Great Pyramid of Cholula

I'm glad to see you are in favor of keeping an open mind, but saddened to see you would want to put limits on your intellectual exploration! I generally think that's a poor idea.

Many reasons, here's two: 1) what better adventure is there? How fun it is to explore curiously some out there possibilities outside of what we know! You might just discover something incredible, and true. It may even be useful! Onward! Haha :)

2) It's kind of arrogant to think, 'well I can't be "too open" otherwise I might consider some things that are wrong.' To me that reeks of orthodoxy and this idea that humans can proscribe what is possible for the universe, rather than standing in awe of it and in humility at our ignorance of all the things we don't know.

I think that humility, ignorance and awe is ultimately liberating, and the intellectually honest thing to do, and not just honest, but the most useful position to take, the scientifically ignorant one.

I see your "smart person", and I raise you one, haha! :) One smart person recently said: "Science is nothing more than the invention of ignorance."

I encourage you to meditate deeply upon that. I'll go watch your youtube video now! :)

edit: Oh Tim Minchin is often very funny, but I find him off here. Out of touch and a little flat. I also like George Carlin, I recommend you check him out if you haven't.

I think comedians can offer us insights, but in general they should not be used as guides as to what's possible, nor as proscribers of your intellectual curiosity.

If you let them do that, you're basically subscribing to a kind of orthodoxy that many comedians are by definition against, being free, lateral thinkers in many (but perhaps not all!) ways.

The sad thing about Minchin's stance above is he couches it in this irrefutable way, when it's really not. A lot of the things he tries to make out, as unsubstantiated are in fact very substantiated. But sadly it feels as if you would only seek to mock those things, as Minchin tries to, so perhaps you're not the best one to have that discussion with now, I guess? Haha :)

I also wonder if Minchin is not subtly lampooning the stance he merely pretends to embody there? It would be in character for him. And the way he rapid-fires the overly formal verbiage, seems to suggest satire, even mockery of it. At least I think we should remain open to the possibility that's what he's doing! Or at the very least perhaps not make much of the stance of someone whose job it is as court jester to basically satirize everything! :) hahahaha

But thank you for reminding me of him. I'm a fan of that duet he did with Missy Higgins. You should check that out!

Also, as these megalithic foundations could conceivably last 100,000s of years we don't really know from how far back they could originate.

I'm not sure what you're referring to with your references to 'compass navigation', 'Hitler in antartica', 'cosmic significance' and 'negative energy'--do you have sources for these claims?--but in any case it's never wise to judge someone's work by their other work (if such ad hominem is what you are suggesting).

A simple example that we could all probably relate to: on Monday you made a series of very poor commits, but that was the best you could do at the time. But on Wednesday you did stellar work, representing the best of your capabilities at any time. It's incorrect and unfair of me to doubt your Wednesday work because of your Monday failure, and unfair and incorrect of me to judge you a poor programmer because of Monday. I can see you are a good programmer, who is human! :)

Perhaps a more pertinent example: think of Newton. Would you be so bold as to disagree with his physics and discount his laws because he was also passionate about alchemy? Or would you expand yourself to also admit alchemy could be as valid as Newton through it could be? Or would you pick and choose, selecting only those ideas which you deemed to have merit, or not, based on how they stand on their own, rather than against generalities you may be inclined to make across the body of work as a whole, or, in an ad hominem sense, about the person whose work it was?

I think it's clear which is the most sensible course there, but I also understand that you could differ, and that's fine, and interesting! I look forward to knowing your perspective, if you'd like to share it! :)

I like your simple analogy, between accepting the ET reality, but not the film ET as reality. I think it captures quite a lot of stuff well! Indeed, perhaps more than you intend, as I think often, all disciplines and theories are want to become captive to the narratives we tell ourselves--and obsessed as we get with those narratives, we may miss out on the truth! :)

So, I think, judicious and critical consideration of the facts, and the narratives, and open minded exploration, is essential to finding the truth (as hard as that is), and is a good way forward.

Finally, regarding finding more evidence of prior civilizations--consider that during/before the last ice age sea levels were 120 meters lower and that often, civilizations form around rivers and deltas which are typically in low lying regions. These regions are most likely to be the first to be flooded.

So, evidence of other cultures may be there, it just may be located under the ocean. Even so, very distant civilizations may not leave many traces at all, besides their very durable megalithic foundations.