That's an apples-to-oranges comparison for two reasons. Firstly the HST also provides two great scientists.
True, but for all the attention they get, this is the lesser of its two effects given the game stage at which you get Hubble and its marginal impact on science victory if you're already tech leader. Moreover the point isn't to compare the two Wonders overall (I wouldn't deny that Hubble's a better Wonder than Statue of Liberty), but simply to point out that in principle production gained vs. production saved is not a standard by which Wonders can reliably be judged.
Secondly it is specifically geared towards a science victory, at which point any edge at all in getting the spaceship parts out a bit faster is worth it.
Needing spaceship parts is hardly the only case in which getting items faster is worth it - if it were no one would bother with workshops, factories etc. in the first place (and of course the Statue helps to get spaceship parts out faster as well...).
So for SofL, I see some value in it if you are specifically attempting to hit certain things out as soon as they are available. But it has certainly not been my experience that I'm sitting there looking for things to build because I have everything I already want, especially around the time SofL becomes available.
I usually specialise my cities, since building maintenance costs make duplicating everything but the most basic buildings in all cities inadvisable, unless I'm in need of particular National Wonders. What's more my production city is both my main centre for building Wonders and, by its nature, will tend to have all the buildings it needs earlier than my other cities. In any case, the SoL is like any Wonder - you choose it because you want its effect ideally, not because there's just nothing better to build.
All this says to me is that we have such completely different approaches to the game it's no wonder we disagree. I can't remember the last time I got writing before both mining and archery, and I can never get luxuries soon enough. Or archers for that matter.
Getting libraries early is paramount in my experience; even the delay from trying for GL and missing it can cost me critical time in teching on Immortal; going for other techs earlier than I need them is a definite no-no. Indeed the library situation is somewhat analogous to my case with SoL; if you get the library ASAP, you get Mining and Archery a lot sooner when you need them, and for such cheap techs even the difference in population between researching them after Writing and researching them earlier can save a turn or two of research.
As above, though, I simply can't see a case where I'd want Mining early unless I was beelining Bronze Working for an aggressive strategy. By itself it's no use until you have a Worker, there's no use having a Worker until you have more than two or three pop to work the tiles you're improving (I don't want to build a Worker until I've completed at least Scout-Monument-Library), and since I want my capital to grow as fast as possible as early as possible, I'm not going to be working 0 food, 3 hammer tiles that early in the game. While excess happiness is good to start churning out Golden Ages, that's not a priority right at the start of the game and I don't use 'sell luxes for gold' exploits. Even if I did, it's fairly rare that I come across mining luxuries alone in my starting location.
I also don't play aggressively enough to need early Archers. Even the earliest rushes from AIs tend to hit after turn 70 or so, and I often delay or prevent them anyway. I also like to buy my first archers, and rarely have 200 gold at the very start. I like Temple of Artemis, but it's a very long time since I last built it - and it's always the first Wonder the AI builds anyway.
Alhambra 9
Big Ben 16
Chichen Itza 26
Eiffel Tower 2 - 2 = 0
Great Library 4
Hanging Gardens 27 + 1 = 28
Hubble 21
Leaning Tower of Pisa 26
Louvre 30
Machu Picchu 27
Neuschwanstein Castle 15
Notre Dame 31
Oracle 28
Petra 25
Porcelain Tower 24
Sistine Chapel 8
Statue of Liberty 4 -1 = 3
I will hasten the demise of Eiffel and add a vote to HG that can come in handy to switch to a specialists economy.
There are 2 downvotes here - if Statue of Liberty wasn't downvoted, it should still be in the list with 1 point following the last vote.
In a wide empire the bonus is actually quite immense, in a 20 city empire you get +20 Happiness, +40 Culture and +60 GPT from a building that doesn't even cost you any maintenance and which is quite cheap and makes your cities harder to take. What's not to love?
if needed(luxuries selling). Versatile wonder.
