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Ray Grasse Proposes a Framework for Exploring the Fortean, But It's Pretty Much Zeitgeist Theory Applied to Fringe Believers

5/18/2017

41 Comments

 
​When I was in college, one of the pieces of anthropological literature that I had to read was an article called “Baseball Magic” by George Gmelch. The article, a revised version of a 1992 journal article, described the way that baseball players engaged in particular rituals in order to secure favorable game outcomes, under the folk magical theory that performing the same actions before a game—whether eating the same meal or wearing the same clothes or even repeating specific gestures—would produce the same positive outcome. The key is that there is no “empirical correlation” between the ritual and perceived result. The meaning, if any, is entirely in the head of the person performing it.
​I couldn’t help but think of the logical error those baseball players commit when I read an article that The Daily Grail posted this week called “Portals of Strangeness” by Ray Grasse. Ostensibly, Grasse’s purpose was to make the case that Fortean phenomena—all the strange things that cause people to take notice of the world around them—have a deep importance because they hold a personal and collective significance for human beings. This, allegedly, justifies the study of Forteana as a phenomenon, with some sort of apparently objective existence as coherent representation of reality.
 
I will omit the author’s discussion of his astrological beliefs, but it takes little to see a connection between his belief that planets govern human fate and his parallel belief that Fortean anomalies “hold special significance as signposts of transformation and change in our world.”
 
Anyway, I don’t want to get too bogged down in Grasse’s personal story, which he seeks to universalize. Instead, I’d like to think about his proposed theoretical basis, which he says provides a systematic framework for understanding Fortean phenomena:
To some extent that involves becoming more aware of the larger network of events these phenomena are constellated within, since they inevitably seem enmeshed in larger patterns of significance. But it also requires the added critical step of asking, What do these events mean? For as important as those webs of synchronicity are, they mean little if we don’t make the effort to dig deeper and explore the archetypal meanings involved. Said another way, Fortean phenomena may be best understood as elements within an overarching symbolic worldview.
I trust that most of you can see the mistakes he has made quite easily: He has begun by assuming that Fortean phenomena are a coherent category of events taking place outside our categories of understanding and from that attempted to frame the question in terms of whether weird things hold deep meaning. If we were to start with the opposite assumption, namely, that these so-called phenomena only appear anomalous but are actually natural and merely poorly understood or intentionally misconstrued, then the question of meaning disappears altogether.
 
At the same time, however, Grasse accidentally comes close to making a good point. There is a constellation of meanings attached to Fortean phenomena, but it is not one that exists in the objective world of facts and matter; instead, it is the meaning that believers in the occult, the New Age, and the outré see in them, imposing onto ambiguous events a framework that has cultural meaning to them but one that is not objectively “real.” It’s sort of like when the Greeks saw the work of dryads and demigods in the actions of nature; indeed, Grasse at one point compares the ancient catalogs of monstrous portents like two-headed animals to Fortean research. But the pagan worldview lacks empirical support—we can find no demigods—and Grasse’s is similarly a fantasy woven into the unusual.
 
Grasse gives a good example of this when he attempts to analyze the circumstances surrounding the famous film clip that supposedly shows Bigfoot walking through the woods. I’ll leave you to read the whole thing, but he outlines all the material involving themes of wilderness and civilization, human evolution, and (less plausibly) counterculture that occurred in the weeks and months leading up to the creation of the film. “Putting all of these pieces together, the picture that starts coming into focus is indeed one of a powerful force welling up in the collective psyche—a force simultaneously rooted in the intuitive-emotional aspects of our nature as well as our rational faculties.” He’s describing zeitgeist, which is to say the impact of culture, but he attributes it to some sort of mystical power rather than the working of cultural influences and beliefs.
 
To that end, he offers a very weird claim, that the Fortean is also a method of uncovering the hidden nature of reality:
I’d like to touch briefly on another possible level of significance: the universal. What does that mean? Simply, that Fortean events of the most dramatic kind may be saying something important, perhaps even revolutionary, about the nature of the universe itself. Let me explain. […] Fortean events would represent tears in the fabric of reality, allowing other dimensions to bleed through into ours—a cross-pollinating of unique yet interlocking worlds. Such experiences occur at times that are special to us and filled with numinosity, or what the Greeks described as kairos, experiences of sacred time. At their most dramatic, such events display a quality of archetypal resonance and invite us to expand the boundaries of our consciousness, allowing us to catch momentary glimpses of the larger ocean of possibilities we swim within. In the end, Fortean events may represent portals into a different way of understanding our universe, and ultimately, ourselves.
​But does it really? Half the time, he’s talking about cultural fantasies and then at the end he lurches into questions of science, which, if taken as hypotheses, could theoretically fall within the purview of science. Ultimately, his article, as personal and meandering and lacking in rigor as it is, speaks to the nebulous nature of whatever we call the “Fortean”—a mix of unusual but natural events, tall tales, and speculative science. By trying to weave a variety of unrelated events into a coherent worldview—one where the human perspective of strangeness provides a fictive link—Grasse is accidentally creating a cultural myth that he mistakes for a description of reality.
41 Comments
Ken
5/18/2017 10:47:38 am

If you take 100 sports fans who have rituals, clothing, habits etc. which they believe influence whether or not their team wins or loses, you will probably find 100 different 'lucky' behaviors. That should tell you something.They can't all be right, and in fact none of them are.

Reply
A C
5/18/2017 12:58:40 pm

Ritual behavior among Sports PLAYERS does have a strong influence on matches. Much of Sports Psychology is founded on this.

The denying of the real affects of psychological factors is ignorant extremist-reductionist claptrap. Morale is a key factor in all forms of competition and to claim otherwise is insanity. Morale boosting behaviors are specific to individual groups and cultures because they need to satisfy people who are themselves diverse.

Psychology is not Newtonian physics, it doesn't have single right answers for inputs and outputs and to think otherwise would be magical thinking in itself.

Magical thinking might be a 'logical error' but the cited anthropologists are completely wrong that there's no empirical affects of ritual behavior. Under George Gmelch's logic the outcome of a sports match is a dice roll so a player's performance should be identical no matter how miserable he's feeling. If that logic worked then batting averages probably wouldn't exist because if you selected for weather players would always perform average anyway.

Ritual behaviors are incredibly important to the quality of life for sufferers of developmental disorders such as autism. If someone's mental wellbeing requires certain activities then telling them to stop being irrational is highly offensive and to try and alter their behavior would be a form of torture (as has been proven in psychiatric practice for decades).

Reply
Jason Colavito link
5/18/2017 01:39:52 pm

Gmelch didn't deny that rituals can make people feel better and boost their confidence, resulting in positive outcomes; he meant that the rituals are not connected to outside forces: e.g., eating chicken has no connection to the weather.

Americanegro
5/18/2017 04:16:32 pm

So, sports PLAYERS engage in behaviors that they share with the mentally ill (your word "disorders")?

Can you spot your spelling mistake?

Highly offensive? Moi?

Do you even lift bro?

V
5/19/2017 12:31:29 pm

And yet, cognitive-behavioral therapy is all about altering behavior, and is frequently used to help people who have developmental disorders. Certainly if a behavior is benign, there's no reason to change it, but when a behavior negatively impacts physical or social well-being, even when it's "required for mental well-being," attempts are definitively made to change it without considering it "torture." That is, after all, quite literally what substance abuse recovery centers DO, because that's what substance abuse IS--regardless of what other disorders one might or might not have.

Nonetheless, Jason is right: ritualistic behaviors have no impact on, for instance, the angle of the wind, how well the OTHER TEAM plays, what other players do, what the sporting audience does, etc. It only affects the internal dynamic of the performer of ritual behavior, NOT the factors that person believes their behavior will impact.

Richard Smoley link
5/19/2017 11:06:45 am

I really see no intelligent criticism here. Mr. Colavito simply denies Ray Grasse's assumptions by stating his own: "There is a constellation of meanings attached to Fortean phenomena, but it is not one that exists in the objective world of facts and matter; instead, it is the meaning that believers in the occult, the New Age, and the outré see in them, imposing onto ambiguous events a framework that has cultural meaning to them but one that is not objectively “real.”"

Mr. Colavito's appeal to the "objective world of facts and matter"--which, upon any sort of scrutiny, turn out to be quite mysterious in themselves--simply asserts his own view as being true and Grasse's as being false.

I suppose the principal logical fallacies in Mr. Colavito's argument are petitio principii--"Grasse is wrong because I say he is wrong"--and a rather naive appeal to authority, because only the most philosophically naive, along perhaps with some followers of Ayn Rand, believe that the "objective world" as cognized by humans accurately and completely represents whatever may correspond to "facts and matter."

Reply
TONY S.
5/19/2017 05:00:13 pm

Please explain how the world of facts and matter is quite mysterious in itself.

TONY S.
5/18/2017 11:17:51 am

Cultural zeitgeist as a mystic power? Well it's original, if nothing else.

You can excuse the mainstream public for being caught up in Fortean phenomena at the time Charles Fort was first writing, since the general state of knowledge was less than it is today. Before the era of space exploration it was easier to consider the possibility of alien craft around the earth. People believed at the time that there may have been other intelligent life in the solar system, as postulated by Percival Lowell, and hence made popular by H.G. Wells. When sciences like meteorology and astronomy were younger and the technology still primitive as compared to today, it was easier to believe in unexplained weather phenomena and undiscovered planets, and all sorts of weird, mysterious celestial occurrences.

But with the answers that have subsequently come with the great leaps and bounds the various scientific fields have made in the many decades since, I fail to understand how or why anyone would choose to try and legitimize Fortean phenomena on any level. I'll admit that they were fun to read about as a kid when I didn't know any better, but that's not exactly a desirable demographic to market these new ideas to.

Then again, people like Ray Grasse for some reason just seem to delight in keeping alive 19th/early 20th century fringe topics, and to a degree they are succeeding, so what do I know.

Reply
An Over-Educated Grunt
5/18/2017 12:14:53 pm

It was perhaps original when White Wolf used it as the foundation of reality in Mage: the Ascension, or when Gaiman used it in American Gods, but those were twenty-ish years ago.

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:47:50 pm

An Over Educated Grunt,

I wasn't aware of those, thanks for letting me know. I haven't yet read any Gaiman, I only became aware of him recently when he appeared on the HPL documentary FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN.

I should have realized that none of these ignoramuses could actually have come up with something wholly unique.

May I say that I've enjoyed your posts through the years.

Shane Sullivan
5/18/2017 12:55:50 pm

I remember my mind being blown by the idea of consensual reality when I read Mage at 15. On the other hand, it sounds like something a stoner would have said in the 60s, and probably is.

David Bradbury
5/18/2017 05:53:50 pm

A.E. van Vogt, "The Book of Ptath" (1947)

V
5/19/2017 12:38:56 pm

Go further back: Robert Heinlein, Number of the Beast and the Lazarus Long stories: Oz as a real place because people believed in it, the concept of the Mythmaker/Storyteller as a god. The little erasure of a character from the story because of their Storyteller. That would be 40 years ago.

Or, for that matter, the age-old belief in mass prayer as a way to change something is precisely this concept. That may even have been the purpose of CAVE ART, after all.

An Over-Educated Grunt
5/20/2017 02:22:30 pm

I find that hard to believe. I mean, even I don't enjoy all of my posts. I sometimes go back later and wince. Sad thing is I only post sober.

Only Me
5/18/2017 11:21:26 am

"By trying to weave a variety of unrelated events into a coherent worldview—one where the human perspective of strangeness provides a fictive link—Grasse is accidentally creating a cultural myth that he mistakes for a description of reality."

I feel like I've seen this before. Wait, now I remember. Isn't this similar to the UFO phenomenon, where you made the same observation? Unrelated events beings transformed into a cultural myth?

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:07:34 pm

I was going to say that it sounded like Scott Wolter's personal credo, to be honest.

Reply
Only Me
5/18/2017 05:12:17 pm

Well...

Americanegro
5/18/2017 06:21:52 pm

Scott Wolter's personal credo is Blue Ruin and Vitriol.

At Risk
5/18/2017 12:04:26 pm

Pretty intensive subect matter, Jason.

Random Wiki insights:

"This category lists Forteana, also known as Fortean phenomena, that are related to the works of Charles Fort, which he described as a "distinctive blend of mocking humor, penetrating insight, and calculated outrageousness"."

"Anomalistics is the use of scientific methods to evaluate anomalies (phenomena that fall outside of current understanding), with the aim of finding a rational explanation."

Welcome to the "phenomena" of the Norse Code-stone and to "Gunn's mindset", for we are now involved is a fantastic reality orchestrated by Divine forces, are we not? We are not talking about kids' stuff like UFO's, Giants, or Aliens...we are talking about medieval Norse humor and their penetrating, futuristic insight...and a very certain degree of calculated outrageousness related to long-distance land speculation.

Indeed, this is odd if not funny, as being something likely very real but readily rejected by self-blinded authorities and self-appointed "fringe history" skeptics.

The Norse Code-stone seems to fit heavily into a Fortean setting, but any "phenomenen" associated with it can be explained...as it has been. In this present situation, much catching-up needs to be done by professionals who do not want to be charged with such an insurmountable-seeming task involved with actually understanding fresh and little-known history.

In most respects, it is silly to think of Frenchmen arriving deep within America before Norsemen, yet this silly view prevails in academia. What a blight on accepted and acceptable history, in a situation where abundant evidences must be explained away or ignored. What a shame....

Reply
Weatherwax
5/18/2017 12:19:45 pm

"...for we are now involved is (sic) a fantastic reality orchestrated by Divine forces, are we not?"

No, we're not involved with any divine forces, we're involved in the real world.

"...we are talking about medieval Norse humor and their penetrating, futuristic insight...and a very certain degree of calculated outrageousness related to long-distance land speculation."

No. We are talking about a fantasy prone individual trying to force his fantasy down everyone's throat despite of the complete lack of any evidence.

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:41:04 pm

Well said, 100% agree.

Mandalore
5/18/2017 12:34:38 pm

"In this present situation, much catching-up needs to be done by professionals who do not want to be charged with such an insurmountable-seeming task involved with actually understanding fresh and little-known history."

Right. Because academic have no interest in research in areas others have overlooked. Why, intensive and original work is only the basis for careers and tenure. Or maybe scholars have considered this topic and though their experience and expertise determined that there's nothing there.

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:43:59 pm

"Professionals who do not want to be charged with such an insurmountable seeming task involved with actually understanding fresh and little known history."

Well that's a new one on me.

Mandalore
5/18/2017 04:45:06 pm

It was meant sarcastically

Americanegro
5/18/2017 04:20:11 pm

Sounds like someone needs a locked room, a Luger, and one last chance to do the right thing.

Reply
Clint Knapp
5/19/2017 01:36:34 am

While I have long been a critic of Bob's methodology and premise, this is just crass.

His hypothesis may have no basis in reality, and it may even be at times that he rants like an evangelical preacher who will not be dissuaded from his quaint and often backwards world view, but insinuating he should kill himself is downright low.

Americanegro
5/19/2017 11:33:23 am

I'm not insinuating it, I'm saying it. He's got a defect. It's for the good of the herd. I also think Scott Wolter should kill himself, as his father did. Or else his dive buddy killed him.....

TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:05:37 pm

I was going to say that it sounded like Scott Wolter's credo, to be honest.

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 12:09:17 pm

Oops, sorry about that. My computer is running a bit slow. It must be an academic conspiracy.

Reply
Shane Sullivan
5/18/2017 01:07:46 pm

Needless to say, Grasse profoundly misunderstands synchronicity in the original Jungian sense. By ascribing the events to cosmic leakage, he's making them causal, which is the one thing synchronicity COULDN'T be. It occurred when events coincided with no conceivable causal connection; if they corresponded with an "archetype" (another thing it sounds like Grasse doesn't quite understand) the coincidence would result in a profound sense of mystical awe.

I know, because I've had people sit down and explain it to me for way longer than they should have had to.

Reply
TONY S.
5/18/2017 10:55:50 pm

@Mandalore: I wasn't quoting you, I was quoting At Risk. I knew you were being sarcastic. I recognize sarcasm well as I employ it myself, ha ha.

Reply
At Risk
5/19/2017 11:35:19 am

Well, that was fun. Here's another idle speculation that could make sense to a legitimate anthropologist interested in quaint ethnography. This is an idea summoned up by many before me, but with a stunning local twist:

Consider that the Greenlanders mysteriously disappeared around the time of the Kensington Runestone, if we bother to round times up and down a bit (according to the two settlements)...meaning, the Greenlanders may easily have decided to migrate to a place of warmer weather where taxes and tithes didn't bother, either.

The Whetstone River in SD just across the border from MN is very heavily marked up with stoneholes and some petroglyphs, too, indicating a geographically widespread (walking) attempt at placing individual land claims. (This is a different approach to land-claiming than the Norse Code-stone proposes, possibly involving a huge claim.) It does look like perhaps monks or people such as the "lost" Greenlanders may have made the attempted individual claims deep in America, well south of Greenland and Hudson Bay.

Ethnologically speaking, the Mandan Nation held secrets lost to time, yet we easily see the European cultural influences on these people as well as previous observers saw light skin and various-colored eyes. None of this can be denied and should be explained, if possible. We only want to discover where these influences came from. Wales, Ireland...Scandinavia? I propose looking across the very short expance of land between the Whetstone River in SD and the ancestral homeland of the Mandan in ND...to possibly see "disappeared Greenlanders" who co-mingled their blood with local American Indians in order to survive.

Another fantasy--fun speculation--that makes sense, but that may anger some here. Who cares? We should consider that in some instances fringe is somewhat in the eye of the beholder...also, that ignorance will prevail when everyone is unaccepting of some things that could be actually fit into the slim category of "fantastic realities".

Fake AMERICANEGRO, why give thought to the idea of a violent suicidal death in a grey world when one can choose to live in a vibrant, colorful, imaginative world...with God?

Reply
Weatherwax
5/19/2017 07:32:09 pm

"Consider that the Greenlanders mysteriously disappeared around the time of the Kensington Runestone, if we bother to round times up and down a bit (according to the two settlements)...meaning, the Greenlanders may easily have decided to migrate to a place of warmer weather where taxes and tithes didn't bother, either."

There is no evidence of any Greenlander immigration into NA. No settlements, no genetics, no artifacts, nothing.

And since the KR is a modern forgery, it doesn't match the time of the abandonment of the Greenland settlements, which weren't that mysterious.

"The Whetstone River in SD just across the border from MN is very heavily marked up with stoneholes and some petroglyphs, too, indicating a geographically widespread (walking) attempt at placing individual land claims."

The same post European settlement stone holes that are all over the place, and that you've been shown, many times, are post settlement.

You don't specify which petroglyphs, but given your history of insisting a generic boat petroglyph is definitely a Viking ship from the middle ages, despite the fact it isn't mentioned until the 1970's, and the locals can tell you who carved it and when, we can dispose of that too.

"Ethnologically speaking, the Mandan Nation held secrets lost to time, yet we easily see the European cultural influences on these people as well as previous observers saw light skin and various-colored eyes. None of this can be denied and should be explained, if possible. We only want to discover where these influences came from. Wales, Ireland...Scandinavia? I propose looking across the very short expance (sic) of land between the Whetstone River in SD and the ancestral homeland of the Mandan in ND...to possibly see "disappeared Greenlanders" who co-mingled their blood with local American Indians in order to survive."

The myth that the Mandan were light skinned, blue eyed, and spoke a European language has been dispelled many times, I believe even by Jason. In addition, there are no European structures or artifacts in the archaeological record, and no European genes in the Mandan people.

"Another fantasy--fun speculation--that makes sense, but that may anger some here."

Fantasy is the correct word.

Instead of angered, lets say annoyed at the constant rants of a fantasy prone individual who could probably benefit from some counselling.

Reply
At Risk
5/20/2017 12:50:43 pm

Well, it takes a certain amount of courage to come to a Skeptic's blog and make claims that most academics and skeptics immediately write off as fringe. However, my bold contention is that history truth is the goal, and that any attempts to control the historical record should be considered fringe if that attempted control involves ignoring legitimate evidences or trying to explain them away.

I wholehearted believe that much of what I've been espousing here is historically accurate and that academics, professionals and skeptics are very wrong about some things. My basic premise charges these same people with gross negligence, since most of them must by peer pressure say that the French were in this Upper Midwest region of America before Scandinavians, in spite of many, many collective and corroborative evidences, including the Kensington Runestone itself...which has not and never will be officially deemed a hoax.

I should probably mention that being a Christian makes me a minority only on this Skeptic's blog. I certainly don't need counseling about how to enjoy life as God has been presenting it to me. Generally speaking, skeptics don't believe in a personal Creator, and much sport is expressed here advocating for a diminished view of Christians and Christianity. This is a shame, since so many people in America and around the World are good, sincere, believing Christians.

Why attack such a large body of good people here? In the name of Science? How about those, like me, who believe in evolution and God together? This seems as bad as attacking the other half of Americans who voted in President Trump. Is it the duty of this blog to alienate half of America's population? Or, should folks enmass tune in to Fox news to see what's actually happening?

In my opinion, we need a more truthful rendition of information being presented to us, both here on this blog and on TV news. Only some people care about the views of Hollywood personalities and extremist Democrats...those who are clearly on the fringe.

By the way, I don't think Fake AMERICANEGRO's comment, above, about Wolter and his father would have stood on other more respectable blogs. For instance, the "Unexplained Mysteries" blog has a very good anti-bullying and anti-trolling policy. (But then again, maybe it's more an issue of enforcement to attain expected common decency.)

[email protected]
5/22/2017 12:35:20 pm

Most Americans are Christians, and I would dare to guess that most of the posters here are Christians. The problem is your assumptions that the majority of Christians agree with the delusional views you've pushed here, and your insistence on pushing your supernatural views when the subjects don't even call for a supernatural influence.

"...any attempts to control the historical record should be considered fringe if that attempted control involves ignoring legitimate evidences or trying to explain them away."

A goofy statement, but anyway, you have no legitimate evidences, you have delusions.

"I wholehearted believe that much of what I've been espousing here is historically accurate and that academics, professionals and skeptics are very wrong about some things. My basic premise charges these same people with gross negligence,"

You do not have the right to demand the scientific communities accept your delusions. The scientific communities deal with real evidence, not fantasy, and if you want respect you have to present real evidence.

Reply
At Risk
5/23/2017 02:00:33 pm

[email protected], somehow, you got left behind. My contention is clear: If so-called professionals are willing to purposely overlook and distort obvious evidences related to Norse exploration in this region, they are to be considered as fringe figures, eventually. I am not the decider in these cases...history truth is. This blog is infamous for distorting medieval American history in favor of an imposter...that being Mr. Columbus. Foolishness, sillyness, is trying to convince yourself that Frenchmen made it to inner America before the Norse, in spite of all the available collective evidences...which you choose on your own to downplay.

Yes, I have come to believe that fringe is in the eye of the beholder, as is factual evidence. You don't know much about obscure medieval European-American history, therefore your head is pretty much stuck in the muck of being left behind...you, yourself, are to be considered as fringe, ignorant to what is historically true, not me. I consider and absord very real evidences, while you have an inner need (peer pressure?) to discard them.

In my limited view, your own viewpoint is extremely biased and meaningless here, because you have shrouded yourself in purposeful self-deception when it comes to ignoring evidences. Don't feel too bad, though, as quite a few so-called professionals, academics, are making the same mistake. I think you are merely a follower of a mistaken viewpoint, but it's okay if we think differently, since truth will likely eventually prevail. In the meanwhile, let's not overreach in limiting ourselves to what the truth may be, based on obvious evidences...which are too often downplayed instead of being understood and accepted.

Reply
Weatherwax
5/23/2017 09:38:51 pm

M_duchek is I. Damm autofill. Anyway.

"If so-called professionals are willing to purposely overlook and distort obvious evidences related to Norse exploration in this region, they are to be considered as fringe figures, eventually. I am not the decider in these cases...history truth is."

Ha ha. You're not just delusional, you're a pompous, arrogant ass. As for the rest of your prattling, you accuse everyone else of what you yourself are.

At Risk
5/24/2017 10:53:17 am

I guess I could say in return that anyone who thinks another bone of contention, the Newport Tower, is a Colonial windmill is delusional, though I wouldn't accuse all these deluded people of being pompous or arrogant asses.

See what happened? You have gone to name-calling over our different perspectives of evidence. Disagreeable folks here like you, WEATHERWAX, think nothing of caving in to peer pressure and academic political correctness in order to pee on conclusive evidences. The fact of the matter is that the Newport Tower cannot rotate, and the top is not even round for anything to rotate on it. Nothing about this medieval structure was condusive to rotation, and any fringe persons such as yourself should understand that fireplaces were not built into mills.

For another example to you, then, anyone who believes the Newport Tower is a Colonial windmill is on the fringe of history truth...not with it. Anyone who believes the Newport Tower was a Colonial windmill is deluded, either by other dumb skeptics, or by themselves...usually because of peer pressure or acamemic political correctness.

The same might be said for the Kensington Runestone and all the many evidences related to it in approximate time and location. The evidences are overwhemingly convincing in their three categories of evidences, except to those on the fringe of history truth...like you.

I will say you, yourself, are in a state of being deluded; however, I will not say you are an arrogant donkey, though you certainly come across as one...and on the fringe, too.

Anyone not accepting of obvious history evidences and truth is on the fringe.

Weatherwax
5/25/2017 01:19:23 am

I called you a delusional pompous ass because of " I am not the decider in these cases...history truth is."

ie They laughed at Galileo too.

Your long history of harassing and threatening any professionals who've tried to point out the problems with your "evidences" helps, too.

But since you brought it up: " guess I could say in return that anyone who thinks another bone of contention, the Newport Tower, is a Colonial windmill is delusional"

You could, but it just shows you're a delusional crank.

" The fact of the matter is that the Newport Tower cannot rotate, and the top is not even round for anything to rotate on it. Nothing about this medieval structure was condusive (sic) to rotation,"

No, the building doesn't rotate. Do you even understand how a windmill works? In any case the upper part of the building, where the blades were mounted, is no longer present.

You're a delusional crank.

Lurking for Years
5/23/2017 02:03:58 pm

(Up periscope, 360 degree scan): Shakes head in disbelief.
(Down periscope), now diving to 100 meters.

Reply
At Risk
5/24/2017 11:03:35 am

Watch out for that submerged rock in the MO River near Mandan/Old Deapolis, ND...don't let your propeller confuse the inscription before we get a good look at it....

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        • Aelian's Various Histories
        • Julius Africanus' Chronography
        • Fragments of Bruttius
        • 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
        • Byzantine World Chronicle
        • Isidore of Seville
        • Book of Liang: Fusang
        • Chronicle to 724
        • Agobard on Magonia
        • Pseudo-Diocles Fragmentum
        • 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
        • Popol Vuh
        • The Aztec Creation Myth
      • Lost Civilizations >
        • Atlantis >
          • Plato's Atlantis Dialogues >
            • Timaeus
            • Critias
          • Fragments on Atlantis
          • Panchaea: The Other Atlantis
          • Eumalos on Atlantis (Hoax)
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          • Atlantis as Biblical History
          • Sardinia and Atlantis
          • Atlantis and Nimrod
          • Santorini and Atlantis
          • The Mound Builders and Atlantis
          • Donnelly's Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Morocco
          • Atlantis and Hanno's Periplus
          • 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
          • Amazing New Light (Hoax)
        • Lost Cities >
          • Miscellaneous Lost Cities
          • The Seven Cities
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          • 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?
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        • 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
          • Mastodon, Mammoth, and Man
          • American Elephant Myths
          • The Mammoth and the Flood
          • Fossils and Myth
          • Fossil Origin of the Cyclops
          • History of Paleontology
        • 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
        • Arabic Names of Egyptian Kings
        • 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
        • America Known to the Ancients
        • 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
        • Remarkable Discoveries Within the Sphinx (Hoax)
        • Spirit of the Hour in Archaeology
        • Book of the Damned
        • Great Pyramid As Noah's Ark
        • The Shaver Mystery >
          • Lovecraft and the Deros
          • 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
        • CIA Search for the Ark of the Covenant
        • 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
        • The Fall of the Sky
        • 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
      • Poltergeist UFOs
      • 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
    • Free Classic Pseudohistory eBooks
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