonders of the world: The Washington Post has a cool photo gallery of candidates for the New Seven Wonders of the World. Take a look at the pictures, but don't pay that much attention to the descriptions. For instance, apparently the "ancient city" of Machu Picchu was "founded by Yale University professor Hiram Bingham in 1911." That's pretty ancient! [UPDATE: This has now been corrected to "found."] More significantly, Istanbul's Hagia Sophia is "a church that was first built in 537 B.C. as a Mosque when the city fell to the Ottomans." How many mistakes are there in that one line? It was once a church, and it was once a mosque (though it was a mosque only after it was a church, not before), but now it's just a museum. In fact, its construction was more like A.D. 537. Not much chance of its having been built as a mosque even in A.D. 537 (to say nothing of 537 B.C.), since Islam wouldn't even exist for about another century after that. And the city didn't fall to the Ottomans until about 900 years after the construction of the church (and the Ottomans arguably didn't even really exist as "Ottomans" until around 1300). Anyway, pretty picture!