In Brief: Italian Ancient Astronaut Theorist Claims Radical New Date for Giza

An Italian engineer claims that his own personal methodology for studying erosion has proved that the Great Pyramid of Giza is as much as 40,000 years old. The claim circulated last week thanks to a report in The Daily Mail, Alberto Donini claims to use his own "relative erosion method" to compare stones and estimate how long they have been eroding, which led him to the conclusion. His erosion study assumes linear erosion rates, which probably cannot be assumed given that the original surfaces he measured, mostly flat paving stones, were in use for thousands of years, whereas the inner blocks exposed when the cladding fell off around 700 years ago were not subject to the same level of daily wear. Donini's claims are not doubtful on their surface, since he is not a geologist, his area of expertise is machines and concrete, and he is also an ancient astronaut theorist who also claims to have found evidence for space alien contact in Mexico on stones he dug up (on a half-day trip!) with pictures of UFOs and aliens on them, i.e. modern fakes.