SATANIC FOSSILS
"Many superstitious notions have been harbored in early times as to occurrence of fossil remains. Some people attributed their existence to the direct agency of Satan... In England, fossil bones were long regarded as belonging to fallen angels! Centuries were required to remove such absurd notions from the minds of men." - Deseret Weekly, Feb 8, 1890
"The final test in science is 'Does the theory explain all the facts better than others?' Think of the difficulty the geologists had to
persuade the mass of ignorant people about a century or so ago that the stratified mountains were not 'eternal,' that they had not been 'created' as they are by the hand of God, but that they were originally flat beds of sand and mud brought down by rivers and laid on the beds of oceans long vanished, which had been elevated by movements of the earth's crust. Still more difficult was it to induce the religious world to believe that the fossil shells, bones, and trees found in the rocks were the remains of living things. Public opinion was shocked at such a flouting of orthodox teachings; it was gravely declared that Satan had put the fossils there in order to mislead the curious and to tempt weak and rebellious men to doubt the Word of God. Some asserted that the fossils had merely an accidental resemblance to real shells and bones and plants! Anything to avoid facing the truth, and to uphold preconceived notions, however false. Yet we must not be too hard upon those who held to what they had been taught in their youth, for unless one takes a large and comprehensive view of the earth and its age and realizes how insignificant its little roughnesses are in comparison with its immense size, the suggestion that the Himâlaya mountains have been elevated nearly thirty thousand feet seems unreasonable and the old teaching that they were created as they are seems like common sense. Numerous illustrations could be brought forward in support of the principle that in nature the real causes of the most striking phenomena need persistent research to find them." - C.J. Ryan, "Reincarnation and Some Criticisms," 1921
ERICH VON DANIKEN
"The ancient 'batteries' found near Baghdad which von Daniken marvels over [are] impressive for 2000 years ago, but hardly of use to advanced space voyagers...
The lens from 700 B.C. in the British museum which von Daniken says in Chariots of the Gods needed a 'highly sophisticated mathematical formula' to grind is in fact a piece of natural crystal polished around the edges...
The rustproof pillar near Delphi which von Daniken says is made of ‘welded parts’ and of an ‘unknown alloy’ is actually a single piece of pure iron—the result of advanced, but nevertheless terrestrial, metallurgy of about A.D. 500. In an interview with Playboy magazine in 1974, von Daniken admitted that new investigations had made him change his mind - ‘so we can forget about this iron thing.'
Von Daniken’s vivid imagination plays freely over Mayan drawings and carvings. As he so rightly says in In Search of Ancient Gods: ‘So far only a minimum number of the Mayan picture writings has been deciphered, so there is plenty of scope for my assumptions.’ This is the whole problem: too much fantasy, too few facts. Never has von Daniken given the game away so clearly." - Ian Ridpath, Messages From The Stars, 1978
"Von Daniken's work does not survive even cursory examination. His calculations are wrong, his facts are misquoted or invented, and he has admitted, during a 1978 PBS Nova television program, that some of his claims, conversations, and research did not take place at all; he simply invented material via what he termed “writer's license.” Nonetheless, his books continue to sell by the millions all over the world, in several different languages." - James Randi, Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds & Hoaxes of the Occult & Supernatural (1995)
Actually, the mystery "space sphere" (right) is the sun. The object (left) which Von Daiken takes to be the sun is actually the planet Venus.
OLMEC HEADS
"These [Olmec excavations] show how hard it is to reconstruct the histories of civilizations that have flourished and died centuries ago, so it's not surprising that some cranks resort to outrageously implausible theories, often invoking aliens from outer space. How insulting to our ancestors to think that they were incapable of sculpting those noble Olmec heads. Even though their reasons may be inexplicable, we can be sure that human beings just like us were the creators of these great works." - Arthur C. Clarke, Mysterious Universe Ep. 23 (1994)
MISIDENTIFIED DINOSAURS
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