Slashdot Mirror
Hundreds of Stonehenge-Like Monuments Found In The Amazon Rainforest (yahoo.com)
turkeydance quotes The Telegraph: Hundreds of ancient earthworks resembling those at Stonehenge were built in the Amazon rainforest, scientists have discovered after flying drones over the area. The findings prove for the first time that prehistoric settlers in Brazil cleared large wooded areas to create huge enclosures meaning that the 'pristine' rainforest celebrated by ecologists is actually relatively new.
The researchers believe the monuments appeared roughly 2,000 years ago -- so after Stonehenge (by about 2,500 years). "It is thought they were used only sporadically," reports the BBC, "possibly as ritual gathering places similar to the Maya pyramids of Central America, or Britain's own Stonehenge."
The researchers believe the monuments appeared roughly 2,000 years ago -- so after Stonehenge (by about 2,500 years). "It is thought they were used only sporadically," reports the BBC, "possibly as ritual gathering places similar to the Maya pyramids of Central America, or Britain's own Stonehenge."
But....ALIENS.
Only the earthworks are visible. Seems somebody messed up on the units for the stones.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Which ecologists, specifically, are celebrating this? Please be specific and cite names.
If the former then we already know who designed them...
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
"It should instead serve to highlight the ingenuity of past subsistence regimes that did not lead to forest degradation, and the importance of indigenous knowledge for finding more sustainable land-use alternatives”.
Brazilian's current population is larger than it was then and the standard of living they aspire to is higher. Jennifer Watling begrudging Brazilian's use of their natural resource to work themselves up, while living in Europe which our ancestors deforested long ago is retarded.
They don't wish to live as subsistence farmers did 2000 years ago.
The book 1492: The Year the World Began, by Felipe Fernández-Armesto, is not a new book. However, it goes into detail about the not so ancient American civilizations. It does promote the crowded Americas theory; which is gaining prominence. Essentially, the records of the first explorers and settlers is very different from the Americas seen by the large waves of explorers and settlers, only a few years later.
Terra preta has been found along the Amazon over wide areas. This manmade soil type is evidence of not just occasional occupation but regular long term occupation. So these new findings don't really newly establish that there were settlements. The soil has already done this.
Earth work and ditches would have been the earliest form of defenses. Let us not belittle the discovery. These earthworks tell us a lot about early settlers in the Amazon region. Also they discovered agriculture late. Eincorn wheat was domesticated in the Levant 11000 years ago, rice in China 9000 years ago. Corn was domesticated in South America just 3000 or 4000 years ago. Domestication of crops correlates with sedentism, and a transition from hunter/gatherer to farmer. We remember that transition in the New World as the story of Cain (farmer) and Abel (hunter). We need to learn the transition in the New World from these clues. So the findings are very very significant.
It is already a great and significant find. Comparing it to stonehenge is counterproductive. Stonehenge was 5000 years after domestication of crops in the New World. These geoglyphs seem to be concurrent with the domestication of corn. It is unfair to compare geoglyphs with stonehenge.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
At certain hours that were preannounced through the week, the local townspeople would gather round these so-called meeting places and show off the tinier stones and rocks that they have collected prior to their arrival at the area. When the warning horn has been sounded, the townsfolk would grab as many of these rocks as they can in their fists, and await the first of the drones. As soon as the first one is spotted, the populace would start casting their rocks and stones, without giving a damn about gravity's tug and its sometimes painful consequences. Not many of these drones returned, nor have any been spotted since.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
The article states that " the 'pristine' rainforest celebrated by ecologists is actually relatively new." The discovery shows nothing of the sort. This must have been funded by an oil company. Only a tiny fraction of the rainforest was cut and for only a relatively short time. As soon as the use of the sites stopped,the surrounding pristine rainforest reclaimed the sites. This was not a distrubance of biological significance.
"He took a duck in the face at 250 knots." -- William Gibson, Pattern Recognition
The assumption that he puts forth is that between the first explorers, and the large wave that followed later, there was a massive death rate due to the introductions of Western diseases. This large die-off was not seen or recorded, by Westerners, because the bulk of it occurred between the exploration stages.
He discusses many of the records of the second wave of explorers, they wrote of well tended, but empty, forests and fruit plantations. Many of their observations reflected that there was a recent, and large population; yet they were not seeing that large population. here is the wikipedia summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The, essential, anarchy seen by later explorers, and settlers as not a fair look at how the Americas had been. What those of the later stages were seeing was the result of a societal collapse to below the levels need for continuation.
To put this in geek terms, imagine that you arrived on earth after the zombie apocalypse, your assumptions would be different than they would be if you arrived today.
The surrounding area is completely entrenched with plants from the Cannabis genus. This is clearly Stonedhenge.
No, not really. Didn't you RTFA? Ha! I'm a kidder, we know you didn't. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
The Druids' ritual gathering ceremony has finally been recreated and captured in this dramatic reenactment.
Probably part of the 2017 portfolio expansion.
I'm thinking it's like distributed RDM for DynamoDB instance...anyone?
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
I meant to +1 but slipped and clicked -1
Just for reference, population estimates for all of Europe (where it hasn't been inflated by agendas) at the dawn of the bronze age was about 100,000. Estimates of 10s of millions of natives living in the Americas is simply politicised nonsense. The land couldn't support that many people at their technology level.
This whole thing is driven by the scammy nature of most early American colonization, explorers claimed 'streets of gold' to raise funds in Europe. Now dumb people take _all_ these claims on face value to claim 40 million natives had lived in the Americas. before smallpox killed them. It's just hippy mythology.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
And what percentage of the rainforest was cleared to build these structures? Obviously not much or else they wouldn't have needed drones to find them. Seems the writer is using a definition of pristine that means "completely and utterly untouched by human hands anywhere at any time", because reasons.
Just for reference, population estimates for all of Europe (where it hasn't been inflated by agendas) at the dawn of the bronze age was about 100,000. Estimates of 10s of millions of natives living in the Americas is simply politicised nonsense. The land couldn't support that many people at their technology level.
Which bronze age? Antique Europe had millions of people, and while antiquity was iron age at its height, it started in the bronze age and "only" spanned a couple of hundred years.
Who is the bigger idiot? The one who wrote this
"... dawn of the bronze age was about 100,000"
into a history book, or the one who is so dumb to believe it?
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
An English archaeologist is digging and finds some copper fragments. He concludes that the ancient Britons were very advanced for their time because they had a telephone system.
A French archaeologist is digging and finds some bits of glass. He concludes that the Gauls were even more advanced because they had fibre-optics.
A Scottish archaeologist is digging and finds nothing at all. He concludes that the Picts were the most advanced of all, as they all had satellite phones.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The biggest idiots are the ones who believe the Americas could support 40 million people at stone age technology.
There were only a couple of tribes that had just started to make bronze. Comparing American natives to bronze age Europe is being generous.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Erm, if you say "Americas" I guess you mean both continents.
I don't think that 40M people on both in stone age times are implausible. After all "stone age", "bronze age" only means what tools they used. Or in other words, what technology they had.
The americas are still in our days the least populated areas of the world, you could quadruple the population and a casual by passer would not see a difference. Keep in mind: more than 50% of the produced food in developed countries is thrown away.
No idea what you mean with: Comparing American natives to bronze age Europe is being generous. ;D
I assume you don't know much about either "tribes"
Trick question: what was the biggest bronze age/iron age empire? Hint: unless you have a deep knowledge you never figure, and no, it is not on wikipedia :D Big as in spread over the landscape, not necessarily big as in max of population.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
This is wrong.
"henge" = circular earthworks.
Stonehenge = circular earthworks with stones.
Later, when the distinction between defensive earthworks and non-defensive ones was recognised, the defensive ones were called "hill forts" (because they were mostly sited on the tops of hills) while the harder-to-understand non-defensive structures which were not on hills were called "henges".
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"