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Size matters! I think one of the key factors here is that a civilization that produces our level (or greater) of advanced technology has to be really big, in t

by jbotz 6y ago

Size matters! I think one of the key factors here is that a civilization that produces our level (or greater) of advanced technology has to be really big, in terms of numbers of individuals... an ancient city state of 100,000 - 1,000,000 people isn't going to develop quantum mechanics. You need a lot of people doing science to be able to figure all of this stuff out. And when a civilization gets this big, like ours, it does leave permanent marks, like some of the other comments here have correctly pointed out.

rm445 6y ago
Not people. Dinosaurs, intelligent crocodiles, industrialised trilobites, whatever it might be. So many millions of years ago that there may be no such thing as permanent marks. You possibly could be thinking about an Atlantis type of scenario, the idea that relatively advanced prehistoric human civilisations could have risen say 100,000 years ago and fallen without a trace (especially if they literally fell into the sea). Which does have some level of possibility, but indeed there isn't much chance they could have developed advanced sciences. The thing is, though it seems far wackier, it's interesting to think that there literally could have been populations of millions of intelligent lizards (or whatever) for hundreds of thousands of years, and for the fossil record not to reflect it. It would be amazing if one day a cliff collapsed and we found an intact fossilised dinosaur airliner or whatever, but this article is about whether less direct evidence of such a civilisation, if it ever existed, would persist.
- ncmncm 6y ago
  The realistic Atlantis scenario is not sinking, but being engulfed as the water level rises. 20,000 years ago, sea level was hundreds of feet lower. If any industry was confined to coastal lowlands, it is all deep under the sea, now, and under tens or hundreds of feet of mud, besides. Off India, there are mile after mile of large buildings under 60 feet of water. They were last above water ~7000 years ago. There are many, many thousands of square miles of recent land between Indonesia islands, more between Australia and New Guinea, and between Britain and northern Europe. The Black Sea was mostly dry remarkably recently.

by jbotz 6y ago

rm445 6y ago

Not people. Dinosaurs, intelligent crocodiles, industrialised trilobites, whatever it might be. So many millions of years ago that there may be no such thing as permanent marks. You possibly could be thinking about an Atlantis type of scenario, the idea that relatively advanced prehistoric human civilisations could have risen say 100,000 years ago and fallen without a trace (especially if they literally fell into the sea). Which does have some level of possibility, but indeed there isn't much chance they could have developed advanced sciences. The thing is, though it seems far wackier, it's interesting to think that there literally could have been populations of millions of intelligent lizards (or whatever) for hundreds of thousands of years, and for the fossil record not to reflect it. It would be amazing if one day a cliff collapsed and we found an intact fossilised dinosaur airliner or whatever, but this article is about whether less direct evidence of such a civilisation, if it ever existed, would persist.

ncmncm 6y ago
The realistic Atlantis scenario is not sinking, but being engulfed as the water level rises. 20,000 years ago, sea level was hundreds of feet lower. If any industry was confined to coastal lowlands, it is all deep under the sea, now, and under tens or hundreds of feet of mud, besides. Off India, there are mile after mile of large buildings under 60 feet of water. They were last above water ~7000 years ago. There are many, many thousands of square miles of recent land between Indonesia islands, more between Australia and New Guinea, and between Britain and northern Europe. The Black Sea was mostly dry remarkably recently.