This is why we need an open mind about our prehistoric history

The recent discovery of sauropod dinosaur fossils in South America were found not only in a location they were not expected to be found in, but from a time period they were not expected to be found in.  The evidence suggests the Leinkupal laticauda lived millions of years after it was thought to have gone extinct.




While this dinosaur still lived long before the time the last dinosaurs are typically said to have died off 65 million years ago, it's still proof that new discoveries can rewrite the history books.

But what about the history of human civilization?  We're basically taught that the first humans were hunter-gatherers and that they lived that way for much of history until some started to settle down as farmers.  And it was still a while after that before humans began engineering large cities.  I remember being taught about the "cradle of civilization" in the fertile crescent of the middle east when I was young.  It was said that was when writing first began, and history could be recorded.  That goes back over 6000 years.

But is the "cradle of civilization" really the cradle of civilization?  There is evidence that civilization existed long before the time of the first recorded civilizations in the middle east.  One of the best examples is Gobekli Tepe.

The site of Gobekli Tepe was discovered in 1963 but was not excavated until that 1990's.  Massive stone monuments with elaborate carvings of animals have been found at the site and dated to being at least 10,000 years old.

There is no written record of what the purpose of the site was, who built the site, or how they built the site.  But it was obviously built by skilled engineers and at some point appears to have been deliberately buried thousands of years before the rise of civilization in the fertile crescent.  It is thought only a small percentage of the site has even been excavated, but what they have found so far is proof enough that civilization existed thousands of years before the earliest recorded civilizations in the fertile crescent.


In 2001, it was announced the ruins of an ancient city were found underwater in the Gulf of Khambat in India.  The civilization found there was dated to being 9500 years old.  Whoever built the city obviously built it when the land it is own was above ground.  It is my feeling that there could be many civilizations that existed thousands of years ago prior to the Great Flood (or the end of the ice age) that are now underwater.  The ruins in Gulf of Khambat are just one example.  I elaborate more on my thoughts about lost civilizations and underwater archaeology here.

My feeling is that we need to be more open minded about our prehistoric history.  These are but two examples of prehistoric ingenuity (see more here).  While I am not a dogmatic creationist who believes the world is only 6000 years old, I also do not simply accept "scientific" dogmas about prehistory as fact.  I'm comfortable with my worldview being viscous and shaped by what is discovered instead of just being set in stone.  I don't try to make new discoveries fit into some long held beliefs.  If a new discovery fits with what is known historically, great.  But if it doesn't, then maybe it is time to rethink that part of history.  If a new discovery can rewrite when a dinosaur lived, then new discoveries should be able to rewrite how old civilization is.  And the discoveries at Gobekli Tepe and the Gulf of Khambat are evidence that human civilization existed thousands of years prior to the records of civilization that we have.

Ancient Aliens and The Mysterious Origins of Man

I've had mixed feelings about the History channel show Ancient Aliens over the course of its run.  When the original special aired a couple of years ago, I thought it was interesting and presented the information well.  I'm not a believer of the ancient astronaut hypothesis it presented, but I'm open to the possibility (at least certain aspects of it).  So when they decided to turn it into a series, I figured I would give it a shot.  After watching a couple of episodes though, I lost interest.  I thought they were just getting silly about it, seemingly assuming aliens had something to do with almost any ancient mystery.  Although inspired by writers like Zecharia Sitchin and Erich von Daniken, ultimately, all they are doing is inserting science fiction concepts that have been developed primarily over the last 60-70 years into history.

But I did catch some second season episodes that sounded like they might be interesting when I didn't see anything better on.  My impression of the show didn't change much, but I did realize that the information they were presenting was interesting, even if their analysis of it could be a bit silly at times.  So I've decided to watch the third season just to see what they bring up.  I figure whatever they bring up will be interesting, even if I don't agree with their theories.

On the other hand, I was surfing around on Youtube today and came across a video called The Mysterious Origins of Man.  It was obviously pretty old since Charlton Heston was the presenter (from 1996, according to Wikpedia), so there isn't any new information in it, but I thought the information was presented well.  It covers topics such as out of place artifacts, Tiahuanaco, and ancient Egypt.  If you're interested check it out below.



Here is a shortened version of that video: http://youtu.be/nne_-j08yMo

Cryptid Misidentifications

As I was out walking earlier, I saw a crane (the bird species, not the machine of the same name) fly by near a pond.  It's not the first time I've seen a crane in this area, and it might be the same one I've seen before.

But, even though I've seen a crane around here before, I don't see one very often.  Today when I saw it, I considered that its body type resembles drawings I have seen of certain types of pterosaurs (except the crane had feathers, of course).  I wondered if maybe people who had claimed to see a pterosaur or something like a pterosaur could have misidentified a large crane.

But I didn't wonder about it for too long.  I can't dismiss the possibility that someone might have misidentified a crane as a pterosaur, but I think it's rather unlikely.  When I saw the crane today, it was instantly obvious to me that it was a crane.  Even if it had been twice or even three times the distance away from me that it was, I'm sure I would have still known it was a crane.  Even if it had been so far away that I had to squint to see it and still couldn't quite make it out, my first assumption would have still been a crane or some other type of large bird, not a pterosaur.

I googled 'pterodactyl misidentifications', and it seems that fruit bats are a common suggestion for what alleged pterosaur sightings might be.  One article I found said that large fruit bats can have a pterosaur-like profile when seen in silhouette, especially to 'nonscientific observers', as if to suggest that identifying a bat required at least a masters degree in zoology or something.  I mean, come on, most people know what a bat looks like.  A lot of the pterosaur and thunderbird sightings I have read about - credible or not - described something larger than a fruit bat.  And I think if I were to see a larged winged animal flying around at night, my first guess would be a bat or an owl of some sort - not a pterosaur.  It would have to be exceptionally large before I would even start considering the possibility that it was some sort of pterosaur or thunderbird.  But hey, that's just me.

And what about these skeptics who suggest that bigfoot sightings are bear misidentifications?  I guess I can see the possibility of some sightings being bear misidentifications - assuming that the bear was seen from the back and only at a distance and the witness got scared and ran away in the other direction without investigating any further.  But when people describe seeing humanlike faces, how can that be confused with a bear?  And what of the size and body type?  Skeptics like using bears as examples because bears can stand on their hind legs, but bears have long torsos and short legs - they still don't look humanlike even when standing on their hind legs.

And it's not like people don't know what bears look like.  Even someone who has lived in a city or the suburbs all their life with no interest in hunting or camping knows what bears look like.  Some of the people who have claimed to have seen a bigfoot are outdoorsmen who are familiar with the area they sighted it at and the wildlife that is normally seen in the area.  So what are the odds that they would misidentify a bear as a bigfoot?

I realize there are some people out there who may be overly-anxious to believe in bigfoot and let their imagination get the best of them, but is that really what most people would do?  Wouldn't most people be able to recognize a bear when they saw one - even at a far away distance?  And I could be wrong, but even if they saw a bear at a far away distance and couldn't tell for sure what it was, wouldn't most people be likely to assume it was bear anyways?  Wouldn't most people be more likely to assume what they are seeing is something normal and common?

But like I said, I could be wrong; maybe most people wouldn't assume it was a bear.  Maybe most people do have the vivid imaginations the skeptics accuse them of having.

And here's another thought - wouldn't it be ironic if someone misidentified a bigfoot as a bear?

J

Dragons and Dinosaurs

Dragons are a creature that feature in the stories and mythologies of various cultures around the world.  They're mentioned in the Bible and ancient middle eastern stories, they feature prominently in east Asian traditions, and have also featured in ancient and medieval European folk tales.  The east Asians typically depict dragons as large snake-like creatures, while the Europeans typically depict them as sauropod-like creatures, oftentimes with wings.  While dragons may be depicted somewhat differently in different cultures, it seems that giant reptilian creatures of some sort feature in stories from all around the world.

So where did all these people get these ideas about giant reptiles?  The study of Paleontology has only been around since the 19th century, but people have been finding dinosaur fossils for hundreds, maybe thousands of years.  Could the stories of dragons have been developed by people who found dinosaur fossils?  If so, the next question in my mind would be how did they know the fossils were reptilian?  If they had never seen large reptiles before, what would make them think the fossils belonged to reptiles?  Even if someone in ancient times had found an intact skeleton of a sauropod, what about it would indicate to them it was a reptile instead of some bizarre cross between a giraffe and an elephant?

Some people point to the Ica stones as evidence that some dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time as humans.  The Ica stones also depict scenes that appear to show men looking through telescopes, performing open heart surgery, and performing cesarean section births.  These stones are generally believed to be a hoax not only because of what they depict, but because one man who sold the stones claimed he had been carving them himself (Although it's been claimed that he confessed to carving them to avoid jail time, because if they were legitimate artifacts, they would be the property of the government, and therefore, illegal to sell.).

But the Ica stones are not the only depictions of dinosaur-like creatures from the past.

An ancient Greek mosaic known as the Nile mosaic of Palestrina depicts what looks like some sort of dinosaur like creature.

The temple of Ankor Wat in Cambodia has a depiction of what has been alleged to be a hippo with a lotus flower behind it.

It also looks a little bit like a stegosaurus.  I don't know if it is a stegosaurus, but I don't think it looks like a lotus flower and hippo either (tail looks to long to be a hippo to me).

A figurine found in Anatolia also bears a modest resemblance to a stegosaurus:

It might not be a stegosaurus, but it's hard to tell exactly what it is supposed to be after a few thousand years of weathering.

People argue over what these ancient artworks depict, but what about the depictions of dragons themselves?  Regardless of how you spin it, dragons resemble dinosaurs.  Any single depiction of a dragon might not match up exactly with any single known type of dinosaur, but there is no denying the obvious similarities.  I think it's also important to note that dinosaur skeletons are rarely ever found completely intact.  Modern depictions of dinosaurs are artists interpretations based partially on fossil evidence, and partially on guesswork.  With that in mind, there may be even more similarities than previously thought.

So where did the ancients come up with their ideas of dragons?  Are they the result of some ancient psychic having visions of the earth's distant past?  Or could people have seen 'ghosts' of dinosaurs, like a type of residual haunting?  Or could it be that ancient people found dinosaur skeletons and tried to visualize what they may have looked like (much like how modern artists try to visualize what they looked like based on scientific descriptions)?  Or is it just a mere coincidence that depictions of dragons just so happen to resemble depictions of dinosaurs?  Or could it be that humans and some dinosaurs did coexist at the same time?

Some people think that dinosaurs and humans not only coexisted at the same time, but that certain types of dinosaurs still exist today.  Some people have speculated that the Loch Ness monster and Champ may be plesiosaurs.  Chessie of the Chesapeake Bay is said to be a long serpent like creature, which some some have speculated might be a zeuglodon.

Of course, it's not known whether those sea serpents actually exist, much less if they are dinosaurs that survived extinction.  However, stories of dinosaurs surviving extinction are not limited to aquatic dinosaurs.  The Mokele-mbembe is allegedly a type of sauropod that lives in remote areas of the Congo today.  The term Mokele-mbembe translates to "one who stops the flow of water," because apparently the Mokele-mbembe is so large it can get into a river and stop the flow of water.   A handful of westerners have claimed to see the animal, and when locals of the region are shown pictures of animals known to exist in the region, they are able to identify them; when they are shown animals not native to the region, they draw a blank; when shown pictures of sauropods, they identify them as Mokele-mbembe (Although, according to the Wikipedia entry on the subject, a BBC documentary interviewed some tribe members who identified the Mokele-mbembe as a rhinoceros.  So I guess it may depend on which local you ask).  And it is not a situation where they are confusing the picture of a sauropod with a smaller sized reptile, because they are clear that the Mokele-mbembe is very large, and the name itself suggests that it is very large.

So what are the odds that some large sauropods could have survived extinction and still roam the earth in remote areas?  I don't know what the odds are, but it may be important to emphasize that the regions these animals supposedly inhabit are very remote.  We may have satellites and have charted the whole planet, but there are still plenty of places in the world that are rarely visited by people.  There are monuments in the Amazon that modern archaeologists have not excavated (not yet, anyway).  It's known that these monuments are there because they can be seen from an airplane.  But those monuments stay still.  They don't go anywhere.  A 'Mokele-mbembe' - whatever it is - can move around. So while there may be satellite images of the Congo and western investigators may have traipsed through the jungles at various times, the entire Congo is not under constant surveillance.  

Some people have also claimed to see pterosaurs flying through the sky.  There are also stories of flying serpents, which may or may not fit the description of what a dragon is.  A sighting of a flying serpent isn't necessarily paranormal though, as is it known that some snakes have the ability to glide through the air.  However, I doubt a small snake gliding through the air would be mistaken for a large dragon.

So is it possible that some dinosaurs survived extinction and still exist today?  Well, it's not only possible, it's true.  For anyone who doesn't believe that, I would recommend you go to the local zoo and look for an animal known as the 'crocodile'.  Crocodiles walked the earth with the Tyranosaurus Rex, and they still walk the earth today.  The Tuatara lizard also walked with dinosaurs.  Turtles lived with dinosaurs.  The coelacanth was once thought to be a prehistoric fish that had gone extinct, that is, until they found some living ones.  Certain types of insects, such as a grasshoppers and cockroaches, walked with dinosaurs too.  All of these animals look the same now as they did in the past.  All of these animals survived the dinosaur extinction.  Bugs, turtles, fish, and small lizards might not be dinosaurs, but crocodiles are.  Crocodiles are not the largest type of dinosaur, nor are they the smallest.  They are dinosaurs in every sense of the word.  They not only lived at the same time T-Rex's lived, but they are clearly large reptiles.  If you factor in their aggressive nature, the term 'terrible lizard' (which, of course, is what the word 'dinosaur' means) could be a fitting description.

So if crocodiles still exist, why not another type of dinosaur?  Could dinosaurs be the inspiration for dragons?  Could the dragons that the Chinese people revere have been some type of dinosaur that their ancestors had seen?  Could a dinosaur sighting have turned into a local tradition, which in turn spread to other communities, which eventually lead to a widespread tradition? Could a similar sighting somewhere else have produced similar results in other cultures around the world?

Something to ponder, I suppose.