Is there a way the ancients moved giant stones without machinery?

[zoobyshoe]

Some of the posts in this thread seem to assume that the people on Ancient Aliens actually believe what they say. I find that doubtful since they seem to be capable of feeding and dressing themselves and can probably even tie shoelaces. Personally, I think they are laughing all the way to the bank about getting paid to spout nonsense.

You could well be right that they're cold-bloodedly catering to their audience without, themselves, believing a word of what they say, because that kind of charlatanism happens all the time. . On the other hand, I have met dozens of perfectly functional people who believe in stuff like crystal healing, ghosts, the paranormal in general, and visitation of Earth by extra-terrestrials. In other words, belief in those things doesn't render a person dysfunctional. I don't know about Ancient Aliens because I haven't actually ever watched a whole episode, but the crew of Finding Bigfoot seems like a group of authentic believers to me. Likewise with those ghost hunter shows.

But here's the thing: even though I think they're authentic believers I also think they deliberately hoax some of their 'encounters' with the rationalization that, since these things are real (by their reckoning), it's O.K. to, let's say, artificially enhance the show in order to maintain people's interest in something that is real (according to their belief), but can't be relied on to manifest on cue when they are there with their cameras. It's an attitude of, "It's O.K. to fake it now and then because we know such things actually do happen."

The thing I wonder about is whether the real audience for those shows is one of authentic believers or is actually made up of people who enjoy them for how hokey they are: hipsters who sit there stroking their beards, drinking local brewery ales, while smiling cooly at the outlandish claims.

 

[phinds]

My belief is that a great many of the people who watch these shows DO believe the crap they spout. After all, something 30% to 40% of Americans, depending on what poll you read, supposedly believe in angels, aliens, ghosts, and other assorted crap. I find it hard to believe that that is so, but I've seen such statistics more than once, and at least one of them was in a reputable weekly news magazine (I don't remember which because I read several but it was in one of them).

I do agree it's possible that the folks spouting on Ancient Aliens may in fact be true believers but they are SO over the top and have been SO seriously debunked that I don't really believe that they are.

 

[micromass]

If you watch the first video I posted then I don't think there's any other conclusion than that the makers of ancient aliens are liars. I do know there are many people who genuinly believe in the ancient alien theory and that they have (what they believe are) good reasons. I do not wish to criticize such people, since they are genuine. But the makers of ancient aliens do not fall under that category. They say a lot of things which cannot be other than lies. Either that, or they just make up stuff without doing one percent research, but I count that as lying too. Watch the video, you will find many examples of things that are just factually incorrect. And then I don't mean things like "it looks really difficult to do this without advanced tools", or "this looks a lot like an alien", but actual factually incorrect things (an example in the video: the stone is this type and is very hard to cut, while it is not that type of stone at all).

 

[zoobyshoe]

I do agree it's possible that the folks spouting on Ancient Aliens may in fact be true believers but they are SO over the top and have been SO seriously debunked that I don't really believe that they are.

It's well within precedent that they are charlatans. The "father" of that whole line of thinking, Erich von Daniken, in addition to being the author of Chariots of the Gods, was a chronic con artist, involved in many schemes:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_von_Däniken

 

[rootone]

... something 30% to 40% of Americans, depending on what poll you read, supposedly believe in angels, aliens, ghosts, and other assorted crap...

Somewhere recently I read that there had been a poll on the faked Moon landing conspiracy,
I don't remember if it was only Americans polled or a broader sample, but anyway the number of people believing the conspiracy theory was around 20%.
Incredible, since this particular myth has been solidly dubunked with mountains of evidence, besides which there are aspects of it which make no sense at all,
for example that the USSR in the middle of the cold war at the time, sort of just went along with the gag.

 

[jackmell]

One of the most interesting, relatively experimentally verifiable, claims made about moving large stones is that of the Easter Island moai (the large stone figures looking upwards) which tradition claims simply "walked" into place. Well, an experiment was done by tying two ropes to a large stone similar to the moai; a group of people pulling the moai left with one rope and another group pulling it right in a sort of "twisting" action. The moai did indeed twist a small amount with every pull to the left then another to the right and "walked" forward albeit just a little bit and conceivably could with determination and sheer brute force be moved as far as physically possible.

 

[zoobyshoe]

One of the most interesting, relatively experimentally verifiable, claims made about moving large stones is that of the Easter Island moai (the large stone figures looking upwards) which tradition claims simply "walked" into place. Well, an experiment was done by tying two ropes to a large stone similar to the moai; a group of people pulling the moai left with one rope and another group pulling it right in a sort of "twisting" action. The moai did indeed twist a small amount with every pull to the left then another to the right and "walked" forward albeit just a little bit and conceivably could with determination and sheer brute force be moved as far as physically possible.

Thor Heyerdahl said he was told they "walked there by themselves."

Consider this: when I am washing the windows of my old VW Beetle, I spray windex on the windows and then set the bottle of windex on the roof. More often than not, the bottle won't stay put, and jitters down the slope of the roof, remaining upright (until it comes to the edge and falls off).

The Easter Islanders might have maximized that effect. The path from the quarry to the final position would have to be all down hill, and they would have had to pack the path into a very hard surface. The latter is doable with primitive tools: I know the Mandan Indians of the US did it to the floors of their lodges by lifting logs by rope and tripod and letting the logs fall, end first, to ram the Earth hard. Sort of a vertical battering ram. I have read that rammed Earth can be as hard as concrete.

IIRC, the statues are made in the interior of the Island and set into place near the coast, so it could well be the path was all downhill. Even if they weren't all down hill, they could have used this effect on the parts that were and still claim the statues walked by themselves.

 

[zoobyshoe]

This site has a video of experimenters "walking" a statue with ropes, as per jackmell. Once they got the hang of it, it was completely doable.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/a...=0CBgQ9QEwATh4ahUKEwiWjr7P2PzGAhUDGj4KHcQNAEE

 

[Jobrag]

There was a Kurt Vonnegut short story which suggested that in ancient times gravity cycled and ancient monuments were built during times of low gravity, hell its as good an explanation as you'll get from the frizzy haired loon on the History Channel.

 

[Jobrag]

LOL!

I've seen this guy a few times, is he a fool who really believes the rubbish he spouts or a knave who preys on the gullible and foolish?

 

[phinds]

I've seen this guy a few times, is he a fool who really believes the rubbish he spouts or a knave who preys on the gullible and foolish?

Have you read this thread? That's what we've been discussing.

 

[Dotini]

Some day when peace comes to the middle east I would like to visit Baalbeck.

http://www.world-mysteries.com/mpl_5bk.jpg

Stone of the Pregnant Woman

http://www.world-mysteries.com/mpl_5g.jpg

http://www.world-mysteries.com/mpl_5d.gif

The Trylithon

 

[jim hardy]

ne of the most interesting, relatively experimentally verifiable, claims made about moving large stones is that of the Easter Island moai (the large stone figures looking upwards) which tradition claims simply "walked" into place. Well, an experiment was done by tying two ropes to a large stone similar to the moai; a group of people pulling the moai left with one rope and another group pulling it right in a sort of "twisting" action. The moai did indeed twist a small amount with every pull to the left then another to the right and "walked" forward albeit just a little bit and conceivably could with determination and sheer brute force be moved as far as physically possible.

Zooby's link has this photo
http://www.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/46F7505A-AA4C-409E-A7CCA5D711C378E1_article.jpg?9C963

i saw a show within the year where they did that walking the statue (dont remember whether it was PBS or a history channel). It did take them some time to get competent , and they had a crane to recover when they dropped it.

It was over fifty years ago i read Heyerdahl's Aku-Aku about his trip to Easter Island., so details are faint now. As i recall he did finish chiseling an incomplete statue out of the quarry and stood it upright, but didn't "walk" it more than a very few feet..

Aliens ? Kon Tiki relates legends from ancient times of white haired strangers with extraordinary abilities but I assumed they were Vikings.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Zooby's link has this photo

You saw there's more than just a photo, right? Scroll down that link a bit more and there's a video of them "walking" the huge statue. It's a trip.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

Having seen a few AA episodes their arguments regarding this sort of thing essentially boil down to:

1) It's hard to do with modern tools

2) It's harder to do without modern tools

3) Seriously without modern tools it would take ageeees to do this and be reallllly hard

4) Therefore aliens did it

It's like the idea that people would spend years of their life working hard at making something is completely alien to them (pun intended).

 

[WWGD]

I think Giorgio Clamato ( or something like that ) has a degree in either sports medicine or cosmetology

Having seen a few AA episodes their arguments regarding this sort of thing essentially boil down to:

1) It's hard to do with modern tools

2) It's harder to do without modern tools

3) Seriously without modern tools it would take ageeees to do this and be reallllly hard

4) Therefore aliens did it

It's like the idea that people would spend years of their life working hard at making something is completely alien to them (pun intended).

I agree with this, but there is also the arrogance of: " I cannot conceive of it, so it must be impossible" , never mind the fact that they neither have the training necessary to be able to make a reasonable evaluation/assessment of the feasibility of the construction. Though maybe this is just what you meant.