Comment by kcplate | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kcplate | Hacker News Reader

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> For some reason this particular show is aggravating academics in a way the million Ancient Aliens and UFO shows didn't.

Likely because this is essentially a low tech alternative theory, so it’s harder to attack using claims of “its just science fiction or supernatural mythology” to discount it.

It really isn’t that outlandish so it skirts the realm of the plausible. He is not making suggestions that a bunch of dudes with antigravity devices flew off to the the four corners of the globe and levitated a bunch of big stones around for some grunting troglodytes. What Hancock calls “advanced” is basically “some groups 12k+ years ago had more advanced stone working and astronomical understanding than other groups” and some folks with that knowledge survived this global catastrophe and disseminated that knowledge.

It’s aggravating mainstream archaeologists because they can’t really prove him wrong (just point to their own self established authority) and frankly any new civilization oriented discoveries that date older than the conventional wisdom just serves to make his theory appear more likely and since he is not as credentialed in the discipline as they are, it erodes their authority.

I think it's more that he doesn't have any actual archaeological evidence of note to support the theory of relatively advanced ice-age civilizations, and the claim that 'they all lived by the ocean so the evidence is all buried under 100 meters of water and sediment' isn't what any scientific professional would call a solid argument.

I suppose if he can get some billionaire to fund a series of global underwater archaeology expeditions, that's fine, and might even have some interesting results, but otherwise it all feels like another expedition in search of the resting place of the Biblical Ark.

Gobekli Tepi is a megalithic archeological site from (going on memory) 11,900 years ago. Are you aware of when the last ice age occurred?

The level of sophisticated engineering capability and large-scale coordination of populations makes it difficult to falsify the theory that it was produced by a civilization. I have no idea how else megastructures can come into existence. All surviving hunter-gatherer, simple hunter-agrarian, and pastoral groups demonstrate little capacity to produce such things.

Excuse my ignorance about the series and mr.hancock, as i havent bothered with the series or his books, but i'd like to reach an understanding: the claims of the space-debris collisions 12,000 years ago are false?

If not then these two facts aren't false, then it's important to note they coincide with myths of a global cataclysm, and do a lot to confirm graham's theory. Which seems from my 2-mile away viewpoint to have less to do with hand-wavy atlantians-this and more to do with the two points i mentioned above.

i think we can all agree thay academia (and especially anthropology) is one of the most anti-intellectual places on the planet. There's been tons of evidence over the past few years about how a lot of the "knowledge" and analysis that is produced is distorted at best and often outright incorrect. I'd say academia is just jealous and riding the wave of the absolutely fanatical censorship crusade that's been going on.

(for what it's worth my mom's an archeologist)

Gobekli Tepi is an interesting site, but doesn't really seem like 'advanced civilization' relative to later developments:

> "Göbekli Tepe is one of the most important archaeological discoveries of modern times, pushing back the origins of monumentality beyond the emergence of agriculture. We are pleased to present a summary of work in progress by the excavators of this remarkable site and their latest thoughts about its role and meaning. At the dawn of the Neolithic, hunter-gatherers congregating at Göbekli Tepe created social and ideological cohesion through the carving of decorated pillars, dancing, feasting—and, almost certainly, the drinking of beer made from fermented wild crops."

(2012) "The role of cult and feasting in the emergence of Neolithic communities. New evidence from Göbekli Tepe, south-eastern Turkey", Dietrich et al.

The Younger Dryas is a well-studied period in paleoclimate science and the evidence of an impact triggering it is pretty scant, see this from 2011:

https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.earscirev.2011.02.005

> "In summary, none of the original YD impact signatures have been subsequently corroborated by independent tests. Of the 12 original lines of evidence, seven have so far proven to be non-reproducible. The remaining signatures instead seem to represent either (1) non-catastrophic mechanisms, and/or (2) terrestrial rather than extraterrestrial or impact-related sources. In all of these cases, sparse but ubiquitous materials seem to have been misreported and misinterpreted as singular peaks at the onset of the YD. Throughout the arc of this hypothesis, recognized and expected impact markers were not found, leading to proposed YD impactors and impact processes that were novel, self-contradictory, rapidly changing, and sometimes defying the laws of physics."

It does seem to sound a bit like 'the lost civilization of Atlantis was wiped out by a cosmic impact' fairy tale. Also the claims of a 'cover-up' are pretty silly.

> Gobekli Tepi is an interesting site, but doesn't really seem like 'advanced civilization' relative to later developments

Shouldn't we define “advanced” relative to the time of its construction? Seems unfair to compare it to sites that came later. You need to compare to sites from the same period…is it advanced compared to those? That’s an obvious yes.

That site would take a wide variety of skills to build. You need established leadership, an established religious or cultural belief enough to motivate the project. You need planning, you need stone cutting skills, you need artisans with stone carving ability, you need people with building skills, you need laborers, you need logistics, you need to essentially feed a large workforce which means your non-labors on the project have to provide hunting and gathering not just for themselves, but for others who are unable.

> I'd say academia is just jealous and riding the wave of the absolutely fanatical censorship crusade that's been going on.

People who grew up internalizing the ethos of cancel culture are graduating into faculty and other positions of authority. Plus, even as students through sheer aggressiveness they were quite effective at changing academic norms. Less a matter of jealously and more a reaping of what was permitted to be sown, I would think.

Cancel culture was always fundamentally based on moral certitude; not just in the abstract, but in concrete, detailed application to their own and others' activities. So there's obvious dissonance with the nature of the scientific process. The way this dissonance plays out as the cancel culture crowd becomes the scientific establishment is already turning out to be... interesting.

> I think it's more that he doesn't have any actual archaeological evidence of note to support the theory of relatively advanced ice-age civilizations

I guess for me it’s strange that what should be a passive dismissal of a fringe idea seems to have a much more active campaign of labeling it misinformation.

Are his ideas really that dangerous to warrant such concern? Pretty sure society is not going to change just because Graham Hancock convinced a hundred, thousand, or even a million people that maybe there was some groups that had astronomical and stone building capabilities prior to the ice age. I seriously doubt that manic mobs are going to raid the local archeologist’s houses, carry them out on a rail, and burn them at stake at the edge of town for daring to suggest that hunter gathers probably weren’t that advanced.

I don’t understand the resistance to his ideas honestly, or how it really impacts us as modern humans. Physiologically, humans 20,000 years ago were not any different than human beings 5,000 years ago. If they could figure out how to create structures in ancient Egypt, they could have very well figured how to create structures 15,000 years ago - the human brain was largely the same. Regardless, it does little to change how I view myself or my history as a human today.

I find the concept of a pre-ice age civilization with a degree of astronomical and stone working knowledge pretty fascinating and as I said above—plausible, perhaps even likely. But, I think Hancock gets a little more speculative and sure of himself than I think some of his evidence warrants. Some evidence seems plausible and compelling and some requires some big leaps of faith, but he for sure paints an interesting picture and I believe “what if..” is a powerful thing that shouldn’t be suppressed.

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