The thing you're missing here is that the automakers have spent billions upon untold billions of dollars lobbying politicians and on PR campaigns targeted at the public to convince people that literally the ONLY way American cities could possibly exist is in a form that is utterly dependent upon the automobile.
Transit ridership in the US was higher in the 1950s than it is today and it was the automakers that killed public transit. They literally bought up popular and profitable public transit companies just to shut them down so people would be forced to drive.
The problem isn't "Consumerism" it's a culture of car dependency that's largely the result of intentional action on the part of the automakers to grow and protect their profits.
The reason there's so much auto loan debt in the US is people literally HAVE TO OWN a car just to get to work to support their families in the vast majority of US towns and cities. People don't want to go into debt just so they can buy some shitty fucking KIA so they can sit in traffic for two+ hours a day so they can get to one of their three minimum wage jobs, but when the alternative is being unemployed and homeless, a lot of folks will do what they have to do to provide for themselves and their families.
And there are literally thousands of times more examples of oral histories not matching historical events. A broken clock is right twice a day, but that doesn't mean we should rely upon it for timekeeping.
I would argue its actually been those "People in question" who are one of the primary barriers to the acceptance of the growing body of evidence that the Americas were peopled earlier than previously thought.
The issue is that there is clear genetic evidence that the current indigenous population of the Americas arrived onto the continents around 14KYA-15KYA, and all their various land claims and special rights / privileges fundamentally derive from the argument that "They were here first."
Whoever the people leaving footprints at White Sands were, the genetic evidence is clear that they weren't the ancestors of North America's current indigenous population. They were a genetically distinct people group (My suspicion is they would have been more closely related to Australian Aborigines) and are in fact the ones "Who were here first." Accepting that there were already people in the Americas when the current indigenous population arrived, would undermine the land claims of the current North American indigenous populations, and would force them to reckon with the fact they too are colonizers / settlers who displaced an earlier population, likely through violence and possibly even outright genocide, as apart from some isolated groups in the Amazon, there's no genetic evidence the current indigenous population of the Americas meaningfully intermixed with any other populations once they arrived onto the continent as we would expect were the existing population absorbed into the new population through interbreeding.
This is in large part why so many indigenous groups are adamantly opposed to participating in genetics studies, or allowing archaeologists to conduct digs in their "Traditional territories" as a great many indigenous groups actually have "Oral traditions" that there were already people in the Americas when their ancestors arrived, and they know that further study will contradict the narrative that "They were here first," and could eventually invalidate their "Blood and soil" based land claims.
I'd be a lot more into Framework if they had come out with a single other GPU option than the Radeon 7700S that's been the only GPU option available since the brands launch. The 7800M and 7900M have both been out over a year or more, and Framework has made zero mention of when or even if those models would ever be available as upgrades for Framework devices. I don't even really play games, but for my video editing workloads, more GPU cores and VRAM make a world of difference, and the RTX 3070 level of performance out of the RX7700s that's thus far the only GPU option for Framework devices just doesn't cut it. There's just no way I'm spending $2500+ USD for a laptop that has worse performance than devices costing half as much at this point.
They just aren't really delivering on the promise of "Future upgradeability" in any kind of meaningful way so far, and I just can't see the value in purchasing what's undeniably a wildly overpriced machine based on promises that have yet to be delivered upon. They've had plenty of time to communicate when, or even if, new GPUs are coming, yet there's been absolute radio silence from the on this front.
Personally I think they need to focus more on actually delivering on the fundamental promise of the brand, that being future upgradeability, than on releasing new devices, as until they can demonstrate they are committed to delivering on their promises, I won't be buying any of their devices.
At the time when the fields in this article were being tilled, the Europeans were building castles, cathedrals, river spanning arched stone bridges, multi-masted sailing ships and trebuchets and massive siege engines using tools of iron and steel. People in middle east were already working with colored glass and people in China were already working with porcelain, gunpowder and early printing presses. A thousand years or more before that, the Greeks were already working with complex geared mechanisms and making things like the Antikythera mechanism and proto steam turbines. The people tilling these fields on the other hand were using relatively simple stone, bone and wooden tools, and hadn't even invented the wheel yet.
While I appreciate the point you're trying to make that native Americans weren't some kind of savages as they were all too frequently portrayed in the past, the notion that their level of technological or societal development was anywhere near that of Europe, the Middle East or China at the time does not reflect actual history. Relatively speaking, outside the empires of Meso-America most pre-contact American societies were substantially less complex that European societies, and from a purely technological perspective every single American society ever documented was vastly less technologically complex than European, Middle Eastern and East Asian societies. So from that lens its not unreasonable for the Europeans of the time to have perceived the native Americans as less socially and technologically advanced as they were, as that was simply the reality of world at the time.
Also, any historian with any knowledge of actual pre-contact North American societies can tell you they too were subjugating and killing any other populations they encountered just as much as the Europeans did when they arrived on the continent. The notion that native societies lived some kind of eco-friendly, conflict free lifestyle is just as egregious of whitewashing as any former settler narratives.
As someone who's long dreamed of owning a robotic camera control arm, but who doesn't have a spare $50K kicking around to buy one, I've been following the development of these kinds of projects with great interest. While this particular arm doesn't look like it would have enough payload capacity or smooth enough motion for the use cases I have in mind, the fact its a couple hundred bucks means something that does what I need it to do for an actually affordable price isn't likely too far off.
The class war was won decades ago, we're only just now starting to realize it.
The people at the top control literally everything, and they run the world like a gated community, with only those with the proper "Credentials" even being able to get a foot in the door. That foot in the door guarantees you nothing though, only a chance to prove your use to the true masters, who will keep you around and let you hang out in their gated Edens only so long as you continue to be useful to them by making them money.
So how does one get these "Credentials" you might ask? Well, you could be exceptionally talented, absolutely bust your ass in school to get the right degree, and then work like a dog for a decade or more for an at best marginal chance of being let into the club, or as is depressingly the de facto standard, the credentials are stamped onto you at birth if you're lucky enough to be borne into a wealthy and connected family.
The whole goddamn world is a rigged carnival game at this point, with a very small cadre of very wealthy folks setting the rules and for the most part getting to decide who's even allowed to play. If you're very, very, VERY lucky, you might get one ball, and get your chance at a prize, but even then there's a lot more folks who take their shot and lose than their are that win, and the true luxury of the wealthy and connected, is the freedom to take as many shots as it takes until they finally hit a winner.
Damn some of the comments here are really depressing. I'd formerly thought HN was one of the last bastions of critical thought on internet, but I guess I was wrong judging by some of these comments. Way too much regurgitation of long-since debunked pseudo-scientific nonsense.
Atlantis was never real and anyone who thinks it was is a moron.
If there were truly some sort of globe-spanning advanced civilization existing ~11KYA we'd have found at least one single piece of their material culture by now, but we haven't. We have however found innumerable pieces of archaeological evidence of contemporary hunter-gatherer neolithic societies in and around all of the places Atlantis was supposed to have "Conquered" and yet not once have we found a single Atlantean trade good, pot sherd, metal working, etc. Atlantis supposedly had a bronze-age or greater level of technology and a globe-spanning empire, and we literally haven't found a single shred of physical evidence to support its existence, despite having literal mountains of physical evidence for pretty much every other major empire that's existed throughout history.
Nor have we found any genetic evidence in people or crops that there was any kind of "Empire" connecting parts of Europe or Africa as we find time and time again with real empires that actually existed in prehistory. Real empires have people and crops that move around within the empire and leave genetic evidence of the mixing of populations and breeding of crops, yet we find nothing, not even the faintest echo of Atlantis. Again, we have mountains of hard physical evidence that shows how empires like the Summerians in the fertile crescent or the Norte Chico in meso-america spread through genetic evidence in current local populations and crops, yet we find absolutely no genetic evidence to support the existence of Atlantis.
Let alone the fact the bloody story of Atlantis references how the Atlanteans went to war with Athens some 9000 years before the Athenian city-state was even founded. Just utter, complete brain-dead nonsense.
Honestly, belief in Atlantis has become something a litmus-test for critical thinking and research ability these days, as anyone that believes in Atlantis despite the overwhelming volume of evidence that firmly proves it never existed is basically saying "I'm too lazy to do my own research (Based on peer-reviewed primary sources) and / or too stupid to understand actual science."
Also f*ck Graham Hancock (And Joe Rogan via extension). MFer is the worst kind of charlatan and is broadly responsible for how many Americans believe in Atlantis.
"If there were truly some sort of globe-spanning advanced civilization existing ~11KYA we'd have found at least one single piece of their material culture by now, but we haven't."
What about Gobekli Tepe?
"Nor have we found any genetic evidence in people or crops that there was any kind of "Empire" connecting parts of Europe or Africa as we find time and time again with real empires that actually existed in prehistory."
Wouldn't Europe have been mostly tundra/ice that long ago?
Also, what about this article (not Europe, but other global implications), do you dispute it specifically?
You seem to be really upset (and frankly insulting) at the prospect of people being curious about the idea that we don't know everything about our history yet. There is a very wide gap between believing a theory is true or being certain its not true, and that gap is the humility to accept we aren't sure yet and there is room to be surprised.
Skepticism is healthy, but why be dismissive of peoples' interest to consider or search for new evidence? What exactly is the risk? Isn't it more risky to stop developing the science and pursuing the truth? Is this really about scientific rigor, or do you have some reason to want there not to have been more developed civilizations pre-younger dryas than we previously thought existed? What's the harm to you in other people asking these questions and going out and trying to answer them?
>You seem to be really upset (and frankly insulting) at the prospect of people being curious about the idea that we don't know everything about our history yet.
Scientific Curiosity should never involve insisting something exists without evidence or any intention of looking for it.
This is where hancocks people always fall back to. Science just isnt "Imaginitive" enough to give enough time to their theories. Whereas you meet any scientist in the field and they will tell you how 3 broken pots and a pile of bones translates into an amazing civilisation. I dont think archeologists could survive being even 1 iota more imaginative.
>Skepticism is healthy, but why be dismissive of peoples' interest to consider or search for new evidence?
They should search for that evidence instead of writing 20 books, some of them DEEEPLY racist, demanding other people search for that evidence on their behalf.
>Isn't it more risky to stop developing the science and pursuing the truth?
There are tons of people in the field right now developing the science and pursuing the truth.
>do you have some reason to want there not to have been more developed civilizations pre-younger dryas than we previously thought existed? What's the harm to you in other people asking these questions and going out and trying to answer them?
The person trying to force a narrative on history is Hancock. The danger is that he doesn't hypothesize, he instructs his legion of morons that his word is the truth and they need to buy more of his books to discover said truth.
Okay, I get it. You really don't like Hancock and you think he's racist.
I was trying to have a dialog about the actual evidence of the theory that the Richat structure could have been home to an advanced civilization that was wiped out in a flood ~12-13,000 years ago.
Here is what interests me:
- What evidence supports the theory, what evidence falsifies the theory
- If it's inconclusive, what kind of evidence would we need to find to either prove of falsify, and where would we look for it.
Because you have dragged in Hancock and his "people" (whatever that means) into this, I find it really hard to have a constructive dialog with you about the actual evidence and theory. Do you have any interest in setting aside the big fat red herring?
Here goes my best effort:
"There are tons of people in the field right now developing the science and pursuing the truth."
There are tons of people pursuing archeological excavations of the Richat structure? If not, then what novel theories are the archeology community pursuing?
"Scientific Curiosity should never involve insisting something exists without evidence or any intention of looking for it."
I am not doing that, and you are responding to me. I am asking about a theory and what evidence proves or disproves it. All science starts with observations and theories. My intention was to have a respectful dialog about the topic of the article, hoping I might learn something.
"In science, a theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world, based on a body of facts that have been repeatedly confirmed through observation and experiment"
Your idea, your concept, is that there's some huge missing gap in history. You haven't met the standard to expect other people to go and investigate things for you. You are free to take your idea, and go and seek approval to dig up the richat structure.
>what evidence falsifies the theory
No evidence falsifies the theory. First there isn't a theory, but second, the capital of atlantis will simply move somewhere else when evidence fails to be located.
>I find it really hard to have a constructive dialog with you about the actual evidence and theory
The chief proponents of the idea, are kind of relevant. They have 20 years or so of history, moving the goal posts all over the planet. Realistically, you should be looking at it like this:
1. Is there evidence to support your claims, if not, why not.
2. Is there evidence to support your intended course of action, if not, why not.
3. Go and find 2, and then seek 1.
I mean we have seen 1 and 2 unravel before you in this comment section. Theres no geologically sound "mud flood" or impact event that would explain why theres no evidence in the richat structure. Theres no visible evidence of atlantean civilisation in the Richat structure. Why do you expect some other person to go do labor when they have no reasonable expectation of results? Its hard enough for archeologists to get permits to dig where they have a reasonable expectation of findings. Putting down digs in the middle of the desert without a single reason to do so seems mad right? Its like asking a physicist to test gravity in the richat structure just in case it works differently there. Or a chemist to double check the atomic weight of helium on alternate tuesdays. If you are burdened with the glorious imagination that will free us from the shackles of incorrect history, why wouldnt you put that amazing talent to work yourself?
What about it? It's one of the oldest Neolithic settlements we've identified, but otherwise, it's not particularly unusual within our understanding of Neolithic Mesopotamia.
When GP is talking about "material culture", they're (probably) referring to the archaeological definition of culture, which means you need to give an explanation as to what makes an artifact indicative of belonging to a culture. The shape of an arrowhead perhaps, or maybe the kind of style used in painting pottery. Something that lets an archaeologist dig something up and go "aha, this is culture X!" Age isn't one of those characteristics.
But of course the province of pseudoarchaeology is to come up with a theory and work everything into evidence for that theory. Atlantis is old, Göbleki Tepe is old, therefore Göbleki Tepe is Atlantean!
> Skepticism is healthy, but why be dismissive of peoples' interest to consider or search for new evidence? What exactly is the risk?
Most of the people that tend to propose these theories aren't interested in searching for evidence. See for example, Graham Hancock, who has been peddling the same theory for 30 years and has done nothing to actually produce better evidence for it except to whine that mainstream archaeologists don't want to listen to him because they're stuck in their own stupid ways. (Of course, in that same time, mainstream archaeology has thoroughly demolished the Clovis-First hypothesis which was previously disfavored, precisely because the pre-Clovis adherents actually did the legwork to produce better evidence to make it more accepted!) You can also see this with archaeoastronomy, which is borderline fringe--its better practitioners have made some success by listening to the criticisms and persevering in efforts to get better, stronger evidence to buttress their claims. As a basic rule of thumb, if someone's response to criticism is to chide scientists for being rigid in their thinking rather than going out to try to get better evidence, then that's a strong sign they're engaged in pseudoscience and not science.
As for the risk, a lot of these theories bear a deep legacy of overt racism just begin their skin; they've historically been used to devalue the abilities of the people who've made them (e.g., Great Zimbabwe). Nowadays, they've been modified to edit out the basic message of "white people taught everybody how to civilization," so it's no longer quite as overt as their late 19th century ancestors... but you can still see the lingering traces of it in "an ancient civilization taught everybody how to civilization."
There is so much about your comment here that I appreciate (similar to your other reply to me). Thank you.
I wish I had time right now to thoughtfully ask a couple questions I have, but it will have to wait.
I am compelled to squeeze this in:
"As for the risk, a lot of these theories bear a deep legacy of overt racism just begin their skin; they've historically been used to devalue the abilities of the people who've made them (e.g., Great Zimbabwe). Nowadays, they've been modified to edit out the basic message of "white people taught everybody how to civilization," so it's no longer quite as overt as their late 19th century ancestors... but you can still see the lingering traces of it in "an ancient civilization taught everybody how to civilization.""
- Wow! Holy cow, I had no idea, and this hadn't remotely crossed my mind. If anything, I would have thought the opposite. (that evidence of incredible achievements by ancient civilizations would diminish [relatively] the achievements of modern ones).
So I read up on what you are saying and some of Hancock's past work, and I see how the theory could be seen as diminishing the accomplishments of indigenous cultures or denying their own capacity for innovation.
Prior to today, I hadn't read any of Graham Hancock's work and have no attachment to him or his theory.
I was under the impression that the younger dryas impact hypothesis was accepted by Geology (I actually learned from this thread that it's not). If one is to assume that the younger dryas was caused by cataclysmic meteorite impacts, then the idea that an ancient civilization was wiped out in said cataclysm seems plausible and triggered my curiosity.
Given that the impact hypothesis hasn't reached the burden of proof, then I am not sure what to make of it.
That said, I don't appreciate any implication that just because someone is interested in evidence of undiscovered pre younger dryas civilizations they are racist. Not speaking of Hancock specifically, but I would appreciate being able to have a conversation about the evidence without feeling like someone is implying I am racist because I am interested in it. (Keep in mind I wasn't the one who brought up Hancock)
What gets my goat, quite substantially, is that I love bad history/archeology in terms of fiction.
Like Howard and Lovecraft among others, loved this sort of stuff. "What if theres an entire missing age where heroes roamed around doing cool shit" yeah bro what if that shit rules.
They formed a lot of their worldview based on books that were already being discredited in their time. But its still amazing fiction.
The problem largely seems that people cant let it live in fiction.
>then the idea that an ancient civilization was wiped out in said cataclysm seems plausible and triggered my curiosity.
Yeah thats how they get you. It activates the neurons. That said, it would have had to atomise a lot of their society to prevent detection.
>That said, I don't appreciate any implication that just because someone is interested in evidence of undiscovered pre younger dryas civilizations they are racist.
The problem is that, since around the 1950s we have had pretty much perfect knowledge of the planet. Small notes of our understanding can change but we have been almost everywhere and done almost everything. Its really sad but its a fact.
There are really 2 strands of archaeology denial.
1. "I really wish there was more to explore, so I am going to make it up\become heavily invested in a made up history"
2. "I dont think those people could have discovered stacking rocks without help"
1. Can be fine in fiction, but 2. is just gross tbh. And terribly, the people in group 1, are largely basing their understanding on work done by group 2. Its hard to overstate how frequently racist nonsense is bubbling just underneath this.
So while yeah, you might resent the implication by some commenters that you are in some way racist, the fault lies largely with the fact that you are standing, possibly blindfolded, in a big crowd thats like 99% racist by volume. It might be rude to assume, but its also generally a fairly accurate assumption that tends to work without issue.
Something to keep in mind. A lot of YDIH people end up as "Mud Flooders" people whose ur-conspiracy involves the entire planet being covered in 20 meters of mud during the YD. These people then spin off everything in that manner. Flat earth, tartaria, etc etc. Its quite a slippery brain slope.
The operative word of critical thought is "thought" which necessarily requires being open to the possibility that not everything is known, nor can it be known given sufficient time, and lack of evidence. You can only base suppositions on evidence.
It is much harder to prove something is not real, when there is no evidence to support it in the first place. It is effectively proving a negative which requires an onerus amount of proof. The absence of evidence doesn't support a null hypothesis in stochastic environments. This is a classic cognitive bias.
Those that do so without proper basis, are most likely deluding themselves than actually participating in critical thought and rational measure based in external reality.
There are a number of anomalies in the historic record, Graham Hancock has pointed out a number of them, and to date there is no explanation for much of the evidence he has pointed out. In fact some of it points to fantastical levels of tools that in some cases exceed current day processes. The Oseiron for example which can't be pumped out with modern equipment.
You conveniently forget the bronze-age collapse which is attributed to a seafaring people alongside chaos, and the burning of the library of Alexandria destroyed some of the most dated records.
You rely on a number of cognitive biases, your suppositions are not supported, and anyone that has to resort to invective and name calling isn't someone who is operating from a rational perspective that is capable of critical thought.
The latter most entirely undermines any argument you might make.
>Damn some of the comments here are really depressing. I'd formerly thought HN was one of the last bastions of critical thought on internet, but I guess I was wrong judging by some of these comments. Way too much regurgitation of long-since debunked pseudo-scientific nonsense.
Transit ridership in the US was higher in the 1950s than it is today and it was the automakers that killed public transit. They literally bought up popular and profitable public transit companies just to shut them down so people would be forced to drive.
The problem isn't "Consumerism" it's a culture of car dependency that's largely the result of intentional action on the part of the automakers to grow and protect their profits.
The reason there's so much auto loan debt in the US is people literally HAVE TO OWN a car just to get to work to support their families in the vast majority of US towns and cities. People don't want to go into debt just so they can buy some shitty fucking KIA so they can sit in traffic for two+ hours a day so they can get to one of their three minimum wage jobs, but when the alternative is being unemployed and homeless, a lot of folks will do what they have to do to provide for themselves and their families.