Are Humans the first evolution of Intellegence on the Earth?

[All Seeing Eye]

How far back does our knowledge of history actually go? as far as I can make out some people date the pyramids at around 15000 years BC but clearly civilisation didn't just pop up over night, the Egyptian civilisation must have evolved somehow and to be able to build the great pyramids they must have been around a VERY long time to advance to that kind of stage. It's been 17000 years and i'd say we've barely developed our technology that far considering the amount of time we've had. How do we know that the Egyptians etc arn't the descendants of survivors from a lost advanced civilisation. You are assuming they would require fossil fuels but why should they? who is to say they developed the same way we have and taken the same route? maybe when they discovered electricity they also realised they could use wind power to generate it and their civilisation developed into a clean energy producing one? just because we went down the road of dirty oil burning doesn't mean a previous civilisation did.
Also why assume they built roads and drove gas guzzling cars like we do? perhaps they never had roads and utilised a clean efficient electric train/trams or other types of clean vehicles to get around.

There is too much assuming that a possible previous civilisation went the same route that we have.

 

[JNG]

How far back does our knowledge of history actually go? as far as I can make out some people date the pyramids at around 15000 years BC but clearly civilisation didn't just pop up over night

I assumed you meant Egyptian pyramids, but I thought the oldest of those pyramids was around 3rd millennium BCE.

I still am not so clear on how they managed to build those, though. Many of the proposed schemes are utterly ridiculous, and even the ones that might have worked would have left evidence about as hard to miss as the pyramid itself.

 

[All Seeing Eye]

How far back does our knowledge of history actually go? as far as I can make out some people date the pyramids at around 15000 years BC but clearly civilisation didn't just pop up over night

I assumed you meant Egyptian pyramids, but I thought the oldest of those pyramids was around 3rd millennium BCE.

A lot of Historians place their construction around a certain period, possible the time you've said but some carbon dating and a few other historians place their construction around the time of 15,000 yrs BC. There's still debate about the period they were built.

PS: Why have you assumed I meant Egyptian when I talked about the Egyptians throughout the post? No assumption was necessary since it was pretty obvious. The words that follow the sentence you quoted is in fact 'the egyptian civilisation', what more clarity is needed??? I didn't mention the incas or mayans so ya know, WTF?

 

[zenophite]

How far back does our knowledge of history actually go? as far as I can make out some people date the pyramids at around 15000 years BC but clearly civilisation didn't just pop up over night

I assumed you meant Egyptian pyramids, but I thought the oldest of those pyramids was around 3rd millennium BCE.

A lot of Historians place their construction around a certain period, possible the time you've said but some carbon dating and a few other historians place their construction around the time of 15,000 yrs BC. There's still debate about the period they were built.

PS: Why have you assumed I meant Egyptian when I talked about the Egyptians throughout the post? No assumption was necessary since it was pretty obvious. The words that follow the sentence you quoted is in fact 'the egyptian civilisation', what more clarity is needed??? I didn't mention the incas or mayans so ya know, WTF?

I know that some folks place the Sphinx at around 10,000 years b.c or but I had not heard the same thing about the pyramids but to my knowledge they hadn't been able to confirm via carbon dating... do you happen to have a reference? I've always been rather interested in the possibility of lost civilizations

 

[BCI]

At the very least I would say any sort of creature capable of creating fire and using tools like spears etc...

Lots of animals use tools. i just don't like the separation of humans apart from other animals, as if we weren't animals. We are.

And the biggest problems our "civilization" is facing, like war or full employment, we share with ants.

I'm with Indiana Jones: just did deep enough, and you'll find UFOs and unimaginable artifacts from unknown previous cultures.

 

[Venardhi]

I still am not so clear on how they managed to build those, though. Many of the proposed schemes are utterly ridiculous, and even the ones that might have worked would have left evidence about as hard to miss as the pyramid itself.

Best reasoning I've seen is the idea that most of them were actually 'cast' in place, one piece at a time. It explains the freakish perfection that nothing else can, and also how the stone got so far from where it would have had to be mined if they were carved out of a quarry. Recently someone was able to replicate this theoretical method and had fantastic results with just a small team and simple tools comparable to what they would have had available. There is also the fact that particles have been found inside the rock that do not occur naturally in limestone, which could be best explained by the idea that they are unintended impurities(or simply unnecessary additives) that found their way into the 'mixing bowl'.

How those ancient sons of bitches managed to figure out how to create a limestone geopolymer is another matter. . . though seeing as they did a lot of "giant useless shit"-building it makes sense they might have explored other options.