Neanderthal research (Introduction)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, July 30, 2011, 18:09 (4657 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Geological evidence would offer SOMETHING to support the idea of technologically advanced civilizations--which is where I know you're going with this--Pompeii, Ashfall NE, other sites in China, India, etc. Chichen Itza and Coba were "swallowed by mother nature" yet the pyramids still stand; the Great Pyramid in Egypt was also once buried. There are several sites for civilization dating back to 5100 in Meso America, I've heard some estimates as far back as 10k years. But no evidence of any kind of civilization on par with our own--they certainly never cracked the atom, or harnessed oil. 
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> > If an ancient, pre stone-age civilization was that advanced, there would be solid evidence for it. 
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> I don't necessarily disagree with you. I see some quite large gaping holes in your logic, though. 
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> A) You are assuming that any advanced pre-stoneage civilization would 'evolve' along the same lines that we did. i.e. They would use the same types of materials etc etc etc. While this is possibly true, it is also possibly false. Much of the materials we used today are based on petroleum, if a hypothetical civilization did exist, there are other sources of energy they could have used that would not have produced the same type of material byproducts. 
> -Well, that's because clearly we were here to create Styrofoam. -> B) You are using the non-existence of evidence as evidence of non-existence. -This is only true when we take one claim in isolation. I didn't do that here.-The lack of evidence only proves our ignorance on a topic, true. But when presented with evidence that contradicts a claim made in absence of evidence, one suddenly becomes more likely. -Vimanas existed. -Vimanas are a legend.-Given that we have no evidence of Vimanas, one of these claims is a safer position. Doesn't mean its "true" but claims made in absence of evidence are inherently weak.-> 
> C) You are assuming that we have looked in the right places already, and that we have dug deep enough in those places to find it.
> -I'm judging research in the current state. And I only believe in changing my views when faced with contradictions.-> D) You are asumming that natural geological events have not eradicated the evidence(glacial migrations, volcanos, earthquakes, tectonic subduction, yada yada yada).
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> -In which case, there is no way to validate the claim, hence no valid reason for giving it similar weight to declaring it legend.-> 
> Anyway, I wasn't particularly leading anywhere with my comments. To me it was more of a, "Well, tomorrow they will be saying something different" moment. My main beef with topics like this is NOT that they change the theories and hypotheses, but that they teach the theories and hypotheses as facts. Bad juju in my opinion.-Everyone is guilty at some point about mistaking science for truth, but my experience with scientists is that they take for granted that the provisional nature of science is common knowledge.-Don't worry, I'll be discussing "The Brothers Karamazov" soon and will be directly arguing about an instance where a "most likely explanation" completely misses truth. Despite the fact that I took a very "debate-oriented" tact with this post, don't think that I necessarily disagree with you.

--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"