This was posted on one of the videos on the channel of archaeologist Flint Dibble (yes that is his real name, his dad is also an archaeologist and his brother’s name is Chip).

As it said, he debated Graham Hancock on Rogan because he felt Rogan’s audience needed to hear from an actual archaeologist about the nonsense Graham Hancock was pushing and hopefully get them interested in real archaeology, which I feel is a solid reason for going on Rogan and doing what he did. Too bad more actual experts aren’t asked to go on Rogan.

  • Optional@lemmy.world
    317·
    4 months ago

    I like Graham Hancock. He’s got some neat theories. Are they truth? Dunno. Am I gonna hassle some academic and be a dick about something because of them? No.

    Remember back before someone put together the orientation of the Pyramids at Giza and Orion’s Belt? It was pretty astonishing if one had lived with the Pyramids for a long time and saw them as just sort of misaligned for ? reasons. Some guy had to get razzed for twenty years to get that out there before the interwebs.

    We’ve over-compensated a bit, yeah.

    • TheFriar@lemm.ee
      6·
      4 months ago

      I’ve literally never heard he name. Want to hit me with some of his most interesting theories?

      • Optional@lemmy.world
        38·
        4 months ago

        Well the main one is that he posits there was a broad-reaching civilization on Earth that was effectively wiped out at the start of the last ice age, about 12,000 years ago.

        Typically the Mesopotamians, around 6,000 years ago are considered the first civilization. So it’s not likely to get any support for the idea of “civilization” before that. Most of what a civilization had is usually wiped out after a millennia or three. (Or deliberately destroyed, thanks The Pope.) Connecting them is difficult, but he finds interesting parallels, examples, possible ways it could have happened, etc.

        One of those ways is through paleoastronomy, which upsets basically everyone and their dog, but it says essentially earthworks created to point to or mirror astronomical features can tell us things like when they were built. Or, with enough like-examples suggest a common theme or purpose.

        He’s engaging and intelligent, and pretty laid back about the wild theories which makes some people really dislike him. Here’s a set of specials he did in the 90’s? I think? Which are pretty thought provoking if you’re into that kind of thing.

        What I don’t buy is that all of history has been discovered, correctly interpreted, and sewn up with a bow on top. But I understand he’s particularly annoying to academics because he wants to be an explorer, an educator, a theorist, an archaeologist, an anthropologist, an astronomer; and yet he hasn’t completed coursework or any other feats of strength to prove he knows anything about those things. Skeptics just hate him immediately on the face of everything. Which, yeah. That also makes sense.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
          31·
          4 months ago

          First of all, Graham Hancock is a racist.

          In a May 2000 essay published on his website, Hancock writes: “I have consistently argued that the Americas were inhabited in prehistoric times by a variety of ethnic groups – Negroid, Caucasoid and Mongoloid … Such ideas have caused deep offense to some American Indians, who have long claimed to be the only ‘native’ Americans.”

          He goes on to describe various prehistoric artifacts that he says prove the presence of Caucasians and Africans before Columbus landed on the continent in 1492. This includes his research into the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl, who he says was described by the Aztecs as “tall, white-skinned and red bearded – sometimes blue eyed as well”.

          https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/01/netflix-ancient-apocalypse-canceled

          Secondly, here’s why he’s just wrong. I wrote this in another thread:

          There is a very simple reason that we can say with relative confidence that there were no earlier civilizations that vanished and that reason is domestication.

          There is just no evidence of plant or animal domestication before a certain date range and, while that date range does keep getting pushed back, it doesn’t get pushed back in a way that suggests any sort of civilization even as advanced as Sumer existed before Sumer. It gets pushed back in the “they were planting and harvesting this crop but didn’t know how to make it very nutritious yet” sense.

          We can see based both on morphology and genetics that there’s no sign of any sort of civilization that domesticated plants and animals which then went feral after the civilization collapsed and, even with massive sea level rise, there should be some evidence. Sea levels didn’t rise all of the sudden. There would have been people who had time to escape with their animals and seeds. Also, plants just have a habit of escaping on their own.

          You need farming in order for a civilization to advance. You can’t feed a large population via hunting and gathering.

          https://lemmy.world/comment/11529789

          • Optional@lemmy.world
            23·
            4 months ago

            First of all, Graham Hancock is a racist.

            I don’t see that - in the first example he’s saying different races existed in prehistory on the American continent. (Well “prehistoric” and “before Columbus” which seem pretty far apart. But regardless) I’m not seeing what the racism is there -? I could just be stupid, but it doesn’t seem to be proclaiming the superiority of one race over another?

            In the second example, he’s talking about Quetzalcoatl which has several interpretations as being a white man - whether that was the Spanish creating a myth or not, it’s been a common one. And, again, it’s not one he made up so not sure how that makes him racist.

            Here’s the titles of his first seven books:

            Non-Fiction Books In Publication Order

            1. Africa Guide 1980 (1979)
            2. Gulf Guide and Diary 1981 (1980)
            3. Journey Through Pakistan (With: Mohamed Amin) (1982)
            4. Ethiopia (1985)
            5. AIDS (1986)
            6. Lords of Poverty (1989)
            7. African Ark (With: Carol Beckwith) (1990)

            I just don’t buy that he’s racist, but open to new info.

            As for the “there’s no evidence of agriculture” I’d guess that he’d say the many cataclysmic changes coincident with the last ice age may have wiped them out. (That’s a guess, I don’t know what he’d actually say.). The discovery of Gobekli Tepe does put a pretty robust culture in that time frame, in the are of modern Turkiye but that’s a very recent discovery.

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
              22·
              4 months ago

              First of all, read the whole article. That is the tip of the iceberg with his racism against Native Americans. Secondly, you had absolutely nothing to say about my domestication comment and I think that’s very telling.

              • Optional@lemmy.world
                31·
                4 months ago

                Sorry the first part took awhile and I thought to do a second on the ‘domestication’ but ultimately added it as an edit. Will go check out the article.

                • Optional@lemmy.world
                  21·
                  4 months ago

                  Okay, I read the article. I think it’s bullshit. Case in point:

                  In addition to defying Indigenous histories and more than a century of established archaeological research in North America, Hancock’s theories are especially damaging because they fuel long-held racist beliefs that seek to erase the violence of colonization and slavery upon which the United States was founded, say Hancock’s detractors.

                  Now this is editorial, okay? It’s not referencing any particular thing - just the entirety of his “pre-civilization” theory, in addition to any theory which does not hold to “established archaeological research” AND native American traditions. Tellingly as you say, the intrepid reporter here does not discuss any other “established archaeological research” which conflicts with the native American origin histories, of which there are many.

                  “Hancock’s theories are especially damaging” because they “. . . seek to erase the violence of colonization and slavery upon which the United States was founded”. Which - NO THEY DON’T, and what the fuck. Oh, here we go: “. . . say Hancock’s detractors.” Well that’s a pretty sleazy sleight-of-hand there, Grauniad. But okay - let’s pretend you wanted readers to hear all that hyperbolic invective as coming from Hancock’s detractors and not from the authoritative voice of the source (the Grauniad). Sure. Let’s pretend that. So - who are “Hancock’s detractors”?

                  ——— hang on, need to save the comment, go back to the article to copy/paste ——-

                  Edit:

                  “[Hancock] presents his theories as being superior to what the first inhabitants of the area say about their own history,” said Stewart Koyiyumptewa, tribal historic preservation officer for the Hopi Nation.

                  The Hopi people have lived in or near the Grand Canyon for at least 2,000 years and claim a sacred site inside the canyon as their place of emergence. They also have strong ties to Chaco Canyon.

                  Well, so the article author is lying. It should be Hancock’s detractor, singular, Stewart Koyiyumptewa, who says the 2,000+ year history of the Hopi people has been, apparently, made inferior by an alternate unproven theory of 12,000 years which does not appear in Hopi history.

                  Well, yeah. If Mr. Koyiyumptewa wants to take offense to the idea that an alternative theory is being proposed which was not known to have existed in his history or anyone else’s before - okay. But there’s no reason to. That’s pretty much how science works. Before the idea of Pangea was accepted, it infuriated all established archaeological researchers. And geologists. No need to declare it racist.

                  And tagging it to “long-held racist beliefs that seek to erase the violence of colonization and slavery upon which the United States was founded” is just fucking outrageous. Come the fuck on, even Mr. Koyiyumptewa didn’t say that. And neither did Graham Hancock.

                  The article stinks.

                  Did you even watch the series? It was interesting. And not racist. They were barred - in the first series, now, not the one this article is talking about - they were barred from filming in Ohio. Why? Because racism, right? Well, no. Because allowing someone to film while discussing a theory not established is wrong. Somehow.

                  And NO he wasn’t saying white men built it for fuck’s sake: “Hancock believes Serpent Mound is much, much older, and its current incarnation may not be the original. Instead, built millenniums ago, around 10,000 BC, by Native Americans.” So what’s not-established since that’s what “established archaeology” also believes? The timeframe. It couldn’t be then because we haven’t found pottery shards from then. (You know what I mean.)

                  So your Mr. Koyiyumptewa is all onboard with demanding no one be allowed to posit any other history besides the established one. Which, to be clear, is:

                  The Hopi origin story has it that Hopis used to live beneath the earth. When it came time to emerge into the world, that Hopi met Maasaw, Caretaker and Creator of the Earth, and promised him they would help take care of the world as a trade-off for staying. The sacred story of Hopi origins includes a covenant that Hopi peoples will be stewards of the earth. After making this promise, Pueblo Indians began a sacred quest, under Maasaw’s order, to find “center spaces” and settle, and populations marked their settlements with spiral insignia as they found them.

                  That’s what your Mr. Koyiyumptewa is objecting to - someone discussing a theory that does not comport with his established history.

                  Here’s Graham Hancock and his wife, fwiw.

                  If you want to triple-down that he’s a racist, then go for it. But I’m telling you these type of “outcrys” are not about racism, though they may say exactly that. What they’re actually about is someone threatening established knowledge. That’s it.

                  Maybe he’s just crazy, maybe he made it all up, maybe established history is complete and accurate. But I don’t think so. I hope that doesn’t make me racist.