Jump to content

Narrowband

Ancient aliens


Recommended Posts

Anyway, what with the pyramid text and all, they sure was a clever bunch.
Indeed so. I reckon they SWORE (considerably?) when Tutankamun's Sarcophagus LID developed that crack! But I like to think it was a case of: "C'mon Lads, let's stick a bit of (Ancient Egyptian) "Polyfilla" in the gap - Job's a Good 'Un"! At least for a few thousand years... :(
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 74
  • Created
  • Last Reply
Ancient Egyptians had "Bronze Age" technology? Copper (based) tools? Their masonic mauls and chisels, on tomb reliefs, looked much like those of contemporary stone workers. For every few hammer blows, some poor "apprentice" had to re-sharpen the master's chisel? <G> One suspects they had "pipe drills" too: Feed a sand / water slurry down the inside and rotate back and forth with ropes... ad-infinitum. Even hard granite (sarcophogi etc.) would eventually yield? I suspect they "undercut" things in much the same way as later (Brits) carved out millstones at Stanage Edge... Albeit carefully! :)

Stanage Edge, Millstones. | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Climatically, Ancient Egypt was a more green and temperate, back then. They had vast non-desert, Middle East and African Empires to provide them with timber for ships and furniture, so why not a few rough-hewn 4x4's (timber) on a inclined plane. Place stone on sledge, add a bit of animal fat lubricant, and away you go! Seems fairly plausible? :p

I suspect managing and servicing a large workforce is / was as difficult back then as it is now. More reason to imagine they were not slaves. I suspect the "Craft Gang" who signed-off the Great Pyramid as the: "The Drunkards of Menkaure" were not totally oppressed and starving - At least re. regular Beer supplies? ;)

Aside: No-one "knows" stuff? No explanation perfect? But it's interesting to ponder ideas "unearthed" by Experimental Archeology? As a one-time "hard" scientist, I sometimes feel a tad *envious* of disciplins that seem like extended (FUN!) field-trips in the sun. LOL. But I see no "absurdities" here - Or even "impossibilities" re. Ancient Egypt. ;)

Hey Macavity,

Sorry to be so harsh using "absurd" but I just dont believe we know exactly how the pyramids were built. Supposibly, modern tools were not used by Egyptians or by Aztecs or Incans etc. But as you mentioned, objects were found resembling tools and there are marks on the stone that resemble "machine made" marks. There are many theories of how these granite stones were moved, I like the animal fat idea, but no one knows for sure. What bothers me are the people who say they know, either Arcaheologists or Ancient Alien Theorists. No one knows as you say.

I have worked as a Scientist as well (teacher) and my father is a stone mason. I worked on granite and we always joked about moving 40 ton granite slabs into the King's Tomb in the Great Pyramid. How did they do it? I like asking these questions and they will always intrigue me.

As a side note, Coral Castle is a pretty amazing place and I see a bunch of links being put up on this thread. If anyone ever travels to Miami, Florida go check it out. The guy who built it was a little crazy but he did amazing work.:(

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Göbekli Tepe is the one that interests me the most, its really different to most other places in style and layout.

Wow, that really is interesting! Makes you wonder why they buried it..

On the pyramids, have a look for the 'famine stele', an often over looked item of pheronic Egypt.

What with the Pantheon and its concrete roof built around 126 ce, they may well of got the idea from it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A friend and neighbour is an amateur archaeologist who recreates, without cheating, the technologies of the stone age. He works with the University of Marseille on these projects and I love to see what he's up to. Stone age technology is very, very clever and I think it unlikely that many of us in the modern world would have a cat in hell's chance of lighting fires in damp forests and transporting their embers, or of spinning fishing line from tree bark or bonding flint blades into bone handles. We really should not underestimate our ancestors and have no need to invent aliens to provide them with the intelligence we seem to think they lacked.

As for similarities between unconnected cultures, they are a commonplace of human life. Ideas are in the air. The pyramid is a simple structure which had no need of the arch (which the Maya, for instance, never discovered or invented. They weren't paying attention to the aliens that day!) The bizarrely arbitrary-seeming socio-religious system known as totemism is found in historically unconnected cultures all over the world. Phenonemonolgists of anthropology and religion find incredibly similar myths and stories and beliefs and rituals from equally unconnected cultures.

Our error is to assume that they are similar because they came from the same outside source. They didn't, they came simply from our own common humanity. We think alike. No one says that the internal combustion engine was almost simultaneously invented in the northern and southern hemispheres because the earth was visited by an alien Model T ford a month earlier. We are many. We have ideas. We follow them up. The intersting 'coral castle' was new to me but these one man structures are, again, 'in the air.' There 'Le Palais Ideale' made by Factueur Cheval or the Watts towers of Simon Rodia, for instance. A creative impules, a certain techonology, and off you go. As for the levitation in Coral Castle, I just put it down to delusion first and commercialsim second.

Olly

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As for similarities between unconnected cultures, they are a commonplace of human life. Ideas are in the air.......

Our error is to assume that they are similar because they came from the same outside source. They didn't, they came simply from our own common humanity.Olly

And of course humans are descended from the same very small group of ancestors and would probably have carried the same origin myths(for example) into new areas. There would also have been quite a bit of trading between different areas, whether trade of actual goods or ideas.

Pyramids were also roughly contemporary with Stonehenge (among other large 'monuments'). So there was obviously something going on in the world at the time that required large obvious monuments to be built. Perhaps just a case of showing off to the neighbours as with today's competition to build the tallest towers?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Thornborough henge is worth a look also and the paper back book 'Before the pyramids' by Christopher Night.

Obviously sea bound travel would need the understanding of longitude latitude cords, the book puts forward theories of how this may be achieved some 4000-5000 years ago.

Also, another highly recommended read (see study) is 'The temple of man' by R.A.Schwaller De Lubicz. Gratefully translated by Deborah & Robert Lawlor from the original work Le Temple de l'homme.

It gives an insight of how the ancients thought...Truly shocking.

Alien intervention, no. Clever people, without doubt most defiantly :(

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A friend and neighbour is an amateur archaeologist who recreates, without cheating, the technologies of the stone age. He works with the University of Marseille on these projects and I love to see what he's up to. Stone age technology is very, very clever and I think it unlikely that many of us in the modern world would have a cat in hell's chance of lighting fires in damp forests and transporting their embers, or of spinning fishing line from tree bark or bonding flint blades into bone handles. We really should not underestimate our ancestors and have no need to invent aliens to provide them with the intelligence we seem to think they lacked.

As for similarities between unconnected cultures, they are a commonplace of human life. Ideas are in the air. The pyramid is a simple structure which had no need of the arch (which the Maya, for instance, never discovered or invented. They weren't paying attention to the aliens that day!) The bizarrely arbitrary-seeming socio-religious system known as totemism is found in historically unconnected cultures all over the world. Phenonemonolgists of anthropology and religion find incredibly similar myths and stories and beliefs and rituals from equally unconnected cultures.

Our error is to assume that they are similar because they came from the same outside source. They didn't, they came simply from our own common humanity. We think alike. No one says that the internal combustion engine was almost simultaneously invented in the northern and southern hemispheres because the earth was visited by an alien Model T ford a month earlier. We are many. We have ideas. We follow them up. The intersting 'coral castle' was new to me but these one man structures are, again, 'in the air.' There 'Le Palais Ideale' made by Factueur Cheval or the Watts towers of Simon Rodia, for instance. A creative impules, a certain techonology, and off you go. As for the levitation in Coral Castle, I just put it down to delusion first and commercialsim second.

Olly

Very well said, Olly!

I've always thought it miraculous that laughter, tears, fear, sadness and happiness can be recognized in anyone from another culture from yours. Singing, too, seems to be a common human trait, though in America it is less commonly practiced that it was when I were a boy. I blame modern entertainment media for removing the need to entertain oneself, ergo the skills seem not to be learned. Perhaps similar phenomena occurred to cause the loss of many of the ancient skills.

Thanks for the thoughtful and thought provoking post.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Very well said, Olly!

I've always thought it miraculous that laughter, tears, fear, sadness and happiness can be recognized in anyone from another culture from yours. Singing, too, seems to be a common human trait, though in America it is less commonly practiced that it was when I were a boy. I blame modern entertainment media for removing the need to entertain oneself, ergo the skills seem not to be learned. Perhaps similar phenomena occurred to cause the loss of many of the ancient skills.

Thanks for the thoughtful and thought provoking post.

There was a very interesting program on World Service this week, that showed that Facial Expressions are not as world wide as we might presume specifically comparing Western to Far East.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, there is one place in the world, I read, where shaking the head is affirmative. Can't remember where, dammit. However, I still think we are remarkably similar. Take the various syndromes which can affect us - autism, for instance, or many, many others. They produce staggeringly similar behavioural characteristics, often of the most bizarrely arbitrary kind. We do love to emphasize our own autonomy and 'free will' but do we rather exaggerate our freedom to think as we wish? And if we had a greater ability to think 'freely' would we still be able to communicate with each other as we do at present?

Olly

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I caught today's episode of this - aliens and Atlantis. Why did nobody mention that it's a comedy? :)

It didn't start off well by pronouncing that aliens were involved with Atlantis from the start because it was Poseidon who established Atlantis, and by definition he is/was an extra-terrestrial, as in 'not of this world'!

They then went through a variety of increasingly flimsy evidence which always pointed to aliens.

And seriously they did look at some really interesting stuff. Cities which have been found under the sea, which according to the show look as though they may be over 10,000 years old. But then they'd ignore any real analysis of evidence, or any possible alternatives, and go for aliens every time. They were talking about carvings found on stonework on one of the cities but didn't actually show the carvings. So I'd have to ask why not? The same place also had a block which the presenters thought looked like a huge face a la Easter Island. To my eyes it looked like a submerged rock with a resemblance to a face. Nothing unnatural.

A ridiculous programme I'm afraid, if only because they are desperate to have everything fit their idea. It's like watching my kids do a jigsaw and trying to force pieces into the wrong places.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Our error is to assume that they are similar because they came from the same outside source. They didn't, they came simply from our own common humanity. We think alike. No one says that the internal combustion engine was almost simultaneously invented in the northern and southern hemispheres because the earth was visited by an alien Model T ford a month earlier. We are many. We have ideas. We follow them up.

Olly

Too right, people don't often? question the Beaver species and the building of it's dams, they all do it to the same 'draft', spread all over the place - and the bee creating honeycomb.. Similar principle?

Had a giggle when you mentioned the nuances of different cultures, Bangladeshi or Indian i think, it just reminded me of a trip to Greece and saying "no thank you" to the waitress (with palm facing out) when asked if i'd like more coffee.. not advisable at all.:)

After apologies and explanations i found it rather easier to catch a cab the next day by pointing to the ground:rolleyes:

.....And if we had a greater ability to think 'freely' would we still be able to communicate with each other as we do at present?

I'd like to think so, may it boundaries pushed or ego's bruised, we are knackered if we don't.

Cheers

Glen

Link to comment
Share on other sites

.....And if we had a greater ability to think 'freely' would we still be able to communicate with each other as we do at present?

I'd like to think so, may it boundaries pushed or ego's bruised, we are knackered if we don't.

Cheers

Glen

Have you heard of the pineal gland??

pineal gland link

Wikipedia link click me here

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Let me rephrase my example. More than three quarters of all people believe in some sort of deity. There is no physical evidence for these deities, so does that mean all those people are wrong?

If history has proven us anything it's that the vast majority of people are nearly always wrong.:)

For example before Galileo they would've all believed that the sun orbited the earth, yet their belief didn't make it so, and before Darwin all these people would've believed that their deity created mankind...

So, just because a large number of people believe in something doesn't mean their beliefs have more of a chance of being true than the one person (think Galileo, Darwin, Bruno etc..) that doesn't believe.

And just to prove that I'm not having a dig at religion I'd like to draw attention to the fact that a few hundred years ago most scientists believed in phlogiston and their belief in it didn't make it real either.

There is no concrete evidence our life was influenced by higher intelligences, that is one way to look at it. But there's also no concrete evidence they haven't either. That's thinking outside the box.

No offence but that's not thinking outside the box. It is a classic argument from ignorance.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Quote; More than three quarters of all people believe in some sort of deity. There is no physical evidence for these deities, so does that mean all those people are wrong?

We should respect the 'no religion' rule, I think, so I will resist an enormous temptation to answer that.

As for 'concrete evidence against something,' how would that work? Science doesn't work by proving negatives but by confirming positives. I cannot prove that there is not a teapot orbiting mars (an old example). The question is, is it really mentally sound on my part to consider it a possibility? (However many people think there might be.) I am similarly sceptical about anything else which is not evidence based or, like ealy aliens, based on a very questionable interpretation of data.

Olly

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We should respect the 'no religion' rule, I think, so I will resist an enormous temptation to answer that.

I don't get that "no religion" rule?? Please explain.

I am similarly sceptical about anything else which is not evidence based or, like ealy aliens, based on a very questionable interpretation of data.

Olly

But you do agree that since man has existed he/she has always looked up to the skies and questioned his/her existence on earth?? By that I mean, egyptians with afterlife and pyramids/Mayan temples/pagan sun gods/greek gods ect ect all evidence available too suggest and point towards a higher being??

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Quote; More than three quarters of all people believe in some sort of deity. There is no physical evidence for these deities, so does that mean all those people are wrong?

We should respect the 'no religion' rule, I think, so I will resist an enormous temptation to answer that.

As for 'concrete evidence against something,' how would that work? Science doesn't work by proving negatives but by confirming positives. I cannot prove that there is not a teapot orbiting mars (an old example). The question is, is it really mentally sound on my part to consider it a possibility? (However many people think there might be.) I am similarly sceptical about anything else which is not evidence based or, like ealy aliens, based on a very questionable interpretation of data.

Olly

Minor point of pedantry. Science does not proceed by "confirming positives". That would make it very vulnerable to the dreaded "confirmation bias", which is something science tries very hard to avoid. Instead science generally attempts to rule out or disprove hypotheses by working out and accounting for any observations which may falsify them. The longer an idea survives this kind of assault, the more a scientist might be convinced that it approximates objective reality.

It's a common myth that science tries to prove things, it doesn't - it tries to *disprove* things.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't get that "no religion" rule?? Please explain.

But you do agree that since man has existed he/she has always looked up to the skies and questioned his/her existence on earth?? By that I mean, egyptians with afterlife and pyramids/Mayan temples/pagan sun gods/greek gods ect ect all evidence available too suggest and point towards a higher being??

The forum has a rule excluding the discussion of politics and religion.

It's in big red letters at the top of the Lounge page! I'll PM you with my answer to your question but then I think we should move on.

NAFK your correction of my point about scientific method is not at all pedantic and is quite right. Sorry about my carelessness there. Indeed, trying to break current theories is where much of the energy goes. However, Jocelyn Bell was pushing for more thought to be given to the generation of speculative hypotheses and its importance, since without these hypotheses there is less to destruction test. The genius launches the kite, the workers (aka The Poor blumming Infantry) try to shoot it down, maybe?

Olly

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Have you heard of the pineal gland??

pineal gland link

Wikipedia link click me here

lol, yeah very interesting, what fascinates me is the Egyptians new far more about it and a better understanding it seems. Allot covered by the work of R.A.Schwaller De Lubicz.

Some of the hieroglyphs in the temples where 4 dimensional Ie you had to look at one side, remeber it and patch it to the other side, as if the wall was not there, like i say very clever peeps. Worth a read.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.