Kevin Kauffman

An Assessment of the Ancient Alien Theory

Archeology and anthropology in general are relatively new sciences. Both have only been around as full-fledged fields of study for about a hundred years. In addition, they are seen by many as “soft” sciences since there is not much within them that is concrete or quantifiable. Both of these facts leave archeology particularly open to pseudoscience. Pseudoscience is a practice that imitates science but usually ends up relying on faith or an appeal to higher powers and often claims to offer certain and concrete answers. Because of this confidence in a conclusion pseudoscience frequently will ignore or dispute data that does not directly support their idea and will use outdated data if it supports their verdict. Pseudoscience research usually only involves the reading of texts and not direct field-work or experimentation. Pseudoscience publications are usually targeted at the public, not professionals, as they undergo no peer-review process what-so-ever, yet pseudoscience often cites itself for credibility. In science, however, everything said is tentative and subject to change with new evidence, not concrete and certain. Science bases its ideas on data collected through direct research such as experimentation or field-work. Publications must be peer-reviewed and one must give rigorous detail about research methods so that any field-work or research can be reproduced. New evidence is considered using the scientific method (Coker 2001). Archeology is admittedly a very speculative science, but it does adhere to the ideals of science: field-work is approached using the scientific method, archeologist speak about theories and interpretations not concrete conclusions, generally accepted theories are based upon a wide data-source that was collected using the scientific method and then peer-reviewed, accepted theories are always open to debate and change. Pseudoarcheology calls upon evidence uncovered by scientific field-work, but never actually uses the scientific method itself. Probably the most popular example of pseudoscience in archeology is the Ancient Aliens theory.

The Ancient Alien, or Ancient Astronaut, theory started to seriously crop up around the 1960’s when we entered the space age (Hampton 2009). It was written about by W. Raymond Drake in his 1964 book “Gods or Spacemen?” Four year later, the famous book “Chariots of the Gods?” by Erich von Daniken was published, sparking widespread public interest in the theory. At first, there was some scientific consideration of these theories, and with good reason. With the fact that humans had themselves just traveled to the Moon when they only created the automobile about fifty years earlier, many were opened to consider the idea of other intelligent beings having traveled here. In addition, there was good evidence through ethnographic analogy. Over time we have seen many examples of “cargo cults”. A cargo cult is a religion that is born out of contact between technologically distant cultures. Many of these cargo cults sprung up in Pacific islands after World War II. A technologically advanced culture, such as the United States, would land their planes on small Pacific islands and use them as refuel points. They would give the natives goods they brought as cargo to appease them for using their island. As the war ended, the planes stopped coming and so did the cargo, or western goods, which the natives had grown fond of. Once the deity-like men stopped coming from the sky, people came to believe that if they prayed for them to return, or worshiped them, the goods they desired would be delivered. This even resulted in some natives believing they needed to perform sacrificial rituals to these white “gods” (Peoples and Bailey 2006, 301). In fact, some of these still exist today and have evolved into full-fledged religions with village-wide rituals (Raffaele 2006). It is difficult not to draw parallels between these cargo cults and the religions of the past or of today. Given this evidence, it is easy to postulate that if extraterrestrials had visited Earth in the past and brought with them things that amazed and engaged us, we would have created cults and eventually religions that deified and tried to appease them. Based on this ethnographic analogy and our own space travel, some professionals did give attention to the claims brought forth by Ancient Alien theorists. However, this theory soon became considered pseudoscience within professional archeology, which had other, more conventional explanations or interpretations for much of the evidence cited by Ancient Alien theorists.

There are many different variations of the Ancient Astronaut theory, but most include several similar ideas: extraterrestrials came to Earth millennia ago; they were physically and sometimes genetically similar to humans; some believe pre-humans were interbred with or scientifically genetically altered by the extraterrestrials; the aliens ruled over humans as god-kings sometimes enslaving them; while here they advanced our technology and performed, helped with, or directed megalithic construction; they left after some time but promised to return; this promise sparked the religions of today and of the past (Saylor 2002). Proponents of these theories usually cite four main bodies of evidence from which they draw their claims: ancient writings and myths, ancient artwork and artifacts, megalithic and monumental architecture, and ethnographic analogy. Ancient writings are one of the first bodies of evidence that Ancient Alien theorists struck upon. In fact, von Daniken credits the Holy Bible with sparking his interest in ancient astronauts in the first place. It was the book of Ezekiel and its description of God using what sounded like technology that made von Daniken begin looking into this idea. Ezekiel describes what could be extraterrestrial technology, speaking of seeing visions of the Lord in which God and some “living creatures” came to Earth from the sky in a vessel that appeared to be made from metal flowing with fire inside. With these living creatures were wheels that sparkled as if made of metal and moved within each other, intersecting. Where the creatures moved, the wheels moved. The creatures sped back and forth as like lightning. They were accompanied by a loud sound, like the beating of wings or thunder (Ezekiel 1:1-28). As von Daniken continued to look through the Bible he found more evidence in Genesis and Enoch for extraterrestrials or advanced technology (Hampton 2009). Theorists cite that many religions have a common theme of deities descending from the sky, living with or teaching the people then they often return to the sky with a promise to come back in the future. Some even describe their deities riding in flying machines. Many Sanskrit epics describe “vimanas”, or flying machines, that the gods rode in or upon. There are fairly detailed descriptions of many vimanas and several sound very much like they could be extraterrestrial technology. A vimana in the Ramayana is described as a wonderful aerial chariot that looked like a bright cloud, could go anywhere at will, and once boarded by the king, rose into the upper atmosphere (Dutt 1910). Many Ancient Alien theorists draw upon ancient texts from several different cultures for support of their claims. They feel that the people who wrote these things were trying to make sense of things they were actually seeing, but didn’t understand.

Ancient artwork and artifacts that seem to depict unusual figures or advanced technology, or are themselves advanced technology, are also cited as evidence of alien contact. Ancient Alien theorists look at artwork as far back as the Paleolithic for evidence. Cave paintings at Wodjina in Australia are thought to look like alien figures (see fig. 1) and paintings at Val Camonica in Italy seem to depict figures wearing helmets, possibly for space-travel (see fig. 2).

Fig. 1 Fig. 2

Hieroglyphic artwork has also been cited as evidence. Hieroglyphs in the temple at Abydos in Egypt look very much like modern technology, such as a helicopter, submarine, or flying saucer (see fig. 3). Across the world, the inscription on the tomb of Lord Pacal at Tikal is believed to be a depiction of Pacal seated in a spacecraft. He has an air-tube in his nose and appears to be manipulating controls (see fig 4). Fig. 3 Fig. 4

Geoglyphs at Nazca in South America are also frequently used as evidence for alien contact. According to Ancient Alien theorists, there would be no reason for people to ever want to create a geoglyph if someone wasn’t going to see it, and the only people that could see the Nazca geoglyphs would have had to have been in the sky. In addition, they claim that many of the Nazca lines are actually landing strips for spaceships (Hampton 2009). Some artifacts have also been considered which seem to be out of place, or depict advanced technology. Some of the most compelling artifacts were allegedly discovered in a tomb at a pre-Columbian Inca site. These golden figurines look like modern airplanes (see fig. 5).

Fig. 5

Another source of evidence for Ancient Astronaut theorists is megalithic and monumental architecture. Often the megaliths or monuments themselves are used as evidence, citing the size and weight of building materials and the building technology available. Theorists also often refer to an array of alignments megaliths or pyramids have with either astronomical bodies or features of the environment that they claim people of the time never could have known about. Some of the most commonly cited structures are the pyramids at Giza, especially the Great Pyramid, Tikal, the Moai at Easter Island, Tiwanaku, and Stonehenge.

The methodology of Ancient Astronaut theorists usually includes little to no field-work. When they do visit archeological locations it is usually in the same capacity as a tourist not a researcher. They do not have archeological sites of their own that they are working on to find evidence supporting their theory. This leaves reading books, articles, internet pages, etc. as their main method of research. Because of this, they often can only refer to other’s work and reiterate it or reinterpret it. Often they use data uncovered by professional archeologists but believe that the archeologist working on the site must have misinterpreted the evidence. They release publications without putting them through a peer-review process. Despite the lack of peer-review, Ancient Alien theorists will frequently cite each other for credibility. They call their idea a theory, but at the same time they feel that it is a certain and concrete, if not the only possible, answer to questions about human evolution, the evolution of societies, the progression of technology, and the origin of religions and mythologies.

Conventional archeology on the other hand offers only tentative theories and interpretations. There are many different anthropological theories that archeologists use, but most share several ideas: humans are primates; we are a branch of primate called hominid and are the only remaining hominid though there was once many species; we evolved into our modern form in Africa; we first organized ourselves as small mobile hunter/gatherer bands; groups may develop horticulture, agriculture, or domestication which can lead to larger populations and higher sociopolitical complexity; sociopolitical complexity often leads to inequality, stratification, and specialization; increasing complexity and development of technology takes place over time (Kottak 2006). Evidence archeologists use comes from first-hand research in the form of field-work or experimentation. This field-work is approached using the scientific method and sometimes employs testing methods that rely on advanced technology. Besides first-hand research archeologists use empirical data that has been collected by other archeologists or anthropologists and then peer-reviewed. In addition, archeologists sometimes use historical texts if they are available, but they use much caution in giving them credibility. The methodology archeologists employ is to conduct field-work as well as other research and have publications peer-reviewed. Archeologists use both inductive and deductive reasoning to approach problems, and they give theories, never concrete conclusions.

Archeologists have some very different interpretations of much of the evidence cited by Ancient Alien theorists. First, religious beliefs and mythologies are a very common human occurrence. Almost every group of people has some stories about super-natural or amazing things and beings. If contact with aliens is what spurred human mythologies, it would be safe to assume it would be absent in groups that were totally isolated until recently. But, just in the last century, we have discovered many groups of people that have been entirely isolated from other cultures, and they almost invariably have some sort of mythology, sometimes with no mention of people from the sky. Even in some of the mythologies Ancient Alien theorists cite for their descriptions of gods that descend from the sky, there are also gods that ascend from the ground, or originate from other places than the sky, but they do not try to claim that these deities must be interpretations of beings people actually encountered. Using artwork as evidence is thin because artwork is largely up to interpretation. When something is solely up to interpretation, someone that has spent often years of their life studying the culture that made the artwork will probably have the most accurate idea. Ancient Astronaut theorists will frequently only look at a few isolated pieces of artwork and try to interpret things about them without having any frame of reference for that interpretation other than their own pre-conceived ideas. They do not draw upon other artwork from that culture or any actual evidence about the life of the people that created the artwork when they create an interpretation of that artwork. For example, the engraving on Lord Pacal’s sarcophagus was interpreted by Ancient Alien theorists as being a depiction of Pacal sitting in a spaceship spouting flames (see fig. 4). Had they been Mayanists, and devoted most of their life to understanding they Maya rather than looking at a few examples of their artwork that happen to look like spaceships, they would have recognized that the large chamber in which Pacal sits is commonly depicted as a sacrificial bowl and what they believed to be the aerodynamic point of a rocket pointing upwards is an even more common glyph that is referred to in hieroglyphs as the “wacah chan”, or the world tree, the tree of life (Townsley 2004). When these two glyphs are placed on top of each other they do somewhat resemble a rocket of today, but with some more extensive knowledge about the people that created the art a much more reasonable interpretation can be reached.

The argument that ancient people could not have constructed monumental architecture without some sort of help from a higher power is seen as very ethnocentric by anthropologists. It is a very weak argument as it has no real evidence to work on other than flinging facts about sizes or weights of building materials and then jumping immediately to the conclusion that people couldn’t move these things. In some cases, such as the pyramids in Giza, the people who built this monumental architecture actually left pictures of some of their building techniques. These are largely ignored by Ancient Alien theorists. In other cases, such as Tikal, experimental archeologists have reproduced the methods the Maya used in quarrying and transporting of materials with the tools available at the time (Townsley 2004). Another flaw in the logic of this argument is its selectiveness. For example, Ancient Alien theorist never bring to question monumental architecture such as the Baths of Caracalla, Fortress of Mycenae, the Pantheon, the Coliseum, or any of the giant medieval castles or cathedrals. They never argue that “there is no way the Romans could have built that with the tools 2000 years ago” yet “there is no way the Maya could have built that with the tools 2000 years ago”. This exemplifies the ethnocentrism of this argument. People can have misconceptions like the Maya were “just one step out of the stone age” (Hampton and Burns 2009) which gives them the idea that building these things would have been out of their grasp. What is really the best evidence for the Ancient Astronaut theory is the ethnographic analogy to cargo cults. However, ethnographic analogy can also work on the Ancient Alien theorists themselves. After the collapse of the Mycenaean civilization, the stone-work they left behind was believed by many Greeks to have been constructed by Cyclops. They argued that there was no way people could have moved those stones and constructed such monumental masonry, and that the only thing that would have been capable of such a feat was the Cyclops (Kashdan 2007). There can easily be an analogy drawn between the Greek Cyclops Masonry theorists’ belief in the necessity of a Cyclops builder and Ancient Alien theorists’ belief in the necessity of extraterrestrial intervention.

Since Ancient Alien theorists and archeologists share much of the same evidence it is the methodology each uses to interpret that evidence one must consider when determining the validity of either argument. The archeologist’s methodology, which utilizes field-work, peer-review, empirical data, and both inductive and deductive reasoning is much more solid than the Ancient Alien theorist’s methodology of non-direct research, the lack of peer-review, and the use of only inductive reasoning. The conclusions reached by the archeologist are tentative, they are theories and interpretations. The conclusions reached by the Ancient Alien theorist are seen as the only possible answer, yet they use the term theory and make a habit of using question marks even when making statements to give the illusion that they are making only speculations. The archeologist, being trained in anthropology, is often scientifically-minded and relativistic, considering both emic and etic points of view. The Ancient Alien theorist is often ethnocentric or projects limitations onto people with arguments like “there is no way these people could have done this”. The Ancient Astronaut theory does bring up some interesting points. To truly be scientific we must be open to considering all possibilities. We must look at every idea with seriousness and honestly examine the evidence for and methodology of that idea. But we need to keep a distance between consideration and belief. Belief is usually based upon faith, which has no place in science. In the end, archeology does not really give concrete answers to some of the tough questions like how we evolved, how we learned to organize ourselves, how we developed language, or why human ideology is as it is. In contrast, Ancient Alien theorists offer certainty. People will always long for certainty in their life and flock to people that claim to have it for them.

References Cited

Rory Coker. “Distinguishing Science and Pseudoscience” last modified May 30, 2001. http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/pseudo.html

Rob Hampton and Kevin Burns. “Ancient Aliens”. Television. Directed by Kevin Burns. USA: History Channel. 2009.

Paul Raffaele. “In John They Trust”. Smithsonian. Feb 2006. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/john.html

James Peoples and Garrick Bailey. “Humanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology”. Australia: Thompson/Wadsworth, 2006. 300-301.

William Saylor. “The Ancient Astronauts Theory Revisited”. 2000-2002. http://www.world-mysteries.com/aa_1.htm#Ancient

New International Bible. Grand Rapids, MI. Zondervan. 2011. Ezekiel 1. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ezekiel+1&version=NIV

Manatha Nath Dutt (translator). “Ramayana”. Elysium Press, Calcutta, 1892 and New York, 1910. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimana#cite_ref-2

Conrad Phillip Kottak. “Anthropology: The Exploration of Human Diversity”. Boston: McGraw Hill, 2006.

Graham Townsley. “Dawn of the Maya”. Television. USA: National Geographic Television. 2004.