At the end of January, our friend Graham Hancock appeared on the Bulletproof radio podcast, but I wasn’t aware of this until an excerpt from it was posted to Audio Burst this week and ended up getting shared on Facebook. At this point, I think it’s safe to say that there are too many podcasts and radio shows to keep up with. Bulletproof seems to be a bit of an odd duck, in that its primary business is selling diet guides, coffee, and health supplements but it augments this business with a New Age lifestyle brand. Its podcast has played host to medical quacks, diet gurus, and media personalities like NatGeo Brain Games host Jason Silva. Into this stew of holistic health claims and pseudoscientific mysticism, Graham Hancock arrived to discuss ancient mysteries. This is important mostly for revealing that Hancock has not quite outgrown the more ridiculous end of the pseudoscience he once promoted in Fingerprints of the Gods and intentionally downplayed in Magicians of the Gods. The warrant for Hancock’s appearance is his advocacy of psychedelic drugs, which Bulletproof podcast host Dave Asprey, who is interested in altered states of consciousness because of their New Age mystical implications (he has used the same drugs as Hancock), but that is not really my area of concern. Nor am I interested in Hancock’s claims that MK ULTRA (yes, that again) was a failure because the “planet” speaks to us through hallucinogens and thus undermines conservative power structures that don’t harmonize with the earth. Instead I’d like to focus on Hancock’s discussion of archaeology and history, right after I note that Hancock confesses to meeting with space aliens while taking drugs, presumably referring to his encounters with supposed interdimensional beings, since he later says he thinks aliens are from another dimension. Anyway, he begins with his usual upset about the education system, which he again feels has a death grip on the portrayal of history and thus on the minds of impressionable youths. He seems to have unresolved trauma from high school: I think that the point here is that history is a story. It’s a narrative, which is being told to us, and that sole possession of that narrative has been handed over to a professional class, the historians and the archaeologists. They effectively have a grip on the story of our past, and they deliver it to us through the schools and through the universities, and it’s what we are taught is the fact about our past, but we should never forget that it isn’t a fact. It’s a story. Notice that Hancock intentionally conflates facts and evidence with the interpretation of that evidence. Clearly, he has never taken a course in historiography—something offered at every university with a history program—but notice the emphasis on the university system and on the teaching profession as a source of special scorn. Perhaps the situation is different in Britain, but most people in the U.S. receive their history lessons from television and the internet, especially since all but the most basic historical narratives were long ago removed from many secondary schools’ curriculums, replaced with more nebulous “social studies,” nor is any detailed study of history required of university students. Here in New York State, for example, a student attending a public university must complete seven of ten areas of General Education to earn a degree. Three of those areas are American History, Western Civilization, and Other World Civilizations. Depending on their choices, this might involve as little as four credits in history, or none at all since the State University of New York has approved courses in subjects like architecture or women in art to meet these requirements. Requirements vary greatly among private schools. So why is Hancock so concerned about historians? He says that the narratives historians tell result in “mind control”: “If you’ve got a grip on history, if you’re controlling history and how history is taught, then that gives you amazing power in the present as well.” He believes this is an outgrowth of the Catholic Church’s pioneering work in exercising intellectual “control” over what people think. Why competing institutions, and those opposed to the Church, went along with it I can’t imagine, but for Hancock all current holders of power are trying to deny the everyman the ability to think for himself. He said that “there is a control structure and a power structure in our society, which is vested in keeping us asleep.” In other words, like others who are discontented with modern society, Hancock perceives education as a battleground for instilling ideology and thus reinforcing social control. His mirror image, Mary Lou Bruner of Texas, believes the same thing. That’s why the creationist who believes Pres. Obama was a gay prostitute, is now a leading candidate for the Texas Board of Education. She promises to rewrite the textbooks, too, because she worries that history and science might encourage students to abandon evangelical Christianity and conservatism. Hancock wants to rewrite the textbooks to promote New Age neo-paganism and a libertarian-inflected social liberalism, or what he calls “progress.” Hancock, though, doesn’t see much progress in his own work. He’s still using nineteenth century ideas to support his claims. Take this recapitulation of a Victorian claim about the Great Pyramid: Here’s the math. If you take the height of the Great Pyramid and multiply it be 43,200, which is not a random number […] If you take the height and multiply it by 43,200, you get the polar radius of the earth. If you measure the base perimeter of the great pyramid and multiply it by 43,200, you get the equatorial circumference of the earth. The Great Pyramid, whether by accident or by design, encodes the dimensions of our planet through those long, dark ages, in the Middle Ages and so on, when we didn’t even know we lived on a planet, let alone its dimensions, those dimensions were always there, encoded on a scale of 1 to 43,200 in the Great Pyramid. This is only approximately true. The height of the pyramid was likely 146.5 meters when complete, which would yield 6,328,800 meters, or 6,327.8 km. The earth’s polar radius is 6,356 km. The number is close but not identical. The perimeter of the Great Pyramid similarly yields a figure that is off by several hundred miles. It’s the kind of thing that makes it seem more like a coincidence than a planned event. Given the malleability of Hancock’s precessional numbers—virtually any multiple of 12 or 72—and the variability of the Earth’s measurements due to its oblate spheroid shape, the measurements were bound to be close enough to something significant. While these claims originate in nineteenth century pyramidology, particularly Charles Piazzi Smyth’s mystical accounts of the Great Pyramid, Hancock also continues to make use of medieval Islamic pyramid lore, which he now falsely claims to be ancient: There are specific ancient traditions relating to Giza, which tell us that it was created as a repository from knowledge from before the flood. When they refer to the flood, I can't help thinking of meltwater pulse 1A that happened 11,600 years ago with a massive meltdown of the icecaps and the comet impacts and the rising of sea level. The trouble is that those “ancient traditions” are known only from medieval texts, and these in turn were based on Late Antique Christian works, particularly those of Annianus and Panodorus. What’s interesting—and not known to Hancock—is that the oldest surviving version, preserved in later quotations from the work of Abu Ma’shar, the ninth-century astrologer, specify that the knowledge from before the Flood was preserved in the temples of Egypt, not the pyramids, something that only entered a bit later, when the Pyramids had become identified with the Pillars of Wisdom from Enochian lore.
Finally, I have no idea what to make of Hancock’s remarks that he speculates that our DNA has been coded with hidden messages or pre-programmed by interdimensional beings to help us have mystical visions while high on drugs. “Such ideas, in my view, are worth exploring,” he said, though conceding that such seeming possibilities might really be nothing more than being high on drugs and seeing things that aren’t there. Hancock unintentionally gave us insight into himself when he imagined he was describing mainstream science: “The staying power of bad ideas is really quite astonishing, and this is to do with psychological factors. As human beings, we get invested in particular areas of thought.”
50 Comments
Only Me
3/12/2016 01:47:24 pm
One correction.
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David Bradbury
3/13/2016 08:22:42 am
Are you a secret Clangers fan?
David Bradbury
3/13/2016 08:27:12 am
PS: Louis Martin's "Evangiles Sans Dieu" is not the tidiest of books. I'll get back to you when I've figured out which bits in its 300 pages are helpful in understanding fringe claims.
Shane Sullivan
3/12/2016 02:42:16 pm
Hancock's pyramid math inspired me to conduct a little research.
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Time Machine
3/12/2016 03:00:37 pm
Different generations of Egyptian priesthoods revised and altered the religious beliefs of Egypt. Ditto Stonehenge. Ditto Christianity and Judaism. No religious belief is set in stone for eternity.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 08:11:53 am
Milton Wainwright is a British microbiologist who is known for his research into what he claims could be extraterrestrial life found in the stratosphere.
V
3/12/2016 05:01:32 pm
The problem with Mary Looney Bruner's concept of "rewriting the textbooks" to take out history and science is that it is very literally ILLEGAL to do so. All materials in schools are required by Federal law to be scientifically-based materials, used in scientifically-validated teaching methods.
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Time Machine
3/12/2016 05:03:22 pm
Except that there happen to be teachers who only do their jobs and don't believe what they teach to be "factual"
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V
3/13/2016 03:32:37 pm
GTFO, you contemptible turd. You know nothing about factual and not factual, only your own deluded bullshit. You CERTAINLY know nothing whatever about the field of education.
Time Machine
3/13/2016 06:04:09 pm
>>>GTFO<<<
Clete
3/12/2016 05:56:08 pm
I too have a mathematical theory about the Earth. I once came upon a cow pie and measured it. I then multiplied its circumference by six hundred and twenty and found that it was the exact distance from the cow pie to El Paso, Texas.
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anon
3/12/2016 07:36:42 pm
Introductory university courses on history that I've taken have been really good at open interpretation, attention to primary sources, understanding government propaganda from Romans to Soviets etc., creation of national myths....
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anon
3/12/2016 07:41:18 pm
Having said that, Hancock would be right to think the prohibition of hallucinogens prejudices the content and outlook of academic courses. As long as academics propose (with good reason) altered states as pivotal in the development of art and philosophy, then the inability of universities to directly explore these areas will remain a block to understanding.
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David Bradbury
3/13/2016 08:24:48 am
Even in official terms, it's not a 100% inability to study altered states:
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V
3/13/2016 03:43:03 pm
I personally have yet to see anything truly convincing as evidence that hallucinogens has been "pivotal" to the development of art and philosophy. To be honest, hallucinogens and the production of anything solid in the way of artistic merit are just incompatible, for the simple fact that hallucinogens remove one's ability to EDIT. So please present "with good reason," because until that statement is proven, I remain of the opinion that nothing at all is being lost by refusing to let students kill brain cells in the name of art.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 06:00:59 pm
>>>I personally have yet to see<<<
anon
3/13/2016 09:46:30 pm
"I remain of the opinion that nothing at all is being lost by refusing to let students kill brain cells in the name of art."
anon
3/12/2016 07:45:12 pm
... but as anyone who has been to a student party knows, there are unofficial ways around all that - and it's not like it's a big secret.
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anon
3/12/2016 07:45:54 pm
...I mean Uruguay. Wherever :-)
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anon
3/12/2016 09:31:37 pm
...so, to elaborate, if you are a university student studying christian mysticism, anthropology of religion, Plotinus, William James, Dostoyevsky, Schopenhaur, Buddhism and a vast whole load more - then there are certain experiences which will either take massive luck, long diligent practice, or a dose of acid to be able to comprehend fully.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 07:25:37 am
>>>And hence it will be a while before we ever see a paper like "William James and Timothy Leary - Phenomenological Comparisons of the Ether and LSD Experiences", or, "Mushrooms - Do They Make You Paint Like A caveman ? "<<<
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anon
3/13/2016 09:46:18 am
On the other hand Google scholar is full of the goings-on of the Americans. It's one of my latter interests to read about what the natives of the Americas REALLY do, rather than what New Age hippies CLAIM they do, and anthropologists have recorded some hair raising stuff.
Time Machine
3/13/2016 08:13:56 am
>>> Erowid isn't going away any time soon<<<
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anon
3/13/2016 09:23:59 am
Nor I.
V
3/13/2016 03:53:55 pm
1. No, you really can't play with "dangerous nuclear equipment in the lab" as an engineering student. The most you can play with as an engineering student is the safe parts, with no nuclear fuel available.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 05:54:37 pm
Drugs and human evolution - it's a myth. It's all wrong.
anon
3/13/2016 10:13:52 pm
Numbered points, sure sign of over confidence...... :-)
anon
3/13/2016 10:26:12 pm
...ok...sigh....no art while under the influence eh ?....
anon
3/13/2016 10:32:40 pm
....and hm, number 5 - interesting use of dots. Possibly reminiscent of the dots drawn on cave art - all over and around the horses & etc.
Time Machine
3/14/2016 03:10:28 am
Wasson once commented about how he understood the art of Goya after taking a certain drug.
Time Machine
3/14/2016 03:16:31 am
Besides, Coleridge Taylor bragged about how he composed Kublai Khan under the influence of opium, and everyone knows about how The Beatles went from Pop Music to Progressive Music (Sgt Pepper) through taking drugs. And who could have guided them except the Maharishi. Religious meditation the East was conducted under the influence of psychedelics.
Time Machine
3/14/2016 03:21:02 am
Actually, The Beatles met the Maharishi for the first time a couple of months after Sgt Pepper was released.
Time Machine
3/13/2016 07:30:33 am
Even those like Graham Hancock, Timothy Leary and Carlos Castaneda have to be regarded seriously in relation to drugs because like the ancient religions, these people regard drugs as being holy and a gateway to the origins of man, however batty and crazy they are/were.
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anon
3/13/2016 11:30:38 pm
It's funny how so many people still believe in Castaneda despite being shown to be a fraud years ago. I remember telling a hippy this and getting "yeah, well, it's the philosophy that counts whether it's true or not.".
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Time Machine
3/14/2016 09:31:35 am
Wasson took Castaneda's accounts of his drug-tripping seriously and it would be interesting to see what Wasson would make of Hancock if he were still alive today. I am sure he would acknowledge the tripping side seriously, respecting it as an inspiration to Hancock's fantasy history and fantasy archaeology.
Time Machine
3/13/2016 09:13:41 am
Dr Don Morse, a Temple University science professor, DDS, PhD., thought he had a near-death experience after a run one day in 1983.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 09:28:53 am
There are gangs of nutty professors who seriously believe in life after death and write batty books about this crap.
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Time Machine
3/13/2016 09:57:57 am
Way back in the 1970s it was explained by sober rational people that so-called "Near-Death Experiences" in hospitals during operations were caused by the effects of anaesthesia on a minority of people.
Pacal
3/13/2016 04:21:39 pm
What is fascinating is just how old, predictable and thoroughly dull are Hancock's actual beliefs about the past. They are just recycled bromides much of which is over a century old. Yet Hancock claims repeatedly that that his ideas are new, daring and cutting edge, when there are in fact old and pathetic.
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anon
3/14/2016 06:17:18 am
Just looking at Wasson's wikipedia entry, looks like someone's had a dig at him (wasn't me).
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Uncle Ron
3/14/2016 02:35:21 pm
Anon - this post is a little out of sync but with all the bloviating Time Machine adds to the thread it's hard to follow anyway. Earlier you asked, "<Do> You think every bit of cave art was a masterpiece worthy of Michaelangelo ? When did this superhuman ability cease to be a general skill and become the preserve of a select talented few ?" I assume by "superhuman ability" you are referring to the idea of creating art(?) What makes you think that painting was a general skill? I think it's more logical to believe that, like today, most "cavemen" couldn't draw or paint. In your favor, the ones who could may well have been shamans who DID use hallucinatory plants - whether that contributed to their artistic ability is debatable. But they were the FIRST artists so their work, which is often superb - as good as any modern impressionist - IS "worthy of Michelangelo" in the sense that the mental leap from thinking about the terror of stalking a dangerous beast like a bison (remember the idea of "majestic" nature only came about when it was no longer a threat to us), to representing a terrifying bison with pigments on a cave wall represents a milestone in the development of the human brain. I seriously doubt that it was a general ability.
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Time Machine
3/14/2016 03:51:02 pm
Wasson commented how he understood that Goya's artwork originated from drugs.
anoon
3/14/2016 07:43:21 pm
That's what I was getting at. I was combating the inference that because cave art is so great, it couldn't possibly have been done on drugs - and doing so by contradicting the assumption that it is indeed all great art.
Uncle Ron
3/14/2016 08:16:46 pm
anon- Good questions. I will make a hypothesis: It has been suggested that cave art was used for "mystical" purposes, e.g. pre-hunt ceremonies or coming-of-age initiations, and the like (proto religion). As such they would only have been allowed to be made and used by special persons, i.e. "shamans", who had demonstrated their power and ability. The juvenile and "practice" art - such as it was in a society that spent most of its time just staying alive - was done outdoors and/or in places where it has not survived, except for some stone and bone carvings, shell jewelry, etc., which do not deteriorate as easily.
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Time Machine
3/14/2016 08:40:26 pm
Uncle Ron belongs to the "drugs are to be ignored" camp.
anon
3/15/2016 08:19:09 pm
I agree, some of it is very moving. Would you believe I actually shed a tear looking at some horses ? It's true, I feel a bit pathetic admitting. But I don't think that's necessarily because of the quality of the work, rather the profundity of the gap of time to, and simplicity of, our ancestors.
anon
3/15/2016 08:23:34 pm
We see a similar thing happening with the work on Gobeklie Tepe. People seem to be getting confused with the amazingness of the fact of the discovery, and the quality of the work itself.
anon
3/15/2016 08:36:41 pm
Here you go look, Gobekli Tepe carving, easy as pissing in the shower.
anon
3/14/2016 01:57:44 pm
"Wasson took Castaneda's accounts of his drug-tripping seriously and it would be interesting to see what Wasson would make of Hancock if he were still alive today. I am sure he would acknowledge the tripping side seriously, respecting it as an inspiration to Hancock's fantasy history and fantasy archaeology."
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