Gobekli Tepe

Discussion in 'Science' started by historycircus, Oct 10, 2010.

  1. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Sadly, I've never had the budget for much travel outside of the western hemisphere. Visiting relatives in England is about the extent of it, and that was only when fairly young.
     
  2. teeceemv

    teeceemv New Member

    Joined:
    Jul 6, 2010
    Messages:
    1,115
    Likes Received:
    17
    Trophy Points:
    0

    You make all valid points. And I understand every one of them. I am talking about what we KNOW based on written accounts or legend passed down through generations.

    To say they may have been far more advanced than we believed, flies in the face of logic. You say they could have been far more advanced than we believe, yet there is no evidence of that. I say something else was at work here, and you object to that because there is no evidence to support that.

    Neither of us have evidence to support our beliefs, so our suppositions are equal in all aspects.
     
  3. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    The more exceptional the claim, the more evidence required to support it. The claim that "they perhaps had more mathematical knowledge than we admit" is not a particularly exceptional claim--we know that most of these societies did have reasonably sophisticated understanding of math, because virtually all of them were obsessed with astronomy and lining up structures for astrological significance. The claim that space aliens or god or whatever came down from the sky and used their tractor beams to levitate the rocks, or other similarly ludicrous supernatural explanations, are much more far fetched than the idea that we underestimate their precise degree of mathematical knowledge. After all, even the archeologists admit that much of a societies writing, culture, and knowledge gets lost over the years.

    For an example of this, consider the construction of free standing domes during the renaissance. The techniques for constructing free standing domes out of poured concrete were known by the Romans, but this knowledge was long since lost by the middle ages. Engineers at the start of the renaissance knew that these domes were possible to construct--they'd seen what the ancients did, because some examples did survive into the 15th century. What they didn't know was how they did it, because the knowledge had been lost. The knowledge of how to build free standing domes had to be reinvented; and the renaissance method was quite different from the original Roman method (not the least because they lost the recipe for concrete...). In the same way, we know that these people had a method of constructing megalithic structures, even if that seems impossible to us today. The technique, like the technique for constructing free standing domes, was forgotten. This doesn't mean that suddenly mundane but only loosely supported propositions are just as valid as fantastic answers to the question. Claiming that these structures are so impossible it must require a supernatural explanation is just as silly as proposing that the Romans used magic to pour a free standing dome.
     
  4. teeceemv

    teeceemv New Member

    Joined:
    Jul 6, 2010
    Messages:
    1,115
    Likes Received:
    17
    Trophy Points:
    0
    You keep mentioning aliens, as if I had somehow said they were involved. Why? I never made any mention of aliens. Only you have.

    We know the level of technology of the Egyptians. It is well written.

    We know the builders of Puma Punku are UNKNOWN. They are not known to any existing peoples in the area. They were a pre-Inca people. The largest stones weighing up to a couple hundred TONS were transported there... from 10 km away, 13,000 ft altitude. The remainder were quarried 90 km away. There is no known written language of any known peoples at the time the site was supposedly built. The wheel was not known to exist at the time of construction, and there were no trees for miles. The stone was cut with incredible intricacy and used "cramps" to secure stones together. These cramps were made of an unusual alloy and the molten alloy was "poured" directly into the sockets.

    Gobekli Tepi was also built by an unknown people for an unknown purpose. It is estimated to be at least 11,000 years old. We are supposed to believe that it was built by "hunter gatherers". Neolithic people who wander around searching for food. Yet they have the skills to quarry, transport, and carve 7 ton blocks of stone.

    One has to ask how these people did this, and why the hell did they invest such incredible cost and effort to complete. WHERE IS THE PROOF OF THAT?

    If they used lost technology, then we are talking about an immensely different history than the one we have been taught. And a human history that is far far older than we have ever believed possible. WHERE IS THE PROOF OF THAT?

    How and why have never been proven. And yet you seem eager to criticize others who question the mainstream explanation. Not very scientific of you, is it.

    Now, where did I ever mention aliens?
     
  5. injest

    injest New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,266
    Likes Received:
    204
    Trophy Points:
    0
    didn't I read that the New World didn't have the wheel when it was 'discovered'??

    it is VERY interesting to me to speculate on how and why. What I wonder is this: current theories say that human civilization evolved in a fairly straightforward line from primitive to modern, with an occassional dip here and there...civilizations rise and fall but overall, the human race has steadily advanced...WE think WE are the most advanced civilization that has ever appeared on this planet and that our descendents will be more advanced than we are but maybe that isn't true.

    Maybe history isn't quite so clear cut. Maybe we AREN'T the most advanced people that have ever evolved on this planet.. Maybe some time in the past a civilization as advanced or more DID evolve and DID fall for whatever reasons and all those stories of Atlantis are just primal memories?

    just something interesting (to me at least) to consider...and if it happened to them..it could happen to us. There is no guarantee that we won't experience a cataclysmic (sp) event that will erase most of the traces of our existance from the earth.

    We don't know, it could have happened a dozen times..humans reaching high levels and then falling back to primitives again.
     
  6. Someone

    Someone New Member

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2010
    Messages:
    7,780
    Likes Received:
    84
    Trophy Points:
    0
    We say they didn't have the wheel because we haven't found evidence that they used them. On the other hand, if they were moving huge blocks, it's pretty (*)(*)(*)(*)ed obvious they did have at least log rollers among their collection of tools. Certainly more likely than tractor beams, cranes, bulldozers, or whatever 'ancient technology' people want to propose. There's really no way to construct something in the mountains with stones larger than a few hundred pounds without wheels or log rollers. Logistically it's just not possible.

    I guess if you characterize devastating losses of culture, art, and technological knowledge as 'occasional dips'. Development of human societies has been along multiple concurrent paths, some taking huge declines, others rising. The general tendency has been towards modern civilization, but that's not to say that all societies have evenly progressed along one technological line largely uninterrupted. The medieval European dark ages weren't the only dark ages in human history.

    That said, we'd still find evidence of cranes and other technology if they'd had them way back when. It's far less controversial to place log rollers among the list of technologies in the new world than to say that some bit of decorative art means they had airplanes and spaceships.

    We've never found even one fragment of an 'ancient crane', nor any real evidence suggesting high technology.

    It is and always was a myth. Plato created Atlantis as a philosophical statement about government and power, not an actual testament to the truth of what happened. The truth is that an actual ancient technological civilization would have left behind at least some fragmentary clues as to their existence. That's not present in the historical or archeological record. Neither is it possible they were creating one-off examples of high technology, because often these early societies show no evidence of modern social organization, nor evidence of advanced materials science. Why on earth would these societies focus on building cranes and airplanes and whatnot if they can't even build a mud brick hut safely? The very first thing people turn to when they get some technology is making their life easier, then the focus on going to war with it. We've found evidence of neither. This lack of evidence for basic, foundational technology almost certainly precludes the possibility of more advanced examples of machinery. There's no way that people limited to, for example, bronze forging were going to be able to create a usable crane capable of lifting multi-ton blocks. While yes, steel was produced by roughly 1500 BC (with some limited evidence of earlier production), it certainly wasn't used for much other than weapons. We do not find examples of steel bolts, nuts, nails, beams, cast steel machine parts, or any other uses of it. One lone steel valve would be enough to totally validate the possibility, but there's never been any evidence of that.

    These are the same sort of people who had their entire world revolutionized by things like an archemedes screw--that wasn't going to happen if they had enough knowledge of hydraulics to power cranes capable of lifting megalithic stones.

    Any event that would wipe all trace of modern society off the face of the earth--every fragment of plastic, every shaped piece of steel, every titanium valve on an airplane--would be so devastating that it would be recent and in the geological record, and completely global. It would almost certainly wipe out human beings as a whole. We're talking mass destruction on the order of a large asteroid strike.

    Any cataclysm that would destroy all record of modern society would only do so because it would leave such massive record of itself.
     
  7. injest

    injest New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,266
    Likes Received:
    204
    Trophy Points:
    0
    log rollers are not wheels, and I never said they didn't...I asked the question, chill a bit, please! We aren't talking abortion or gay rights here...can't we be civil for THIS at least?

    who said anything about spaceships? are we even discussing the same thing? are you in the wrong thread or am I?

    you have never heard of out of place artifacts?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Out-of-place_artifact

    not saying they are all real; although some have been proven to be true artifacts..for example the Antikythera mechanism, a computer built in 100 BC..

    you can't prove a negative, just like we didnt' know about Gobekli Tepe til now, there may be more artifacts laying around we haven't discovered. Conventional wisdom said Stone Henge was the most ancient site too before this one was found..

    and in a few thousand years, all traces would be wiped out too...we KNOW that there have been cataclysmic events in Earth's history. The people that made Gobekli Tepe could have been the last surviving members of that group of people. Evidence seems to show that the more recent artifacts are the most primitive and as they find older ones, they are more refined and show more skill...which would indicate that the civilization was in serious decline...

    like I said, just something interesting to think about...but that's just me, feel free to ignore the idea but I see no reason to be snippy about it.

    how do YOU explain ancient buildings?
     
  8. injest

    injest New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,266
    Likes Received:
    204
    Trophy Points:
    0

    apparently we aren't supposed to think or speculate, we should simply sit like children and wait for 'them' to tell us what to think...

    :omg:

    any deviation from official rulings are NOT allowed!
     
  9. injest

    injest New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,266
    Likes Received:
    204
    Trophy Points:
    0
    nowhere...he is apparently responding to the voices in his head...

    when did "they perhaps had more mathematical knowledge than we admit" become a "claim"? perhaps means maybe...it isn't a statement of fact.

    "they perhaps had more mathematical knowledge than we admit"

    and

    "they had more mathematical knowledge than we admit"

    are NOT the same sentence nor do they mean the same.
     
  10. injest

    injest New Member

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2011
    Messages:
    4,266
    Likes Received:
    204
    Trophy Points:
    0
    and one other thing...how very egocentric of you to think that any advanced civilization as great or greater than ours must be exactly like ours and use the same materials and techniques? You yourself evoke the concept that the same idea (domes) can be achieved by different materials and methods..why do you think an advanced civilization would HAVE to have plastic and titanium?
     
  11. teeceemv

    teeceemv New Member

    Joined:
    Jul 6, 2010
    Messages:
    1,115
    Likes Received:
    17
    Trophy Points:
    0

    A WINNER!!!!

    That's where I was going with this! I wanted to see if anyone would come to that conclusion, but alas, aliens were the best someone could do prior to this post (not that I would dismiss that possibility either).

    Clearly man did not develop in a linear fashion, and DNA evidence presents some serious questions about our so-called evolution. But it would appear WE are not the most advanced humans to inhabit the Earth. Year after year it seems that archaeologists push mans history back further and further.
     
  12. Margot

    Margot Account closed, not banned

    Joined:
    Oct 23, 2010
    Messages:
    62,072
    Likes Received:
    345
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Fyi.........
     
  13. Margot

    Margot Account closed, not banned

    Joined:
    Oct 23, 2010
    Messages:
    62,072
    Likes Received:
    345
    Trophy Points:
    0
    Göbekli Tepe is a Neolithic (stone-age) hilltop sanctuary erected at the top of a mountain ridge in southeastern Turkey, some 15 kilometers (9 mi) northeast of the town of Şanlıurfa (formerly Urfa / Edessa). It is the oldest human-made religious structure yet discovered.

    The site, having been under excavation since 1994, by German and Turkish archaeologists, was most likely erected by hunter-gatherers in the 10th millennium BCE (c. 12,000 years ago). Together with Nevalı Çori, it has revolutionized understanding of the Eurasian Neolithic.
     
  14. Margot

    Margot Account closed, not banned

    Joined:
    Oct 23, 2010
    Messages:
    62,072
    Likes Received:
    345
    Trophy Points:
    0
  15. Margot2

    Margot2 Banned

    Joined:
    Sep 9, 2013
    Messages:
    73,644
    Likes Received:
    13,766
    Trophy Points:
    113
    FYI......................
     
  16. Margot2

    Margot2 Banned

    Joined:
    Sep 9, 2013
    Messages:
    73,644
    Likes Received:
    13,766
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Wheels weren't very effective in desert sand, but they did use the wheel for grinding grains and for lifting well water for irrigation.
     
  17. Gelecski7238

    Gelecski7238 Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Aug 26, 2012
    Messages:
    1,592
    Likes Received:
    196
    Trophy Points:
    63
    Gender:
    Male
    Yes it is present, but the technology was not thoroughly distributed throughout the populations of numerous civilizations and thus was seldom historically obvious. It was possessed by some who had special privileges and powers. For example, the evidence includes descriptions of vimadas, skeletons of victims that are radioactive, and vitrified rock dwellings.

    You have not followed the investigations of Allen Dunn (if I have the first name correct). For example, symmetry and surfaces of Egyptian statues made of hard granite show evidence of production by exceptional high-tech machinery that is beyond the practical capability of present technology. The scoring patterns in holes bored in granite offer a similar kind of daunting challenge.

    Some megalithic stone walls are so intricately shaped and well-fitted as to suggest that the stones were softened and molded into interlocking joints. Then look at the ruins of Pumo Punku where the blocks have astounding cuts and insert accommodations that we can hardly begin to duplicate.
     
  18. BoDiddly

    BoDiddly Member

    Joined:
    Jan 13, 2015
    Messages:
    824
    Likes Received:
    5
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Dude, do you even Graham Hancock?
     
  19. Gelecski7238

    Gelecski7238 Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Aug 26, 2012
    Messages:
    1,592
    Likes Received:
    196
    Trophy Points:
    63
    Gender:
    Male
    Info: The correct name is Christopher Dunn, not Allen Dunn.
     
  20. Grey Matter

    Grey Matter Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    Feb 15, 2020
    Messages:
    4,400
    Likes Received:
    2,578
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
  21. Moi621

    Moi621 Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jul 13, 2013
    Messages:
    19,292
    Likes Received:
    7,606
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    What was happening in China at the same time?
    Let alone England or the major River Valleys, Nile,
    Indus, Amazon, Yellow, etc. oops and Mississippi too
     
    Last edited: Jun 26, 2020
  22. One Mind

    One Mind Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2014
    Messages:
    20,296
    Likes Received:
    7,744
    Trophy Points:
    113
    According to the anthropology that I was taught in the 70s Gobekli Tepe should not exist given its date. Yet it does and has changed some theory that was as concrete as evolution. Or so the experts thought.

    I wonder why this massive structure was buried?

    If earlier advanced civilization existed prior to ice age sheets melting any on coasts would be under water now.

    IMO there is still much to be learned about our history . And we thought we had it all figured out !
     
    modernpaladin likes this.
  23. An Taibhse

    An Taibhse Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2016
    Messages:
    7,238
    Likes Received:
    4,819
    Trophy Points:
    113
    People have lived using primitive ‘techniques’ for thousands of years and some of the their methods and materials are quite ingeniously simple and many of those skills are still used in parts of the world such as India, China, SE Asia, S America and elsewhere. Wonder how ancients moved huge monolithic stones like those of Stonehenge?
    [video][/video]
    While staying in Alaska, I helped a friend construct a large log Cabin A-Frame structure with some of the logs we move weighing more than a ton using just rope, log levers, understanding of the principles of mechanical force, balance and pivot points, and simple devices like the flip flop windlass or a simple Spanish windlass (devices used for millennia). I learned how it could be done with very few modern tools. Moving large logs. How about a simple primitive wench. They are deceptively easy to make with materials at hand. Then raising large logs up on walls? History is full of examples of individuals that built log cabin houses with little more than an ax and an understanding of gravity. Need to lift a heavy weight? Learn how to quickly make a simple A-Frame wench.
    One technique similar to one we used to move large sections of logs (worth understanding... might come in handy).
    [video][/video]
    Wondering how to cut large stones?
    [video][/Video] Polishing the sides then becomes a simple matter of stone chisels, patient pulverization with stone on stone and abrasion with water and sand. Also, another technique I have seen was the use of wooden wedges that when soaked with water expand and create enough force to cleve massive stones in a highly controlled manner. Romans, who learned from others, developed block cutting methods with water wheels, rope and sand, that could cut thin veneer marble slabs (discarded unfinished examples still exist) but it could have been done with pure manpower and time.
    When folks claim lost knowledge, it usually means lost to them, not to human kind... they just haven’t looked about to see who is still using ‘primitive’ methods. Every such claim I have seen proffered as unexplainable, is not unexplainable. Wanna see how the Egyptian pyramids were laid out with precision, or the massive blocks were quarried, shaped, polished with stone, copper, primitive wenches, a-frame cranes, hand powered drills with rock bit and sand and then moved? Go to Visit them in Egypt, there are demonstrations how all of these tasks were accomplished periodically for the tourists on site. The demonstrations are as impressive as the pyramids themselves.
     
    modernpaladin likes this.
  24. modernpaladin

    modernpaladin Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Apr 23, 2017
    Messages:
    27,696
    Likes Received:
    21,097
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    I read (listened to) a book that went over several major archaeological sites (advanced settlements) currently under the ocean and largely unstudied. I remember one was off the cost of Japan and a few more off the coast of India. The author posed the same notion you did- that the history of civilization is far older than we think, its just all flooded now by the melting of the last major ice age.

    I wish I could remember the author and title...
     
    Last edited: Jun 27, 2020
  25. One Mind

    One Mind Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2014
    Messages:
    20,296
    Likes Received:
    7,744
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Sounds like Hancock.
     

Share This Page