JASON COLAVITO
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Books
    • Legends of the Pyramids
    • The Mound Builder Myth
    • Jason and the Argonauts
    • Cult of Alien Gods >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Foundations of Atlantis
    • Knowing Fear >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Hideous Bit of Morbidity >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Cthulhu in World Mythology >
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
      • Necronomicon Fragments
      • Oral Histories
    • Fiction >
      • Short Stories
      • Free Fiction
    • JasonColavito.com Books >
      • Faking History
      • Unearthing the Truth
      • Critical Companion to Ancient Aliens
      • Studies in Ancient Astronautics (Series) >
        • Theosophy on Ancient Astronauts
        • Pyramidiots!
        • Edison's Conquest of Mars
      • Fiction Anthologies >
        • Unseen Horror >
          • Contents
          • Excerpt
        • Moon Men! >
          • Contents
      • The Orphic Argonautica >
        • Contents
        • Excerpt
      • The Faust Book >
        • Contents
        • Excerpt
      • Classic Reprints
      • eBook Minis
    • Free eBooks >
      • Origin of the Space Gods
      • Ancient Atom Bombs
      • Golden Fleeced
      • Ancient America
      • Horror & Science
  • Articles
    • Skeptical Xenoarchaeologist Newsletter >
      • Volumes 1-10 Archive >
        • Volume 1 Archive
        • Volume 2 Archive
        • Volume 3 Archive
        • Volume 4 Archive
        • Volume 5 Archive
        • Volume 6 Archive
        • Volume 7 Archive
        • Volume 8 Archive
        • Volume 9 Archive
        • Volume 10 Archive
      • Volumes 11-20 Archive >
        • Volume 11 Archive
        • Volume 12 Archive
        • Volume 13 Archive
        • Volume 14 Archive
        • Volume 15 Archive
        • Volume 16 Archive
        • Volume 17 Archive
        • Volume 18 Archive
        • Volume 19 Archive
        • Volume 20 Archive
      • Volumes 21-30 Archive >
        • Volume 21 Archive
        • Volume 22 Archive
    • Television Reviews >
      • Ancient Aliens Reviews
      • In Search of Aliens Reviews
      • America Unearthed
      • Pirate Treasure of the Knights Templar
      • Search for the Lost Giants
      • Forbidden History Reviews
      • Expedition Unknown Reviews
      • Legends of the Lost
      • Unexplained + Unexplored
      • Rob Riggle: Global Investigator
    • Book Reviews
    • Galleries >
      • Bad Archaeology
      • Ancient Civilizations >
        • Ancient Egypt
        • Ancient Greece
        • Ancient Near East
        • Ancient Americas
      • Supernatural History
      • Book Image Galleries
    • Videos
    • Collection: Ancient Alien Fraud >
      • Chariots of the Gods at 50
      • Secret History of Ancient Astronauts
      • Of Atlantis and Aliens
      • Aliens and Ancient Texts
      • Profiles in Ancient Astronautics >
        • Erich von Däniken
        • Robert Temple
        • Giorgio Tsoukalos
        • David Childress
      • Blunders in the Sky
      • The Case of the False Quotes
      • Alternative Authors' Quote Fraud
      • David Childress & the Aliens
      • Faking Ancient Art in Uzbekistan
      • Intimations of Persecution
      • Zecharia Sitchin's World
      • Jesus' Alien Ancestors?
      • Extraterrestrial Evolution?
    • Collection: Skeptic Magazine >
      • America Before Review
      • Native American Discovery of Europe
      • Interview: Scott Sigler
      • Golden Fleeced
      • Oh the Horror
      • Discovery of America
      • Supernatural Television
      • Review of Civilization One
      • Who Lost the Middle Ages
      • Charioteer of the Gods
    • Collection: Ancient History >
      • Prehistoric Nuclear War
      • The China Syndrome
      • Atlantis, Mu, and the Maya
      • Easter Island Exposed
      • Who Built the Sphinx?
      • Who Built the Great Pyramid?
      • Archaeological Cover Up?
    • Collection: The Lovecraft Legacy >
      • Pauwels, Bergier, and Lovecraft
      • Lovecraft in Bergier
      • Lovecraft and Scientology
    • Collection: UFOs >
      • Alien Abduction at the Outer Limits
      • Aliens and Anal Probes
      • Ultra-Terrestrials and UFOs
      • Rebels, Queers, and Aliens
    • Scholomance: The Devil's School
    • Prehistory of Chupacabra
    • The Templars, the Holy Grail, & Henry Sinclair
    • Magicians of the Gods Review
    • The Curse of the Pharaohs
    • The Antediluvian Pyramid Myth
    • Whitewashing American Prehistory
    • James Dean's Cursed Porsche
  • The Library
    • Ancient Mysteries >
      • Ancient Texts >
        • Mesopotamian Texts >
          • Atrahasis Epic
          • Epic of Gilgamesh
          • Kutha Creation Legend
          • Babylonian Creation Myth
          • Descent of Ishtar
          • Berossus
          • Comparison of Antediluvian Histories
        • Egyptian Texts >
          • The Shipwrecked Sailor
          • Dream Stela of Thutmose IV
          • The Papyrus of Ani
          • Classical Accounts of the Pyramids
          • Inventory Stela
          • Manetho
          • Eratosthenes' King List
          • The Story of Setna
          • Leon of Pella
          • Diodorus on Egyptian History
          • On Isis and Osiris
          • Famine Stela
          • Old Egyptian Chronicle
          • The Book of Sothis
          • Horapollo
          • Al-Maqrizi's King List
        • Teshub and the Dragon
        • Hermetica >
          • The Three Hermeses
          • Kore Kosmou
          • Corpus Hermeticum
          • The Asclepius
          • The Emerald Tablet
          • Hermetic Fragments
          • Prologue to the Kyranides
          • The Secret of Creation
          • Ancient Alphabets Explained
          • Prologue to Ibn Umayl's Silvery Water
          • Book of the 24 Philosophers
          • Aurora of the Philosophers
        • Hesiod's Theogony
        • Periplus of Hanno
        • Ctesias' Indica
        • Sanchuniathon
        • Sima Qian
        • Syncellus's Enoch Fragments
        • The Book of Enoch
        • Slavonic Enoch
        • Sepher Yetzirah
        • Tacitus' Germania
        • De Dea Syria
        • Aelian's Various Histories
        • Julius Africanus' Chronography
        • Eusebius' Chronicle
        • Chinese Accounts of Rome
        • Ancient Chinese Automaton
        • The Orphic Argonautica
        • Fragments of Panodorus
        • Annianus on the Watchers
        • The Watchers and Antediluvian Wisdom
      • Medieval Texts >
        • Medieval Legends of Ancient Egypt >
          • Medieval Pyramid Lore
          • John Malalas on Ancient Egypt
          • Fragments of Abenephius
          • Akhbar al-zaman
          • Ibrahim ibn Wasif Shah
          • Murtada ibn al-‘Afif
          • Al-Maqrizi on the Pyramids
          • Al-Suyuti on the Pyramids
        • The Hunt for Noah's Ark
        • Isidore of Seville
        • Book of Liang: Fusang
        • Agobard on Magonia
        • Book of Thousands
        • Voyage of Saint Brendan
        • Power of Art and of Nature
        • Travels of Sir John Mandeville
        • Yazidi Revelation and Black Book
        • Al-Biruni on the Great Flood
        • Voyage of the Zeno Brothers
        • The Kensington Runestone (Hoax)
        • Islamic Discovery of America
        • The Aztec Creation Myth
      • Lost Civilizations >
        • Atlantis >
          • Plato's Atlantis Dialogues >
            • Timaeus
            • Critias
          • Fragments on Atlantis
          • Panchaea: The Other Atlantis
          • Eumalos on Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Gómara on Atlantis
          • Sardinia and Atlantis
          • Santorini and Atlantis
          • The Mound Builders and Atlantis
          • Donnelly's Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Morocco
          • Atlantis and the Sea Peoples
          • W. Scott-Elliot >
            • The Story of Atlantis
            • The Lost Lemuria
          • The Lost Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Africa
          • How I Found Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Termier on Atlantis
          • The Critias and Minoan Crete
          • Rebuttal to Termier
          • Further Responses to Termier
          • Flinders Petrie on Atlantis
        • Lost Cities >
          • Miscellaneous Lost Cities
          • The Seven Cities
          • The Lost City of Paititi
          • Manuscript 512
          • The Idolatrous City of Iximaya (Hoax)
          • The 1885 Moberly Lost City Hoax
          • The Elephants of Paredon (Hoax)
        • OOPARTs
        • Oronteus Finaeus Antarctica Map
        • Caucasians in Panama
        • Jefferson's Excavation
        • Fictitious Discoveries in America
        • Against Diffusionism
        • Tunnels Under Peru
        • The Parahyba Inscription (Hoax)
        • Mound Builders
        • Gunung Padang
        • Tales of Enchanted Islands
        • The 1907 Ancient World Map Hoax
        • The 1909 Grand Canyon Hoax
        • The Interglacial Period
        • Solving Oak Island
      • Religious Conspiracies >
        • Pantera, Father of Jesus?
        • Toledot Yeshu
        • Peter of les Vaux-de-Cernay on Cathars
        • Testimony of Jean de Châlons
        • Rosslyn Chapel and the 'Prentice's Pillar
        • The Many Wives of Jesus
        • Templar Infiltration of Labor
        • Louis Martin & the Holy Bloodline
        • The Life of St. Issa (Hoax)
        • On the Person of Jesus Christ
      • Giants in the Earth >
        • Fossil Origins of Myths >
          • Fossil Teeth and Bones of Elephants
          • Fossil Elephants
          • Fossil Bones of Teutobochus
          • Fossil Mammoths and Giants
          • Giants' Bones Dug Out of the Earth
          • Fossils and the Supernatural
          • Fossils, Myth, and Pseudo-History
          • Man During the Stone Age
          • Fossil Bones and Giants
          • American Elephant Myths
          • The Mammoth and the Flood
          • Fossils and Myth
          • Fossil Origin of the Cyclops
          • Mastodon, Mammoth, and Man
        • Fragments on Giants
        • Manichaean Book of Giants
        • Geoffrey on British Giants
        • Alfonso X's Hermetic History of Giants
        • Boccaccio and the Fossil 'Giant'
        • Book of Howth
        • Purchas His Pilgrimage
        • Edmond Temple's 1827 Giant Investigation
        • The Giants of Sardinia
        • Giants and the Sons of God
        • The Magnetism of Evil
        • Tertiary Giants
        • Smithsonian Giant Reports
        • Early American Giants
        • The Giant of Coahuila
        • Jewish Encyclopedia on Giants
        • Index of Giants
        • Newspaper Accounts of Giants
        • Lanier's A Book of Giants
      • Science and History >
        • Halley on Noah's Comet
        • The Newport Tower
        • Iron: The Stone from Heaven
        • Ararat and the Ark
        • Pyramid Facts and Fancies
        • Argonauts before Homer
        • The Deluge
        • Crown Prince Rudolf on the Pyramids
        • Old Mythology in New Apparel
        • Blavatsky on Dinosaurs
        • Teddy Roosevelt on Bigfoot
        • Devil Worship in France
        • Maspero's Review of Akhbar al-zaman
        • The Holy Grail as Lucifer's Crown Jewel
        • The Mutinous Sea
        • The Rock Wall of Rockwall
        • Fabulous Zoology
        • The Origins of Talos
        • Mexican Mythology
        • Chinese Pyramids
        • Maqrizi's Names of the Pharaohs
      • Extreme History >
        • Roman Empire Hoax
        • American Antiquities
        • American Cataclysms
        • England, the Remnant of Judah
        • Historical Chronology of the Mexicans
        • Maspero on the Predynastic Sphinx
        • Vestiges of the Mayas
        • Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel
        • Origins of the Egyptian People
        • The Secret Doctrine >
          • Volume 1: Cosmogenesis
          • Volume 2: Anthropogenesis
        • Phoenicians in America
        • The Electric Ark
        • Traces of European Influence
        • Prince Henry Sinclair
        • Pyramid Prophecies
        • Templars of Ancient Mexico
        • Chronology and the "Riddle of the Sphinx"
        • The Faith of Ancient Egypt
        • Spirit of the Hour in Archaeology
        • Book of the Damned
        • Great Pyramid As Noah's Ark
        • Richard Shaver's Proofs
    • Alien Encounters >
      • US Government Ancient Astronaut Files >
        • Fortean Society and Columbus
        • Inquiry into Shaver and Palmer
        • The Skyfort Document
        • Whirling Wheels
        • Denver Ancient Astronaut Lecture
        • Soviet Search for Lemuria
        • Visitors from Outer Space
        • Unidentified Flying Objects (Abstract)
        • "Flying Saucers"? They're a Myth
        • UFO Hypothesis Survival Questions
        • Air Force Academy UFO Textbook
        • The Condon Report on Ancient Astronauts
        • Atlantis Discovery Telegrams
        • Ancient Astronaut Society Telegram
        • Noah's Ark Cables
        • The Von Daniken Letter
        • CIA Psychic Probe of Ancient Mars
        • Scott Wolter Lawsuit
        • UFOs in Ancient China
        • CIA Report on Noah's Ark
        • CIA Noah's Ark Memos
        • Congressional Ancient Aliens Testimony
        • Ancient Astronaut and Nibiru Email
        • Congressional Ancient Mars Hearing
        • House UFO Hearing
      • Ancient Extraterrestrials >
        • Premodern UFO Sightings
        • The Moon Hoax
        • Inhabitants of Other Planets
        • Blavatsky on Ancient Astronauts
        • The Stanzas of Dzyan (Hoax)
        • Aerolites and Religion
        • What Is Theosophy?
        • Plane of Ether
        • The Adepts from Venus
      • A Message from Mars
      • Saucer Mystery Solved?
      • Orville Wright on UFOs
      • Interdimensional Flying Saucers
      • Flying Saucers Are Real
      • Report on UFOs
    • The Supernatural >
      • The Devils of Loudun
      • Sublime and Beautiful
      • Voltaire on Vampires
      • Demonology and Witchcraft
      • Thaumaturgia
      • Bulgarian Vampires
      • Religion and Evolution
      • Transylvanian Superstitions
      • Defining a Zombie
      • Dread of the Supernatural
      • Vampires
      • Werewolves and Vampires and Ghouls
      • Science and Fairy Stories
      • The Cursed Car
    • Classic Fiction >
      • Lucian's True History
      • Some Words with a Mummy
      • The Coming Race
      • King Solomon's Mines
      • An Inhabitant of Carcosa
      • The Xipéhuz
      • Lot No. 249
      • The Novel of the Black Seal
      • The Island of Doctor Moreau
      • Pharaoh's Curse
      • Edison's Conquest of Mars
      • The Lost Continent
      • Count Magnus
      • The Mysterious Stranger
      • The Wendigo
      • Sredni Vashtar
      • The Lost World
      • The Red One
      • H. P. Lovecraft >
        • Dagon
        • The Call of Cthulhu
        • History of the Necronomicon
        • At the Mountains of Madness
        • Lovecraft's Library in 1932
      • The Skeptical Poltergeist
      • The Corpse on the Grating
      • The Second Satellite
      • Queen of the Black Coast
      • A Martian Odyssey
    • Classic Genre Movies
    • Miscellaneous Documents >
      • The Balloon-Hoax
      • A Problem in Greek Ethics
      • The Migration of Symbols
      • The Gospel of Intensity
      • De Profundis
      • The Life and Death of Crown Prince Rudolf
      • The Bathtub Hoax
      • Crown Prince Rudolf's Letters
      • Position of Viking Women
      • Employment of Homosexuals
      • James Dean's Scrapbook
      • James Dean's Love Letters
      • The Amazing James Dean Hoax!
    • Free Classic Pseudohistory eBooks
  • About Jason
    • Biography
    • Jason in the Media
    • Contact Jason
    • About JasonColavito.com
    • Terms and Conditions
  • Search

Ancient Aliens and the Swiss Spaghetti Harvest of 1957

9/1/2014

46 Comments

 
Since it’s a federal holiday here in the United States, I’m going to keep today’s entry short. Let’s begin with a very quick note that a self-described ancient astronaut theorist named David James, who bills himself as the CEO of DJWorldWide Technologies, Inc., is asking for $3,000,000 on IndieGoGo.com to prove that Puma Punku was built by space aliens. According to his request for funding, James plans to use that three million to fund an expedition to Bolivia with a team of geologists, conduct tests and a survey at the ancient site, and develop a “dating method for non-carbon based materials, which up to now has not been developed.” James has clearly not done his research; various methods are available and in regular use.
His reasons for undertaking the project are depressing. He summarizes that Ancient Aliens episode on Puma Punku, including meaningless claims that native Bolivian folklore claims that the site was built in a single night (Yeah, so? British lore said Stonehenge was built overnight by Merlin the Magician), and the false claim that the site is built out of rock nearly as hard as diamonds. But this is the most depressing part: “This is a very personal project for me.  I have been studying the Ancient Alien Theory for almost 30 years.”  It’s sad because his other claims show that he has rarely if ever ventured beyond ancient astronaut books and TV shows to study the archaeology and geology that underpins our understanding of history.

At any rate, there’s little to no chance that Bolivia would approve an ancient astronaut field trip to test Puma Punku for alien residue.

This actually leads nicely into something I had planned to discuss anyway. One of the major arguments my critics put forward is that Ancient Aliens and its ilk are just television shows, entertainment, not to be taken seriously. No right thinking person could take it seriously, not when facts are so easily found. As we see from David James, this is clearly not the case, even though the facts about Puma Punku and methods for dating rock are well-known and easily found.

So I thought it would be fun to share this video from the BBC’s Panorama, which aired on April Fool’s Day in 1957.
The segment was a hoax that claimed Swiss people harvested spaghetti from trees, and they backed it up with the borrowed authority of respected news presenter Richard Dimbleby, who narrated the segment and presented it on air. More than half of all Britons watched the broadcast.

The hoax succeeded because in the Britain of 1957, spaghetti was as unfamiliar and unusual as aspic is in America today. Viewers were taken in by the hoax in droves, and hundreds of viewers called the BBC to ask how they could grow their own spaghetti trees. The BBC, taken aback by the reaction, eventually began to tell callers to plant a sprig of spaghetti in a can of tomato sauce “and hope for the best.”

Now, in theory, it should have been easy to find out whether spaghetti grew on trees. Viewers had access to encyclopedias (though as Sir Ian Jacob, then BBC director-general, discovered after being fooled himself, the Britannica had no entry for spaghetti!), the ingredient list on the back of boxes and cans of spaghetti, cookbooks, libraries, etc. But the fact is that while undoubtedly many viewers took advantage of these resources, a good number did not and accepted the story at face value, of which a subset called the BBC itself for more information on the apocryphal trees.

Now you might say that a few hundred callers is a drop in the bucket compared to the millions of viewers, but those who called about the hoax were likely only the most motivated among a much larger group taken in by the broadcast. We know this is likely to be the case because letters and calls continued for weeks (despite a confession from the BBC that the segment was a joke), and when Johnny Carson and Jack Paar re-aired the segment years later in America, they too received letters and calls from viewers who took the joke seriously.

As silly as the claim is, it provides a good parallel for the faux-documentaries we see on cable television about ancient mysteries, conspiracies, and space aliens. In both cases, the subject matter is exotic enough that most of the audience will not have firsthand experiences with the material (especially the underpinnings of archaeology) and therefore will have little grounding for recognizing when claims may be untrue. Like the spaghetti hoax, shows like Ancient Aliens, America Unearthed, Mermaids: The Body Found, and others trade on the perceived credibility of cable channels like History, H2, Discovery, etc. Similarly, their claims are easily disproved with research, but a distressingly large percentage of the audience cannot or will not research beyond the televised claims and therefore accepts some or all of their ideas—however false—as true. Many will recognize the claims as false, but a large number will accept them at face value.

If it was possible in 1957 to convince a fair number of Britons that spaghetti grew on trees, is it any wonder that television has done such a good job convincing a specific subset of viewers that a conspiracy is suppressing the truth about history?

46 Comments
Titus pullo
9/1/2014 04:11:29 am

Never had seen the bbc bit before. Thanks.

I remember having a cross country race at RPI in college and as our bus drove past the sad state of the city of Troy I mentioned out loud to a few of my fellow runners pointing to a abandoned crumbling factory, how the city still hadn't cleaned up from the german uboat attack of 43. Only one person has me how the Germans bombed Troy. I responded that a u boat got up the Hudson River surfaced and shelled the town with their five inch deck gun. And these were engineering, science, an Eco majors.

Reply
EP
9/1/2014 04:20:50 am

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TijcoS8qHIE

Reply
Clint Knapp
9/1/2014 05:31:01 am

I can understand folks panicking over something like Orson Wells's War of the Worlds broadcast. It's dramatic, plays on a multitude of fears, and had the luxury of good acting to support it. Spaghetti trees, though? In Switzerland? I have no polite words suitable for comments on that one. However...

Coast to Coast still gets callers who believe that stupid Mermaid documentary. I just heard one while catching up on shows last night in the August 27th episode's latter half with Linda Godfrey- who C2C's bio page calls "one of the most respected authorities on anomalous animals and paranormal phenomenon in Wisconsin". Now that's an expert!

At least in this case she, and George Noory, confirmed that documentary was an acknowledged hoax- as the show had done several times before that. Looks like last night's episode might be a good one to mine for stupid-nuggets; Melba Ketchum was on.

Reply
EP
9/1/2014 05:45:26 am

Have you seen Incident at Lake County (1998)? There are still people arguing on the internet over whether it is authentic. Lots of people used to say that it is fake but the original version from the 1980s is real. When it was unearthed and posted online, people began saying that *it* is fake but "the other version" (the 1998 version) is real.

Oh, and Stanton Friedman got tricked into appearing as an expert :)

Reply
Clint Knapp
9/1/2014 06:09:27 am

I have not. Might have to take a look. It reminds me of The Fourth Kind (which was horrible, in every respect. Poor Mila Jovovich), which saw a good bit of speculation and I'm pretty sure helped spawn Linda Moulton Howe's "black pyramid" farce- which also tries to explain disappearances near Nome that never actually happened.

EP
9/1/2014 06:20:07 am

It's like The Fourth Kind, only consisting entirely of found footage (plus "experts") no-name actors and Halloween-level alien costumes.

Shane Sullivan
9/1/2014 06:55:24 pm

Oh, Linda Godfrey was on C2C? I almost went to a lecture of hers at a library about ten years ago, but I decided against it.

Reply
Carol
9/1/2014 05:32:42 am

Alternative 3 was another April Fool's hoax that caused a huge stir in Britain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_3

Reply
Clint Knapp
9/1/2014 05:47:04 am

Unlike the spaghetti trees, Alternative 3 lives on in fringedom today! The August 7th episode of Coast to Coast had a man named Olav Phillips who claims that although the show itself was fiction it was meant to disseminate actual truths.

Reply
Kal
9/1/2014 06:37:51 am

Strange Sept. 11 theories started up everywhere since the 'sociology experiment' done by a Berkley professor who cribbed stanzas from Tolkien and Nostradamus to make it sound like they predicted 9/11, after the fact. This even reached top level people at Northrup Grumman in the area. The story about the towers as cobbled from other sources was indeed a hoax and when the creator turned and said it was, the conspiracy nuts figured he had been told to retract his information. The experiment was used as a 'fact' on the many 2012 doomsday shows on Histroy channel as though this person was a prophet who predicted 9/11 by researching it from Nostradamus and Tolkein. They completely got it backward.

Sept. 11 was real.

Reply
spookyparadigm
9/1/2014 08:01:24 am

To be fair, there was zero chance that Nostradamus wasn't going to get wrangled into 9/11 conspiracies.

In addition to the usual, the exposure for most Americans over the age of 35 was the tv-film "The Man Who Saw Tomorrow" starring Orson Welles. In the film, there is specific imagery of the WTC being destroyed by a nuclear bomb as imagery for WWIII.

The particularly ironic bit is that imagery was from the movie Wrong is Right. The imagery is a simulation of what two small nuclear devices would do if detonated in NYC. The devices are part of double-crossing plots in which a Middle Eastern dictator attempts to gain access to the devices, taking place in the midst of an already ongoing campaign of suicide bombers attacking the west. He apparently then uses them to blackmail America, placing them on top of the WTC, where they are discovered and disarmed. This catapults the new 'clean" president into power, and then sends America to war in the Middle East. One of the last shots is of the Middle Eastern dictator screaming in his bunker that he wasn't responsible, and indeed the two devices are in his possession. The entire thing was a false flag cooked up by members of the military industrial complex and the new president (when he was a candidate).

It is a satire from 1982 but reads more or less as a textbook 9/11 conspiracy.

Reply
spookyparadigm
9/1/2014 08:06:07 am

Correction, the new candidate doesn't win, but he's in on the whole thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J34-mtBGhxQ

spookyparadigm
9/1/2014 07:50:45 am

As we know, television as a medium does not influence people at all.

Because if it did, corporations might spend billions of dollars using artfully-crafted advertisements to influence consumers, banking their existence and the fortunes of all its employees on such advertisements.

Thankfully, we don't live in that world.

Reply
EP
9/1/2014 11:43:55 am

I'm not sure whether tevelision actually influences people more than radio or print periodicals do. I think newspapers have record of misleading people that dwarfs that of television.

I think it's a lot easier to misdirect people's attention with television, but may be actually harder to use it to get them to believe things they should know better than believe.

Not sure why I feel this way. I may be completely wrong...

Reply
spookyparadigm
9/1/2014 01:14:49 pm

It would be much harder to claim that newspapers aren't taken as true, and just as entertainment. In part this is because we shouldn't think of newspapers as comparable to tv, but to tv news only (maybe including news-like programs such as Today or GMA).

The comparison between TV and print would be to all print magazines, some of which feature fiction, some which are generally considered reliable, and a number in between (or where it doesn't really matter).

Given that one of the major themes discussed on this site is how much even admitted fiction has had an impact on actual beliefs, I find the "it's just TV, relax" argument to be bizarre.

I think you may be right that print still has _somewhat_ more prestige for many people than tv, but not by much. This is partly due to the silly factor tv tries to promote at times. But I would also suspect it is due to the derivative nature of tv. It has never broken out of feeling like a lesser adaptation of older media.

If I had to guess, I would suspect that words spoken on television, open themes, are indeed taken less seriously than other media. But moving images, especially wordless ones, are more powerful. The Patterson-Gimlin film is an excellent example of this. In following the tweets during the first airing of Animal Planet's hoax about Mermaids, and discussing the topic with some students, they generally didn't believe the talking heads or voice of god narration. But the "viral" style clips of glimpses of the creatures in the real world and not as obvious CGI reconstructions, either during the show or as promotion for it, did work in favor of their believing the story.

I think where TV really factors in here is repetition. Such short iconic clips will be played again and again and again and again. This is true of non-fringe topics as well, and is tv's most powerful form.

Which is why TV advertisers have moved away from video versions of print ads (show the product and consumers, read catchy copy), and towards repetitive and verbally minimal adverts (or if the product is difficult to actually sell, like car insurance, use of completely irrelevant but eye/ear-catching micro-narrative nonsense designed to hook the viewer into seeing and hearing the company name).

IMO, TV isn't good at giving specific answers, of making someone choose Brand X or Brand Y. But it is very good at prepping the ground for your consideration (that you should choose one of those brands), and deeply establishing a set of options through repeating them many times (if Brand Z isn't on TV, then there is something strange and off-putting about it, whereas we may just not like X and Y).

Maybe if television began with numerous options like picking a book from a library or selecting a site from the web, it would be different. But the legitimating power of the initial narrow selection of channels is still in play, and it is why people still care about what Fox News, CNN, or MSNBC have to say even though they get minuscule audiences. The "push" rather than "seek" nature of TV is why I am much more disturbed by the presence of anti-science on television than on the net or in print.

EP
9/1/2014 03:28:43 pm

I spoke of "print periodicals" for exactly the reason you say we shouldn't contrast tv and newspapers. I was contrasting the latter two in terms of their historical record. If I'm right about that, then the general point holds a fortiori.

Perhaps prestige does have something to do with it, but my hunch is that it's more than prestige - I suspect it has to do with how we process information from different media.

You say that "moving images, especially wordless ones, are more powerful"... Not sure how I feel about it. I wish there was a way to determine proper comparison classes that's not post hoc. I think phenomena such as this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo
have something to do with my uncertainty.

Repetition may do more to extablish brand awareness than to shape people's opinions. There is also more risk of people getting sick of the same "iconic" images being repeated too often if the expectation is that they continue to evoke the same powerful emotional response they did initially. (This is what makes internet clips possibly more insidious: you play once or twice - by choice - and then simply have the residual memories of their content fester.)

In addition to push vs seek issue, TV's continuous (pre-pause function) stream made fact checking less effective and more inconvenient. It also made it more difficult to reserve judgment, since the stream of information tends to impel one to get on board to continue.

Overall, however, I now think we agree a lot more than I believed at first.

BillUSA
9/2/2014 10:34:00 am

spookyparadigm -

In addition to the points you raised about the influence that media and entertainment have exercised over the span of their respective histories, there's also the gullibility of the observer to be taken into consideration.

Believe me or not, I used to work with a guy who thinks what happens in movies - actually happens. It came to my attention after he saw "Armageddon" during its theater run. The conversation is too lengthy to get into, but I swear I had a difficult time breathing for all the laughter I couldn't hold back.

I'm sure there are many like him out there who believe what they see on television is real and because they think nobody would put anything on that wasn't true. It's the same for print and radio. Speaking for myself, I grew out of that "believe everything" mode by the time I was seven. Yet there are adult-aged people who persist in their belief about something they refuse to believe was a work of fiction or erroneous information.

Jay Leno used to have a spot on the Tonight Show where he'd be on the street asking people trivial questions on topics we learn in grade school. I've seen some young reporter do that sort of thing again when I watched Fox News one night.

It's relevant to say that it seems an untold number of people aren't all that interested in anything beyond work-home-kids-school-friends especially since metropolitan areas and suburbia are populated with people hustling just to keep up with what life throws at them.

Take the types of people I mention here and sit them in front of a television, radio, or newspaper and it's no wonder the world needs a website like this one to point out the hucksters soaring over their heads like vultures.

EP
9/2/2014 10:53:33 am

"I grew out of that "believe everything" mode by the time I was seven. Yet there are adult-aged people who persist in their belief about something they refuse to believe was a work of fiction or erroneous information."

When it comes to certain issues, you are one of these people. How else are we to take your insistence that the admitted experts are mistaken?

Only Me
9/2/2014 07:10:55 pm

@EP

Ideology or willful ignorance?

Doesn't this relate back to what Jason said about Lovecraft choosing to hold onto old beliefs, even as they are challenged by new ideas?

BillUSA
9/2/2014 10:43:51 pm

EP -

Obsess much?

BillUSA
9/2/2014 11:42:49 pm

EP -

So you can't let it go can you? I see the bait you laid out to rekindle our conversation from another blog, but I won't oblige you because I'm not into online pissing matches beyond a response or two. I said that conversation was over and left it without returning to see if you had the last word or not. I do realize however, that you can't accept that someone has another opinion (whether they be right or wrong) and then conduct yourself without harassment. Got news for you, you don't own this website.

Me, on the other hand, have yet to be moved off my opinion on anything, even by some experts I have encountered in the past. That's because I need proof. Not words, but proof. As a matter of fact, as recently as three weeks ago, I convinced a medical doctor that he was wrong about something. He made it easy because of his arrogance. Experts are people. People are fallible. Fallibility leads to incorrect assumptions.

But I don't fall in love with my beliefs. Flexibility is the name of the game in my head and if enough evidence is presented, my opinion can change. But not because someone else believes the presented evidence to be the gospel of the Lord (so to say). I would be descending into "getting myself blocked from the website" depths if I got into just the type of person I am through my eloquent command of profanity. So, if you expect me to change my opinion on the subject so as to help reach that itch you can't seem to scratch, I wish you the very best of luck.

Since I have opened a response to your harassment I believe I can help you with something you seem to dismiss about experts. That is, the typical assumption that an expert is the alpha and the omega. Experts can be (and have been proven to be) wrong. For example, experts once said that the Earth was flat. Experts once said that blacks are slower to learn than whites. Experts once believed that our galaxy was the Universe. Experts once concluded that the coelacanth was extinct. And no doubt there has been many an expert who managed to convince some people that the investment of a few billion dollars would reap benefits if they sunk that money in a movies such as "Heaven's Gate" and the like.

Experts thought it would be a great idea to have children stick their feet under an unprotected x-ray machine in order to find better-fitting shoes. There have been and will continue to be experts who get duped by forgeries in art and documents. There were engineering experts who believed that building a multi-story seawall would protect them from tsunami only to be proven ignorant of the fact that tectonic activity leads to land subsidence thus rendering their idea a very costly mistake. There were even some experts who (for a negotiated price) who claimed that DDT was harmless. Let's not rule out the "experts" who make predictions at horse racing tracks or at the beginnings of every season of each sport around the globe, as well as those who opine about political elections. Lastly, let's not overlook those experts who make a living guessing what the weather is going to be like.

As someone who has had experience in the world of attorney's, I can say without any doubt that expert opinions can be bought. As long as the imperfect creatures that we are continue to walk upon the surface of this Earth, our fallibility and infantile need to claim that anyone is an expert at anything just illustrates our ignorance.

What is an expert? Someone who knows a subject to its logical end? And for whom do they speak? You cannot tell me that experts don't argue amongst themselves. Thus, the judgment of experts can be called into question.

So, like it goes for people and their choice of religion, each and every person who has lived, lives now and will come to live can choose to believe what they will when it comes to any so-called expert. For myself, the best expert is one who never claims to be one. They are a person who exercises humility in the presence of knowledge and for whom a title has very little value. Hell, even Einstein admitted that he made a mistake.

Therefore, if a person can be wrong, and a person can be an expert, then an expert can be wrong.

I've read the claims of experts on the subject you wish to rehash and there is nothing compelling to make me believe that their conclusion is correct. They are entitled to their opinion, but until they can walk upon the surface of water, their opinions are just that - opinion's.

And in my opinion, you might want to check on that obsessive nature of yours.....

EP
9/3/2014 09:22:59 am

@ Only Me

How about now? :)

Only Me
9/3/2014 09:43:06 am

@EP

Re: my earlier concerns to you that were deleted. I stand corrected, sir.

As to my other questions...I'm going with all the above.

EP
9/3/2014 11:54:02 am

"I... eft it without returning to see if you had the last word or not."

Suuuure you did...

"you can't accept that someone has another opinion (whether they be right or wrong) and then conduct yourself without harassment."

Nothing I've done qualifies as harrassment, though I'm not surprised that a man who thinks that the Hollywood "power homosexuals" are "rubbing their lifestyle" in his face wouldn't know.

You like to speak about your rights. Well, just as you have the right to express your opinions and pat yourself on the back for being reasonable, so do others have the right to express their disapproval of your opintion and to call you out on your hypocricy. I respect your right to believe what you believe. However, that doesn't require us to respect your beliefs themselves (or you, for that matter). But yeah, keep making yourself out to be the victim.

At some point there you apparently tried to produce something resembling a syllogism. You kinda lost me there since you were combining a bunch of irrelevant sentences into invalid arguments, so I won't even bother making sense of any of it.

But yeah, clearly your opinion of homosexuality is too important to you for anyone to hope to change it.

"As someone who has had experience in the world of attorney's, I can say without any doubt that expert opinions can be bought."

You don't need the apostrophe there. Also, your 12-step program wasn't court-mandated by any chance, was it? :)

Uncle Ron
9/1/2014 01:53:29 pm

"...corporations might spend billions of dollars using artfully-crafted advertisements to influence consumers..."

And politicians would spend billions of dollars broadcasting artfully crafted lies about their opponents.

Reply
Kal
9/1/2014 08:04:45 am

Like the savings and loan scandal, the Dot Com bubble and the wall street bailout....and the...

Reply
Clay
9/1/2014 09:42:41 am

Everyone knows that spaghetti doesn't come from spaghetti trees - it comes from spaghetti squash!

Reply
EP
9/1/2014 11:38:33 am

But where does spaghetti squash comes from?...

Reply
Uncle Ron
9/1/2014 01:32:51 pm

They grow it on squash courts, of course.

Screaming Eagle
9/1/2014 01:48:06 pm

Clint Eastwood's ear hair wax of course. See what I did there?

EP
9/2/2014 07:00:11 am

@ Secreaming Eagle

I do not, actually... Do I want to? :)

Uncle Ron
9/1/2014 01:39:55 pm

I recall, from ca. 1960, a short film about the sausage harvest in Germany. Same idea, with sausages hanging from trees, but the visual effect was more impressive.

Reply
Screaming Eagle
9/1/2014 01:53:36 pm

@Uncle Ron, Sausage Harvest...
@ JC, Still enjoying the posts. Yesterday's led to hours of research into topics I never dreamed of and cost me most of the morning from over-sleeping. Cheerio!

Reply
666
9/1/2014 02:02:07 pm

>>>>>If it was possible in 1957 to convince a fair number of Britons that spaghetti grew on trees, is it any wonder that television has done such a good job convincing a specific subset of viewers that a conspiracy is suppressing the truth about history?

PSYCHOLOGICAL TYPES
There will always be such a percentage of people no matter what

Reply
Only Me
9/1/2014 07:04:58 pm

Are you in the top 1% of those types or just part of the 99%?

Reply
April Fools Day
9/1/2014 05:15:39 pm

April Fools Day = April Fools Day

Reply
A GAiA hypothesis for two ICE AGE "venuses" today
9/6/2014 07:03:24 am

my apology if off topic about bras... mature breasts and how
many foul mouthed mature heterosexual males it takes to
screw in one modern lightbulb that is 21st century in design!
my suspicion is that c. northcote parkinson has the committee
of 22 dead to rights but 7 to 10 normal males suffice. not two.

"sorry. i am a feminist. 1970s style. i was about to explain
why they sag due to what little Isaac Newton understood
as to the female anatomy interacting with gravity. all we
feminists can be freer in old age on the Moon or Mars,
not here. I am remiss. Its the point about being 15 or 55!"

the boobies in the two 'venuses' SAG that jason put online.
they are smutty by classic Victorian era standards. banned in
boston. even. so much for today and the acco*lytes who are
15 to 25 and hero worshipping Jason right now, who are all
capable of making pithy rape jokes concerning male sodomy.

Reply
name
9/6/2014 07:16:18 am

i think we are talking about a tribe's matriarch.
easily a grandmother. an ample food supply.
i know i get over the top but i kept an "earth
mother" hypothesis out of it but drew in old
Crete at about the time of Theseus in a few
Victorian Aether vannish's postings as i was
about to say a most mature Greek Aphrodite or
Roman Venus is 25 to 35 years of age, ample
but with less of a sag. a young 15 or 18 year old
like the ancient Ice Age 'venus" sculptures is very
morbidly obese by today's rules if with equal sag.

name
9/6/2014 07:25:01 am

This BLOG is Jason's social space, its comments section
can be a total zoo or very rude, if only there was a time
machine that could let me go back to the walls of ancient
Rome just before Augustus Caesar reads them and scrubs
them down. That would have been a collection of urban
graffitti that would be cool to screen snapshot with a digital
camera. i think i can half forgive the dudes who did up the
Piltdown Man hoax, or Marcellin Boule in 1913 who tried
to describe an old Neanderthal male of 40 arthritic years of
age. We know art can be Cubist due to Picasso and realistic
due to Leonardo's draftsman skills, but sometimes i get into
a mood like a Mother Superior when the smut in the restrooms
is too much. The young know old age exists, as did the wise legendary SPHYNX outside Thebes. i am the Enlightenment...

Only Me
9/1/2014 07:02:08 pm

But, Jason! Why all the head shaking at the programing offered on the channels you mentioned? <snark ON> I think you need to follow the mantra of one of the blog's more infamous posters:

"It's just a TV show...a series of interesting and controversial TV shows. They have a VERY positive value in stimulating interest in and discussion of some intriguing questions...precisely in doing what they HAVE obviously done, i.e., encouraging thought and discussion and exploration, to stimulate critical (!!!) thinking, which may or may not mostly match-up with the received traditions. They attract viewers to bump ratings...are commercially produced and marketed to draw an audience that will stick around long enough to see the paid adverts.

They AREN'T a 'Video Peer-Reviewed Academic Journal of Archaeology and History'...are NOT PBS or 'NOVA'."

In other words....Lighten up! <snark OFF>

We now return you to common sense and a healthy dose of reality, already in progress.

Reply
EP
9/1/2014 07:07:28 pm

And you wanted to give me an internet hug with those arms... :)

Reply
Only Me
9/1/2014 07:21:16 pm

Hey! I took a shower! :)

lil ole moi
9/6/2014 07:38:28 am

is this the first time in your life?
like a badly lapsed Old Believer
in Stalin's gulag thee be ripe???
how droll! how rarefied an insight!

Wes
9/2/2014 04:03:39 am

So as of today, he's raised $100; better hold off on packing ....

Reply
EP
9/2/2014 06:29:39 am

My favorite part is that you get a "True Believer Certificate" if you donate $1000. Talk about putting your money where your mouth is...

Reply
Orson Welles fan
9/2/2014 09:17:14 am

In late October of 1938 a radio play made it seem like
New Jersey was being invaded by Martians. The faux
news stories that interrupted the music numbers made
it seem very real. On air broadcasts obey a format that
the viewers are comfortable with. The TV series DARK
SECRETs obeys a TV news magazine and docudrama
format, it ran one season and was actually an anthology
short stories in the guise of a piece trying to be 60 Minutes.

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Blog
    Picture

    Author

    I am an author and researcher focusing on pop culture, science, and history. Bylines: New Republic, Esquire, Slate, etc. There's more about me in the About Jason tab.

    Become a Patron!
    Tweets by JasonColavito
    Picture

    Newsletters

    Enter your email below to subscribe to my newsletter for updates on my latest projects, blog posts, and activities, and subscribe to Culture & Curiosities, my Substack newsletter.

    powered by TinyLetter

    Blog Roll

    Ancient Aliens Debunked
    Picture
    A Hot Cup of Joe
    ArchyFantasies
    Bad UFOs
    Mammoth Tales
    Matthew R. X. Dentith
    PaleoBabble
    Picture

    Categories

    All
    Alternative Archaeology
    Alternative Archaeology
    Alternative History
    Alternative History
    America Unearthed
    Ancient Aliens
    Ancient Astronauts
    Ancient History
    Ancient Texts
    Ancient Texts
    Archaeology
    Atlantis
    Conspiracies
    Giants
    Habsburgs
    Horror
    King Arthur
    Knights Templar
    Lovecraft
    Mythology
    Occult
    Popular Culture
    Popular Culture
    Projects
    Pyramids
    Racism
    Science
    Skepticism
    Ufos
    Weird Old Art
    Weird Things
    White Nationalism

    Terms & Conditions

    Please read all applicable terms and conditions before posting a comment on this blog. Posting a comment constitutes your agreement to abide by the terms and conditions linked herein.

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010

    RSS Feed

Picture
Home  |  Blog  |  Books  | Contact  |  About Jason | Terms & Conditions
© 2010-2023 Jason Colavito. All rights reserved.

  • Home
  • Blog
  • Books
    • Legends of the Pyramids
    • The Mound Builder Myth
    • Jason and the Argonauts
    • Cult of Alien Gods >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Foundations of Atlantis
    • Knowing Fear >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Hideous Bit of Morbidity >
      • Contents
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
    • Cthulhu in World Mythology >
      • Excerpt
      • Image Gallery
      • Necronomicon Fragments
      • Oral Histories
    • Fiction >
      • Short Stories
      • Free Fiction
    • JasonColavito.com Books >
      • Faking History
      • Unearthing the Truth
      • Critical Companion to Ancient Aliens
      • Studies in Ancient Astronautics (Series) >
        • Theosophy on Ancient Astronauts
        • Pyramidiots!
        • Edison's Conquest of Mars
      • Fiction Anthologies >
        • Unseen Horror >
          • Contents
          • Excerpt
        • Moon Men! >
          • Contents
      • The Orphic Argonautica >
        • Contents
        • Excerpt
      • The Faust Book >
        • Contents
        • Excerpt
      • Classic Reprints
      • eBook Minis
    • Free eBooks >
      • Origin of the Space Gods
      • Ancient Atom Bombs
      • Golden Fleeced
      • Ancient America
      • Horror & Science
  • Articles
    • Skeptical Xenoarchaeologist Newsletter >
      • Volumes 1-10 Archive >
        • Volume 1 Archive
        • Volume 2 Archive
        • Volume 3 Archive
        • Volume 4 Archive
        • Volume 5 Archive
        • Volume 6 Archive
        • Volume 7 Archive
        • Volume 8 Archive
        • Volume 9 Archive
        • Volume 10 Archive
      • Volumes 11-20 Archive >
        • Volume 11 Archive
        • Volume 12 Archive
        • Volume 13 Archive
        • Volume 14 Archive
        • Volume 15 Archive
        • Volume 16 Archive
        • Volume 17 Archive
        • Volume 18 Archive
        • Volume 19 Archive
        • Volume 20 Archive
      • Volumes 21-30 Archive >
        • Volume 21 Archive
        • Volume 22 Archive
    • Television Reviews >
      • Ancient Aliens Reviews
      • In Search of Aliens Reviews
      • America Unearthed
      • Pirate Treasure of the Knights Templar
      • Search for the Lost Giants
      • Forbidden History Reviews
      • Expedition Unknown Reviews
      • Legends of the Lost
      • Unexplained + Unexplored
      • Rob Riggle: Global Investigator
    • Book Reviews
    • Galleries >
      • Bad Archaeology
      • Ancient Civilizations >
        • Ancient Egypt
        • Ancient Greece
        • Ancient Near East
        • Ancient Americas
      • Supernatural History
      • Book Image Galleries
    • Videos
    • Collection: Ancient Alien Fraud >
      • Chariots of the Gods at 50
      • Secret History of Ancient Astronauts
      • Of Atlantis and Aliens
      • Aliens and Ancient Texts
      • Profiles in Ancient Astronautics >
        • Erich von Däniken
        • Robert Temple
        • Giorgio Tsoukalos
        • David Childress
      • Blunders in the Sky
      • The Case of the False Quotes
      • Alternative Authors' Quote Fraud
      • David Childress & the Aliens
      • Faking Ancient Art in Uzbekistan
      • Intimations of Persecution
      • Zecharia Sitchin's World
      • Jesus' Alien Ancestors?
      • Extraterrestrial Evolution?
    • Collection: Skeptic Magazine >
      • America Before Review
      • Native American Discovery of Europe
      • Interview: Scott Sigler
      • Golden Fleeced
      • Oh the Horror
      • Discovery of America
      • Supernatural Television
      • Review of Civilization One
      • Who Lost the Middle Ages
      • Charioteer of the Gods
    • Collection: Ancient History >
      • Prehistoric Nuclear War
      • The China Syndrome
      • Atlantis, Mu, and the Maya
      • Easter Island Exposed
      • Who Built the Sphinx?
      • Who Built the Great Pyramid?
      • Archaeological Cover Up?
    • Collection: The Lovecraft Legacy >
      • Pauwels, Bergier, and Lovecraft
      • Lovecraft in Bergier
      • Lovecraft and Scientology
    • Collection: UFOs >
      • Alien Abduction at the Outer Limits
      • Aliens and Anal Probes
      • Ultra-Terrestrials and UFOs
      • Rebels, Queers, and Aliens
    • Scholomance: The Devil's School
    • Prehistory of Chupacabra
    • The Templars, the Holy Grail, & Henry Sinclair
    • Magicians of the Gods Review
    • The Curse of the Pharaohs
    • The Antediluvian Pyramid Myth
    • Whitewashing American Prehistory
    • James Dean's Cursed Porsche
  • The Library
    • Ancient Mysteries >
      • Ancient Texts >
        • Mesopotamian Texts >
          • Atrahasis Epic
          • Epic of Gilgamesh
          • Kutha Creation Legend
          • Babylonian Creation Myth
          • Descent of Ishtar
          • Berossus
          • Comparison of Antediluvian Histories
        • Egyptian Texts >
          • The Shipwrecked Sailor
          • Dream Stela of Thutmose IV
          • The Papyrus of Ani
          • Classical Accounts of the Pyramids
          • Inventory Stela
          • Manetho
          • Eratosthenes' King List
          • The Story of Setna
          • Leon of Pella
          • Diodorus on Egyptian History
          • On Isis and Osiris
          • Famine Stela
          • Old Egyptian Chronicle
          • The Book of Sothis
          • Horapollo
          • Al-Maqrizi's King List
        • Teshub and the Dragon
        • Hermetica >
          • The Three Hermeses
          • Kore Kosmou
          • Corpus Hermeticum
          • The Asclepius
          • The Emerald Tablet
          • Hermetic Fragments
          • Prologue to the Kyranides
          • The Secret of Creation
          • Ancient Alphabets Explained
          • Prologue to Ibn Umayl's Silvery Water
          • Book of the 24 Philosophers
          • Aurora of the Philosophers
        • Hesiod's Theogony
        • Periplus of Hanno
        • Ctesias' Indica
        • Sanchuniathon
        • Sima Qian
        • Syncellus's Enoch Fragments
        • The Book of Enoch
        • Slavonic Enoch
        • Sepher Yetzirah
        • Tacitus' Germania
        • De Dea Syria
        • Aelian's Various Histories
        • Julius Africanus' Chronography
        • Eusebius' Chronicle
        • Chinese Accounts of Rome
        • Ancient Chinese Automaton
        • The Orphic Argonautica
        • Fragments of Panodorus
        • Annianus on the Watchers
        • The Watchers and Antediluvian Wisdom
      • Medieval Texts >
        • Medieval Legends of Ancient Egypt >
          • Medieval Pyramid Lore
          • John Malalas on Ancient Egypt
          • Fragments of Abenephius
          • Akhbar al-zaman
          • Ibrahim ibn Wasif Shah
          • Murtada ibn al-‘Afif
          • Al-Maqrizi on the Pyramids
          • Al-Suyuti on the Pyramids
        • The Hunt for Noah's Ark
        • Isidore of Seville
        • Book of Liang: Fusang
        • Agobard on Magonia
        • Book of Thousands
        • Voyage of Saint Brendan
        • Power of Art and of Nature
        • Travels of Sir John Mandeville
        • Yazidi Revelation and Black Book
        • Al-Biruni on the Great Flood
        • Voyage of the Zeno Brothers
        • The Kensington Runestone (Hoax)
        • Islamic Discovery of America
        • The Aztec Creation Myth
      • Lost Civilizations >
        • Atlantis >
          • Plato's Atlantis Dialogues >
            • Timaeus
            • Critias
          • Fragments on Atlantis
          • Panchaea: The Other Atlantis
          • Eumalos on Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Gómara on Atlantis
          • Sardinia and Atlantis
          • Santorini and Atlantis
          • The Mound Builders and Atlantis
          • Donnelly's Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Morocco
          • Atlantis and the Sea Peoples
          • W. Scott-Elliot >
            • The Story of Atlantis
            • The Lost Lemuria
          • The Lost Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Africa
          • How I Found Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Termier on Atlantis
          • The Critias and Minoan Crete
          • Rebuttal to Termier
          • Further Responses to Termier
          • Flinders Petrie on Atlantis
        • Lost Cities >
          • Miscellaneous Lost Cities
          • The Seven Cities
          • The Lost City of Paititi
          • Manuscript 512
          • The Idolatrous City of Iximaya (Hoax)
          • The 1885 Moberly Lost City Hoax
          • The Elephants of Paredon (Hoax)
        • OOPARTs
        • Oronteus Finaeus Antarctica Map
        • Caucasians in Panama
        • Jefferson's Excavation
        • Fictitious Discoveries in America
        • Against Diffusionism
        • Tunnels Under Peru
        • The Parahyba Inscription (Hoax)
        • Mound Builders
        • Gunung Padang
        • Tales of Enchanted Islands
        • The 1907 Ancient World Map Hoax
        • The 1909 Grand Canyon Hoax
        • The Interglacial Period
        • Solving Oak Island
      • Religious Conspiracies >
        • Pantera, Father of Jesus?
        • Toledot Yeshu
        • Peter of les Vaux-de-Cernay on Cathars
        • Testimony of Jean de Châlons
        • Rosslyn Chapel and the 'Prentice's Pillar
        • The Many Wives of Jesus
        • Templar Infiltration of Labor
        • Louis Martin & the Holy Bloodline
        • The Life of St. Issa (Hoax)
        • On the Person of Jesus Christ
      • Giants in the Earth >
        • Fossil Origins of Myths >
          • Fossil Teeth and Bones of Elephants
          • Fossil Elephants
          • Fossil Bones of Teutobochus
          • Fossil Mammoths and Giants
          • Giants' Bones Dug Out of the Earth
          • Fossils and the Supernatural
          • Fossils, Myth, and Pseudo-History
          • Man During the Stone Age
          • Fossil Bones and Giants
          • American Elephant Myths
          • The Mammoth and the Flood
          • Fossils and Myth
          • Fossil Origin of the Cyclops
          • Mastodon, Mammoth, and Man
        • Fragments on Giants
        • Manichaean Book of Giants
        • Geoffrey on British Giants
        • Alfonso X's Hermetic History of Giants
        • Boccaccio and the Fossil 'Giant'
        • Book of Howth
        • Purchas His Pilgrimage
        • Edmond Temple's 1827 Giant Investigation
        • The Giants of Sardinia
        • Giants and the Sons of God
        • The Magnetism of Evil
        • Tertiary Giants
        • Smithsonian Giant Reports
        • Early American Giants
        • The Giant of Coahuila
        • Jewish Encyclopedia on Giants
        • Index of Giants
        • Newspaper Accounts of Giants
        • Lanier's A Book of Giants
      • Science and History >
        • Halley on Noah's Comet
        • The Newport Tower
        • Iron: The Stone from Heaven
        • Ararat and the Ark
        • Pyramid Facts and Fancies
        • Argonauts before Homer
        • The Deluge
        • Crown Prince Rudolf on the Pyramids
        • Old Mythology in New Apparel
        • Blavatsky on Dinosaurs
        • Teddy Roosevelt on Bigfoot
        • Devil Worship in France
        • Maspero's Review of Akhbar al-zaman
        • The Holy Grail as Lucifer's Crown Jewel
        • The Mutinous Sea
        • The Rock Wall of Rockwall
        • Fabulous Zoology
        • The Origins of Talos
        • Mexican Mythology
        • Chinese Pyramids
        • Maqrizi's Names of the Pharaohs
      • Extreme History >
        • Roman Empire Hoax
        • American Antiquities
        • American Cataclysms
        • England, the Remnant of Judah
        • Historical Chronology of the Mexicans
        • Maspero on the Predynastic Sphinx
        • Vestiges of the Mayas
        • Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel
        • Origins of the Egyptian People
        • The Secret Doctrine >
          • Volume 1: Cosmogenesis
          • Volume 2: Anthropogenesis
        • Phoenicians in America
        • The Electric Ark
        • Traces of European Influence
        • Prince Henry Sinclair
        • Pyramid Prophecies
        • Templars of Ancient Mexico
        • Chronology and the "Riddle of the Sphinx"
        • The Faith of Ancient Egypt
        • Spirit of the Hour in Archaeology
        • Book of the Damned
        • Great Pyramid As Noah's Ark
        • Richard Shaver's Proofs
    • Alien Encounters >
      • US Government Ancient Astronaut Files >
        • Fortean Society and Columbus
        • Inquiry into Shaver and Palmer
        • The Skyfort Document
        • Whirling Wheels
        • Denver Ancient Astronaut Lecture
        • Soviet Search for Lemuria
        • Visitors from Outer Space
        • Unidentified Flying Objects (Abstract)
        • "Flying Saucers"? They're a Myth
        • UFO Hypothesis Survival Questions
        • Air Force Academy UFO Textbook
        • The Condon Report on Ancient Astronauts
        • Atlantis Discovery Telegrams
        • Ancient Astronaut Society Telegram
        • Noah's Ark Cables
        • The Von Daniken Letter
        • CIA Psychic Probe of Ancient Mars
        • Scott Wolter Lawsuit
        • UFOs in Ancient China
        • CIA Report on Noah's Ark
        • CIA Noah's Ark Memos
        • Congressional Ancient Aliens Testimony
        • Ancient Astronaut and Nibiru Email
        • Congressional Ancient Mars Hearing
        • House UFO Hearing
      • Ancient Extraterrestrials >
        • Premodern UFO Sightings
        • The Moon Hoax
        • Inhabitants of Other Planets
        • Blavatsky on Ancient Astronauts
        • The Stanzas of Dzyan (Hoax)
        • Aerolites and Religion
        • What Is Theosophy?
        • Plane of Ether
        • The Adepts from Venus
      • A Message from Mars
      • Saucer Mystery Solved?
      • Orville Wright on UFOs
      • Interdimensional Flying Saucers
      • Flying Saucers Are Real
      • Report on UFOs
    • The Supernatural >
      • The Devils of Loudun
      • Sublime and Beautiful
      • Voltaire on Vampires
      • Demonology and Witchcraft
      • Thaumaturgia
      • Bulgarian Vampires
      • Religion and Evolution
      • Transylvanian Superstitions
      • Defining a Zombie
      • Dread of the Supernatural
      • Vampires
      • Werewolves and Vampires and Ghouls
      • Science and Fairy Stories
      • The Cursed Car
    • Classic Fiction >
      • Lucian's True History
      • Some Words with a Mummy
      • The Coming Race
      • King Solomon's Mines
      • An Inhabitant of Carcosa
      • The Xipéhuz
      • Lot No. 249
      • The Novel of the Black Seal
      • The Island of Doctor Moreau
      • Pharaoh's Curse
      • Edison's Conquest of Mars
      • The Lost Continent
      • Count Magnus
      • The Mysterious Stranger
      • The Wendigo
      • Sredni Vashtar
      • The Lost World
      • The Red One
      • H. P. Lovecraft >
        • Dagon
        • The Call of Cthulhu
        • History of the Necronomicon
        • At the Mountains of Madness
        • Lovecraft's Library in 1932
      • The Skeptical Poltergeist
      • The Corpse on the Grating
      • The Second Satellite
      • Queen of the Black Coast
      • A Martian Odyssey
    • Classic Genre Movies
    • Miscellaneous Documents >
      • The Balloon-Hoax
      • A Problem in Greek Ethics
      • The Migration of Symbols
      • The Gospel of Intensity
      • De Profundis
      • The Life and Death of Crown Prince Rudolf
      • The Bathtub Hoax
      • Crown Prince Rudolf's Letters
      • Position of Viking Women
      • Employment of Homosexuals
      • James Dean's Scrapbook
      • James Dean's Love Letters
      • The Amazing James Dean Hoax!
    • Free Classic Pseudohistory eBooks
  • About Jason
    • Biography
    • Jason in the Media
    • Contact Jason
    • About JasonColavito.com
    • Terms and Conditions
  • Search