Claim: Ancient Cultures inherited Structures and Artefacts from Pre-Historic Lost Civilizations with Advanced Manufacturing Capabilities

[Ann K]

They offer no explanation for the precision we see because they have no explanation. Thousands of jars, bowls and vases made of granite and harder stone such as corundum were manufactured. A recent scan of one of vase shows astonishing precision to 1/1000ths of an inch. What tools did the dynastic Egyptians use (before the wheel was invented) to carve these magnificent pieces? Why such precision? If you know what tooling they used, please let me know. There is a real mystery here.

From @Ravi post number 29:
"I am missing in their story the roundness of the shape(s). The only one they mention is the inside of the neck."

It should be obvious to anyone that the circularity of a drilled hole of any type is easier to do precisely than any other shape, since it can be done by simply rotating a grinding tool of that diameter. But perhaps that "astonishing precision" is either an embellishment or an exaggeration of the presenter, just hype. Or maybe it's selective bias, just choosing one that's more precise than others. I have seen a video of a present-day craftsman making a vase of the same type using only the kind of tools that were available to the ancients. See below.

If you think that "they have no explanation", perhaps you should look up some of the videos posted by @yoshy . Indeed, reading this entire thread might be a good idea. I'm trying to save you from falling down the rabbit hole of believing all the claims uncritically and disbelieving all the debunks.

Edit to add: Here it is. @Ravi post 41.
Came across a video about Egyptian artisans that try to keep the crafts alive. Check this part (t=1852), about stone vases..

Source: https://youtu.be/8e0G51TYHy8?t=1852

 

[Ravi]

Ah, it is a kind reminder for me to try to find a free version of SA because that one will be needed to analyse the STL file. We have to be aware of it that the STL format is an approximation of the "real" surfaces, as it is a tessellated object. This means that the laser scan is made of the object and a pointcloud is generated (with it's own accuracy, with uncertainty typ. in the 10ths of microns), which can be huge as it involves XYZ datapionts at 64 bits. The data reduction used creates this vase STL formatted file. Preferably of course, we need the pointcloud AND the uncertainty of the laser scan performed. But I am not sure if we get that, so we are stuck with the STL file, which is of course better than nothing..

In SA you can obtain sphericity and smoothness in a click, all based on vectors. I really need to find a copy, darn it. The viewer won't cut it

 

[Bill Ferguson]

This should help.

 

[Bill Ferguson]

A tweet from one of the guys doing measurements.

 

[NorCal Dave]

Ah, it is a kind reminder for me to try to find a free version of SA because that one will be needed to analyse the STL file. We have to be aware of it that the STL format is an approximation of the "real" surfaces, as it is a tessellated object. This means that the laser scan is made of the object and a pointcloud is generated (with it's own accuracy, with uncertainty typ. in the 10ths of microns), which can be huge as it involves XYZ datapionts at 64 bits. The data reduction used creates this vase STL formatted file. Preferably of course, we need the pointcloud AND the uncertainty of the laser scan performed. But I am not sure if we get that, so we are stuck with the STL file, which is of course better than nothing..

In SA you can obtain sphericity and smoothness in a click, all based on vectors. I really need to find a copy, darn it. The viewer won't cut it

Uh....for us lay people are you saying that the laser scan of the vase may not be as accurate, or the resulting digital model may be different from the actual vase?

They offer no explanation for the precision we see because they have no explanation. Thousands of jars, bowls and vases made of granite and harder stone such as corundum were manufactured. A recent scan of one of vase shows astonishing precision to 1/1000ths of an inch. What tools did the dynastic Egyptians use (before the wheel was invented) to carve these magnificent pieces? Why such precision? If you know what tooling they used, please let me know. There is a real mystery here.

Many experiments have shown how to cut granite with copper, wet sand and a lot of people and time. Same with drilling in various stones or carving stone. Here's a couple of Russian guys using a replica of an Egyptian drill. The video is about 20:00 but shows how it's done:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyCc4iuMikQ


In this one, a lady makes a replica of a breccia vessel completely by herself with only stone and wood tools. That includes the "impossible" hollowing out of the interior. She doesn't use "lost ancient technology", just skill and lots and lots of time:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq2KGQajfAo


Here's an American stone mason showing various techniques in different kinds of stone:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fIigpabcz4


Far too many modern people, especially modern computer jockeys and other people that don't work with their hands, often underestimate what a skilled craftsman can do. If you lived 4K years ago and your job was to carve stone and that's all you did for the better part of your life, you'd get pretty good at it. You'd also be sharing techniques and ideas with other like-minded craftsmen.

I can hear the "Yes, but...". Yes, maybe those techniques worked for what they were demonstrating, but not in harder stone or to the degree of precision that's claimed. I would argue that these people have shown what could be accomplished with simple tools in what is basically a hobby like setting, it's not their vocation they're just trying to see if they can do it. Even the stone mason likely spends most of his time doing actual work using modern tools.

If this is being done by craftsmen that spent their entire lives doing it, and passing on their skills to subsequent generations, I'm more inclined to believe that they figured out how to get whatever degree of precision they needed, in whatever stone they were using, rather than the use of "lost ancient technology" from Atlantis. I'm betting on the skilled workers, not the Atlanteans.

I'll point out again that if Corsetti, Hancock et al want to claim the Egyptians, among others, were using lost tech from Atlantis, they have an equal burden of proof for their claims. In fact, in light of the above demonstrations, a greater burden of proof. If they were using ancient tech from Atlantis, where is it? Any of it? And not only the tech, but all the needed antecedents to that tech. Dimond tipped CNC machines from Atlantis don't exist in a vacuum. How were they manufactured? Where? What were they programed with? Where did they plug them in? Where did the power come from?

The standard answer seems to be, "Well it all disappeared in the flooding post Younger Drye's comet impact". Ok, then what did they pass on to the Egyptians, if it was all wiped out? Just doesn't make sense.

 

[Bill Ferguson]

Why so angry? Relax

The proof of lost technology is hidden in plain sight. Engineers, sculptors and stonemasons alike are in awe of the precision on display in the granite bowls, jars and vases. They were made long before the dynastic Egyptians, tens of thousands of them. Even the Egyptians say they are pre-dynastic. Who could have invented a 5-axis lathe designed to cut granite? What the Egyptians did is awe-inspiring but nowhere near the sophistication and complexity of what they inherited.

 

[Ann K]

A tweet from one of the guys doing measurements.

Measuring what? The average of dozens of such vases? Or, as seems to be the case, one selected example which is very well made? Sample size (which they don't seem to talk about) matters in any analysis.

You're merely being shown examples of low-tech rebuttals of the premise that ONLY more sophisticated technology could do these things. I'm not sure who you think is "angry"; I'm sure there's some exasperation among us that you don't seem to listen to explanations, but people are replying to you and explaining kindly nevertheless. Your "Why so angry?" comment is out of line.

 

[RTM]

Why so angry? Relax

The proof of lost technology is hidden in plain sight. Engineers, sculptors and stonemasons alike are in awe of the precision on display in the granite bowls, jars and vases. They were made long before the dynastic Egyptians, tens of thousands of them. Even the Egyptians say they are pre-dynastic. Who could have invented a 5-axis lathe designed to cut granite? What the Egyptians did is awe-inspiring but nowhere near the sophistication and complexity of what they inherited.

So where is the stuff they inherited? If it was all flooded and destroyed by the "sudden deluge" then how did the Egyptians manage to get this technology, was it rebuilt again and then lost again?

 

[Ravi]

Uh....for us lay people are you saying that the laser scan of the vase may not be as accurate, or the resulting digital model may be different from the actual vase?

Well it is basically a metrology thing, that what you measure is always an approximation of the real size. This is just a theoretical thing, no way around it. So the best one can do is try to measure as precise or accurate as possible with the smallest uncertainty.
The digital model is an approximation of the point cloud distribution using (flat) planes/triangles. Making the maze of the model small, will make the error smaller too. Normally though, one will look at the shape and not at (high frequent) parts on a surface, so not a big problem with the vase.

 

[NorCal Dave]

Why so angry? Relax

Not sure if that's aimed at me, but I'm not angry, merely discussing the idea of "lost tech from Atlantis".

The proof of lost technology is hidden in plain sight.

I'm not sure what that means. Pre-dynastic Egyptians made some really good stuff, what's hidden? Is your argument that they could not cut or shape stone? They could, the above examples (post #128) provide insights into how. Or is your argument that, even if they could work stone as demonstrated above, they could not do it the level of precision claimed?

Engineers, sculptors and stonemasons alike are in awe of the precision on display in the granite bowls, jars and vases.

This is not evidence of anything, merely a common platitude-like statement thrown out, often in support of Lost Tech. Some may be in "awe" of the work done, that doesn't mean they think they were using Lost Tech.

Who could have invented a 5-axis lathe designed to cut granite? What the Egyptians did is awe-inspiring but nowhere near the sophistication and complexity of what they inherited.

I'm a bit confused here, what exactly did the Egyptians, I assume this means Dynastic Egyptians, "inherit"? A 5-axis lathe for cutting granite. Or are you saying the idea of 5-axis lathe is silly? I'm not following.

Again, not in anger but maybe a bit of exasperation with the Lost Tech crowd as a whole, where is all this Lost Tech? And just as important, all of the antecedents to the Lost Tech as well as all the support and/or ancillary tech to the Lost Tech being employed.

One can postulate some sort of granite cutting machine, but if one does, one must also postulate an entire industrial complex that the cutting machine operates in. Such as power generation and distribution, metal foundries, an electronics industry and so on. A granite cutting machine does not exist in a vacuum.

Why is it that only the results of all this Lost Tech is all that remains? For 1000's of years?

 

[Bill Ferguson]

Not sure if that's aimed at me, but I'm not angry, merely discussing the idea of "lost tech from Atlantis".



I'm not sure what that means. Pre-dynastic Egyptians made some really good stuff, what's hidden? Is your argument that they could not cut or shape stone? They could, the above examples (post #128) provide insights into how. Or is your argument that, even if they could work stone as demonstrated above, they could not do it the level of precision claimed?



This is not evidence of anything, merely a common platitude-like statement thrown out, often in support of Lost Tech. Some may be in "awe" of the work done, that doesn't mean they think they were using Lost Tech.



I'm a bit confused here, what exactly did the Egyptians, I assume this means Dynastic Egyptians, "inherit"? A 5-axis lathe for cutting granite. Or are you saying the idea of 5-axis lathe is silly? I'm not following.

Again, not in anger but maybe a bit of exasperation with the Lost Tech crowd as a whole, where is all this Lost Tech? And just as important, all of the antecedents to the Lost Tech as well as all the support and/or ancillary tech to the Lost Tech being employed.

One can postulate some sort of granite cutting machine, but if one does, one must also postulate an entire industrial complex that the cutting machine operates in. Such as power generation and distribution, metal foundries, an electronics industry and so on. A granite cutting machine does not exist in a vacuum.

Why is it that only the results of all this Lost Tech is all that remains? For 1000's of years?

 

[Bill Ferguson]

One can postulate some sort of granite cutting machine, but if one does, one must also postulate an entire industrial complex that the cutting machine operates in. Such as power generation and distribution, metal foundries, an electronics industry and so on. A granite cutting machine does not exist in a vacuum.

Exactly correct. The vase that was tested is in a private collection. Egyptian authorities won't allow testing but many of these artifacts are in private hands. These artifacts number in the thousands and were found buried under the step pyramid. If you're interested look at the attachment.

 

[NorCal Dave]

Exactly correct.

So then where is all the industrial complex needed to support this tech?

The vase that was tested is in a private collection. Egyptian authorities won't allow testing but many of these artifacts are in private hands.

As was pointed out earlier in this thread, the authors of the report admit there is NO provenance for the vase, so it could just as likely be a modern machine-made version as an ancient one.

These artifacts number in the thousands and were found buried under the step pyramid

What we try to do here is substantiate our claims. If all these thousands of pre-dynastic vases were discovered under Djoser's pyramid, please provide some evidence of this. Not saying it's not true, but where is the evidence of it?

If you're interested look at the attachment.

What we also try to do here is not just post a link and tell someone to "go look at it". It there is relevant information in the article, please post it. One need not post the entire 25 pages, but some of the highlights would be useful. I've skimmed it and will do more with it tomorrow, time to make dinner.

 

[Ann K]

One can postulate some sort of granite cutting machine, but if one does, one must also postulate an entire industrial complex that the cutting machine operates in. Such as power generation and distribution, metal foundries, an electronics industry and so on. A granite cutting machine does not exist in a vacuum.

Exactly correct. The vase that was tested is in a private collection. Egyptian authorities won't allow testing but many of these artifacts are in private hands. These artifacts number in the thousands and were found buried under the step pyramid. If you're interested look at the attachment.

"The" object. Singular. All that post facto mathematics about the shape of the design is meaningless, because it isn't the design that's in question, it's the manufacturing technique. That tells us nothing about the "thousands" found buried, or the even higher number of similar vases made today to be sold to tourists. It's a nice vase, but I don't see how you/they can generalize with a sample size of ONE.

I am in awe of the sculptural and artistic skills of Michaelangelo, and he used far more primitive tools than we have nowadays. There are any number of superb artists who worked during the renaissance and before, yet we accept the obvious fact that humans can be very skilled in their artistry, and don't find it necessary to postulate any extraterrestrial assistance. Back at the time (12,000 years ago or more) that Hancock and others suggest these outside experts taught humans to make things, humans were drawing and painting superb depictions of animals in near-darkness in Lascaux, Altamira, Rouffignac, and other caves in Europe. Nobody is suggesting that the Atlanteans dropped in to give them art lessons. I'm afraid you're going to have to count me firmly in the camp of those who simply don't see any need to give a complicated answer when humans have proved themselves to be clever, skillful, and inventive. Those who hypothesize about "superior" civilizations denigrate the skills of perfectly capable human beings.

 

[Mauro]

If you're interested look at the attachment.

You should really read Metabunk's link policy.

Links

The reader should not have to click on a link in order to understand what the post is about. When you link to something to back up something you are discussing then:

• Describe what is in the link, and why it is relevant to the thread topic.
• Quote relevant excerpts using EX tags,
• Include images and screen-grabs from the link.

Links themselves are not content, they are references.

 

[overlord]

Let's take a look at that vase.

What the provided STL file contains:
A triangulated mesh made of two separate parts with about 473k vertices (points), covering the vases outer parts (except for the bottom surface it sits on) and a portion of the inner parts. I'll be calling the outer part the exterior (including the inside of the vase mouth), this has the bulk of the vertices - 333k, the scanner probably had a harder time with the inside of the vase - thus it's separated, incomplete and with several holes, I'll be calling this the interior and it has the remaining 140k vertices. Lastly the handle drill holes (part of exterior) [bottom left of next image] are not complete either, likely for similar reasons.

The total height of the vase is about 4.72 in.

It should be pointed out, that as provided, the model is aligned to the flat top plane of the vase mouth, but it's off from the actual centerline by about 4/100, which is unfortunate given that all measurements provided by UnchartedX [see attached pdf] references that (other than the top flatness).
I'll be using the adjusted centerline.

(Red circles centered on the original centerline, blue ones on the adjusted.)

Looking at the exterior, on the bottom side we can see small bumps, but the curvature is otherwise smooth, however between the handles (and slightly above and bellow them) there are horizontal grooves running around the vase, wobbling up and down and widening to larger marks at parts.

The interior is made practically only of grooves, although these don't wobble, it's curvature is broken up into parts and is less smooth overall.

Short clip showing the mentioned features in motion:

Next picture shows the handles and their drill holes from the top (top) and the side (bottom).
From the top view we can see both on left and right, that the holes are pointing slightly inwards, from the side view on the left the holes are misaligned by quite a bit.

Notably the radial symmetry of the interior is comparable to that of the exterior (equal to slightly worse radial spread).
Here all points are plotted with their distance from the centerline (green) on the vertical axis, the four images on the top are the zoomed in portions of their respective blue rectangles.
Note the messy curvature of the interior and the varying wall thickness along the vase.

Overall I don't see the need for either 'computer design and guidance' or '5 axis restrained precision machinery', the vase presents symmetry (radial) along a single axis, the quality of it's parts corresponds to how well they can be reached and observed by a human or 'simple' tools.

And as others have said, it's meaningless to attribute something to 'ancient advanced manufacturing' without having any evidence of it being ancient.

 

[Bill Ferguson]

Video in support of claim.

Quoting Christopher Dunn:

the relevance of ancient megalithic construction and precision cutting of igneous rock relies on engineering principles not on geology or Egyptology the pot shards laner asked to see that would change his mind about ancient Egyptian history are found in Egypt and in museums all over the world the ones i have studied reside not in Egypt but are situated in a glass display case in the petri museum in London the recent documentaries that have been broadcast by Egyptologists have been a distraction from what was really going on in ancient Egypt they mislead by not addressing the incredible precision of the available artifacts they do not address the remarkable geometry and exactness of the ancient Egyptian statues and they have ignored evidence presented by Flinders Petrie in 1883 that proves that the ancient Egyptians used highly sophisticated methods for cutting stone including efficient and versatile lathes the lathe is a natural development from the potter's wheel depicted in ancient artwork and presumed to have existed in ancient Egypt the type of potter's wheel in ancient Egypt is taken from an Egyptian relief showing the god known seated at what is theorized to be a kick wheel the potshards in the peachy museum however are of a different quality than what can be produced on a potter's wheel or even a woodworking lathe of the kin used by underdeveloped cultures what is depicted in figure 11.2 does not explain two pot shards that Petrie described in the pyramids and temples of Giza as seen in the photographs of the Bol shard housed in a petri museum illustrated in Petrie's drawing is the backside convex part of a Bol shard petri however did not discuss a more important feature of this shard the concave surface on the opposite side of the surface he had illustrated this is surprising because the radial gouge on the dished side of the pot shard can provide a clue as to what may have caused the bowl to be knocked off axis in the lathe or at least another result of the bowl's displacement in the lathe the question it raises however cannot be answered by conceptualizing the lathes used in ancient time that are depicted in history books the grooves on the dish may have been the result of the material shifting on its axis causing the tool to plunge into the material knocking it off axis and causing the biaxial convex radius on the outside of the bowl because it has the impression of the geometry of the tool bit being applied to the surface the existence of the gouge also proves petri's contention that the surfaces noted on his 15d were created with a single point tool and were not the result of rubbing with abrasive this is an important point when we consider the ancient Egyptians level of technology implied in the manufacturing errors may be the action of two tools at the same time one on the outside and one on the inside which indicate that as the tool created the gouge on the inside of the bowl it pushed the bowl into a component of the chuck that was holding the bowl until the stone broke under the pressure perhaps the most important question to ask when we try to determine how these errors were created is what kind of power was behind the lathe to allow a single point tool to cut a gouge so deep into the material that the stone would ultimately fail and break the forces implied with this simple pot shard are not the forces associated with a potter's wheel or a spindle lathe that is spun via the manual push and pull of a strong bow if a manually operated lathe met such resistance it would come to a stop to argue that only manpower was used in the process of creating this error would be to argue that the operator acquired some sort of lever to rotate the chuck that held the stone and made a conscious decision to drive the tool deeper into the diorite and ruin his or her work Petrie's 15d shows the versatility of the lathe employed to create it as seen in figure 11.4 the surface is double disc shaped with tantalizing telltale shallow striations on the surface these striations would not be out of place on a modern artifact created on a lathe when a tool which had made a cut across the surface was reversed across the same path it took when it made the cut the grooves shown just below the cusp indicate that as the bowl turned in the lathe the tool moved rapidly across the surface when I first examined these pieces physically by running a finger across the surface of the dished out stone they were smooth machined surfaces with no dips or high spots when we take these into consideration along with the sharp cusp and the scratches in the surface in Petrie's 15d and the deep groove in his 14d the implication is the use of a lathe that was under significant power and that the rotary axis of the bowl and rotation of the tool were dependent upon precise bearings this technology pushes the envelope further considering that the pyramids were crafted with such precision is it surprising to find circumstantial evidence that proves that exact and robust machine tools existed in pre-history such machines did not just saw blocks for the pyramids and temples but they also crafted delicate and precise stonework such as the Ramses statue and the stone bowl fragments discovered by petri could we recreate the granite and basalt boxes in the seraphim without employing some fairly sophisticated machinery if we did not have the materials to devise such machinery had not developed an understanding of metrology and were without an inventory of instruments to measure precisely, how would we achieve these miracles in stone is anyone today willing to take on the fabrication of an Apis bull box.

Source: https://youtu.be/7LEt8VM42PY?list=PLb1MDIWaJM6ll4xS6jBDsCVDjjEJhfQQ2&t=1317

 

[Mendel]

Thank you for taking the time to do a thorough analysis!
I have follow-up questions:

Here all points are plotted with their distance from the centerline (green) on the vertical axis, the four images on the top are the zoomed in portions of their respective blue rectangles.

how much is the error/deviation in plots 3 and 4 in absolute terms? (mm or inches)
does this get better or worse when the original centerline is used?
what would we expect this error to be if a modern CNC lathe was used?

 

[Bill Ferguson]

All good questions. I don't know the answers but they are probably in this link.
https://unsigned.io/granite-artefact/

 

[Ravi]

All good questions. I don't know the answers but they are probably in this link.
https://unsigned.io/granite-artefact/

To prove these conclusions, one would need to show that the jars were made per design, and thus very likely would mean you can find many jars of the same size. I doubt that there are jars that are completely the same thus weakening the theory "it was done with a guided automated control system..". If they all differ, it could mean they were all individually manually crafted.

 

[Ravi]

It should be pointed out, that as provided, the model is aligned to the flat top plane of the vase mouth, but it's off from the actual centerline by about 4/100, which is unfortunate given that all measurements provided by UnchartedX [see attached pdf] references that (other than the top flatness).
I'll be using the adjusted centerline.
View attachment 58622
(Red circles centered on the original centerline, blue ones on the adjusted.)

Wasn't the origin of the vertical axis chosen to be the centre of a circle fit of the neck diameter? That is what I thought they did.

 

[Bill Ferguson]

To prove these conclusions, one would need to show that the jars were made per design, and thus very likely would mean you can find many jars of the same size. I doubt that there are jars that are completely the same thus weakening the theory "it was done with a guided automated control system..". If they all differ, it could mean they were all individually manually crafted.

I disagree with your conclusion. It is [snip] to suggest that without design plans from a 5,000+ year old artifact you are unable to put together that machines were used with all the data I have sent. Laughable.

 

[NorCal Dave]

Next picture shows the handles and their drill holes from the top (top) and the side (bottom).
From the top view we can see both on left and right, that the holes are pointing slightly inwards, from the side view on the left the holes are misaligned by quite a bit.

These misaligned holes alone should rule out the use of some sort of CNC machine.

All good questions. I don't know the answers but they are probably in this link.

Here are their conclusions:

They are doubling down on an "automated control system" and "manufacturing system". So, a full CNC machine, presumably some sort of computer to create the design before feeding it to the machine for manufacturing and all the necessary societal and industrial infrastructure associated with that. All before the advent of agriculture. And all of it gone, every bit.

Maybe more interesting is their final conclusion about the origins of the vase as it lacks any provenance.

This is also the third time you have simply posted a link and told us to "go look at it". You may want to check this link out on how to post on this forum: https://www.metabunk.org/forums/how-to.42/ It shows how use the various tools to share your evidence.

The particular PDF you keep referencing is a bit tricky. It does not seem to let one copy and paste like most PDFs. In this case, one can screen shot sections of it (press Shift, S and Windows Key at the same time on a PC) then paste (Ctrl V) the result into the comment. One can also add things like highlights in the Snipping tool before pasting.

Getting back to the report, it's 25 pages with lots of drawings and analysis, but from the beginning we have a couple of problems.
https://www.metabunk.org/attachments/unsigned-io-pdf.58618/

First is the authorship:

I find "unnamed" authors a bit of a red flag. If this person stands behind the results, then why stay hidden?

Second:

They don't know where it's from or when it was made. It has no provenience or provenance, so as noted above whatever conclusions are drawn can't really be applied to any pre-dynastic vases of known origin.

Obviously, I'm not going to try to reproduce the entire 25 pages here, but one of the driving themes of the paper is that the vase displays some sort of very complex "design" that was developed prior to its construction:

I may be misunderstanding them, but it seems they are comparing the design to how one would draw something like this in SketchUp or AutoCAD. There then follows lots of math about the interrelations between the various overlayed circles:

Honestly, I don't get it. I have a glass vase on a shelf in my bar. I'll try to insert a picture of it latter. It was made by a friend that was a glass blower. He made his living blowing glass and making vases.
Edit: Add photo

I'm pretty sure these guys could overlay all kinds of circles over a scan of this glass vase and perform lots of math with those circles to conclude it was a "complex design". Thus, inferring that it had to be designed prior to be made. But that isn't the case, he just made them organically and after years of doing it, he knew what looked good, no SketchUp or computer aided design needed. IF this is a pre-dynastic vase, the same logic applies. After years of making them, the craftsmen knew what looked good.

More later.

 

[Mendel]

All good questions. I don't know the answers but they are probably in this link.
https://unsigned.io/granite-artefact/
View attachment 58630

1) the obvious takeaway from your "conclusions" screenshot is that this vase is modern and not ancient.

2) from the site:

To explore what kinds of design principles were used in the creation of the object, we started out by measuring and mapping as many features of the object as possible, and looking for repeating patterns of placement and dimensioning, and repeating or mathematically significant ratios.

This is a bog standard numerology approach; when you see numerology employed, you generally know that science has taken its leave. One example:

We do, however, see an interesting corellation in this number. The approximation we have arrived at is just a mere 2.07μm (less than the scan accuracy) away from exactly matching the wavelength of an eloctromagnetic wave, with a frequency of 16 GHz, propagating in vacuum:

16 GHz is a meaningless number, not just because "why 16?", but also because the second (and therefore the Hertz) is a modern measurement, refined several times, that wasn't used in time keeping in ancient Egypt.

The standard numerology argument goes, "look at all these astonishing numbers I found, therefore something supernatural was at work" when the numerologist simply picked chance relationships. Numerology proves nothing.

 

[Ann K]

Looking at the exterior, on the bottom side we can see small bumps, but the curvature is otherwise smooth, however between the handles (and slightly above and bellow them) there are horizontal grooves running around the vase, wobbling up and down and widening to larger marks at parts.

@Bill Ferguson , this would seem to indicate that, although a lathe might have been used to shape the lower portion, when the artisan got to the level of the handles it would have been done manually. There is no power system needed for a lathe, as many examples have been shown of people using hand-turned lathes to accomplish skillfully turned objects. One gouge in one piece of stone is insufficient to invent the whole new realm of technology for which we have no other evidence. As for any automated manufacturing process, @overlord demonstrated quite conclusively the misalignment in the handles and their perforations, which one would not expect with CAD/CAM. And none of the researchers have produced a line-up of identical objects.

For the sake of everyone else's sanity and eyesight, I am NOT copying that punctuation-free wall-o-text you produced.

 

[Ravi]

I disagree with your conclusion. It is ridiculous to suggest that without design plans from a 5,000+ year old artifact you are unable to put together that machines were used with all the data I have sent. Laughable.

I did not say that.

 

[Mauro]

It is ridiculous to suggest that without design plans from a 5,000+ year old artifact you are unable to put together that machines were used with all the data I have sent.

A straw man + one ad hominem + a non-sequitur in just one sentence, not bad.

 

[JMartJr]

It is ridiculous to suggest that without design plans from a 5,000+ year old artifact you are unable to put together that machines were used with all the data I have sent.

I am trying to follow this discussion and am unable to parse what this means. Likely due to my parsing skills being weak today. Could you restate, so I can take another swing at it?

 

[Bill Ferguson]

These misaligned holes alone should rule out the use of some sort of CNC machine.


Here are their conclusions:

View attachment 58632

They are doubling down on an "automated control system" and "manufacturing system". So, a full CNC machine, presumably some sort of computer to create the design before feeding it to the machine for manufacturing and all the necessary societal and industrial infrastructure associated with that. All before the advent of agriculture. And all of it gone, every bit.

Maybe more interesting is their final conclusion about the origins of the vase as it lacks any provenance.

This is also the third time you have simply posted a link and told us to "go look at it". You may want to check this link out on how to post on this forum: https://www.metabunk.org/forums/how-to.42/ It shows how use the various tools to share your evidence.

The particular PDF you keep referencing is a bit tricky. It does not seem to let one copy and paste like most PDFs. In this case, one can screen shot sections of it (press Shift, S and Windows Key at the same time on a PC) then paste (Ctrl V) the result into the comment. One can also add things like highlights in the Snipping tool before pasting.

Getting back to the report, it's 25 pages with lots of drawings and analysis, but from the beginning we have a couple of problems.
https://www.metabunk.org/attachments/unsigned-io-pdf.58618/

First is the authorship:

View attachment 58633

I find "unnamed" authors a bit of a red flag. If this person stands behind the results, then why stay hidden?

Second:

View attachment 58634

They don't know where it's from or when it was made. It has no provenience or provenance, so as noted above whatever conclusions are drawn can't really be applied to any pre-dynastic vases of known origin.

Obviously, I'm not going to try to reproduce the entire 25 pages here, but one of the driving themes of the paper is that the vase displays some sort of very complex "design" that was developed prior to its construction:

View attachment 58635

View attachment 58636

I may be misunderstanding them, but it seems they are comparing the design to how one would draw something like this in SketchUp or AutoCAD. There then follows lots of math about the interrelations between the various overlayed circles:

View attachment 58637

Honestly, I don't get it. I have a glass vase on a shelf in my bar. I'll try to insert a picture of it latter. It was made by a friend that was a glass blower. He made his living blowing glass and making vases.
Edit: Add photo

View attachment 58638
I'm pretty sure these guys could overlay all kinds of circles over a scan of this glass vase and perform lots of math with those circles to conclude it was a "complex design". Thus, inferring that it had to be designed prior to be made. But that isn't the case, he just made them organically and after years of doing it, he knew what looked good, no SketchUp or computer aided design needed. IF this is a pre-dynastic vase, the same logic applies. After years of making them, the craftsmen knew what looked good.

More later.

I appreciate your response. The reason I kept posting the same pdf is because I had the same trouble with it as you. I couldn't copy and paste text from it and the questions were technical. I remembered where I got the pdf and since you guys prefer links and screenshots, I sent somebody some of each. About the report, I noticed the anomalous author, as well. I'm just an old guy who loves a mystery.

UncharteredX had the jar scanned a few months ago which resulted in 2 videos and the stl data file. I would bet that scan was done at no charge to Ben (the creator of the channel) and I would bet the guys who did the second scan did it on the house as well. The author is a scientist and in one of these papers, there is a twitter link.

I don't know how much interest you have in this subject but the fact that power tools were used has been researched and written about for over a hundred years. The evidence is literally written into the stones and was done before the dynastic Egyptians. Then something happened. Large obelisks were left in place, worked stopped, huge statues and blocks of granite were thrown about. There are signs that some of the granite statues and blocks were exposed to a high temperature event, Some of the stones are "rotting" from the inside out. Not just Egypt, either. Vitrification is found at megaliths sites in South America.

Back to the jars, it was the area of the jar between the lugs. Assuming a lathe was used, that are between the lugs would require additional tooling to remove that part of the work according to Chris Dunn and others. In the end, it isn't the tooling that interest me. It's the timeline of human history. If there were power tools 5,000 years ago, what happened to those people? There would have had to have been schools, factories, contractors, suppliers and people just like us. The dynastic Egyptians were never able to repeat the precision they found but quarried and recycled stone from many sites and made repairs to the pyramids and sphinx. So, it's the timeline and the fact that what we have been taught about our past is incomplete. Thank you, Dave. Have a great weekend!

 

[Bill Ferguson]

I appreciate your response. The reason I kept posting the same pdf is because I had the same trouble with it as you. I couldn't copy and paste text from it and the questions were technical. I remembered where I got the pdf and since you guys prefer links and screenshots, I sent somebody some of each. About the report, I noticed the anomalous author, as well. I'm just an old guy who loves a mystery.

UncharteredX had the jar scanned a few months ago which resulted in 2 videos and the stl data file. I would bet that scan was done at no charge to Ben (the creator of the channel) and I would bet the guys who did the second scan did it on the house as well. The author is a scientist and in one of these papers, there is a twitter link.

I don't know how much interest you have in this subject but the fact that power tools were used has been researched and written about for over a hundred years. The evidence is literally written into the stones and was done before the dynastic Egyptians. Then something happened. Large obelisks were left in place, worked stopped, huge statues and blocks of granite were thrown about. There are signs that some of the granite statues and blocks were exposed to a high temperature event, Some of the stones are "rotting" from the inside out. Not just Egypt, either. Vitrification is found at megaliths sites in South America.

Back to the jars, it was the area of the jar between the lugs. Assuming a lathe was used, that area between the lugs would require additional tooling to remove that part of the work according to Chris Dunn and others. In the end, it isn't the tooling that interest me. It's the timeline of human history. If there were power tools 5,000 years ago, what happened to those people? There would have had to have been schools, factories, contractors, suppliers and people just like us. The dynastic Egyptians were never able to repeat the precision they found but quarried and recycled stone from many sites and made repairs to the pyramids and sphinx. So, it's the timeline and the fact that what we have been taught about our past is incomplete. Thank you, Dave. Have a great weekend!

love your vase! maybe we need to scan it

 

[Miss VocalCord]

the fact that power tools were used has been researched and written about for over a hundred years. The evidence is literally written into the stones and was done before the dynastic Egyptians.

No It is not; only very few people make this claim. Most researchers reject these claims. Also in this topic more then enough evidence has been posted shown it can be done with simple tools available at the time.

Claiming it must have been done with power tools is simply a false claim.

 

[Ann K]

In the end, it isn't the tooling that interest me. It's the timeline of human history. If there were power tools 5,000 years ago, what happened to those people?

Of course it's the tooling that is of interest, because that is the only evidence for that "power tools" claim, and we are right to question everything: the age of the vase, the precision of the artifact, the method of carving, the presence or absence of other examples, and the conclusions drawn by others ...including one that chose not to have his name associated with the study. You say "if they had power tools", but that is the big "IF" that we need to confirm or refute, and so far, it seems that only people with a video to monetize that are on the confirmation side.

 

[NorCal Dave]

I'm just an old guy who loves a mystery.

Same here, but I'm much more likely to lean towards a common sense or mundane answer.

I've shard before a Poltergeist experience I had, a white orb flashing across my living room followed by a loud clunking sound. 15 feet from me as I was eating lunch. But when I went to look, there was nothing there, no orb and nothing that could have possibly made the noise. A mystery indeed. It took me all day to solve it and it wasn't a ghost.

Turned out a very large praying mantis had gotten into the house and was sitting on a white windowsill, so it turned itself whiteish. The window was open, and a gust blew it up into the air creating a white orb in my peripheral vision. I found it behind a speaker a few minutes later. Much, much later and in a totally different room, I found a decretive gourd in front of an open window had likewise been blown by the same gust, hitting the floor and then echoing through the house. All rather mundane.

I don't know how much interest you have in this subject but the fact that power tools were used has been researched and written about for over a hundred years. The evidence is literally written into the stones and was done before the dynastic Egyptians.

I know people have speculated for some time about how the pyramids or other ancient things where built, but I guess I don't see the evidence of "power tools". I see evidence of very skilled craftsmen doing incredible things with the tools they had. That doesn't mean exactly how they did some things is 100% known, but when it can be demonstrated that granite can be sawed or drilled with copper tools using water and sand and using replicas of the drills shown in Egyptian writings, I'm inclined to think the Ancients figured out some other things as well, rather than postulating an entire Modern Technological society from Neolithic times for which there is not a single piece of evidence.

If the existence of a High Tech society from Neolithic times is proving solely by the perceived impossibility of creating some artifacts, I'll default to the ancients figuring out how to create those things with the tools they had.

There would have had to have been schools, factories, contractors, suppliers and people just like us.

Yes, and the burden of proof for this is extremely high. How is it that the vases and other things survived from 5000 years ago, yet not one bit of material evidence for this highly advanced culture exists anywhere? Where is it?

Back to the jars, it was the area of the jar between the lugs. Assuming a lathe was used, that are between the lugs would require additional tooling to remove that part of the work according to Chris Dunn and others.

Here is the same Russian lady from a previous post making a similar looking vase. It's a little squatter but has the same area between the handles. She does it all by herself with ancient tools:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC3Z_DBnCp8


Unfortunately, her last vide from a couple of years ago was looking for some help as she was going to try one in very hard diorite for her next experiment. Hopefully the war hasn't affected her and the others making these useful videos.

In the end, it isn't the tooling that interest me. It's the timeline of human history. If there were power tools 5,000 years ago, what happened to those people?

. The dynastic Egyptians were never able to repeat the precision they found but quarried and recycled stone from many sites and made repairs to the pyramids and sphinx. So, it's the timeline and the fact that what we have been taught about our past is incomplete. Thank you, Dave. Have a great weekend!

Which is easier to answer:
1. "Where did and entire high-tech civilization go without leaving a trace in the archaeological record?"
Or
2. "How did the ancients use the tools they had to produce the artifacts we see today?"

Until there is some form of corroborating evidence for 1, I'm inclined to work with 2. And if the ancients could create the artifacts with the tools they had, there is no need to rewrite history.

Have a good weekend as well! And feel free to PM me if you have questions about how to post stuff on here. Just hover over my name and it should give you the option to start a conversation.

love your vase! maybe we need to scan it

Thanks, a Xmas gift for the wife. And yes, it would be fun to have it, or something similarly hand made, scanned and see if all the "complex design" theories can be applied.

Lastly here is another video where a guy systematically rebuts the idea of using diamond and cutting tools to create similar artifacts and how "machine" marks are NOT the result of machines. It could have been better, but it's ok:

EDIT: I had watched a bit over 1/2 of this video before posting it, but having finished it I guess it could use a bit of a content warning as far as "politeness" is concerned. At the end, he flat out calls the Uncharted X people and others con men who lie for money. Just a heads up. It's a poorly made video but is full of good information.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_iA3afiADw

 

[John J.]

If you don't want to give Corsetti the benefit of the doubt, that's cool.

Deirdre, you're only giving him the benefit of the doubt because you're a decent, open-minded person. But in my bunker of skepticism, I've become weary of people (like Mr Corsetti, not you or anyone else here) making claims that don't hold up.
And then trying to persuade others that he's "got a point", selling out real research for "likes" and YouTube views.
And then labelling any qualified researcher who criticizes him part of "The Establishment".

he's talking about the people that came from Kemit . The egyptians before they were egyptians. (Kemit is also the name of a "religion", a kind of study of the old ways of Kemit)

This is what Jim Corsetti says (source and citation in linked post):

"The people in Egypt, they believed in what's called Khemit, the people that existed before the Egyptians"

But, as already discussed, Khemit is the name of their country. Ancient Egypt is Khemit. (Kemet is a synonym of Khemit).
Corsetti doesn't provide any evidence that it means anything else.

The adjective "Kmtyw" is the name of the people.

Ancient Egyptians referred to their homeland as Kmt (conventionally pronounced as Kemet).

Sauneron clarified that the adjective Kmtyw means "people of the black land"

("Black land" is a translation of Khemit- the name of ancient Egypt).
Wikipedia, "Ancient Egyptian race controversy", sub-heading Kemet
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_race_controversy, accessed 14/04/23.

Corsetti is saying,
"The people in [Khemit], they believed in what's called Khemit, the people that existed before the [people of Khemit]".
Unless we think Corsetti feels the need to tell us that the Egyptians believed they had ancestors who were Egyptians, he must mean something else.

I think it's clear that Corsetti is stating that the ancient Egyptians believed in a specific people (culture) who existed before them.

If true, this might fit with Corsetti's general hypothesis of a much earlier, technologically-adept civilisation. Convenient!
Maybe Corsetti could have shown us an ancient Egyptian painting, carving or text which supports this-
-I have a very limited knowledge of Egyptian theology and creation myths, but I don't recall reference to an older people.

His use of "Khemit" is either a misunderstanding by Corsetti, or the deliberate use of a known word for a purpose different to its normal meaning.

Kemit is also the name of a "religion"

Well, Kemitism is the name of a new-age religion originating in the 70's. Late Elvis era, post-Woodstock.

He's been putting up a theory... that some of the structures could have been built (or partially built) by the people from Khemit. Then kinda remodeled by 4th dynasty workers.

In the literal sense, they were built by the people from Khemit- the ancient Egyptians, the 4th dynasty Kmtyw.
Corsetti seems to think they were built substantially earlier.
But the ages of the Giza pyramids are (approximately) known.
There are two major sources- historical accounts of the genealogies and reigns of the pharaohs with which the pyramids are associated, and since the mid 20th century, radiocarbon dating. Radiocarbon dating broadly confirms the historical estimates.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pyramid_of_Giza Wikipedia, "Great Pyramid of Giza" heading "Age", accessed 15/04/23.

The most comprehensive radiological study (which exploited the presence of wood ash in pyramid mortar) was conducted
by Bonani, G., Haas, H., et al, 2001, "Radiocarbon Dates of Old and Middle Kingdom Monuments in Egypt",
Radiocarbon 43, 3, University of Arizona.
Citation information https://www.cambridge.org/core/jour...nts-in-egypt/A967302ADD527BFEB9226457682C0B4A,
PDF of the paper file:///C:/Users/User/Downloads/radiocarbon-dates-of-old-and-middle-kingdom-monuments-in-egypt.pdf,
PDF attached below (898 KB)

It is pertinent to note that the authors write (my emphasis)

The American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) undertook in 1984 the first of the two projects reported here with financial support from the Edgar Cayce Foundation. The Foundation's interest in the project rested on a hypothesis offered by Cayce that the Giza pyramids dated to 10,500 BC

Over 450 samples were taken from Old and Middle Kingdom sites, including 46 from the pyramid of Khufu (if I counted right), 25 from "Khafre" and 35 from "Menkaure" (pages 9, 10, 11 of PDF).
These pages also detail where the samples were taken from- with "Khufu", samples from the second course of blocks and the top of the pyramid were included.
The results (page 4 of PDF) did not support the hypothesis that the Giza pyramids are 10,500 years old.
For the Giza pyramids, carbon-14 dating indicated age ranges with a median perhaps 200 years earlier than the "historical chronology" estimates.

The presentation of results in Figure 1 (page 4 of PDF) is not beyond criticism; I think you'd have to print out a copy and use a ruler, or use software to superimpose a lined grid, to be confident that you were interpreting the results around the middle of the table correctly. In contrast, the appendix includes the type, location of origin and C14 result for each sample.

The approx. 2 century discrepancies (between the C14 results and the historical chronology estimates) found by Bonani et al were later investigated by Dee, M.W., Ramsey, C.B. et al, 2009, who reanalysed the original raw data with a later Bayesian statistical package.
PDF of their paper,
"Reanalysis of the Chronological Discrepancies Obtained by the Old and Middle Kingdom Monuments Project",
Radiocarbon 51, 3, University of Arizona, can be found here
file:///C:/Users/User/Pictures/reanalysis-of-the-chronological-discrepancies-obtained-by-the-old-and-middle-kingdom-monuments-project.pdf, PDF attached below.

The reanalysed results, for a variety of sites including the three main Giza pyramids, are strikingly close to the historical estimates (page 7 of PDF). Tables giving graphic representations of the probability densities for the ages of structures, and the historical reigns of pharaohs, are shown on pages 8 and 9 of the PDF.

Other radiocarbon studies have given similar results; the Giza structures were most likely built, or started to be built, in the lifetimes of the pharaohs with whom they are historically associated.

 

[Ravi]

@NorCal Dave

Nice. That last video you posted is by "SGD", and he has done extensive practical work in making the actual stone objects himself using simple copper and wood tools. And it worked. Perhaps not as nice as the Egyptians did, but hey, they only had thousands of years practice and "SGD" a few months. He is indeed not "polite", but he is Australian so that is ok.

 

[FatPhil]

I disagree with your conclusion. It is [snip] to suggest that without design plans from a 5,000+ year old artifact you are unable to put together that machines were used with all the data I have sent. Laughable.

Your argument is irrelevant [snip]. The claim was "one would need to show that the jars were made per design" not "one would need to show the design they were made to". There's no need find those plans at all. Ravi's quite clear with that. Artefacts being identical would be the evidence for a design, and the machine capable of executing it.

 

[FatPhil]

View attachment 58636
View attachment 58637

This looks like the CAD equivalent of "word salad".
There's nothing special about the points they've used as the centres for their circles, nor the radii they've chosen.

They've found "Paul is dead" in Moby Dick.

 

[Ravi]

This looks like the CAD equivalent of "word salad".
There's nothing special about the points they've used as the centres for their circles, nor the radii they've chosen.

They've found "Paul is dead" in Moby Dick.

Indeed. It is random geometric fitting and it is thus complete non sense. No other words for this. Give me any shape and I can fit some circles and triangles in it, and it will look awesome. Also the "ratio" R(n) from that diagram is complete non sense. It is the method (playing around with geometries) what Christopher Dunn is using all the time, and indeed also makes no sense.

 

[overlord]

how much is the error/deviation in plots 3 and 4 in absolute terms? (mm or inches)

I used the idea of 'spread' as the difference between the largest and the smallest value, because that can be assessed reasonably well just by looking (in fact most of what I provided is the result of just looking), undoubtedly an average deviation type measurement would give more nuanced information, especially one that describes how that deviation is distributed along the circumference of the vase. I might revisit that later and do some calculations.
Anyway the four snipped portions are on the same scale, with the smallest gridlines showing 1/1000 , the larger ones the 1/100 and some of the thicker 1/10 are visible as well - these latter correspond to the thin lines of the full plot. That means a radial spread of around 3-4/1000 along both the third and fourth images, here are the larger versions.
[Edit] I should also note, that there's nothing special about those portions of the vase, they were just picked as random examples.
Measurements in inches (to stay consistent with the scan as provided).

does this get better or worse when the original centerline is used?

I should have specified this, I arrived at the adjusted centerline by trying to minimize the radial spread along as much of the vase as possible (again by looking, not by calculating), it's deviation from the 'true centerline' should be on the order of 1/10000-s, whereas the original one provided is about 4/100 off from the adjusted.
Plot with original centerline added in yellow, it's spread is around 8/100.

what would we expect this error to be if a modern CNC lathe was used?

I don't have the answer to that one, but I too would be interested in it.

Wasn't the origin of the vertical axis chosen to be the centre of a circle fit of the neck diameter? That is what I thought they did.

Yes, they said to have done so while doing the measurements. Maybe they forgot that alignment or choose the wrong one when exporting from Polyworks, looking at the above image it seems way too bad to be the result of fitting a cylinder to the inside of the vase mouth, but I'm just speculating here.

 

[Ravi]

Mendel said:
what would we expect this error to be if a modern CNC lathe was used?

I don't have the answer to that one, but I too would be interested in it.

With diamond laced tools working an object, the size of the diamond granules and the speed of the tool determines how "rough" a surface will become. At lower speeds, more crystals tend to break out of the surface. So when you have a good quality tool and optimised feed rates and speeds, I am sure roughnesses of less than ±10um (±1/2000") are possible for freeform objects. Polishing after can be done manually.