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> Graham's arguments have strong merit - the presence of the myth of 'civilizing HERO coming from the water with a BOAT, teaching agriculture, infrastructure,

> Graham's arguments have strong merit - the presence of the myth of 'civilizing HERO coming from the water with a BOAT, teaching agriculture, infrastructure, civilization' in regions that are not known to have had any contact until modern age points to one of the below: Here's a counterpoint: the main culture that's attached to is the Mexica, who immigrated into the Central Mexican Valley somewhere between about 1200 and 1300. This means that they were not involved with any of the flourishing developments of the Preclassical and Classical (or even much of Postclassical!) Mesoamerica--notably, not the achievements of Teotihuacan. Nevertheless, they did consciously adopt many elements of the existing cultures that they would come to rule, and the Aztecs themselves engaged in a fair amount of myth-building to tie themselves into the culture. What is to say that the idea of knowledge being specifically given to them by a foreign culture wasn't a conscious attempt to justify their overlordship of the prior inhabitants of the land? > Based on that, indeed, a lot of the prehistoric monuments point to a certain date at the end of younger dryas, which these prehistoric cultures described as catastrophic, cataclysmic in their monuments in different parts of the world. One of the problems with archaeoastronomy is that there are too many variables. If you want to memorialize the sun--do you choose an equinox or a solstice (which one)? Or, in certain latitudes, the day the sun passes directly overhead? The setting or rising position? Or maybe you want the moon, one of the visible planets, the milky way, an important star. Then you have procession of the equinoxes--if you don't narrow it down to within roughly a century, the alignment is off (a lot of dating is insufficient precision to give that tight a bound). You get extra slack for being only "slightly" off--ancient imprecision, amirite?--and besides, which features are you using to establish the alignment in the first place? In short, you have so many parameters in archaeoastronomy that if you want to find an alignment, you probably can. So if a purported alignment is the only evidence you have of a theory... be very skeptical. > Which also explains the differing flood mythologies that exist in totally isolated cultures. I've never been impressed with the thesis that "flood myths = some cultural echo of sea level rise." The thing is that floods are a pretty common thing in... just about every climate (even deserts, which can be prone to flash floods), and so the concept of a flood that utterly destroys everything is going to be readily accessible to every culture. If you've got some cosmological need to have the world be utterly destroyed... a flood is probably the handiest option. (Props to, I think it was the Aztecs, who came up with a different way the world was destroyed after every cycle.) > Graham seems to be the pioneer here. And the conservatism of modern scientific establishment, which descends from its scholastic roots that shaped in the shadow of Christianity that always prefers to explain history in a linear, developing fashion, shows itself again. Arrrgh. If you ever take a class in anthropology, one of the first things you will likely learn about is the unilinear evolution model of civilization... followed very swiftly by how utterly wrong and out-of-date it is. It's not what the scientists believe, not for at least 70 years at this point. It is what popular anthropology believes, though, and people like Hancock are partially to blame for that.

anon120522 4y ago
Disclaimer: I do not have a degree in History. History often follows a pattern of "thesis" -> "antithesis" -> "synthesis", where we tend to go from one extreme ("thesis") to another ("antithesis"), but then end up with a moderate "synthesis" that may be closer to the "antithesis", but incorporates elements from the "thesis". One example is that we used to see written accounts as "facts" (thesis). We then rejected that view (antithesis) because it was too influenced by whoever wrote it. Now we have a more balanced view (antithesis), where we interpret written accounts differently, often by focusing more on the cultural aspects and cross checking with other evidence. The reactions to Hancock indicates that we are in the antithesis state, as a natural reaction to the thesis (unilinear evolution). We may think we have reached the "synthesis" stage, but based on the reactions to Hancock I suspect we have not reached it yet. The classic "unilinear" thesis may be wrong, but we could find that there have been a wider connection than we currently believe.
unity1001 4y ago
> What is to say that the idea of knowledge being specifically given to them by a foreign culture wasn't a conscious attempt to justify their overlordship of the prior inhabitants of the land? As far as I know, the civilizing hero myth exists in other parts of the Americas. Even if it didn't, the the civilizing HERO - not heroeS - coming with BOAT, teaching agriculture, infrastructure and civilization is way too specific to be something like that - simply because we see other things being used than such stuff when an invading people need to justify their overlordship. They mostly invoke divine beings, heavens or other holy things - not a random singular person that did good deeds. Also, even if a singular person would be used, the tendency would be to make it into a god so that the overlordship could be justified that way. Not make it a regular person that came in quite humble circumstances, like in a boat from the sea. Moreover, the good deeds are way too specific and mundane - teaching agriculture, infrastructure and civilization. Not divine things that could make the locals say 'Ok, since obviously the heavens gave this right to these people and their ancestors descended from the heavens, they must be justified'. This is without the exact similarity of the myth in different regions - Osiris is another civilizing hero that came from the sea in Egypt. Apkallu also is. But most interestingly, Osiris leaves Egypt after teaching them agriculture and stuff and sails somewhere else, explicitly saying that he is going away to teach other people agriculture. > One of the problems with archaeoastronomy is that there are too many variables But time and dates are constant. And seen from the perspective of the architects of those monuments, you can easily see the logic that they had while building them: Since the locations of the stellar objects and their movements are invariable, there is no way anyone, anywhere, at any point in time, would not be able to know the dates which the monuments represented. Moreover, anyone would of course know or remember what major event that the monument referred to at that given point in time - like the floods during the younger dryas - because it affected everyone and it was a global event, so surely it would be remembered and transmitted from generation to generation through oral means or other traditions, right... So, with the cultural, actually civilizational paradigm that existed then, those monuments have inviolable logic. But of course, this also means that the info that we can reach through those monuments is limited - because we can definitely know the date of construction of those monuments, and we definitely can match those dates to a known major event like the younger dryas, and therefore concluded that these monuments across the globe referred to that event, but not much more than that. Because the rest of the information was supposed to be handed from generation to generation, wise men to wise men. We could only gleam bits of that information in the myths, legends and maybe in the local religions. > and besides, which features are you using to establish the alignment in the first place? If you study the matter, you will find that the placement of the features are unmistakable. Yes, there could have been a 100 years difference in estimating the exact time point. However, as far as we know, the younger dryas was a process, not a biblical cataclysm - it had a pre-cataclysm phase in which a lot of climate effects were observed, then it itself happened over a duration of time, and then it had an aftermath which took some time to settle. ~100 years would not make any difference - for the people of the time, that event would be one singular, long, ongoing catastrophe to which they would refer as 'the' catastrophe. > I've never been impressed with the thesis that "flood myths = some cultural echo of sea level rise." The thing is that floods are a pretty common thing in... just about every climate (even deserts, which can be prone to flash floods), Floods happen all the time everywhere. But they never happen at the same time, everywhere. For the people of the period, every known major culture, every known major population center getting destroyed by the sea would be an unparaleled thing. With no place to run to, nobody spared from the onslaught. It would be an unparaleled thing if it happened even today if you think about it. > Arrrgh. If you ever take a class in anthropology, one of the first things you will likely learn about is the unilinear evolution model of civilization... followed very swiftly by how utterly wrong and out-of-date it is. It's not what the scientists believe And yet, it is not what is being kept as the public paradigm. What we have is a linear progression of history modeled mainly from Christianity and its beliefs. Things happen in a linear fashion even if there were some mishaps on the way, and the civilization just progresses forward without losing everything at any point in time. There are catastrophes and setbacks, but there is no case of entire civilization going down the drain. The more advanced knowledge that is nascent in the teaching of the sciences does not seem to have propagated itself to how science is applied at the largest scale, less, how the science explains things to the public. As said, this is just scientific conservatism that exists due to the scholastic roots of modern scientific establishment.

anon120522 4y ago

Disclaimer: I do not have a degree in History. History often follows a pattern of "thesis" -> "antithesis" -> "synthesis", where we tend to go from one extreme ("thesis") to another ("antithesis"), but then end up with a moderate "synthesis" that may be closer to the "antithesis", but incorporates elements from the "thesis". One example is that we used to see written accounts as "facts" (thesis). We then rejected that view (antithesis) because it was too influenced by whoever wrote it. Now we have a more balanced view (antithesis), where we interpret written accounts differently, often by focusing more on the cultural aspects and cross checking with other evidence. The reactions to Hancock indicates that we are in the antithesis state, as a natural reaction to the thesis (unilinear evolution). We may think we have reached the "synthesis" stage, but based on the reactions to Hancock I suspect we have not reached it yet. The classic "unilinear" thesis may be wrong, but we could find that there have been a wider connection than we currently believe.

unity1001 4y ago

> What is to say that the idea of knowledge being specifically given to them by a foreign culture wasn't a conscious attempt to justify their overlordship of the prior inhabitants of the land? As far as I know, the civilizing hero myth exists in other parts of the Americas. Even if it didn't, the the civilizing HERO - not heroeS - coming with BOAT, teaching agriculture, infrastructure and civilization is way too specific to be something like that - simply because we see other things being used than such stuff when an invading people need to justify their overlordship. They mostly invoke divine beings, heavens or other holy things - not a random singular person that did good deeds. Also, even if a singular person would be used, the tendency would be to make it into a god so that the overlordship could be justified that way. Not make it a regular person that came in quite humble circumstances, like in a boat from the sea. Moreover, the good deeds are way too specific and mundane - teaching agriculture, infrastructure and civilization. Not divine things that could make the locals say 'Ok, since obviously the heavens gave this right to these people and their ancestors descended from the heavens, they must be justified'. This is without the exact similarity of the myth in different regions - Osiris is another civilizing hero that came from the sea in Egypt. Apkallu also is. But most interestingly, Osiris leaves Egypt after teaching them agriculture and stuff and sails somewhere else, explicitly saying that he is going away to teach other people agriculture. > One of the problems with archaeoastronomy is that there are too many variables But time and dates are constant. And seen from the perspective of the architects of those monuments, you can easily see the logic that they had while building them: Since the locations of the stellar objects and their movements are invariable, there is no way anyone, anywhere, at any point in time, would not be able to know the dates which the monuments represented. Moreover, anyone would of course know or remember what major event that the monument referred to at that given point in time - like the floods during the younger dryas - because it affected everyone and it was a global event, so surely it would be remembered and transmitted from generation to generation through oral means or other traditions, right... So, with the cultural, actually civilizational paradigm that existed then, those monuments have inviolable logic. But of course, this also means that the info that we can reach through those monuments is limited - because we can definitely know the date of construction of those monuments, and we definitely can match those dates to a known major event like the younger dryas, and therefore concluded that these monuments across the globe referred to that event, but not much more than that. Because the rest of the information was supposed to be handed from generation to generation, wise men to wise men. We could only gleam bits of that information in the myths, legends and maybe in the local religions. > and besides, which features are you using to establish the alignment in the first place? If you study the matter, you will find that the placement of the features are unmistakable. Yes, there could have been a 100 years difference in estimating the exact time point. However, as far as we know, the younger dryas was a process, not a biblical cataclysm - it had a pre-cataclysm phase in which a lot of climate effects were observed, then it itself happened over a duration of time, and then it had an aftermath which took some time to settle. ~100 years would not make any difference - for the people of the time, that event would be one singular, long, ongoing catastrophe to which they would refer as 'the' catastrophe. > I've never been impressed with the thesis that "flood myths = some cultural echo of sea level rise." The thing is that floods are a pretty common thing in... just about every climate (even deserts, which can be prone to flash floods), Floods happen all the time everywhere. But they never happen at the same time, everywhere. For the people of the period, every known major culture, every known major population center getting destroyed by the sea would be an unparaleled thing. With no place to run to, nobody spared from the onslaught. It would be an unparaleled thing if it happened even today if you think about it. > Arrrgh. If you ever take a class in anthropology, one of the first things you will likely learn about is the unilinear evolution model of civilization... followed very swiftly by how utterly wrong and out-of-date it is. It's not what the scientists believe And yet, it is not what is being kept as the public paradigm. What we have is a linear progression of history modeled mainly from Christianity and its beliefs. Things happen in a linear fashion even if there were some mishaps on the way, and the civilization just progresses forward without losing everything at any point in time. There are catastrophes and setbacks, but there is no case of entire civilization going down the drain. The more advanced knowledge that is nascent in the teaching of the sciences does not seem to have propagated itself to how science is applied at the largest scale, less, how the science explains things to the public. As said, this is just scientific conservatism that exists due to the scholastic roots of modern scientific establishment.