That's a really interesting take on the Tower of Babel.

Your construction story reminded me of an old family story. My dad dropped out of school at 16 and started working in construction with his father. My dad's a clever dude, and despite his lack of formal education, he ended up working as a manager on some fairly complex engineering projects, because he has that kind of brain.

But when he was younger, he worked on a job with his dad that required getting a giant piece of machinery out of a building that had been built around it. No one could figure it out, including my dad. But my Irish labourer grandfather, who never rose beyond site foreman and never went near being an engineer, could.

I, on the other hand, can barely turn a screw.