APOD and General Astronomy Discussion Forum
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My first assumption would be a couple of guys with headdresses and sticks doing a dance. Indeed, we see tribal dancers that look just like this in many, many cultures.wonderboy wrote:well thats precisely my point. why dont we assume we haven't been duped by our ancestors messages and look at them for what they are. I do not believe that my early ancestors were THAT bad at drawing. look at these Petroglyphs from Val Camonica Italy? what are they?
The fundamental weakness in any such theory is the near impossibility of anything other than machines traveling across interstellar distances... and if machines were doing it, they should be everywhere.wonderboy wrote:I have a theory (if you can call it that) on Alien Visitation.
I've never seen anything that remotely made me think aliens or spaceships were being represented. I've seen such claims, though. They are pretty laughable, and betray a powerful lack of imagination on the part of the claimants. Why a lack of imagination in seeing such fanciful things? Because of the fact that they can only imagine that aliens or alien spaceships would take the form of something from bad 1950s science fiction movies.what we do know is that there are cave drawings from thousands of years ago depicting aliens or strange beings, there are heiroglyphics also showing similar drawings of crafts and aliens (if you take the drawings literally that is) they speak of gods ascending and descending from heavens...
Are you saying that if I, not currently an art historian or anthropologist, told you my opinion about a petroglyph, you'd take it seriously. But if I were to take the time and make the effort to get a degree in one of those fields, you would not take my opinion seriously then? Really?wonderboy wrote:dont go with what art historians have said or anthropolgists. what does it look like to you as another person whos early ancestor drew this?
Wonderboy wrote:
what we do know is that there are cave drawings from thousands of years ago depicting aliens or strange beings, there are heiroglyphics also showing similar drawings of crafts and aliens (if you take the drawings literally that is) they speak of gods ascending and descending from heavens...
rstevenson wrote:Are you saying that if I, not currently an art historian or anthropologist, told you my opinion about a petroglyph, you'd take it seriously. But if I were to take the time and make the effort to get a degree in one of those fields, you would not take my opinion seriously then? Really?wonderboy wrote:dont go with what art historians have said or anthropolgists. what does it look like to you as another person whos early ancestor drew this?
Rob
I think you may need to look into art history a bit. The idea of depicting humans or their surroundings realistically is a relatively recent phenomenom, only taking hold firmly a few hundred years ago. Art in the more distant past had largely symbolic purpose and the most symbolic aspects of the art would have been emphasized in size and in colour in order to ensure the message was perceived by the viewer. (Judging from the reported reactions of some members of "primitive" societies to photographs of themselves, it would have been a very unwise, and perhaps short-lived, artist who thousands of years ago created a realistic image of a member of their tribe.)wonderboy wrote:what i am saying is that just looking at the pictures on caves, the drawings could be tribal dancers, however the proportions are too far out for me to be accidental. look at the size and shape of the head for instance they are both similar in both petroglyphs in size and shape. i do not believe that they were that bad at drawing to get a basic human head shape and size THAT wrong.
rstevenson wrote:Art in the more distant past had largely symbolic purpose and the most symbolic aspects of the art would have been emphasized in size and in colour in order to ensure the message was perceived by the viewer. Many others have said the same things and had the same doubts about our current interpretations of these old paintings and drawings. But reading them as symbolic and entirely about human issues and situations is not an arbitrary or capricious choice.wonderboy wrote:
the proportions are too far out for me to be accidental. look at the size and shape of the head for instance... i do not believe that they were that bad at drawing to get a basic human head shape and size THAT wrong.
Proven where, by whom? And who is it that does better, the salesperson?wonderboy wrote:its a proven fact that the less you know about the intracacies of finance etc the better you do as your knowledge base isnt convolluted with too much information.
Most people are that bad at drawing. And that assumes an intent to be morphologically accurate. By your standards, Picasso, Chagall, Munch were all bad artists.wonderboy wrote:what i am saying is that just looking at the pictures on caves, the drawings could be tribal dancers, however the proportions are too far out for me to be accidental. look at the size and shape of the head for instance they are both similar in both petroglyphs in size and shape. i do not believe that they were that bad at drawing to get a basic human head shape and size THAT wrong.
Of course, if you have the opportunity to view all of their work, their skill is apparent. But each of them produced a substantial body of work in which the human form was grotesquely represented, as well. My only point being, that simply seeing an image that misrepresents the proportions of the human body provides very little information about the skill of the artist.geckzilla wrote:Wow, I don't know about Chagall, but Munch and Picasso both had a lot of training. Picasso's early works were especially realistic. I am sure you already know this, Chris, but I think it's important to further note that even when an artist is extremely stylized they almost always have training for realistic proportions and a lot of life drawing time behind them. Quite often it happens that a person thinks he or she can simply jump right into cartooning when in fact they are bad at it until the basics are learned. Indeed, drawing a human "correctly" takes a lot of skill and a lot of practice, whether it's with a certain style or simple realism.
A delightful image!geckzilla wrote:... you are slapping bits of water in a tiny puddle. The ocean of knowledge awaits you.
The debunking documentary I linked to earlier in the thread can quickly help you understand that ancient humans had just as much ingenuity as modern day humans. The lacked the accumulated knowledge we have built up to now but they were every bit as intelligent.wonderboy wrote:it baffles me how structures like those at saksaywaman could be built without help... and it kinda stands to reason that I don't think they did it without help.
And yet, it is fairly well understood how they were built (and even details of the tools used are known). Archaeologists have since tested the ability of a group of people working together, using only simple tools, to build identical structures.wonderboy wrote:it baffles me how structures like those at saksaywaman could be built without help... and it kinda stands to reason that I don't think they did it without help.
Chris Peterson wrote:And yet, it is fairly well understood how they were built (and even details of the tools used are known). Archaeologists have since tested the ability of a group of people working together, using only simple tools, to build identical structures.wonderboy wrote:it baffles me how structures like those at saksaywaman could be built without help... and it kinda stands to reason that I don't think they did it without help.
It is dangerous to let a lack of personal knowledge about how something might have been done evolve into fanciful ideas not well grounded in reality. People's intelligence hasn't changed substantially in thousands of years. Many complex things can be done with nothing but primitive tools and a lot of manpower.
