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And yet, this is what Google serves up as one of the first results when searching for ancient civilizations during/before the last Ice Age: (No, There Wasn't an

And yet, this is what Google serves up as one of the first results when searching for ancient civilizations during/before the last Ice Age: (No, There Wasn't an Advanced Civilization 12,000 Years Ago)[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/no-there-wasnt-an-advanced-civilization-12-000-years-ago/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/no-there-wasnt-an...] The dude clearly has a bone to pick with Graham Hancock, and honestly I'm not a fan of some of his crazy ideas either. But it seems like he is missing the bigger picture by making this is a personal battle.

tfghjnkm 5y ago
Since when is it wrong to debunk pseudoscience. That takedown on Graham Hancock's wacko ideas is very thorough, and it's great that it's appearing in such a prominent forum. You're interpreting it as a personal attack, but it is not. It is a great intellectual argumentative piece. edit: why was this flagged?
AlotOfReading 5y ago
Neither Michael Shermer nor Graham Hancock are archaeologists, so I'm not sure where you're going with that. If you're asking me which one to trust without critical reading (neither), I'm certainly not going to recommend the ancient aliens dude who's been repeatedly called out by multiple archaeological associations for publishing pseudoscience. Anyway, part of the issue here is that archaeology doesn't have answers to every question you could ask and the farther back you go, the harder it is to answer even basic questions. And ultimately, the archaeological community as a whole is still coming to grips with trying to understand how the people we do see in the archaeological record conceived of the world, which is a necessary prerequisite to start talking about how concepts in it relate to concepts in our own. Take this 2019 paper trying to survey how we understand the term 'home' [1] or Maher's Hunter-Gatherer Home-Making? as examples of some of how primitive our current working vocabulary and methodologies are on this topic. Our understanding of paleolithic lifeways is still very much in its infancy. Nevertheless, suggestions like the presence of a industrialized society much like our own before the LGM is something I've seen no evidence to even hint at yet. [1] https://doi.org/10.1086/701523 https://doi.org/10.1086/701523
edgyquant 5y ago
What’s wrong with this article? They explain exactly what they mean here > Göbekli Tepe was a ceremonial religious site, not a city—there is no evidence that anyone lived there. Moreover, there are no domesticated animal bones, no metal tools, no inscriptions or writing, and not even pottery—all products that much later “high civilizations” produced.

tfghjnkm 5y ago

Since when is it wrong to debunk pseudoscience. That takedown on Graham Hancock's wacko ideas is very thorough, and it's great that it's appearing in such a prominent forum. You're interpreting it as a personal attack, but it is not. It is a great intellectual argumentative piece. edit: why was this flagged?

AlotOfReading 5y ago

Neither Michael Shermer nor Graham Hancock are archaeologists, so I'm not sure where you're going with that. If you're asking me which one to trust without critical reading (neither), I'm certainly not going to recommend the ancient aliens dude who's been repeatedly called out by multiple archaeological associations for publishing pseudoscience. Anyway, part of the issue here is that archaeology doesn't have answers to every question you could ask and the farther back you go, the harder it is to answer even basic questions. And ultimately, the archaeological community as a whole is still coming to grips with trying to understand how the people we do see in the archaeological record conceived of the world, which is a necessary prerequisite to start talking about how concepts in it relate to concepts in our own. Take this 2019 paper trying to survey how we understand the term 'home' [1] or Maher's Hunter-Gatherer Home-Making? as examples of some of how primitive our current working vocabulary and methodologies are on this topic. Our understanding of paleolithic lifeways is still very much in its infancy. Nevertheless, suggestions like the presence of a industrialized society much like our own before the LGM is something I've seen no evidence to even hint at yet. [1] https://doi.org/10.1086/701523 https://doi.org/10.1086/701523

edgyquant 5y ago

What’s wrong with this article? They explain exactly what they mean here > Göbekli Tepe was a ceremonial religious site, not a city—there is no evidence that anyone lived there. Moreover, there are no domesticated animal bones, no metal tools, no inscriptions or writing, and not even pottery—all products that much later “high civilizations” produced.