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Atlantis: Discovered at Last?
Henry G. writes "The BBC is reporting that recent satellite pictures may show the location of the fabled city of Atlantis, as described by Plato. It is in Southern Spain, though, and not on an island as is commonly believed. Here's an image of the concentric rings over the alleged area." This story has gotten a lot of submissions; it's worth noting that it's also shown up off Cyprus, or near Cuba, or is Crete, or... It is worth noting that that Ubar was found this way.
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...who can't see any rings in that photo?
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
Of course, it certainly would be cool if it was the real deal!
I'm probably at the karma cap. Mod up a funny troll instead, it lightens the mood
It's probably just pareidolia. They know what they are looking for, so they see it in highly ambiguous data. Sure it might be Atlantis, but I remain skeptical until they can produce much more unequivocal evidence.
It might be important to note that the sory of Atlantis could and is most likly just that a story. Plato like Homer was a great story teller, he was also had an great impact on many Academic Disciplines.
While Homers story of The Illiad was based on the real war that happened in Troy, we have no conclusive prof that an island of Atlantis existed. This discovery may provide evidence of the fabled city, but I won't hold my breath just yet.
-Ghost
would be if we discovered a very old, very advanced civilization that threw historians a curveball. For example, what if some ancient civilization was just as advanced as us but nuked themselves out of existence? This could explain much: the gods of Greek mythology, etc. Just a thought.
Don't be a looter...and yes, I know that it's spelled with an "A" instead of an "E".
"This is the only place that seems to fit [Plato's] description," he told BBC News Online.
Except for its not being an island and all the other bits we ignored to make the data fit the model.
KFG
I can't make out rings nor rectangles in that
picture. But I clearly see a big cache of WMD in the lower left corner.
---- join dshield.org Distributed Intrusion Detec
If you're looking for something spesific, it's easy to find it.. our mind is good at recognisong patterns, even when they arn't there. Off course, this is what leads people to see cities om Mars, Lenin in their shower curtain and, in this cause, traces of Atlantis. It's called pareidolia, and it's more common than you might think.
PS: I urge everyone to visit the link and explore the site - it's a good read and quite interesting as well as funny.
Everything in the world is controlled by a small, evil group to which, unfortunately, no one you know belongs.
The original Antiquity article is here.
Aside from a great deal of speculation about correlations between Egyptian records, tales of the Peoples of the Sea, and a selective reading of the Dialogues, the only "data" the author points to are the satellite images which may be the remains of rectangular structures. Nothing in situ to indicate dating.
As there is almost certainly evidence of Bronze Age settlements practically anywhere one cares to dig along the Mediterranean coast of Spain, this article is roughly the equivalent of speculating that an unattributed burial in a 6th century Wessex tomb must necessarily be the remains of Arthur.
Trusted by cats.
Always go to other people's funerals, otherwise they won't come to yours.
There's a chain of islands called the Mid Atlantic ridge, which, if the water level were lowered 300-500 feet (as it was before the end of the ice age) would be a very large island. You could even call it an island continent.
Plato said atlantis was 9000 years before him, or about 11,500 years ago. We've only learned in the past couple of decades that almost exactly at that time, the mean temperature of the earth raised a significant amount in a short amount of time. If a bunch of ice (North America had a mile-thick layer of ice) melted all at once, and you lived on an island continent, it would seem that your island sank into the ocean.
Someday I'll be proven correct. I just know it.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
Why can't these people get it through their heads thaty Atlantis, as recounted by Plato in Timaeas and Critias, is allegorical.
It has as much objective reality as More's Utopia and Butler's Erehwon. It even had the same purpose, to illustrate a philosophical point and "demonstrate" Plato's idea of an ideal society.
It just happened that Atlantis was a handy cultural peg to hang it off, somewhat like Avalon and Lyonesse is today for some people.
There have been numerous candidates for Atlantis, but the outstanding one, IMO, is Santorini.
That island, part of the of the Minoan civilisation, blew its top somewhat spectacularly, and was probably a contributory factor to the collapse of the Minoan, Mycenaean and Hittite empires, who just happened to be trading partners with the Egyptians at the time.
The Egyptians, being anal-retentive record keepers kept some records of this, and these, in garbled form, are probably what inspired Plato to use the island as the home for his ideal civilisation.
Given the effects of this massive explosion on the weather (shitty crops practically guaranteed throughout the region), which would have negatively effected the economies of the Mycenaeans and Hitties.
The loss of contact with the Minoans (who were in a decline at the time anyway, so this probably played a large part in finishing them off) would likely have pushed them over the edge as well. Both of those regions (the Anatolian Plateau and southern Greece) being somewhat marginal environments to start with, having low annual rainfall, poor and shallow soil, and high summer temperatures).
This probably would have made it into the Egyptian annals as something along the lines of "those Greek and Turkish bastards haven't turned up so far this year to hawk their tat, no great loss, but a bit of a pain in the arse. Also we have been having some really shitty weather this last year, on the plus side, the surf was wicked last summer. Wonder if they are related? - Amememhat"
This also would quite likely have been mythologised to a certain extent from the tales of survivors.
No need for the tortured logic and papering over the cracks here, it all depends on fairly well understood factors, a big fuck off explosion, the fragility of civilisations based on gift-giving economies and ties of obligation, especially in somewhat marginal environments, and a bit of garbling and mythologisation over the years.
Mix an ambitious philosopher looking for a name to hang an idea off, and Viola! a ready made myth for people to chase incessantly, and for con-men in the mould of Von Daniken and Hancock to make a good living off.
I know you meant this as a rhetorical question, but I'll bite anyways.
;-)
Q: how do they confirm it is atlantis?
A: When they find some artifacts in the vicinity and can carbon date them back from 9000 years ago. When they can find proof of the animals and/or technology that existed there according to the one-and-only document that even mentions the city.
Q: why can't their find of this ancient city stand on its own as exciting and important?
A: Because the human-race has this drive to solve puzzles and find proofs and explanations of any and everything. The city of Atlantis is no different from Noah's Ark, Solomon's Temple, Eden, or even the laws of physics; people will continually search for them until they find inexplicable proof (whether it exists or not) that they exist.
Q: why link it to a dubious unprovable myth
A: Short answer: in hopes of acquiring more research dollars.
And finally...
Q: maybe i'm stpid, but...
A: You are correct, because you can't spell "stupid".
Karma: NaN
This is slashdot, what your seeing is Microsofts secret underwater HQ; looking closer through the skylight of the ballroom you can just make out Bill Gates having tea with several of his puppet CEO's that will be in charge after "regime change" at some unnamed pro-linux companies. Over to the left you can see the 2000 box cluster of G4's running the beta of Longhorn, and on the screen you can almost see what his word document says, but the 5 new Clippy wizards are obscuring too much text.
Do you need a website upgrade?
The more I think about it, the more I think Plato based his story of Atlantis on the destruction of Thera (neé Santorini).
Let's consider the following:
1. Thera in its heyday had a very advanced civilization by ancient standards with things like surprisingly modern plumbing systems!
2. The island of Crete--90 miles south of Thera--had more or less the same type of civilization on Thera.
3. When Thera's volcano did that catastrophic eruption, not only did most of the island sink into the sea from the eruption but it also created a massive tsunami wave that wiped out most of the smaller and larger human settlements on the north coast of Crete 90 miles south. That explains why there was considerable water and mud damage to Knossos.
4. If Solon had properly translated what he heard from the Egyptians in the 7th Century BC, he would have placed the destruction of Atlantis at 900 years, not 9,000 years before his time. 900 years would almost match perfectly the time Thera did its final eruption from Solon's contemporary perspective.