[blacksmithgu]

I have a family member who is quite into "ancient aliens" and who has read all of von Danikens books. The main thing I realized from arguing about it with them was that rigor and science did not really matter and would not convince them of anything. It's an emotional and spiritual belief for them - a way for them to rationalize how humans went from mud to computers. They don't believe in human creativity being powerful enough to lead to modern society and think an external force was required. Ancient aliens is a convenient and fun theory for how it could have happened.

[acdha]

I’ve known a few people like that, and it had a darker undercurrent: they didn’t disbelieve that, say, the Greek or Roman monuments were built by those civilizations because they viewed those as predecessors of their own, but they considered the pacific or Central/South American cultures inferior and didn’t want to believe they were capable of great engineering.

Beyond the strong whiff of racism, I think there was also this idea that civilization went on a single path (grain, the wheel and domesticated horses/oxen/mules, bronze, iron, guns, steam, etc.) and so anyone which didn’t follow that path was basically developmentally challenged. This definitely did not consider the possibility that not every region had the prerequisites to follow the same path.

[nephihaha]

I've heard this claim many times, and yet I remember VD books (and similar ones like Kolosimo's) discussing Prehistoric Europe including cave art and megaliths. The Ancient Aliens TV series does have episodes on Ireland, the Norse and Graeco-Roman mythology.

Even today, these types bring up Baalbek's massive triliths on a regular basis, and state they could not have been built by such classical civilisations.

[usrusr]

An interesting observation, that racism link. Fills a glaring gap in a sad part of my own family history.

[mx7zysuj4xew]

My own favorite example of this is how the pyramids (and all the advanced trigonometry required) were built by the Egyptians prior to their discovery of the wheel

[halfcat]

> The main thing I realized from arguing about it with them was that <my beliefs> did not really matter and would not convince them of anything

> It's an emotional and spiritual belief for them - a way for them to rationalize...

And for you, too.

Science the method is pretty damn great. Science the institution is closer to any other agenda-driven information source. If you’re doing first-hand, first-principles science, great. But if you’re doing the “here’s a study...” game, you’re relying on external authority you aren’t equipped to interpret, which, in practice, isn’t so much different from the people who think CNN or Fox News or Ancient Aliens is gospel.

Put another way, a real practitioner of science would seek to understand the phenomenon of why your family member believes what they believe. I guarantee you, it makes sense, once you know enough information (it always does, even if they’re actually insane, that helps it make sense). But to say, ”this person won’t even accept science” and hand wave it off as a “them” problem, emotional religion etc, are the words of a politician, not a scientist.

[protocolture]

Asking for evidence isnt a "belief system" its a coming to know things system. Equating a request for scientific rigor, to contrarian ancient aliens is nonsensical.

If someone wants to hold something up as true, its correct to disbelieve it until evidence is provided.

These people don't provide evidence, what they do is show you something cool and then beg the question. "Look at this cool rock in this place it might be hard to get a rock to, really makes you wonder who put it there huh". Literally any dumb science "content producer" is going to be able to get you closer to truth than listening to that bunk.

Not to mention that:

>It's an emotional and spiritual belief for them - a way for them to rationalize

>Put another way, a real practitioner of science would seek to understand the phenomenon of why your family member believes what they believe.

Seems like you quoted them having investigated it.

But having done so you call them a politician.

[nprateem]

The ancient aliens line of thinking is:

Is it possible that Adam and Eve were aliens?

If so, then that means [blah blah blah as if this is now an accepted fact]

No wonder your fam has no critical thinking