Well heck.
Ancient Aliens
- Thread starter BillJ
- Start date
Well heck.
You're talking about a development that happened gradually over a period of 2 million years (maybe more, I'm not sure the diet of the Australopithecus). There's a clear line of development to the extent the archaeological record preserves it.
How do you know what the average Maya knew? These things weren't built as a hobby by the average Maya, they were organized by an elite class who certainly had less knowledge of astronomy than our elite astronomers do.
As for not being able to build it today. I've seen a program that recreated Stonehenge using technology of the time (no wheels for one). They also did it with about a third of the people as would probably have been used because they relied on volunteers as opposed to being the leaders of an autocratic dictatorship/religion.
Are you suggesting that the aliens, assuming the visitations are completely alien to Earth, are on an ongoing biological/genetic research experiment. Assuming they are very alien to us, could they be unable to communicate due to very different evolution and are trying to discover a bridge for communication by these biological manipulations?
anything's possivle. No way in hell are they going to land on the White House lawn, that's for sure....you'll have every Federal knuckle dragger and military branch bring all the heavy artilery
Indeed. And it turns out this is even true to a smaller or greater extent to ideas that turn out to be completely false. Fortunately, the process only follows that progression for somebody who is in the process of coming around to internalizing those ideas; everyone else stops paying attention at "denial" and forgets about it.
We are.
Besides, some of the more recent megoliths -- the great wall of China, for example -- are notorious for having been built primarily with slave labor.
Because slave labor is no longer fashionable.
Why does OURS?
In which case, they would simply land in Canada.
the ancient structures are rigid amalagamations of rock, their surfaces degraded. built by ramps and slave labor for some made up purpose by a self-deluded religious elite who needed to fill their egos, the scientists and engineers of that day, slaves to an evil machine work out new ways to create, yet the gained knowledge is lost is when that civilization is no more
dams, bridges and skyscrapers are works of true purpose, they provide electricity and passage to new lands, they provide living space and storage for economic need. sometimes filling their builders ego when they increase the construction and design to beat their neighbor. their engineering is magnificent on its own, yet so dull because it is experienced and utilized every day
i would imagine structures like the burg kalifa in that desert and many other large concrete structure's will remain after a few thousand years, degraded yes, but still there standing like monoliths in a wilderness, striking wonder in a foreign travelers path
Like the Statue of Liberty's arm in Planet of the Apes.
Also, would like to see that pic you posted larger. I didn't realize the Eiffel tower was taller than (the tallest?) a pyramid. Assuming that is a big pyramid and not some starter model.
Plus the pyramid has stones weighing up to 200 tons each. I doubt the Eiffel tower has any pieces that massive. Also, we don't know how they cut them out, sent them down to Giza, lifted them up and fitted them togather with such precision.
Most of the documentaries I've seen indicate that the Egyptian Pyramids were built by free crews who held the all the Pharaohs in very high esteem and believed the structure would help him ascend to heaven, become a minor god and help them and their descendants with important things like the reliability of the river rising to irrigate and fertilize their fields. The state provided housing and food to the crews while they were participating in the construction.
Most credit ramps for the process of lifting stones to their final level, but that would have required massive additional effort and material constructing the ramp(s), especially if it was straight instead of spiraling close to the surface of the pyramid. Spiraling ramp(s) would have resulted in added challenges pulling stones around the corners.
I've seen an alternative theory using ropes under the stone and levers to lift it far enough to put a few inches of wood cribbing under it. Once supported by the cribbing the levers could be repositioned to a different knot and the process repeated until the stone was lifted enough to be shifted across adjacent stones on rollers. On the large middle and lower levels dozens of crews could have each been lifting a stone at the same time, with more crews lifting stones on the lower levels as the structure got taller. Each stone could have been lifted a layer in about half an hour by a crew of about twenty men. Large stones like those used in ceiling areas would have required larger crews with more ropes, levers and cribbing.
An alternative theory for transporting stones involved the use of lumber to assemble thick wheels around both ends of the stone and rolling it across the ground like a big heavy barrel. The larger diameter of the wheels would have been easier to pull over primitive roads than small diameter wood rollers, which might have been vulnerable to crushing under the heavy stones. With so many stones cut to a standard size the wheels could have been disassembled and carried back to the quarry for reuse.
By the time the Hebrews sought refuge in Egypt tomb looting had driven the custom to a more secretive process involving underground tunnels and chambers.
Sorry, I may have seen some of these theories before the availability of the web and don't have any links to online versions or pictures.
Most credit ramps for the process of lifting stones to their final level, but that would have required massive additional effort and material constructing the ramp(s), especially if it was straight instead of spiraling close to the surface of the pyramid. Spiraling ramp(s) would have resulted in added challenges pulling stones around the corners.
I've seen an alternative theory using ropes under the stone and levers to lift it far enough to put a few inches of wood cribbing under it. Once supported by the cribbing the levers could be repositioned to a different knot and the process repeated until the stone was lifted enough to be shifted across adjacent stones on rollers. On the large middle and lower levels dozens of crews could have each been lifting a stone at the same time, with more crews lifting stones on the lower levels as the structure got taller. Each stone could have been lifted a layer in about half an hour by a crew of about twenty men. Large stones like those used in ceiling areas would have required larger crews with more ropes, levers and cribbing.
An alternative theory for transporting stones involved the use of lumber to assemble thick wheels around both ends of the stone and rolling it across the ground like a big heavy barrel. The larger diameter of the wheels would have been easier to pull over primitive roads than small diameter wood rollers, which might have been vulnerable to crushing under the heavy stones. With so many stones cut to a standard size the wheels could have been disassembled and carried back to the quarry for reuse.
By the time the Hebrews sought refuge in Egypt tomb looting had driven the custom to a more secretive process involving underground tunnels and chambers.
Sorry, I may have seen some of these theories before the availability of the web and don't have any links to online versions or pictures.
Yeah, sure.
A wild ape comes out of the cave, using nothing but bare rocks and mud builds a rocket and goes to the moon.
A wild ape comes out of the cave, using nothing but bare rocks and mud builds a rocket, goes to the next solar system and tells the local wild apes how to come out of the caves, so that they can build their rocket using nothing but bare rocks and mud and go to their moon.
The second is not more difficult to believe at all.
A wild ape comes out of the cave, using nothing but bare rocks and mud builds a rocket and goes to the moon.
A wild ape comes out of the cave, using nothing but bare rocks and mud builds a rocket, goes to the next solar system and tells the local wild apes how to come out of the caves, so that they can build their rocket using nothing but bare rocks and mud and go to their moon.
The second is not more difficult to believe at all.
Except the distance to travel and the why they would. Also, there's the lack of evidence. So it's not impossible to believe, but it is more difficult to believe. Maybe we're the apes that teach the other apes rather than vice versa.
BTW, Colossus at Rhodes, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, Great Lighthouse of Alexandria, Temple of Artemis, and Statue of Zeus. Those are six of the seven wonders of the Ancient World. None of them exist anymore. So it's not really all that helpful to talk about lasting achievement of the ancients.
BTW, Colossus at Rhodes, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, Great Lighthouse of Alexandria, Temple of Artemis, and Statue of Zeus. Those are six of the seven wonders of the Ancient World. None of them exist anymore. So it's not really all that helpful to talk about lasting achievement of the ancients.
Oh, I was kinda sarcastic about the “not more difficult to believe” part. My point was that the incredible human achievements seem, the more unlikely alien help is. If it is so difficult to believe that humans did what they did alone, then it is even more difficult to believe that there would be aliens doing all these same things waiting for us at every corner.
Of course, people here made the argument that after it has happened once they would spread throughout the galaxy in no time, which kinda makes it more likely to have them next door, but... um, if it is so difficult to believe that humans built something as unsophisticated as the pyramids, then the closest space-faring aliens could ever be would be in the next galaxy or cluster of galaxies, damn it.
P.S. Given how well contacts between cultures remote in their development and civility have gone on Earth, I'd be tremendously surprised if any alien attempts to teach us anything had any success beyond speeding up a lesson or two, and giving them a headache.
Because building techniques have improved tremendously.
Perhaps they're more intelligent than most.
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YES the proof was given, and by far more than "two drunk elderly English guys." You just choose not to believe it, or even investigate it, because you would prefer to believe in aliens.
There's a big difference between "There is no proof" and "I don't believe the proof." We learn this from a study of creationism -- particularly young Earth creationism -- which somehow manages to look at the entire volume of scientific literature and see "Not enough data; inconclusive."
But not permanently, and not all of them, which is EXTREMELY significant. IF that is an example of alien intervention, it is one of aliens testing their ability to systematically disarm us if we ever decided to oppose them (or if not aliens, some sneaky Russians in a top secret aircraft). "Intervention" can be said to have lasting effects, which UFOs and/or alien abductions never really produce.
Case in point:
Only to give to throw them on the floor where those two bratty kids can immediately pick them up and start fighting again?
Oh, I was kinda sarcastic about the “not more difficult to believe” part. My point was that the incredible human achievements seem, the more unlikely alien help is. If it is so difficult to believe that humans did what they did alone, then it is even more difficult to believe that there would be aliens doing all these same things waiting for us at every corner.
Of course, people here made the argument that after it has happened once they would spread throughout the galaxy in no time, which kinda makes it more likely to have them next door, but... um, if it is so difficult to believe that humans built something as unsophisticated as the pyramids, then the closest space-faring aliens could ever be would be in the next galaxy or cluster of galaxies, damn it.
P.S. Given how well contacts between cultures remote in their development and civility have gone on Earth, I'd be tremendously surprised if any alien attempts to teach us anything had any success beyond speeding up a lesson or two, and giving them a headache.
I hadn't thought about that before, but it's a sort of ontological argument against the Ancient Aliens theory. It basically assumes that primitive cultures cannot accomplish things their distant descendants would consider impressive without help from people as advanced as those ancestors. Apart from making a sweeping assumption about what people in general find impressive, it's a self-defeating assumption, since it would just as easily apply to the aliens and then we have to ask who lead THEM out of their primitive past, and who tutored their leaders, and their leaders' leaders, and so on.
Fair enough. I suppose that's a testament to how seriously people believe outlandish things that it's almost impossible to spot sarcasm.
"Ancient Aliens" is an historically and scientifically ignorant hypothesis, and the world would be a better place if there were some way to prosecute the people who promulgate it in the media.
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