Pseudoarchaeology

[@thrinaxadon9]

Took your lab course a few years ago and I am SO glad I stayed subscribed. This video is so great. Shared it with my friends and family who are a little "confused" about archaeology. Thanks!

[@tedbanning9090]

Thanks for the nice feedback!

[@chucklearnslithics3751]

The best and most thorough rebuttal I've seen on this hot topic! Very well done! I'm just going to leave links to this video from now on, rather than my own lengthy and wasted comments, from now on. Thank-you!

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Thanks for sharing!

[@russellmillar7132]

I don't know how I missed your channel til now but I'm enjoying it. I read the foundational books from the ancient alien hypothesis (12th Planet and Chariots of the Gods) in the late '80s and became a true believer. These ideas prompted me to study mainstream science (astronomy, anthropology, Assyriology etc.) to see if any of this stuff was confirmed with "real" science. As you might imagine, I was disappointed in my stated quest. However, my digging into these topics awakened in me a thirst for knowledge about the methods and processes researchers in the fields of archaeology, paleontology, and forensics utilize. This sent me in numerous directions and led to an ocean of discovery about the world (and universe) in which we live. I also chose to study logic and critical thinking. This has come in handy.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Thanks. I'm glad you're enjoying them.

[@andreyradchenko8200]

Why the jumpscare sound effects? If they were removed, the video would be a hundred times better.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Sorry. I thought those added emphasis and made things a bit more entertaining, but I'll keep that in mind in future.

[@olafwolgast3127]

The music sounds like Zappas orchestral efforts.

[@alephmale3171]

Thank you for your charitable and scientific character throughout this video. I know that superficially it seems less impactful than Twitterian vitriol, but I think this tried and true method necessarily results in longer lasting convictions and meaningful questions much harder to shake and disregard.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Many thanks. I tried (not always successfully I'm sure) to avoid being too arrogant in my responses to these theories.

[@berkantsokmen7651]

Good job!... I add Joseph Davidovits' book "The Pyramids: An Enigma Solved" and of course Fehmi Krasnigi's movie "Great Pyramid K 2019".

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Thanks!

[@egronk56]

My first prof on the NeaR East was in a course given by Prof Celeste Peters at Uni of Calgary who had just graduated from NES Studies at my later alma mater University of Toronto--she could read Sumerian texts.

[@AnthonyArena-g7l]

Excellent video! Thank you!!

[@KEK-dd4iu]

Just to let you know, you guys are the ones saying that prehistoric humans were brutish stone age men whose existence was consistent of nothing but hunting and gathering, not people who believe the obvious truth that civilization is far older than the time of Sumer. Just some self-awareness.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Sorry to have to disagree with you, but no archaeologist I know says that Pleistocene humans were brutish or stupid. In fact, we have lots of evidence for how resourceful they were. But that doesn't mean that they had electricity, lasers, anti-gravity machines, or high-precision machining either. They were clever, but they were still hunter-gatherers and they lived in very small communities with what modern people would consider pretty basic economies.

[@deathmagneto-soy]

Sorry but sounds effects are just too jarring.

[@AleXander-m1t]

Excellent video! Although the explanation of erecting large blocks of stone still isn't enough to explain how the pyramid was built since simple erecting on stone beside another is far from placing them on top of each other to form a giant pyramid

[@KEK-dd4iu]

This is just a gate keeping video. The funny thing is people are just eating what this guy is saying 🤣

[@AleXander-m1t]

@@KEK-dd4iu no. it's well reasoned and argumented. if you're referreing to gatekeeping sacred geometry and occult knowledge then no it isn't gatekeeping, these things discussed in the video stand on their own (bad english?). gate keeping would be not even making reasonable arguments but just ad hominem attacks to ridicule, to distract etc.

[@KEK-dd4iu]

@AleXander-m1t No, it's not well reasoned it's actually logically inconsistent and even contradictory, and anything contradictory can not be the truth because there is an error in it. For instance, he admits we don't have a complete story and explanation for our history, and the guy says scientists are open to questioning things to get to the truth, but at the same time says that any "sensational" explanation is "pseudo archeology" which is a contradiction. He also shows a drawing around the 21:00 timestamp of early archaic humans and builds a strawman that alternative enthusiasts are claiming mankind in the past was primitive when that's actually what academia is saying. Furthermore, he claims humans have the capacity to build and plan. Well, if that's the case, why is it wrong to claim that humans have created civilizations many times in the past? See the logical inconsistency? Overall, this video was very shallow, and not many will question or see through what he's saying for what it is. Unfortunately, but that's not really important to be honest.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

I highly recommend you check out Wally Wallerstein's videos. He can raise stones way bigger than the Giza ones all by himself with no more technology than levers, counterweights and wedges.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Sorry you feel that way. However, I did NOT say that anything that contradicts my own beliefs or interpretations is pseudoarchaeology. What makes an interpretation pseudoarchaeology is that it's not base on any testable evidence, and is often based on complete misinformation or even, in extreme cases, fraud. Archaeologists, even though they disagree about interpretations, do agree that their inferences have to be grounded in evidence.

[@HeavyDemir]

I remember reading a Daniken book when I was a teen, far away places all so impossible for me to see, until he referenced from another fantasy book, I found the other book and read a few lines, I never bought another Daniken book again and never finished the one I was reading when I saw how he had taken a few words from a chapter to fit his narrative while the chapter itself in the other book painted a very different picture, to me the spell was broken.

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Yes, a classic case of cherry-picking evidence.

[@russellmillar7132]

I feel you, mate! I had a similar breaking of the spell experience in the early'90s with the same book (and the 12th Planet).

[@PhoenixProdLLC]

They are UNLIKELY to ACTUALLY have a legit debate WITH ANYONE, >ESPECIALLY< an expert because they FOLD UP even on approach! 😂😂 They even HEAR a question like,"Can you please provide a link to the credible research or evidence for your assertions?" and they immediately shit themselves, scream you're a big meanie, block you, and run 😂😂

[@Yarglish]

What about Cheikh Anta Diop's revisionnist fans ?

[@tedbanning9090]

I have to admit that I was fascinated with Diop's views when I was about 20, but later found difficulties with a lot of the detail. I'd say his greatest contribution was to point out the colonialist foundations of a lot of our understanding of ancient African cultures, and also to point out that Egypt is, after all, part of Africa and that, therefore, Egypt's cultural contributions were African contributions. On the other hand, links between Egypt and other parts of Africa were likely more complicated than his charactrizations, and his views on race are outdated. However, I'm rather out-of-date on Diop.

[@RodrigoOliveira-tb7zf]

Why isn't biblical archeology not a pseudoscience?

[@tedbanning9090]

Some forms of Biblical archaeology arguably are. It depends on what the archaeologist is trying to accomplish. Using archaeology to flesh out the details of life in Iron Age Israel, for example, is perfectly fine, and might even help people understand certain aspects of the Old Testament better. On the other hand, using something resembling archaeology to try to "prove" claims like "the world is no older than 4004 BC" or that the entire world was destroyed by a flood in the time of Noah, and relying on flawed evidence for that, is another matter. Then there are the really bad examples, like the comedic stereotype of a corrupt Biblical archaeologist in the movie, Don Verdean!

[@trout3685]

Enjoyed until the loud sound effects so now I must leave

[@chiznowtch]

The sound effects are like the harmonic resonance that the Aliens used to lift the pyramid blocks in place

[@Yarglish]

excellent.

[@rudolphtheodore3474]

Of Grients humanoid

[@kellynbilly4]

Graham has you lot worried enough to make a video! How excellent!

[@chiznowtch]

A lot of us are indeed worried about scheisters like Graham dumbing down the population. Idiocracy, coming in hot.

[@ninerealms69]

A science fiction writer with zero credibility making people believe nonsense with zero evidence is worrisome.

[@richard1849]

if you want to believe we we are stupid, this is for you

[@chiznowtch]

I love the irony in your post.

[@richard1849]

is it too deep for you to dig? Sorry.@@chiznowtch

[@chiznowtch]

@@richard1849 we we. Stupid.

[@grantorino948]

Bitterness is not a good way to present. As your “Opponents” have tall hair… one side of the opinion is always the “smart” side. My disappointment with any presentation from this apparently 2 sides only discord: cold . Anything discussion worthy in this world never seems to be discussed more than two dimensions. The rascal card was dis credit to this „side“ ….again .

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Hmmm. I wasn't aware that I had any bitterness here. All I did was present evidence for the capabilities of the human beings who would have built the site. And, in my opinion, the evidence is clear that there's no need to call on some mysterious civilization to account for these structures. They'd have been well within the capabilities of early Neolithic people.

[@chiznowtch]

Yeah you're reading bitterness into this presentation bc you're a cultist and it hurts to hear people discrediting your beliefs. The presenter used an astounding amount of patience and tact, considering the ridiculousness of the subject matter.

[@GaryR55]

Whatever the subject, people will believe whatever they WANT to believe, regardless of the facts. Some people are simply predisposed to believe sensational claims.

[@theloner6063]

Read The Lost Book of Enki.

[@tedbanning9090]

Would be entertaining as fiction. Does anyone really believe that Sitchin has all these tablets written by a pre-Sumerian author? It's all just made up. Also contains entertaining anachronisms, like saying that this Enki "splashed down" just like an Apollo-era American astronaut. Apparently Annunaki couldn't land their spacecraft on dry land!

[@pranays]

Sitchen is a proven fraud.

[@russellmillar7132]

From what I read it took 116,000 years for the Anunnaki to figure out that they didn't like laboring in the mines (for the precious metals to protect the atmosphere on their home planet) so they decided to create homo sapiens as slaves. This was all determined before modern genetics research by Sitchin and Van Danniken.

[@KEK-dd4iu]

​@russellmillar7132 The Annunaki weren't the ones working. It was the Igigi gods and later homo-sapiens, according to the Atra Haisis.

[@avigares]

i'm 5min in this video i alreaady i can say this guy's carrier depends on what he learned over the years from his collegues,thinking outside of box can ruined his carrier..i'll pass on that..bye

[@tedbanning9090]

I can see you didn't get to the part where I addressed this very issue. And, no, advocating surprising theories, as long as they're supported by real evidence, does not damage your career at all. It actually propels it forward.

[@chiznowtch]

Love how the ancient aliens/tech crowd seem to think that 1) archeologist-academics are super rich and powerful and are capable of controlling a global conspiracy to suppress these things and that 2) these archeologists wouldn't be the absolutely most excited ppl in the world if a single credible shred of paradigm changing evidence was found and legit.

[@ninerealms69]

I can tell you've never read a book and rely on youtube for your "theories".

[@robinjames7967]

wrong..

[@chiznowtch]

Yes, Graham and the pseudoscienctists are obviously wrong but why do so many people buy into the nonsense?

[@BenWillBarrows]

I am reminded of the poster on the wall in Fox Mulder's office at the FBI which says "𝙄 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝙗𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙚𝙫𝙚." I read Von Daniken as a child - but my favourite book was a Reader's Digest book; "𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘞𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥'𝘴 𝘓𝘢𝘴𝘵 𝘔𝘺𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘴" which was about ancient civilizations. As a teen I was never separated from my bible or my copy of "the Handy Dandy Evolution Refuter." A church I attended for a while taught British-Israelism and one of the pastors considered himself the authority on how the Giza pyramids were "the Bible in Stone". When I became disillusioned with the church I discovered Zechariah Sitchin. This was not a bad thing. Through Sitchin I was introduced to the rich tapestry of ancient cultures in and around Mesopotamia. I found more and more information about ancient civilizations all around the world. In the absence of factual information people will believe 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨. When the pseudo-knowledge is more accessible than the actual knowledge many people will stop searching when they have a simple answer that satisfies them. Thank goodness the Reader's Digest book was wrong: real research, real archaeology, real knowledge about our origins is continually growing and is every bit as exciting and compelling as the quick-fix-beliefs. But, it must be presented, promoted and defended. Good Job!

[@tedbanning9090]

All good points! Archaeologists and ancient historians need to do a better job of reaching the broader public and showing that the stories that are backed up by evidence are just as interesting (well, almost as interesting) as the fictions they're being sold

[@pranays]

@@tedbanning9090 it's not there job to compete with billionair TV moguls. The government needs to enforce false advertising rules on psuedo history channels.

[@kamikazes03]

@@pranays Some Xian churches claim that Noah's ark is located on Mount Ararat. That claim could also be labelled as false. Would you want to go after churches too?

[@thearchaeologistslaborator6591]

Like many others, they're quoting Genesis 8 for that claim. My video doesn't concern religious beliefs, only secular misrepresentations of evidence that sometimes includes biblical evidence (as in the Ark of the Covenant example I mentioned). Nothing in the Bible suggests that ancient people were incapable of building monuments.

[@russellmillar7132]

@@kamikazes03 I get the impression that the "pseudo dudos" don't mind the pushback. Authors like G. Hancock, Z. Sitchen, and B. Foerster have made millions peddling their claims to those who accept them uncritically. Those who stick with practical knowledge-based explanations are by far the minority. Fiction and fantasy have always sold orders of magnitude more than boring scientific studies.