Ancient Technologies: Alien or Human?

JamesTB
This photo in particular stands out for me -

www.martingracephotography.com... -ancient-egyptians

What could have made those marks on the ground?

It's quite simple, really.

Those grooves are how they quarried granite - by bashing it out in the troughs you see - using diorote pounding balls, hundreds of which litter the entire quarry.

Hartet

reply to post by Harte


...the idea being investigated here is that tools could have existed that stopped working due to environmental change and then, became unrecognizable within a few generations.

Imagine an event or series of events that trigger back-to-back earthquakes, massive tsunamis, then a nuclear winter/ice age, and alter the atmosphere in such a way that common "tools" no longer work. Large populations and cities are decimated. Survivors are concerned with survival, not teaching their children about now-obsolete technology, except as tales for fireside chatter. One day, the great grandchildren pick up a laser-like tool once used for rock-cutting, say, "What a funny looking stick," play with it a while and discard it. Stories become legends then myths about "magic wands." The kids pick up an orb that one time worked to levitate workers on pallets up to their rock carving stations - they say, "What a funny looking rock!" throw it around for a while and forget about it. Stories become legends then myths about "magic carpets."

Imagine that a small group of knowledgeable, wealthy and powerful elite know what's coming and prepare so they can survive to run the world. A few people outside the 'enclave' figure things out and want to tell everyone. They are told ordinary people will just panic and are better off not knowing. "Besides, we don't really know exactly when or what will happen and nothing can be done anyway," they're told. Those who don't shut up are killed. When the "event" finally happens, ordinary people are not prepared in any way. Only the knowledgeable, wealthy and powerful elite, and their children and close minions know what really happened. They keep their knowledge to themselves and run the world, silently, from the shadows. Now, imagine that this has already happened. At least once.



RE: Supernovas and Gamma Ray Bursts

Every 50 years or so, a massive star in our galaxy blows itself apart in a supernova explosion. Supernovas are one of the most violent events in the universe, and the force of the explosion generates a blinding flash of radiation, as well as shock waves analogous to sonic booms.

Gamma rays, neutrinos and cosmic rays (particulate matter) travel at different speeds - the effects will vary in severity and in terms of what is affected, and when, depending on the size and distance from the Earth.

"Coronal mass ejections" from our Sun can cause geomagnetic storms on Earth. These storms effects are only now beginning to be recognized.

Intense Geomagnetic Storms and their possible effects on society:

Modern society is becoming ever increasingly dependent on space technology for daily routine functions, such as communication, navigation, data transmission, global surveillance of resource surveys, atmospheric weather, etc. Space weather can influence the performance and reliability of space-borne and ground based technological systems and can endanger human life and health. Intense and super intense geomagnetic storms create hostile space weather conditions that can generate many hazards to the spacecrafts as well as technological systems at ground. Geomagnetic storms can cause life-threatening power outages such as Hydro Quebec power failure during March 1989 magnetic storm. Strong geomagnetically induced currents (GICs) produced by short period variations in the geomagnetic field during intense magnetic storms can cause damage to power transmission lines and corrode long pipelines. Maitri station data clearly shows the correlation between the substorm activity and the southward component of the IMF. Adverse space weather conditions created by intense and super intense magnetic storms could affect communication, navigation and proper functioning as well as the life span of technological systems in space.

Also of interest:

Earth’s Global Electric Circuit – an integrated framework involving the lower atmosphere, the ionosphere and the magnetosphere:

The Earth’s electrical environment can be regarded as a single giant electrical circuit that connects currents and electric fields in the magnetosphere, ionosphere and the Earth’s lower atmosphere. The classical picture of the global electric circuit (GEC) presupposes that the thunderclouds are the only source and the fair-weather fields are set up by the upward flowing currents, from the thundercloud system, which charges the ionosphere to a few hundred kilovolts with respect to Earth. It is now recognized that there are at least two other important sources that contribute to the global fields. The solar wind/magnetosphere dynamo generates 30-150 kV potential drop across the northern and southern polar ionospheric caps which when mapped down to the surface can produce a ±20% changes in the air-Earth current and vertical electric field. A smaller contribution comes from the ionospheric dynamo originating in 100-150 km altitude range due to tidal forcing. Potential difference of 5-10kV are generated by this source in the ionosphere, and when mapped to the surface can produce perturbations typically few percent in the observed fields. The study of GEC provides a good framework for exploring the interconnections and coupling of various regions of the atmosphere. Long-term measurements of electrical parameters, namely, the atmospheric vertical electric field, conductivity and total current density, that are required to obtain an adequate description of the GEC, will be useful in such an integrated approach involving the various atmospheric regions.

[In case you missed it. ]

soficrow


...the idea being investigated here is that tools could have existed that stopped working due to environmental change and then, became unrecognizable within a few generations.

Maybe, but we have no examples of any, nor do we know what kind they would have, so I really do not know where to start with the speculations.

Harte

JamesTB
This photo in particular stands out for me -

www.martingracephotography.com... -ancient-egyptians

What could have made those marks on the ground?

It's quite simple, really.

Those grooves are how they quarried granite - by bashing it out in the troughs you see - using diorote pounding balls, hundreds of which litter the entire quarry.

Hartet

I disagree.

I don't see anything simple here at all. The diorite balls were not responsible for the markings we see on the ground in the photo they were probably left there way after the markings were made. This is a totally different technology to stone pounding balls.

Could you point out an area in the photo where you think a stone has been removed from the bed rock and also explain how it was done?

Xtrozero

soficrow


...the idea being investigated here is that tools could have existed that stopped working due to environmental change and then, became unrecognizable within a few generations.

Maybe, but ...I really do not know where to start with the speculations.

Start with analysis. First, consider a number of relatively common predictable events - maybe a supernova with the attendant bombardment of gamma and cosmic rays and neutrinos (but not at ELE level), a CME or two and a few geomagnetic storms, throw in a geomagnetic excursion and major disruption of the Global Electric Circuit - and consider what might happen if the effects of these events converge to impact our Earth at the same time. This is not speculative - mainly an if-then analysis - the research and evidence exist to measure and extrapolate effects for each event. Most likely, if these events converge we're looking at back-to-back earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, massive tsunamis, a disruption of our Earth's Global Power Grid that would render our technology unusable and then, a nuclear winter/ice age. Whatever the probability, such a convergence is not inconceivable.

The next step, again almost purely analytic, is to consider the potential impact on our current civilization. You might start with the effects on our communications technology and power grids, then go from there. Most major centers will be destroyed by earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis and the world's population will be decimated from the get-go. Don't forget the biological impacts of radiation exposure - the epigenetic and genetic impacts relative to dose-response impacts are also fairly well documented.

Considering what might follow is where it gets more speculative - and interesting. Note that tsunamis, earthquakes and glaciers have a rather incredible capacity to destroy "evidence."

More to the point of this thread is the fact that if it could happen, it might have happened already - given our planet's instability and our inconstant cosmic environment, such speculation is not inconceivable. Here's where your imagination comes into play.

soficrow


Start with analysis. First, consider a number of relatively common predictable events - maybe a supernova with the attendant bombardment of gamma and cosmic rays and neutrinos (but not at ELE level), a CME or two and a few geomagnetic storms, throw in a geomagnetic excursion and major disruption of the Global Electric Circuit - and consider what might happen if the effects of these events converge to impact our Earth at the same time. This is not speculative - mainly an if-then analysis - the research and evidence exist to measure and extrapolate effects for each event. Most likely, if these events converge we're looking at back-to-back earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, massive tsunamis, a disruption of our Earth's Global Power Grid that would render our technology unusable and then, a nuclear winter/ice age. Whatever the probability, such a convergence is not inconceivable.

This above sounds very Sitchin-ness but once again what technologies? Are we talking magic like proprieties that stopped working due to catastrophic events?

I agree lost technology would be conceivable, but we see nothing of its likes in the last 6000 years. Now if you are talking 200,000 years ago or longer then that would present maybe a chance with any evidence of lost tech also disappearing into decay. As we push farther into our past we would not be talking about humans at all, but some other humanoid like species.

The next step, again almost purely analytic, is to consider the potential impact on our current civilization. You might start with the effects on our communications technology and power grids, then go from there. Most major centers will be destroyed by earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis and the world's population will be decimated from the get-go. Don't forget the biological impacts of radiation exposure - the epigenetic and genetic impacts relative to dose-response impacts are also fairly well documented.

One would first think about what could last an extremely long time. Many advance metals will last a very long time, stainless steel, Titanium, gold, platinum etc. Depleted uranium used in nuclear fuel would last a very long time as a signature of an advance society. Anything on the moon would last for 100s of millions of years, so I would say we are the first of this planet to get to the moon. We also would have shadows in rock of things that may have oxidized too.

Thinking about it, life as we see today basically started 400 million years ago after snow ball earth. All life was wiped-out except for very simple life forms in that environment. After that we went from simple life forms to dinos in just 150 million years and then on to mammals to rule the planet in the last 75 million years or so with us coming along the in the last 2 million years to what we would refer to as modern man in the last 200,000 years.

I really don't think that we been around long enough to already have had an advance civilization that came and went with all evidence disappearing into the ages, and as I said before, if we go back much farther we are not even talking humans anymore, but some other species.

JamesTB

I disagree.

I don't see anything simple here at all. The diorite balls were not responsible for the markings we see on the ground in the photo they were probably left there way after the markings were made. This is a totally different technology to stone pounding balls.

Could you point out an area in the photo where you think a stone has been removed from the bed rock and also explain how it was done?

What do you disagree with? Do you disagree that if you take a harder stone and hammer/scrap it on a softer stone the softer stone would not break/crumple/scratch/wear at all?

reply to post by Xtrozero

I agree lost technology would be conceivable, but we see nothing of its likes in the last 6000 years. Now if you are talking 200,000 years ago or longer then that would present maybe a chance with any evidence of lost tech also disappearing into decay. As we push farther into our past we would not be talking about humans at all, but some other humanoid like species.

It's arguable whether or not we see "nothing of its like" in the past 6000 years. But who's to say early humanoids were not advanced - and a triggering event involving radiation exposure could help explain documented genetic deviations and divergences.

soficrow - The next step, again almost purely analytic, is to consider the potential impact on our current civilization. You might start with the effects on our communications technology and power grids, then go from there. Most major centers will be destroyed by earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis and the world's population will be decimated from the get-go. Don't forget the biological impacts of radiation exposure - the epigenetic and genetic impacts relative to dose-response impacts are also fairly well documented.

xtrozero - One would first think about what could last an extremely long time. Many advance metals will last a very long time, stainless steel, Titanium, gold, platinum etc. Depleted uranium used in nuclear fuel would last a very long time as a signature of an advance society. Anything on the moon would last for 100s of millions of years, so I would say we are the first of this planet to get to the moon. We also would have shadows in rock of things that may have oxidized too.

You avoided dealing with the step asking you to consider the potential impact on our current civilization. Big oversight that. But as far as the lack of "evidence" - what if the kind of advancement did not involve the kind of evidence we might recognize? And even if it did, two words: re-use and re-purpose. SLAYER69 said it best: "Does anybody reading this think a Spanish Conquistador plundering the New world would have known the difference or even cared before tossing these into a pile for shipping then later in Spain melting them down?"

I really don't think that we been around long enough to already have had an advance civilization that came and went with all evidence disappearing into the ages,

Thing is, you don't know. Nobody does. I think this is an important "thought experiment" for several reasons, not least because the tendency to keep ordinary people ignorant and powerless is a long-established strategy that is detrimental to the conscious evolution, development and survival of our species and planet.

reply to post by Xtrozero

soficrow - Start with analysis. First, consider a number of relatively common predictable events - maybe a supernova with the attendant bombardment of gamma and cosmic rays and neutrinos (but not at ELE level), a CME or two and a few geomagnetic storms, throw in a geomagnetic excursion and major disruption of the Global Electric Circuit - and consider what might happen if the effects of these events converge to impact our Earth at the same time. This is not speculative - mainly an if-then analysis - the research and evidence exist to measure and extrapolate effects for each event. Most likely, if these events converge we're looking at back-to-back earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, massive tsunamis, a disruption of our Earth's Global Power Grid that would render our technology unusable and then, a nuclear winter/ice age. Whatever the probability, such a convergence is not inconceivable.

Xtrozero - This above sounds very Sitchin-ness but once again what technologies? Are we talking magic like proprieties that stopped working due to catastrophic events?

You mean Sitchinesque? In any event, had to look that up, learned he is totally into an "alien hypothesis," speculation about catastrophic events within our solar system. My "thought experiment" here has nothing to do with aliens or hypothetical planetary collisions; it is focused on known cosmic, solar and magnetosphere events and properties, with at least partially known and measurable effects. Not "Sitchinesque" at all. Pretty desperate move to try and blow off my ideas with such an inappropriate reference.

btw - What the heck do you mean by "magic"? You mean like pictures that travel through the air? Sound originating on one side of the world that's heard almost simultaneously on the other? Some kind of light that cuts rock? Pretty vague word that, "magic." Could you clarify please?

JamesTB

Harte
Those grooves are how they quarried granite - by bashing it out in the troughs you see - using diorote pounding balls, hundreds of which litter the entire quarry.

Hartet

I disagree.

I don't see anything simple here at all. The diorite balls were not responsible for the markings we see on the ground in the photo they were probably left there way after the markings were made.

Yes.

Also, these are not the droids you're looking for.

Harte

soficrow
Not "Sitchinesque" at all. Pretty desperate move to try and blow off my ideas with such an inappropriate reference.

Have you read his works? I don't think it is inappropriate at all since his theory was that past advance civilizations were wiped out by a world cataclysm.

btw - What the heck do you mean by "magic"?

I'm trying to get an idea for what you mean by advance technology, and it seems it is a form that we can no longer accomplish, can not comprehend, does work anymore, or takes little material to use....

Mental powers maybe mixed with advance concepts beyond our abilities even today to grasp? I'm not trying to patronize you in the least... I just trying to understand what would be this technology that would be so different than what we have today when compared.

Xtrozero
I'm trying to get an idea for what you mean by advance technology, and it seems it is a form that we can no longer accomplish, can not comprehend, does work anymore....

A series of CME's or a pole reversal could destroy our current technology - and it's environmental basis. Future generations would express disbelief and say, "You're kidding! Pictures that travel through the air? The sound of a voice travelling a 3-day ride in just seconds? Light that cuts rock?" ...How would you explain these technologies and products 1000 years down the road? To people with NO experience or exposure whatsoever? If YOU had no exposure to our technology and environment, what would YOU imagine them to be? How would YOU imagine them to work?

...It's one thing to claim you don't 'get' the idea or accept it, quite another to fish for useable concepts that can be appropriated and repackaged. Frankly such adversarial phishing generally gets me right PO'd. More to the point, adversarial crowdsourcing might work with ambitious cutthroat barracudas who trash little old ladies' computers and slaughter all the golden geese to steal the golden eggs (and incidentally end up with nothing in the end except a lot of dead geese and butt-stupid empty "commentary" to work with), but just so you know, the real goldmines on ATS are older people with the time and inclination to think. We do not take disrespectful exploitation lightly.

Whatever. I find I am motivated to seek and learn after spending a bit of time on ATS. For example, I just learned that some of the ideas I put forth here have been investigated much more thoroughly by Andrew Collins. Also this afternoon, I learned about the vast array of underground cities and networks in the world - which dovetails rather neatly with the notion that Earth's people have been bombarded with cosmic radiation in the past, and suggests people knew enough to seek shelter from the radiation.

Underground cities and networks around the World – Myths and Reality (Part 1)

Underground cities and networks around the World – Discoveries (Part 2)

Extensive Ancient Underground Network Discovered From Scotland to Turkey

yorkshirelad
Why do we have to resort to Aliens every time some ancient technology cannot be explained. There are many many tools nothing more than 150 years old that cannot be explained for the simple fact that all users are dead and the tool use was never documented. WE do not resort to aliens to explain victorian technology !!!

The idea "aliens" is soaked in meaning for too many people. If there is technology to travel around the universe that we have invented yet, and others have and different civilzations from different planets have met each other, gotten used to it, etc., then it's not really "alien" for them is it? Why shouldn't life off this planet be a concrete possibility to consider? To not do so would be like trying to figure out the history of a country without ever imagining the possibility that the inhabitants could have: left that country, been visited by others from other countries.

reply to post by thebtheb

The idea "aliens" is soaked in meaning for too many people. If there is technology to travel around the universe that we have invented yet, and others have and different civilzations from different planets have met each other, gotten used to it, etc., then it's not really "alien" for them is it? Why shouldn't life off this planet be a concrete possibility to consider? To not do so would be like trying to figure out the history of a country without ever imagining the possibility that the inhabitants could have: left that country, been visited by others from other countries.

I agree with yorkshirelad that we do NOT need aliens to think for us - I also agree with you that there IS life elsewhere and it only makes sense we've had contact. Maybe even trade. I just don't want them to get all the credit for all our own hard work.

soficrow
"Does anybody reading this think a Spanish Conquistador plundering the New world would have known the difference or even cared before tossing these into a pile for shipping then later in Spain melting them down?"

Probably not. But I've got to ask: so what?

There is absolutely no reason in the world to think that the Conquistadors came across printed circuit boards.

Can I also ask, what is your definition of "advanced technology"? Gunpowder would be highly advanced to iron age people, just as iron weapons would be advanced to bronze age people just as farming would be advanced technology to hunter gatherers. It's all relative.

FatherLukeDuke

soficrow
"Does anybody reading this think a Spanish Conquistador plundering the New world would have known the difference or even cared before tossing these into a pile for shipping then later in Spain melting them down?"

I've got to ask: so what?

I agree with Slayer69's point - people tend to destroy things they do not understand, NOT preserve them for 'posterity,' so we don't really know what might have been left behind. That said, the OP listed a series of questions I consider pertinent:

Is it true that those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it?

…Are we overly reliant on our technologies to sustain our civilization? Do human societies really depend on an elite knowledge class? What body of knowledge is most important? What is progress, if critical environmental conditions and material developments are transient?

…We know our planet is unstable in a variety of ways, but seem unwilling to work together to protect ourselves and each other. As a consequence, the predatorial uber-wealthy prevail above the mass of humanity, and are best positioned to survive catastrophe. Is this our real priority? Do we really want the most greedy to perpetuate our species?

…Did we have relationships with aliens in the ancient past? Did they abandon us because our planet is unstable? Or because we don't have our moral-ethical poop together?

Can I also ask, what is your definition of "advanced technology"?

I used the term sophisticated technologies, other members referred to "advanced technologies." Ask them what they mean.


Ed. to add: I totally forgot about cracked.com - tripped over it this am, remembered they have the fun and discovery I look for but am not allowed here. Here's a piece that uses terminology you might respect.

5 Shockingly Advanced Ancient Buildings That Shouldn't Exist

The achievements of ancient cultures tend to be woefully unappreciated -- we think of the people as loincloth-wearing savages, and when we're proven wrong by some impressive feat of engineering, we just make a bunch of documentaries about aliens. But the engineers of times past were nothing to sneer at, and some of their accomplishments make ours seem slightly embarrassing.

Consider the decline of the ability to accomplish these tasks from a different direction. As the population gets larger the possibilities of a virulent disease increases. If they concentrated on the physical movement of rock perhaps they had no knowledge about microbes and the ability to fight disease. If at the top of their game it hit perhaps only a few dazzled survivors made it out. They couldn't carry all of the expertise forward, some got lost. That would explain the rise and fall of the early empires. It would also explain why some civilizations started from a small population with a larger knowledge than expected.
No need for an alien or a Nova. Just evolution or nature doing her worst.

Sounds like you've been watching ancient aliens... Giorgio A. Tsoukalos's Afro distracts me, reminds me of my duck, Einstein, he's a white crested duck. Crested ducks have a piece of scull missing causing an 'Afro' to form. Because of that, their brain is smaller than most ducts so they're quite... dumb, stupid, discombobulate. I suspect the same thing is true about Giorgio A. Tsoukalos.