Saturday, December 19, 2015

They Would Be Gods - 39 - An Ice Age Civilization?

THEY WOULD BE GODS: OUR PAST RECONSIDERED, OUR FUTURE FOREWARNED

PART V: CIVILIZATIONS

by Anthony Forwood (2011)

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39: 



If there was an advanced civilization in pre-history that had the knowledge and capabilities evidenced by the preserved ancient legends of different cultures, and by the physical remnants of great megalithic structures found all over the globe, and by the anomalous artifacts found within the archeological record, then this advancement was not necessarily so widespread that all the peoples of that past time were able to use it or were affected by it in their daily lives. There might have been many people that were not as civilized as other more organized societies, and who were living in much harsher conditions and relied on much more primitive methods for their existence, being almost completely ignorant of the ways of the more advanced peoples. These less advanced peoples could be compared to the primitive tribes that exist today in the African and Amazonian jungles, being not much more technologically advanced than our hunter-gatherer ancestors. These primitive humans may have lived this way until about ten thousand years ago, when the last ice age is supposed to have ended. Apart from the technological advancements of their counterparts, they may have otherwise been their equals.

We must consider that such an extreme degree of difference between primitive and advanced peoples may have continued even after the last ice age ended, with the advanced peoples continuing to exist in isolation, forgotten by the rest of the world. If this were the case, there would not necessarily be any evident discrepancy with the archeological record as it stands today, other than the fact that a few occasional signs of such an advanced civilization have been found from time to time.

Prior to the last ice age, an advanced civilization may or may not have fallen to ruin due to planetary cataclysms such as earthquakes and floods. If such a civilization did exist, there have certainly been very few artifacts left behind as evidence. An ice age – or perhaps some other planetary cataclysm that preceded it – would cause such an upset to any civilization for a long enough period of time that virtually all of its peoples would be forced into a primitive existence for many generations – perhaps even spanning thousands of years. Most, if not all, of the knowledge that had been gained by such a civilization would have been lost over this time if it wasn’t purposefully preserved. All of the peoples of the Earth would have been forced to struggle hard to survive, and nomadic or cave dwelling lifestyles would have become the norm for those who essentially had nothing left in the way of technological knowledge or skills to rely on.

We must consider here how conditions would have been for the people of such an advanced civilization after being thrown into an ice age, irrespective of any other natural upheavals that may have also occurred. Such a global environmental change, whether it came fast or slow, would have had a dramatic effect on any civilization that might have existed, and would have effectively destroyed it. When conditions had changed so drastically that normal food sources became scarce, it’s most likely that the people would have begun to emigrate from their homeland, and eventually most or all of the population of that civilization would have dispersed, taking with them only bits and pieces of the knowledge that had previously been attained. Most of the people, being only educated to a limited degree or only in specialized fields of knowledge, as most of us are in our modern world, would have very little knowledge of any value to pass on to future generations other than their history, language, and perhaps a few learned non-technical skills that would still be useful. As for the more educated few from that former civilization, many of them may have attempted to preserve whatever higher knowledge they could, in whatever manner was possible, in the hope that their civilization could eventually be rebuilt. It may very well be that some of these educated few remained together and they or their descendants were able to begin a new civilization at some point later on, from which may have arisen one of the early civilizations of our own history. This would not have happened immediately, of course, and many generations would have to have passed before they could have grown into anything that might be considered advanced. Nor would they have been able to achieve anything close to their previous level of advancement, since it would have been very unlikely that more than a small portion of their previous knowledge would have been preserved. Much of it would have become obsolete or simply unusable, and only that which was deemed most significant to their survival would likely have been preserved over time. Aside from these educated few, if they were to have made an effort to preserve their higher knowledge, there might very well be little else that remained to indicate to later generations that such an advanced civilization had ever existed at all.

Thus, it is only natural that we find a wealth of evidence of such a primitive lifestyle in the archeological record of the time period just after the last ice age, and very few signs of a previous advanced civilization. However, there would likely still be some physical evidence that would arise from time to time, just as we are finding today.

Using our modern civilization for comparison, and by studying our earliest historical and archeological records, we can see that civilizations arise where people cluster in certain geographical locations that can easily provide the needs for large populations. These centers of civilization are to be seen as natural concentrations of human development, which is in contrast to the much slower development that takes place in much less populated areas. These centers become self-sufficient early on, and only after having established themselves in this way, do they embark on seeking to do trade with other peoples outside of their immediate area. Such centers of civilization have always been the repositories of knowledge, while elsewhere such knowledge has remained in greater absence. Because of this, there has always been a wide variance of development between such centers and elsewhere. This means that the majority of the advanced knowledge that exists is always to be found within such populated centers, while elsewhere such knowledge is simply inaccessible or not even known of. Should such centers of civilized society ever be lost, so would much of its knowledge, and humankind would be left to fall back on the more primitive knowledge common to the people living elsewhere. In ancient times, unlike today, such centers were fewer in number, and would not have been known about by those people who were too far removed from their vicinity. Such centers of civilization in ancient historical times were often closed off to most outsiders, which meant that such advancements that may have otherwise proliferated would have been that much more unknown or inaccessible to anyone not living within the civilized society that possessed them. To lose such an advanced civilization to a natural cataclysm would have meant that future knowledge regarding the advancement that these civilizations had attained would also be lost.

Such prehistoric civilizations, if they had been known about by outsiders, would have become the destination of more and more migrating people during the advent of an ice age as they found it harder and harder to live on the land as they had once done. At some point, the rulers of these centers of civilization would have had to stop further immigration as it weighed more and more on their ability to sustain their growing population. They would have had to build their centers into walled fortresses against these desperate outsiders as much as against the ravages of nature, and may even have eventually receded into isolation to live alone, taking their knowledge with them.

For those people who were not fortunate enough to live within or near these centers of civilization during such a time, knowledge of the existence of these centers would have eventually faded to no more than legends that were passed on from generation to generation. Little evidence that suggested their existence would be reflected in any of the common artifacts from that time that we might find today.

If there was such an advanced civilization prior to the last ice age (or other cataclysmic event), there should be some physical evidence that exists even today that would verify the fact, even though such evidence may not yet have been found or otherwise properly recognized. We must realize that such an advanced civilization, at the time of an ice age or during a time of planetary upheavals, would seek to use whatever knowledge it had in order to continue to survive, as well as to understand the environmental changes that were taking place and what they might expect of these changes in the future. For this reason, great endeavors may have been undertaken, such as the building of those great megalithic structures that we now find scattered around the globe and which we’re in such awe of due to the mysteries that surround their construction and purpose.

It needs to be realized that an ice age would last for at least several thousand years, and that prior to its onset, the geography of much of the Earth would be very different than it is today. We know very little beyond our various theories in regards to planetary mechanics, and we are in no position to state with any certainty that we know what caused the last ice age, or what other planetary cataclysms may occur due to the natural cycles of the Earth’s evolution. We know that the Earth’s crust is not stable, and the shifting of tectonic plates has often caused landscapes to change dramatically in a relatively short period of time, forming entirely new features while burying those that previously existed. Because of these changes, much of what may have once existed that would bare evidence of any previous civilization might very well have been swallowed up by the Earth itself, leaving us in almost complete ignorance of the fact. If an advanced civilization had once existed that was more or less isolated to a small geographical area that underwent extreme natural upheavals, such as Atlantis is said to have undergone, then most or all evidence of that civilization would have been lost completely. Only the remnants of such an advanced civilization that were located outside of major disaster zones might have remained relatively untouched by such upheavals, and being distant from the lost civilization that produced them, would not in modern times be understood for what they are or who produced them. Without something to associate them with, such as a people, a place, a time, or even a purpose, they become anomalous mysteries of human history.

This is the very state we are in with regards to the Great Pyramid, Stonehenge, the city of Machu Picchu, and so many other ancient artificial structures that exist but cannot be explained by our current understandings and beliefs about our past. We cannot explain these anomalies from within the context that we have, up to now, seen ourselves historically. They have been effectively ignored or have remained unexplainable as science has pieced together an understanding of our human history and development that has been guided by what has been more predominantly evident in the archeological record, and much of this evidence was found long ago, and has not since been reconsidered. Since the formulation of our current understanding, however, our world has been explored much further, and many new discoveries have been made that counter many commonly held assumptions that our current understanding relies on for its logical coherence. Thus, we have no concrete solutions and only various speculative hypotheses to account for those mysteries that remain outside our current understanding, and unless they can be realized for what they truly signify, irrespective of what we assume to be true at the moment, these mysteries will always perplex us.

It has only been relatively recently that mysteries such as the Great Pyramid or Stonehenge have been realized to contain within their structures signs of higher intelligence through mathematical and astronomical relationships. These relationships reveal an advanced knowledge that could not possibly have been attained given the current understanding we have of our forebears. In fact, without the acceptance of an understanding that reaches far beyond our current assumptions about our past, these mysteries cannot be properly placed within the context of our history at all.

We cannot explain how the Great Pyramid and other such megaliths were constructed by an otherwise primitive people using primitive technologies. Not even with our own modern technologies are we capable of such feats of construction. To transport, lift, and place stones weighing hundreds of tons as was achieved in the construction of so many of these megalithic structures is still beyond our modern capabilities. Many theories have been suggested as to how the stones of the Great Pyramid were manipulated using simple technology that would have been within the means of the ancient Egyptians. Although some of these theories are plausible, they still do not account for the construction of many other megalithic structures, such as at Machu Picchu, where these construction techniques could not possibly have been applied. Machu Picchu is an enigma of construction that, in many ways, surpasses that of the Great Pyramid. It sits atop a mountain peak some ten thousand feet above sea level, an impenetrable fortress protected by the extremely steep slopes of the mountain it is perched upon. The stones that were used to build this city were not local to the area, but came from a quarry some distance away. These stones had to have somehow been lifted to the top of the mountain where they now sit, and how this was achieved is an even greater mystery than the construction of the Great Pyramid.

The existence of such megaliths cannot be explained by our current understandings, neither as to their method of construction, their full purpose, who built them, and when. They do not have an origin that’s revealed in any of our historical records, and seem to have always been there. They are obviously remnants of an earlier, prehistoric civilization, and it’s only because of our stubbornness that we cling to old understandings and refuse to consider new ones that are likely to be more accurate. When we consider these megalithic structures in the context of a previous civilization with advanced technology, which is what they undoubtedly signify, we are faced with the need to reconsider what we know about ourselves and the world around us.

The megaliths that stand in testimony to the existence and achievements of a past civilization do not give us any indication as to their exact age, and therefore we cannot be sure how long ago such a civilization might have existed, or when it fell. It may have been thousands of years, or it may have been millions of years. These structures, having been constructed exclusively with stone, cannot be dated using normal scientific methods. Only organic materials that might be found in or around these structures can be properly dated, but any such materials might have been introduced to the area much later than the time of construction of the megalith itself. Anything that is found at these sites that can be dated to within our own historical period must be considered as possibly having been introduced at a point after their construction. As for primitive artifacts that predate the earliest point of our own civilization, such as stone tools, pottery, etc., these too must be considered as having been introduced at a time after their construction, or otherwise by people other than the original builders, simply because of the marked difference in technological achievement between the two. These structures stand in their pure stone formations, bare of any original relationship to our own civilization. They seem to have been purposely built to last for millennia, as though it was known by their builders that they would need to withstand the ravages of time that they have undoubtedly endured. Their often strange and out of the way locations suggest that the geography of the land at the time of their construction was much different than it is today, and we know that in some cases it was. The unknown method of their construction and the mystery of their actual purpose and function indicate that the builders had knowledge that reaches beyond what we can attribute to our own historical ancestors.

Fairly recent studies of some of these structures, primarily the Great Pyramid, has revealed further evidence of the level of knowledge that the builders had, including complex mathematical concepts and formulas, advanced astronomical knowledge, and very precise knowledge of the size and shape of our planet. It has been suggested that this knowledge was purposely built into these structures in order to preserve that knowledge for the benefit of later generations, perhaps with the awareness of events that were to come that would threaten the loss of such knowledge and the human race with it. Such a possibility is merely an assumption at this point, but there is strong evidence to suggest that it might be true, and it should be considered carefully in regards to what is discussed within these pages. There are probably other equally plausible assumptions that might be made, and each of these possibilities would deserve equal consideration, no matter how unrealistic any of them might seem in relation to our current understandings. The level of mathematics incorporated into such structures may not be any sort of message to later peoples, but instead reflect a deeper knowledge that is required for the unusual purpose that these structures were intended for. Because we don’t yet possess an understanding of this deeper knowledge, we don’t yet recognize what these structures really are. Only recently has anyone begun to make any serious and in-depth studies of these many structures from a global perspective rather than as individual and separate mysteries. It may be discovered that they are individual components of a larger technology, or various applications of ancient technological knowledge.

As it is, we can assume that the megalithic stone structures that have been found in many varied locations around the planet, and the construction of which cannot be explained, must be regarded as remnants of an earlier, prehistoric civilization that once inhabited Earth. That they are incredibly stable structures that have withstood the ravages of nature so well suggests that they were meant to withstand extreme conditions as well. Most of them show certain astronomical functionality that allows a person to measure the seasons and phases of the moon. This suggests that they were, at least in part, time clocks, perhaps to be used for something as simple as determining the planting of crops (which seems like incredible overkill), but in many cases it seems that their complex designs were for much more significant purposes.

We must consider the need for such a large structure as Stonehenge to be necessary for determining when to plant crops. This may seem like a rational explanation at first, and many have been quick to conclude that this is all that many of these structures were for, and nothing more, but we must wonder why this could not be achieved without such an immense structure. Farmers have been able to plant crops for centuries without the need for such a device to tell them when to plant or when to harvest. Stonehenge, and other such structures with similar time clock functionality built into them, seem to have a much greater purpose than just this. If we consider that they were built to last, that they were erected prior to or during the last ice age, and that the builders had a strong interest in astronomy, it is not too difficult to see that they might have been used as time clocks for the purpose of measuring longer Earth cycles, such as those that brought on the ice age or other planetary upheavals. A long existing civilization that had survived for perhaps even millions of years would know of such cycles, and would be ever watchful for the signs that portended its phases. If it was known by the builders of these megaliths that the Earth goes through such periods of upheaval at regular cyclic periods, and that one of these periods was due to come at a specific time, then such enduring time clocks make much sense. We must not ignore that both the Mayan and Indian cultures of old believed in and understood the cycles of ages, some of these spanning thousands of years, and some millions. One of the Mayan calendar systems reflects one of these major cycles, and this cycle ends very soon in our modern time. The Indian beliefs also tell us that a major planetary cycle, the Kali Yuga, is about to end as a new one begins.

We ourselves know so little about planetary mechanics, and most of what we assume about our Earth’s evolution and internal structure is based more on theory than on known facts. The ice age was originally a purely theoretical proposition, and only in the last century with the accumulated geological data have we come to accept it as fact. But before we did, many otherwise intelligent people scoffed at the idea because it didn’t fit into what was commonly assumed at the time. There was no reasonable explanation for why the Earth would go through such an extreme environmental change, but the evidence that it did slowly mounted until it had to be accepted as fact. From that point on it was only a matter of determining why it went through this change. We still don’t know, and we shouldn’t doubt any proposition without giving it careful consideration, no matter how outrageous it may seem, based on our current understandings.

From all that we have considered here so far, the idea that a once great civilization existed before us, and left their mark as evidence is quite plausible, and answers to many otherwise anomalous mysteries about our world and our past. We can only assume at this point, however, that it was the recent ice age and whatever initiated it that led to their downfall. Did any of the descendants of the people of this ancient civilization survive its downfall, to carry on into our own time the knowledge that once made them so great? Is this knowledge to be found today in the possession of a secret group that lurks in the shadows of our society? We must consider the matter further before we can reach a reasoned conclusion one way or the other.


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