How NOT to Do Astronomical Dating: Tiwanaku | Myths Highlights

In this selection from "The Age of Tiwanaku," Dr. M discusses how archaeoastronomy can be misused to date an ancient site.
Want to know how old Tiwanaku really is? Watch the full video here: • The Age of Tiwanaku: W...
►LEAVE A COMMENT
Be respectful and courteous to other commenters.
If your comment does not appear, try again with different words. KZbin sometimes glitches and comments don't go through. Or they might flag your comment as potentially inappropriate.
►DOWNLOAD Professor Miano's free e-booklet: "Why Ancient History Matters":
mailchi.mp/a402112ea4db/why-a...
►SUBSCRIBE to the World of Antiquity KZbin Channel for regular ancient history content.
► SUPPORT THIS CHANNEL
Supporters get access to behind-the-scenes videos, early-release videos, course discounts and more! / worldofantiquity
FTC Disclaimer Notice: Some of the links here may be affiliate links, meaning that if you click on them and purchase something on another website, I get a small commission. It doesn't cost you any extra, but I thought you should know! It does help support the channel.
Professor Miano's handy guide for learning, "How to Know Stuff," is available here:
www.amazon.com/How-Know-Stuff...
Follow Professor Miano on social media:
►FACEBOOK: / drdavidmiano
►TWITTER: / drdavidmiano
►INSTAGRAM: / drmiano

[@ZendelWashington]

the chances of me dating are indeed astronomical

[@aleksandergierach]

Hahahah !

[@helenamcginty4920]

😂😂😂 ditto.

[@John-qo9hw]

Wow what a Chad.

[@brandenmanuel2037]

Lol!

[@psychette8846]

The answer to your problem is ALIENS!!!!!!!!! It worked for the history Channel guy.

[@lucasmatiasdelaguilamacdon7798]

Hi! Historian from Peru here. Something so many people tend to forget about Tiawanaku is how it is essentially, at least at this point, modern in many, MANY, places. And I don’t mean as in couple centuries, but like literally the 1950’s. A HUGE lot of the construction was rebuilt, almost remodelled, during the course of the past Century, mostly for the purpose of Nationalistic propaganda and tourism. A lot of the construction has been replaced over the years by modern bricks and concrete. And another weird thing is how there are photos and even postcards of tbe 1920’s and 1930’s showing completely different views of the site, almost entirely in ruins. A lot of the stones were used over the centuries for construction even after the Conquista. Some stones have even been found in Catholic churches and parishes. A lot of those stones, sometimes important for the entire structure, had to be replaced, and those replacements were modern stones, concrete, and even drywall.

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Interesting! Thank you for sharing.

[@etevenatkowicz9745]

Even recently (circa 2009) Tiwanaku almost lost UNESCO heritage status because they were building entirely new stuff on the site and not really differentiating it.

[@MrGksarathy]

Oh wow, that's... certainly something.

[@lucasmatiasdelaguilamacdon7798]

@@etevenatkowicz9745 Yes, it also seems they have been refilling a lot of cracks and trying to “restore” carvings using plaster. I wonder how much harder that makes to actually date the site or be able to locate the origin of the stones.

[@sheldonwheaton881]

I was actually angry when I found that out. The pictures of the room full of the "facial blocks". Very disappointed. Posnansky was dedicated fellow! Gotta respect that at least.

[@aliciaflood2908]

I build a house with a room with windows to face south and get some sunlight. I am the teeniest degree off pointing ever so slightly southwest, despite the windows doing exactly what I built them to do in relation to the sun. Suddenly my house is hundreds of years older than when I built it.

[@sarahrosen4985]

Now they are going to back charge you property tax. 😅

[@TankUni]

Obligatory 'they couldn't do that with modern technology' comment.

[@UnintentionalSubmarine]

Nonono, obviously you are a time traveler and have built your house to align with the sun in 2780.

[@sociallyferal4237]

@@sarahrosen4985 And they'll never be able to change it again as it is now a 'heritage site'. . . 🤣

[@SuperUAP]

I hear If you cut a house in half and count the rings that each layer of paint is 100 years 😂

[@charleshartley9597]

As a former land surveyor, those differences of angle, minutes and seconds are so small to think they were built with such precision as the assumption suggests is mind boggling. Its hard to find those differences with a theodolite, much less "by eye" as we would imagine for the site. But that just provides "evidence" that a lost advanced civilization or ancient aliens were involved, right?? Except, of course, it doesn't because such claims rely on the veracity of the original claim that the alignment is perfect. How about we just marvel at the precision they *did* achieve and the fact such a structure was built -by humans- in the first place.

[@davidtydeman1434]

UnchartedX had a distinguished career in the IT industry and did important work with computer networking at Cisco. None of his background gives any indication he knows anything about archeology or history and his videos prove that despite excellent production quality and an authoritative speaking voice he is utterly clueless about ancient history and architecture- keep up the good work debunking his drivel 👏👏👏

[@raina4732]

I really respect the passion he puts into his videos, but it’s shocking he hasn’t read the (up to date) literature about the sites, especially since he is making money giving tours! He tries to debunk the mainstream narrative to invoke Atlantis without knowing what the “mainstream” evidence even is. Either he doesn’t know or he does know and wants to keep his audience in the dark about it. He keeps talking about the 80s (1980s and 1880s LOL) as if nothing ever happened after Sir Flinders Petrie.

[@wolfmauler]

"If this megalith doesn't line up with sunrise on the Autumn Equinox then... 🤔 It must've been errected when it DID align!!" 🧐🥇

[@WorldofAntiquity]

And yet it DOES line up. Even today.

[@michaelpettersson4919]

Even if that actually was its purpose huge rocks are heavy. Maybe they couldn't be bothered to do anything about it.

[@TankUni]

Have you heard of a little thing in Egypt called 'the Sphinx'?

[@adamseward4713]

Roight

[@frankvandorp9732]

It's how I know my apartment is millions of years old. I have windows on the north and on the south, but because it obviously was built to align with the sun in an east-west direction, it must have been built before continental drift rotated the continent 90 degrees, and my apartment with it.

[@larrywest42]

2:00 it's also common for buildings to shift, due to construction material, or soil/water table movement, or earthquakes, or continental drift. They're all slow, but they add up over hundreds or thousands of years. Continental drift, for example, at 1-2cm per year, would be ~15 meters over 1,000 years. That could easily affect the angle to the sunrise at the summer solstice.

[@keith6706]

South America is moving westward at about 3 cm per year. Assuming the consensus dating of about 110 CE is accurate, over the past 1900 years it would have moved 57 meters. Combine that with the continuing orogeny of the Andes and the location on the Altiplano, it's easy to imagine a slight "twisting" in addition to the overall plate movement. That aside, the angles mentioned at one point (23 deg 27' as opposed to the measured 23 deg 8'48") are only 0.3 degrees different. I mean, seriously, in a modern home having the walls being 0.3 degrees off so the corner angles aren't exactly 90.0 degrees to each other wouldn't even be noticed.

[@Demane69]

If the Gregorian calendar is ever to be replaced by a better one, the only option is clearly Tolkien's Hobbit Shire calendar.

[@johnbigboote8900]

Could not agree more. In fact I'm thinking of just adopting it unilaterally for myself, and to heck with the consequences. It will be the Esperanto of Dayplanning.

[@pandakicker1]

No, thank you. ^_^

[@holdingpattern245]

I don't get why a calendar can't be just day numbers, like instead of March 5th why can't it be day 64?

[@helenamcginty4920]

My calendar when I worked as a hospital nurse varied each 7 days. Eg ELEL half off off LE off off L E half. Etc. We worked earlys and lates on a 40 hour time off duty rota but as the hours had been reduced to 37.5 over the week we had 'half' days. The name of the day was immaterial. Now, retired, I have reverted to today, yesterday and tomorrow. I only need to check its not weekend when catching the bus to the shops.

[@ihatespam2]

@@holdingpattern245is this a joke? You want to say, today is 321? Let’s get rid of zeros while we are at it, just give every number a new symbol.

[@lostpony4885]

Theres a big impulse these days to math things and normalize junk into conclusions but when it comes to numbers, garbage in = garbage out

[@Blowfeld20k]

You just need a 'Bug atee' m8 !!!!!!!

[@russellmillar7132]

Good job. I watched and commented on your previous, full-length video on the same site. If Ben had been making his videos in the early 1900s, his reporting would have been cutting-edge, based on the best methods available at the time. As it is he has to ignore or dismiss findings based on modern methodology and claim that the archaeologists and other researchers reporting on this site were either morons, or so heavily indoctrinated by mainstream academia that they can't see the reality that he and Posnansky do/did. I'm really glad that I found your channel back in the days when you had around 150 subs. It's gratifying to see you thrive and continue to call out guys like UnsupportedX and his ilk. It's a worthy endeavor!

[@Deipnosophist_the_Gastronomer]

Flinders Petrie is the only archaeologist you can trust. 😁

[@J_Z913]

A clip from my favorite myths video! Thanks Dr. Miano.

[@GizzyDillespee]

The Puma Punku looks like either there was a massive earthquake, or something catastrophic. I wouldn't trust any alignments to be too precise anymore. The further back you date it, the more likely it is to have been shifted in the meantime. Actually, to me, puma punku looks like somebody dynamited some of it, unless the rocks were stoopid brittle. From what I saw of Tiwanaku, it looked like it wasn't built all in one go... but the very ancient suggestion is sooo much older, that you'd hope to find coroborating evidence somewhere in the area, instead of assuming the measured alignments were meant to be that precise, and had stayed stable for all that time. I'd have loved to see that site in its prime, decked out for a festival.

[@jackboomslang5646]

The site has been reconstructed in modern times..

[@wolfmauler]

Puma Punku has been dismantled and used as a stone quarry by the locals for centuries, stones for churches, foundations, bridges and the like.

[@CB-vt3mx]

to say nothing of geologic changes that may have occurred--land deformation, water run off, earthquakes, tectonic shaping....the number of things that have happened since just 1800 are impressive. One cannot assume that ANY point on the land is where it was just 500 years ago, let alone millenia. For example, the North American plate has continued to move northwestward since the break away from pangea...

[@lostpony4885]

How do you even measure precision of fat stone features and teensy little stars anyway. Its like judging the 2x4s locations in my house compared to the stars.

[@hedgehog3180]

This is why observatories are so expensive to build.

[@Itsjustme-Justme]

When you simply look at the stage of decay/erosion of different ancient sites to roughly(!) estimate(!) their relative(!) age, it seems highly unlikely that Tiwanaku is older than the Egyptian pyramids. It's quite well preserved, the stones still have beautifully worked surfaces and sharp edges. Especially when you take into account that the casing stones on the Giza pyramids are 100% proven to have been missing for less than 1000 years and the exposed core masonry already is in a rather sad state. You can add more decay/erosion "data" from other sites in an attempt to check the estimate. Medieval cathedrals, of which we usually know the exact age, need constant maintenance because the stone erodes so horribly. Weather exposed stones in cathedrals need to be replaced every couple hundred years to keep the cathedral structurely intact. More "data" wanted? Look at the roughly 10000 year old structures of Göbekli Tepe. Even though they have been protected by sediments for something like 80% of the time, they show stronger signs of erosion than Tiwanaku. That VERY basic estimate of relative age is enough to totally rule out claims of Tiwanaku being 15000 years old. You don't have to know much, you don't need math or astronomy, you simply need to use your eyes.

[@CPOFastForward]

As soon as Dr. Miano started describing the hypothesis I was pretty much at the refutation. I am learning! Thank you Professor 👍

[@rcrawford42]

If you have enough points, you can create any alignment you want.

[@pandakicker1]

Past and future! Even if the 1000-ish BC date was the right one, those alignments could have happened before and could happen again in the future and people who want to sensationalize it would want to choose the earliest date they could.

[@Deipnosophist_the_Gastronomer]

Nobody builds something that has this accuracy in timing unless there is a need to do so ... therefore I believe this is a pyramid landing site. Further exploration is required to uncover the passenger terminal and duty-free shops.

[@Eyes_Open]

Ben is precisely content in receiving financial gain from unsupported claims.

[@edgarsnake2857]

Thanks, as always, for your injection of truth and knowledge into the conversation about these ancient sites.

[@robsellars9338]

I think that the best analogy for uncharted Xs dating method is that of a broken watch, which will always be correct 2 times per day no matter when it stopped working. The professor is correct to point out that unless there is clear evidence that the builder made this paricular alignment (such as inscription or graphic of moon or sun or building tradition etc) there can be no reason to assume an alignment was done

[@kellykelly7747]

Another great video! Thank you ❤

[@poneill65]

I don't get his use of obliquity variance for dating,.. surely the precessional variance cycle every 26000 years is the main cycle affecting sunrise/sunset positions. Precession moves the position an entire 360 degrees around the ecliptic every 26000 years. The obliquity variation ONLY affects which stars within a tiny 3 degree vertical strip are directly behind the sun at those moments, which would seemingly be a much harder measurement. Surely this perturbation must only represent tiny fractions of a degree from the gross precessional location. How on earth is anyone to measure that, when you cannot do it directly at sunrise/sunset but have to extrapolate fom night time measurments when you can actually see stars! (IF you had extra-ordinarily precise measurement, the ONLY use for obliquity would be to use BOTH to measure far far larger timescales by combining it with precession, but then we're getting long before homo-sapiens, so there's nobody to measure it! (plus other factors like refraction, landscape(horizon) changes, would come into play)

[@tma2001]

Precession produces large swings in the rising and setting points for the _stars_ but not for the Sun. For the Sun that is determined only by the obliquity which is the maximum change in its declination above and below the equator from solstice to solstice. The azimuth range from rise to set expands and shrinks with the obliquity cycle. For example at summer solstice sunrise, it is the furthest point east of south that varies with the change in obliquity. As you say good luck with measuring that with any precision; are we talking about when the disc of the Sun first appears above a distant landmark or the when the whole disc of the Sun is sitting above a marker stone and have the marker stones moved due to subsidence/earthquakes etc over the millenia ? Do the marker stones form a gap for the line of sight (as in tomb doorway entrances) or are we talking about alignment with a particular edge of the stones ? So many questions.

[@TheZestyTea]

I'm happy to have your analysis here. In most cases, even a discerning layperson can see pseudoarchaeology for what it is, but every now and then, I find myself to be the potential victim due to the complexity of the concepts being discussed: only to be better informed by an excellent explainer. Thanks for the video!

[@daeryram]

Btw there is a huge geological factor - Andes is highly active seismic and tectonic region, Andes actually continue to raise up every year along with earthquakes. So even several sentures ago angles and position of key stones might been slightly different there.

[@naciremasti]

Dr. Miamo, could you do a video on the ancient egyptian calendar? Was recently looking in the the plethora of Ramesses' and was intrigued by the 3 seasons approach. Thunk it'd make an interesting video.

[@pwolkowicki]

I think that measuring few structures like this one could give us an answer, how precise they were built.

[@granknutterbutter3472]

I'm so glad that Posnansky, Hancock and Sitchin have finally gotten the recognition they deserve. People are finally waking up. A new generation is now learning that the Arya.. I mean "Atlantians" had to teach all those silly brow... I mean "primitive people", because they just couldn't figure out how to stack rocks on top of other rocks. Those lesser.. I mean "primitive" folks better be thankful that the perfect, beautiful, vastly superior Arya.. I mean, Atlantians showed them how to be real humans. Thank you, Joe Rogan!

[@poneill65]

How do these people even pretend to measure minute-second accurate positions for sunrise and sunset anyway? 1) there are innaccuracies in the exact starting and ending POINTS of the alignments,... POINTS, to some rough measure of the "middle" of a stone block, aperture, or doorway. That CHOICE of "middle" will have great affects. Also, all these blocks/apertures are some random height above ground anyway. Everyone knows that, even just lying down vs standing (i.e.a 6ft observer change) you can see two different moments when the sun sets. In those two moments, the sun has moved west some amount of seconds/minutes of arc! FFS Peru is also an active techtonic area, you might even have land uplift/subduction affecting observer to horizon sightlines! 2) atmospheric refraction at the horizon (through the thickest atmosphere) bends the background starfield up about the entire diameter of the sun. While someone might contend that this is symmetrical for sunrise and sunset, IT IS NOT! You have to consider air temperatures. a) The mean air temperature at sunrise and sunset is different, after a hot day heating the land vs a cold night. b) The spring and summner solstice the mean air temperatures are also very different, exiting winter vs exiting summer. BOTH of these affect the atmospheric refraction, differentially, sunrise-sunset and solstice-solstice.

[@markbriten6999]

Absolutely there is a funny bit of QI where Stephen asks where is the sun. It appears to be on the horizon but has in fact actually set. Phil Jupitas's reaction is worth a look

[@poneill65]

@@markbriten6999 For certain that's where I got that particular "Quite Interesting" snippet! Also, when is a Phil Jupitus reaction not worth a look!

[@cryptospin2060]

The Obliquity of the Ecliptic - GREAT NAME FOR A BAND lol or a song

[@AveragePicker]

Rule 1: You should be able to say the name of your band over the phone and not have to spell it. Rule 2: You should be able to write it across a flyer without running out of room and scrunching up the letters. Rule 3: Tell someone the name of your band, ask them 1 week later what the name was. If they can't remember it exactly, change it. Rule 4: If someone looks up your band name, what will they find? Will it give them an idea of what you sound like? Are you going to be constantly having to explain the name and is that a long and involved explanation? Rule 5: If a drunk person is reading off the list of bands playing, will they stumble on your band name? Bonus Rule: For greatest success, it should start with the letter B.

[@rahrahrobbbieee]

Great video.

[@peterwikvist2433]

Erich von Däniken with his fringe theories has caused a lot of damage. Same with the outrageous claims by the Ancient Alien show. The word 'pseudo' is a Greek word meaning false apparent or supposed but not real. Pseudo fits right in there.

[@vondahartsock-oneil3343]

Hiya Dr. M!! I want to say something, but it'd prob. come off as being mean to "that" guy. I'm not here to be mean to anyone. You have such a gentle and factual way of correcting someone. I enjoy your videos very much, and always look fwd. to more. History is very interesting and fun, when taught correctly! Thank You!

[@MaryAnnNytowl]

As someone else more-or-less already said, my chances of ever dating again are definitely astronomical. That tends to happen when you mate for life, but your soulmate ... didn't. So unless he somehow figures out what his problem is and we date again, no, I won't be. And the chances of that happening are astronomical and infinitesimal at the same time. Aaaaanyway... sorry for the bummer. You're great, Dr. Miano!!

[@NoahSpurrier]

Since there are numerous observation points it should be possible to determine the current precision of the observatory. That might help set error bars for any specific observation point. With subsidence and seismic shifts, I wouldn’t expect the observatory to be as precise today as it may once have been.

[@SuperUAP]

As a Nigerian internet nutritional engineer prince, I am qualified to say this is definitely the right way to date things. I just hold up a stick and if it cast a shadow I can say that there is definitely a full moon out. 🌚

[@BazNard]

Best content on KZbin

[@etevenatkowicz9745]

Dr Miano, your videos are great but I'm astonished how quickly you produce them. Are you using secret knowledge from some sort of advanced content-producing civilisation?

[@pandakicker1]

Isn’t it obvious? (;😊

[@WorldofAntiquity]

I cheat a little. This is an excerpt from a longer video I made a few years ago.

[@johannageisel5390]

@@WorldofAntiquity This video must be older than the pyramids and have brought its cultural content to all other videos on youtube!!!

[@Springfield-1903]

I Love your videos! If life weren't surely to get in the way, I'd jump on your guided tour of Egypt in a heartbeat! Perhaps, one day, when the stars are aligned just so... but seriously keep up the excellent videos! UnchartedX should pay attention to scholars like you. The pseudo archeology is getting WAY out of control!

[@promiscuous675]

Thank you.

[@letyvasquez2025]

A story for the ages. If only stories left fossils, instead of secret messages left for the lucky few to follow.

[@Zelyoni]

@worldsofantiquity Not sure if you can fix this, but the subtitle @4:15 says 23° 27' while you say 23°8' 48".

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Thanks. Fixed it.

[@Spielkalb-von-Sparta]

What I also don't understand is which points of reference those alignments are based on. It's a ruin, has got eroded stones there so which points do you use to align to the constellations? Depending where you put your high precision instruments there could be easily a discrepancy of several minutes, couldn't it? Don't know if I've got a mistake in my thought process here, please enlighten me.

[@stevenkies802]

I always wondered what the exact alignment the builders were aiming for. Did the want to line up with the centre of the Sun, the left or right edge, the top or bottom? How much of a deviation would these cause in the alignment, and therefore the calculated date of construction?

[@Spielkalb-von-Sparta]

What I also don't understand is which points of reference those alignments are based on. It's a ruin, has got eroded stones there so which points do you use to align to the constellations? Depending where you put your high precision instruments there could be easily a discrepancy of several minutes, couldn't it?

[@hedgehog3180]

Also buildings settle, this is such a well known phenomena in engineering that an entire subfield has developed around earth settling. Just go watch Pratical Engineering's entire video series about soil science. So like there's no reason to believe that any ancient building is in the exact same orientation it was originally built and often this is visually apparant, think of the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa or the Parthenon which has cracks in it caused by settlement.

[@Saki630]

Doctor, what do prospective students have to think about/accept when becoming a field archaelogist? Is that a very difficult job to fill with many applicants and little seats? My niece wants to study ancient Latin American history and she says its a shame she couldnt see herself making a living while out making discoveries. When I was young, I wanted to be Indiana but my purpose was engineering (for now). How can I help my niece? I would like her to continue thinking that she can do it and take those electives/courses in college one day while staying undecided until she figures out if it truly is as fun as she thinks it is.

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Most archaeologists make their money by teaching at a college or university. It doesn't pay much. But if she loves it, well, that may be enough for her!

[@Hoxle-87]

Measurements with “precision instruments” probably refer to a guy with a cell phone and a hand ruler

[@lostpony4885]

Getting weary of the word "precise"...its not precise no matter how precisely its claimed

[@lairdhaynes1986]

Indeed. It's good to remember that precision is not the same as accuracy.

[@LanceHall]

Apparently peddling pseudo-history pays for housing, food and trips around the World.

[@AveragePicker]

That's what always kills me about the claims "they" are hiding the truth because of x/y/z and one is usually money. People like Hancock make way more than an archeologist starting out, and even many established ones. I had an ex that spent a year in a swamp, after at least a year of trying to get grant money and funding. I guess she was $39k and being covered in swamp muck was worth more in the long run than revealing the evidence of an advanced civilization.

[@AncientAmericas]

Great job here! There's a lot of pseudoscience around Tiwanaku and its frustrating to see.

[@Sgt.chickens]

I love your content here but Man it is hard to sit through clips of CumfartedX talking. Us australians are very sorry he has been allowed to escape

[@adamseward4713]

Tiwanaku has been moved around like a chessboard in a storm at sea. But at least here they got the calculations right; in archaeoastronomy they often just assume that you won't check. Have you read WIlliam Sullivan? He is erudite, fun to read, but sometimes he just makes stuff up - like the etymology of the name "Prometheus" for instance.

[@Wodz30]

@6:000 eeeehhhhh my boy Viracocha!

[@drstevej2527]

I never thought anything could equal the damage that the history channels ancient aliens show did to our understanding of legitimate research. I was wrong! Along came social media! This channel is trying to undo some of that idiocy.

[@lakrids-pibe]

Oh man! I would looove to get rid of the Gregorian calendar. How about 12 months of 30 days, and then four special holidays at the equinoxes and solstices (five days in leap years). Doesn't it just sound a lot easier?

[@pandakicker1]

(stares at you in Pontifex Maximvs) You can use whichever you choose, but the Gregorian one is as accurate as we can get right now. Find a more accurate one first. It took thousands of years to perfect our calendar.

[@flarvin8945]

It sounds a lot easier to keep what we got now, because it ain't broken. No need for every month to have equal number of days, unless one has OCPD. A bunch of change for no real benefit.

[@hedgehog3180]

I think we should go back to the French Republican Calendar.

[@revolutionaryhamburger]

So... It wasn't space alien stone masons with a longing for distant heavenly bodies?

[@vintageexcellence]

I love watching you dorks fight over KZbin

[@kensvideos1]

When the position of the pillar is initially marked it needed someone with a stick putting it in the ground with the shadow falling on the prime viewing point. And why not get it right?

[@WorldofAntiquity]

It is right.

[@Ano-Nymous]

Is it me or does Dr. Miano's audio recording sound different (worse quality)? No hate, but if indeed the case I'm pretty sure he'd be interested as well.

[@monkerud2108]

currently listening to a librivox recording of Atlantis the antediluvian world, and i discovered a new fact of anthropology, by listening to a voluntary recording of an audiobook you may discover whether it is crackpot literature by the tone of voice of the person reading the book, if it is a pompous sounding young man, or old man, it is likely a questionable book.

[@Spark010]

Interesting, is it not true that ancient civilisations were able to precisely align? Seems that the validity of the premise comes down to; is it more likely that there was an error in the alignment or not. Obvs shack ground trying to use that as a basis to date construction but…

[@hedgehog3180]

There are warying levels of precision, this monument is only off by 3 arcminutes, which is less than a single degree and I think that is pretty impressive already for a society that was mostly limited to stone tools and simple measuring devices.

[@jasonlowery1369]

On the one hand they repeatedly state that our ancestors couldn't build precision engineering then say that if these were to line up with the sunset and sunrise of when it was constructed then it wouldn't be precise enough to be exact - so year they didn't have pin point precision. But no they then say but they had to be pin point precise and have to fudge the dates. But the question is which point had to be pin point precise? Is it the left hand edge of the columns or the right hand edge of the columns? Might it be the dead centre of the columns? No-one really knows. And of course it would only be pin point accurate if you were standing in the exact right spot. A little to the left or to the right or even forward/back would change the relationship with the columns and their alignments. And of course only one person would be able to observe it if it was so pin point precise - anyone else looking would see it off to one side or the other so out of alignment. Wouldn't it be more likely to be build so that a group of people would be able to see the alignment, therefore having a not so precise alignment. How precise would you really need be in order to be able to say it was the end of winter or the start of summer? Oh I don't know because it is a smidgen out of alignment so I haven't got a clue where in the year we are! Bull. It's like standing at the back of a room and having the alignment so that it only aligns with a small peep hole or it aligns with a door way. Either way you know if its aligned, it's just more impressive with the doorway throwing light into the room than a peep hole.

[@salinagrrrl69]

What PuPu looked like if it were ever to have been completed BLOWS my mind. And the repurposing which is common world wide - PuPu really got hit.

[@SuperUAP]

I hear if you cut a pupu and count the rings your fingers will be smelly 😂

[@yvonneferguson8575]

When I get my new time machine, I'm waiting for a more reliable model, We shall travel back and ask the builders ourselves as long as they don't mention the oblicity? thing whatever. We think with our 2024 minds. We will never know how their brains/minds solved the problems they encountered, but they did. Thanks Dr. M.

[@varyolla435]

Time travel is science fiction of course...... 😋

[@petrapetrakoliou8979]

I ignore how you get the patience to deal wirth these theories, but good job at doing so. I just get infuriated with them, especially when it is my own folk, nationalist Hungarians who claim that we are the people who civilized the world, and also built such monuments as Tiwanaku, and that the world is at conspiracy to hold back the "truth".

[@johannageisel5390]

Oh gawd... 😫 I mean - yeah, Hungary had probably the earliest civilization (as in: urbanized society) in Europe, but civilizing the world? Rofl. Today's Hungarians didn't even LIVE in Hungary back then. We all know they arrived here only in 899, because we have fucking documentation about that. Next time such an idiot spouts idiotic stuff, ask them how they could have civilized the world when they were beaten on the Lechfeld by Otto I. in 955. Who happened to be king of the Saxons living where I live now and therefor must be my glorious ancestor (according to the logic of those people).

[@barryobrien1890]

Well there are all the other stones in the calendar. If all the stones are very precisely placed with respect to each other then it's fair to assume the entire precision, but if errors are in the other placements then who knows and the claims cannot be verified

[@danielfallu5716]

The stones are placed at regular intervals

[@thumbsdownbandit]

So now we only have to figure out when the Summer solistice in the Southern Hemisphere did occure in September...

[@WorldofAntiquity]

It didn't.

[@dororo101]

I heard that Australian accent and immediately scowled lol.

[@loke6664]

Am I the only one who think "What an interesting hypothesis, why don't we try to check the archaeology and see if we can get the same date there?". Oh, yeah... The archaology say it is slightly less then 2000 years old and nothing even close to the proposed age have ever been found in the area. So yeah, you can't just date a site with astronomical dating without backing it up with something more, otherwise you are making a lot of assumptions. And when you are dating a site to 3 times the age of the oldest known city on the continent (that would be Caral Supe) you kinda need a bit more to back up your hypothesis then just this, some kind of physical evidence at least. The alt history crowd usually try to avoid that part but usually when we date sites we prefer to have 2 different methods to be sure. Be date by C14, luminescence, dendrochronolgy, pottery dating, actual writing or some other method. Astronomical dating is one of the least certain ones since we can't be sure how exact the original builders were so it isn't strong enough to stand by itself. I don't think the original dudes measuring 90 years ago was poor scientifically, at the time almost all of the modern dating methods were not invented so he used what he had at hands but today we can run it against more modern methods and we have, the result does not agree with his claims. It is a shame, a 15 000 years old town in South America would have been super cool but the evidence just don't agree.

[@jorgegonzalez-larramendi5491]

more than one way to "date" is highly recommendable ~

[@NaDa-kw2fu]

I wonder if the calculations include ground shift (vertical) and tectonic shift (lateral) ...just saying.

[@user-yg1zj5dz9f]

i think Starry Night Pro is the only sky simulator that will go thousands of years bcE..assuming uniformitarianism of course...perhaps the planetary alignments went through a step change,like perhaps if a planet got destroyed and turned into an asteroid belt

[@hedgehog3180]

If any major change had happened in the last many thousands of years it would be clearly visible. Like we have to talk about billions of years before the changes are old enough to not leave evidence we could find.

[@johannageisel5390]

Lol, it's like measuring your height with a sounding line.

[@abandoninplace2751]

So this monumental building is aligned exactly with the solstices and equinoxes. To a precision measured in minutes and seconds. Built out of rock. Which has never erodes, nor settled. For a putative 15 ky. Localized entirely within your kitchen.

[@christophercripps7639]

The astronomers came up with two dates. Why pick the older one?

[@pyotrberia9741]

I know that archaeologists try to use as many techniques as possible to date a site. Not just one. What dates do we get from other sources of evidence?

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Check out the full video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/qKmsmneto8ypjLM

[@Its_Shaun_the_Sheep]

I can tell Ben uses chat GTP and auto cue. He can’t explain without it. Almost monotone.

[@paulisfat8077]

Explains why he comes off as robotic.

[@Its_Shaun_the_Sheep]

@@paulisfat8077 i didn’t say robotic. He is reading not using his own thought.

[@yellowflowerorangeflower5706]

Cool

[@almitrahopkins1873]

If it was 15,000 years old, wouldn’t wind erosion have already ground parts of it entirely to dust? Wouldn’t water have already dissolved big pieces of it? Wouldn’t frost crack large stones into smaller ones? Exposed stone tends to weather. It doesn’t take long. Look at the granite grave stones in any cemetery. A grave marker from the Civil War is barely legible today without restoration and that’s only 160 years ago, not a hundred times that long ago.

[@varyolla435]

There tends to be a lot less "acid rain" in the jungles and mountains of South America than you'll find in the US........ While it has lessened since the 1970's when coal-fired electrical plants began to invest in scrubber technologies - to then switch to natural gas = the damage is already done. That is why you see your 19th Century stone monuments worn down - to say nothing of imported Egyptian and others. p.s. - above is currently happening in Egypt coincidentally. Egypt being dependent heavily upon fossil fuels - as well as other sources of sulphuric precipitates spewed into the atmosphere - is today seeing its' heavy air pollution damaging ancient monuments. Some temples where the hieroglyphs were readable 30-40 years ago today see them badly worn away. Consequently Egyptologists are racing to make copies/photographic evidence of what is left before it is all gone.

[@AIenSmithee]

Although I appreciate the debunking of pseudoscience let’s not forget that Ben Van Kerwyk went on a podcast and suggested that the moon is a spaceship…..

[@keith6706]

He stole that from a David Weber science fiction novel.

[@ihatespam2]

Of course it was originally perfect, because they had better technology then, that’s why we know it’s perfect because they had better tech and better tech would make it perfect. You see, it’s like a circle the proves itself.

[@sonder122]

I see that Uncharted X subscribes to the Alan Sokol school of scholarship.

[@christianagsteiner2072]

Ben is such a bullshit artist

[@nilkilnilkil]

These fellas have a strange outlook. Strange world view

[@stephenfoley1261]

UnchartedX's claims are self referencing, therefore they must be true. 😮

[@gailforce]

Folks... I think we have to give some credit to the fact that they at least accept the heliocentric model

[@_MikeJon_]

That video was hard to watch. The yarn of nonsense Ben spins is embarrassing. That and he just runs with it as if it's fact too. They never stopped to think "or maybe it wasn't precisely aligned?" 😂 of course not. It has to be Atlantian aliens pointing to their home planet Dumbdadoo.

[@letyvasquez2025]

He is really missing out on making a fun video game. He certainly has the fantasy for it.

[@comentedonakeyboard]

Modern Christmas doesnt match exactly with the winter solistice either

[@bipolarminddroppings]

Doesn't matter how many times I hear that dude explain the nonsense he and Hancock et al believe, I can't help but think of the teachers out there that had the misfortune of having to try to educate a mind made of mush...

[@letyvasquez2025]

History repeats…

[@itsnot_stupid_ifitworks]

Ben is slipping...he made it all the way to the fourth sentence before saying "precise"

[@Eyes_Open]

He was confident in his mystical sounding Obliquity of the Ecliptic. It must be true if you repeat that magic phase.

[@MrJonsonville5]

I thought the earth's tilt was on a 25,950ish or so year cycle.

[@Spielkalb-von-Sparta]

That'd be earth's _precession,_ not its obliquity. Two different things.

[@needfoolthings]

Some numbers need to excrementially applied.

[@nickauclair1477]

So it wasn't aliens after all?

[@karldubhe8619]

Obviously, he just forgot to mention the Aliens who could back up his claims. The aliens for whom we have no evidence, and are my favourite fan fiction characters.

[@markaxworthy2508]

So, GIGO?

[@ansfridaeyowulfsdottir8095]

Again, this is an area where you excel. Keep it up. Far better than pseudo-political wokery and kowtowing to fascist dictators having a girly tantrum about imagined insults. {:o:O:}

[@MarcosElMalo2]

I might not be first, but I’m the most ancient.

[@troydavis1]

2:57 you mean December 21st here not september…

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Summer begins on December 21?

[@troydavis1]

@@WorldofAntiquity you spoke here of the solstice I thought, later you speak of the equinox

[@WorldofAntiquity]

@@troydavis1 No, I spoke of the seasons.I mentioned the solstice in the sentence before.

[@adamseward4713]

Huh. Your commenters tend to agree with you, which is suspicious, but they do so rationally and seem informed. Good work.

[@WorldofAntiquity]

Nothing suspicious about it. It took me 5 years to find these reasonable people.

[@TimBee100]

Is the beginning of summer in the southern hemisphere September 21st?

[@chrismcmullen4313]

What about the claim that the gateway of the sun temple was made by the Gods in a single day? A guy like you would totally discount the explanation that clearly exists that would explain how such a thing would even be possible. Totally rejected by modern science when EVEN RUDIMENTARY observations show that for almost all of history people lived thier lives accomodating the role of the supernatural