WEBVTT - Lost Continent: Part 1 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.240 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:13.680 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:16.279 My name is Robert lamp and Julie Douglas Julie. Isn't 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:20.439 there just something delightfully intoxicating about the notion of a 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:24.160 lost world, a lost continent, a lost city. Yeah, I mean, 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:27.120 especially in this day and age, where everything is mapped out. 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:29.840 You have GPS, you can zoom to nearly any street 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:33.080 and take a gander. The idea that there is this 0:00:33.200 --> 0:00:37.520 continent out there, undiscovered or perhaps once known and now 0:00:37.680 --> 0:00:43.000 just um unknown to us again, just ripe and ready 0:00:43.120 --> 0:00:45.920 to be discovered, is amazing. Yeah, I mean we uh. 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:49.720 When we were talking about HP Lovecraft in a recent episode, 0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:53.479 we talked about his um, his novella At the Mountains 0:00:53.479 --> 0:00:57.200 of Madness, which which is written in a time when 0:00:57.280 --> 0:01:00.320 when man is on the cusp of exploring ing the 0:01:00.640 --> 0:01:07.560 last unknown um Antarctica, and Lovecraft injects his fiction and 0:01:07.800 --> 0:01:13.280 places some uh, the ancient remnants of a primordial alien 0:01:13.880 --> 0:01:18.080 civilization there, and in in a sense he was investing 0:01:18.680 --> 0:01:21.639 our our last hopes for something undiscovered on this world 0:01:21.880 --> 0:01:25.080 in that place. We love the idea if there's not 0:01:25.160 --> 0:01:28.000 something undiscovered out there in the present, then maybe there 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:30.480 was something in the past that we've lost, and failing that, 0:01:30.600 --> 0:01:32.640 hey we'll just look to the future and dream something 0:01:32.720 --> 0:01:34.720 up there. Well, I feel like he was tapping into 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:38.560 something anyway, and this idea that there are cultures so 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:41.319 very ancient civilization is so very different from us, that 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:44.440 they did seem or might seem alien to us. And 0:01:44.520 --> 0:01:47.280 especially if you think about all the artifacts in that 0:01:47.400 --> 0:01:50.920 novella that they come across um the ancient writings or 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:54.520 drawings and things that we discover today when we're trying 0:01:54.520 --> 0:01:57.120 to figure out how people worked in the past. So 0:01:57.880 --> 0:02:00.160 it is this idea that this lost cons and that 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:04.440 could give us another angle and another lens into humanity 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:08.200 and what what ultimately helped to create us and where 0:02:08.240 --> 0:02:11.040 we are today. And certainly even just within known history 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:14.399 there there there are plenty of places and times it's 0:02:14.480 --> 0:02:17.120 very difficult for us to to wrap our heads around, 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:19.160 like it's it's been pointed out to me before that 0:02:19.480 --> 0:02:22.520 the religion of the ancient Egyptians, for instance, Uh, it 0:02:22.720 --> 0:02:26.560 never really took off behind the ancient egypt because it 0:02:26.639 --> 0:02:29.359 is it is very difficult for an outsider to sort 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:32.679 of wrap your head around, uh, these these concepts and 0:02:33.160 --> 0:02:35.160 what exactly they were going for, which I think it 0:02:35.280 --> 0:02:39.080 makes makes it even that more romantic, these notions that 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:43.920 these lands could have existed, these these utopias where you know, 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:48.960 people were incredibly strong and and the societies were wealthy, 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:52.040 and and they were technologically advanced. This idea that this 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:55.840 could have existed. And I'm even thinking about El Dorado, 0:02:56.200 --> 0:02:59.120 which is, you know a perfect example of the sort 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:03.600 of um romantic version of society, but all through this 0:03:03.680 --> 0:03:06.080 idea that all these treasures exists and you just need 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:08.760 to go find them and plunder them. And El Dorado 0:03:08.800 --> 0:03:13.079 is the famous city of riches. Seventeenth century European explorers 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:16.480 were trying to find in South America with all sorts 0:03:16.480 --> 0:03:19.560 of fantastical stories of you know, this Indian chief covered 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:22.560 in gold and all sorts of gems and rubies just 0:03:22.880 --> 0:03:26.960 there for the taking if you can find the city. Yea. Indeed, 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:29.680 one of the sources we both read for this particular 0:03:29.720 --> 0:03:34.640 episode an article by else Broad de Camp titled Lost Continents, 0:03:34.680 --> 0:03:36.720 which is published in the National History magazine. You can 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:39.840 find it online. Uh. He pointed out that as we've 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:42.520 been saying, we love this idea of utopia. We love 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:44.720 this idea that there's some lost land somewhere that that 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:50.680 captures perfection. Um. Our world sucks, but surely we got 0:03:50.680 --> 0:03:52.360 it right at some point, or we will get it 0:03:52.440 --> 0:03:55.080 right at some point in the future. He says that 0:03:55.120 --> 0:03:58.000 we we used to situate these Eden's and Golden ages 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:00.520 in the remote past or in some unex word portion 0:04:00.600 --> 0:04:03.520 of the world, but now we're we're forced to place 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:06.880 them on other planets or in the distant future. So 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:09.040 so one day, one day, maybe we'll get there. But 0:04:09.080 --> 0:04:12.280 failing that, of course we we we fill our our 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:16.039 our fantasies, we feel our dream worlds with these various places. 0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:18.760 So I think we've already mentioned a few, but just 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:20.440 some of the writers that come to my mind when 0:04:20.520 --> 0:04:24.160 we think about lost worlds uh Um Lovecraft, of course, 0:04:24.440 --> 0:04:27.440 Clark Ashton Smith wrote whole cycles of short stories set 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:32.000 on the lost continent of Hyperborea, on the future continent 0:04:32.160 --> 0:04:35.720 of Zofik, and on the last chart of sunken Atlanta 0:04:35.760 --> 0:04:39.840 is known as Poseidonus j R. Tolkien wrote of uh 0:04:39.960 --> 0:04:43.520 New Minore, which I made. The Tolken fanetics will probably 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:47.080 correct me on that, and the pronunciation of Tolkien's name, 0:04:47.080 --> 0:04:49.760 but I grew up saying Tolkien's though it's grew it. H. 0:04:50.240 --> 0:04:52.240 But this world is another one that a fictional world 0:04:52.240 --> 0:04:56.080 fell into darkness sank beneath the waves Thomas Moore's Utopia 0:04:56.200 --> 0:05:01.560 fifteen sixteen classic. We also in remembering this chapter in 0:05:01.680 --> 0:05:05.280 Ken jennings book map Head, in which he talked about 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:08.839 this law professor Austin tap And right, who died in 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:13.040 one but he left behind something like twenty three d 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:18.279 handwritten pages describing and mapping this fictional country in his 0:05:18.360 --> 0:05:23.839 mind called Islandia and decades long fever dream for him, right, 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:26.120 you know. And this is beyond the sort of scope 0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:27.720 of his work that he did in his daily life. 0:05:27.720 --> 0:05:29.320 So this is what he did in the mornings and 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:33.400 when he got home from work, and it detailed, uh everything, 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:37.839 the population, the culture of the languages. And again here's 0:05:37.839 --> 0:05:41.320 this idea that we can't help but storytelling, we think 0:05:41.360 --> 0:05:45.320 about distant lands, real or imagined. I mean, this is 0:05:45.360 --> 0:05:47.560 something that really takes hold of us. I'm glad you 0:05:47.560 --> 0:05:50.560 mentioned map Head because because that really cuts down to 0:05:50.800 --> 0:05:54.400 two of the key features here. In discussing lost continents 0:05:54.400 --> 0:05:57.120 and lost worlds, on one hand, the mapping of our 0:05:57.200 --> 0:06:00.920 world us as we will roll out as we continue 0:06:00.960 --> 0:06:03.920 in this conversation. UM. A lot of the stems from 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:07.040 our attempt to understand the shape of our world, the 0:06:07.120 --> 0:06:10.080 layout of our world, where the where the continents are, where, 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:16.880 where various islands are, and then misinformation theories, hypothesis here 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.400 and there, and and a lot of dreaming. We get 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.800 into the the the theory of what may exist gets 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:25.600 picked up by the into and transformed into the desire 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.480 for something to exist. Yeah, that's a good point because 0:06:28.800 --> 0:06:31.160 I was thinking about this. You have maps that are 0:06:31.240 --> 0:06:34.560 physical maps, and you have allegorical maps. In the same way, 0:06:34.600 --> 0:06:36.279 you have the same kind of stories, right, you have 0:06:36.360 --> 0:06:38.640 some of their allegorical stories, and then you have some 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:42.720 stories that may be rooted in historical fact. And I'm 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:46.200 thinking about the city of Troy, which was written about 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:49.360 by Homer in the fictional poems Iliad and Odyssey, and 0:06:49.560 --> 0:06:54.000 turns out that the city of Troy is was a 0:06:54.080 --> 0:06:58.280 city that is located in modern day Turkey, and the 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:01.920 Trojan Wars may actually have happened. So you have all 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:06.240 of this sort of tinging these ideas of history and 0:07:06.960 --> 0:07:12.800 legend and no more so than the idea of Atlantis. Ah. Yes, 0:07:13.200 --> 0:07:14.720 And I do want to say a place like Troy, 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:18.760 it instantly makes me think of any number of places 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:22.160 that have an important role both in real history as 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.960 well as in fiction, as well as in religion and myth. 0:07:25.360 --> 0:07:30.600 And some individuals want to really only take one of 0:07:30.600 --> 0:07:33.360 those or want to combine them all into a single thing. 0:07:33.440 --> 0:07:35.239 But I really feel a place like that, like Troy, 0:07:35.480 --> 0:07:38.120 it kind of exists in a like a quantum superposition. 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:40.240 You know, it is at once a real place and 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:43.080 it is this fantasy place. And and these things are 0:07:43.120 --> 0:07:47.320 not necessarily connected. You can't necessarily overlay them like see 0:07:47.360 --> 0:07:49.160 through panels in a book and expect to see a 0:07:49.200 --> 0:07:52.040 concise image. It could be dueled with nature. Yeah. Yeah. 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:56.160 And indeed Atlantis, the Big One definitely falls into this 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:59.640 category as well. Well. The thing about Atlantis, though, is 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:03.880 widely seen as an allegorical story. Yes, right in the 0:08:03.880 --> 0:08:07.280 time that it was written in the present, but we 0:08:07.360 --> 0:08:10.680 just can't help ourselves, right for all the reasons that 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:13.200 we just ticked through. Um, so when we talk about 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:15.840 the story of Atlantis, for talking about the lost city, 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:20.160 and you can't have this actual story about Atlantis unless 0:08:20.160 --> 0:08:23.360 you talk about this other city, this Athenian city that 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:26.560 existed in the story at the same time. Um, this 0:08:26.680 --> 0:08:30.120 is huge empire that was organized along the lines that 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:32.800 Plato had set forth in his republic, and the state 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:35.800 was ruled by a communistic military cast and everybody was 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:43.680 brave and handsome and virtuous kind of like Garrison Keiller's Yeah, 0:08:43.720 --> 0:08:47.840 something like that Lake Wobegone as Atlantis new theory, new theory. 0:08:48.040 --> 0:08:51.559 Garrison Killer needs to write that episode for like what 0:08:51.840 --> 0:08:54.600 are we gone? Um? But his rival city, of course 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:57.320 was Atlantis. And this is an island west of the 0:08:57.360 --> 0:09:01.080 Pillars of Hercules, larger than North after good Asia, Asia 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:04.920 minor combined, right, so just land mass wise huge, right, 0:09:05.160 --> 0:09:11.200 And this was just a rehash written and he's saying 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:17.040 this was nine thousand years ago from in was like, hey, 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:19.840 this happened nine thousand years ago, which kind of as 0:09:19.840 --> 0:09:23.360 a red flag anyway, Right, we'll discuss why. Um, this 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:26.680 is long ago in a galaxy far far away. Basically, yes, 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:30.679 you're right, but basically this continent had all sorts of 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:33.679 great power, had tried to conquer the eastern Mediterranean, but 0:09:33.840 --> 0:09:37.920 had been defeated by the Athenians, and up to this 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:40.840 point in the story, we get all this background on 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:44.080 Atlantis and how it was an advanced society, but there's 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:47.240 no flying planes, no laser guns. There's they have a 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:50.560 really fancy bronze like metal that science shines like the sun, 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:52.960 but that that's pretty much yet place. It doesn't allot 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:57.199 anything else sci fi. But they have fancy architecture and art. Yeah, um, 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:00.440 fancy pants. Okay, But at this point you have a 0:10:00.600 --> 0:10:05.680 great earthquake that devastates this Athenian city and Atlantis, and 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:08.480 along with it, uh you know, you you then have 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:13.560 the flood swallowing it, or you have Poseidon mandating that 0:10:13.720 --> 0:10:18.400 these floods um swallow these cities whole, right, because it's 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:22.079 also laid out in Plato's work that that Poseidon puts 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:25.000 his ten sons in charge of Atlantis. In the Atlantis 0:10:25.040 --> 0:10:28.560 gets gets kicked off with to begin with, Yeah, the charter, 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:30.839 if you will. Josh Clark has an article about this, 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:33.640 this an Atlantis article and has stuff works, and he 0:10:33.679 --> 0:10:36.440 says Plato loses some credibility when he mentions that the 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:39.680 city was also populated by blood descendants of the sea 0:10:39.760 --> 0:10:43.079 and earthquake god Poseidon. Yeah, I tend to agree with them. Yeah, 0:10:43.120 --> 0:10:45.600 I mean, if you're gonna try and take Plato seriously. 0:10:45.679 --> 0:10:48.319 But it's it's like if you read J. R. Tolkien 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:51.560 and said, this Middle Earth thing is just completely made up. 0:10:51.600 --> 0:10:53.680 I tried to find it on a map. I couldn't 0:10:54.040 --> 0:10:56.439 you work really hard. I came close a couple of times, 0:10:56.440 --> 0:10:58.440 but it just doesn't pan out. Of course, it doesn't 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:01.600 pan out because Middle Earth does not really exists. It 0:11:01.679 --> 0:11:05.280 exists as a fiction. It exists. You could argue as 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:09.160 an allegory for for for Europe during the Second World War, etcetera. 0:11:09.280 --> 0:11:12.080 But wait, wait, wait a second, I saw that documentary 0:11:12.120 --> 0:11:16.520 Lord of the Rings. Yes it exists. Well, New Zealand exists, 0:11:16.520 --> 0:11:18.840 and we'll actually discuss New Zealand a little bit in 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:21.679 part two of this uh this episode, yeah, the perfect 0:11:21.679 --> 0:11:24.800 setting really for Lord of the Rings, and um, the 0:11:24.800 --> 0:11:27.120 perfect setting as as all lost. The idea of a 0:11:27.160 --> 0:11:30.079 lost continent right has all the elements, all right. But 0:11:30.120 --> 0:11:32.480 there are two remaining points to hit here, and one 0:11:32.640 --> 0:11:34.840 is that the fact that nobody in Greece for nine 0:11:34.880 --> 0:11:40.440 thousand years had mentioned a giant battle between Athens and Atlantis, 0:11:40.960 --> 0:11:44.080 the except for Plato's tail on various commentaries by his successors. 0:11:44.280 --> 0:11:48.320 There's not another surviving word about Atlantis in the Greco Roman, 0:11:48.360 --> 0:11:53.040 Egyptian and Babylonian canon of literature, which is a little suspect. Yeah, 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:55.640 and again, everyone knew in Plato's day that this was fiction, 0:11:55.679 --> 0:11:58.840 this was allegory. Uh. Those who came after him knew it. 0:11:58.920 --> 0:12:03.800 But as els Brague de Camp points out, critical standards 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:07.440 in the later Roman Empire degraded, and some began to 0:12:07.520 --> 0:12:10.560 take the tale seriously. And that's kind of the beginning 0:12:10.600 --> 0:12:13.400 of what would later pick back up in terms of 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:18.280 re examining Atlantis and thinking or wanting it to be true, 0:12:18.760 --> 0:12:21.880 even though and this is the second point, Plato was 0:12:22.440 --> 0:12:26.280 a philosopher, not a historian, so he wrote on an 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:29.200 allegorical level. Yeah, but he's Plato. He's a big name, 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:32.480 so you know, especially as the centuries roll by, there 0:12:32.520 --> 0:12:35.040 becomes this there's more of a tendency to want to 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:37.640 take what he says really seriously. And if he's talking 0:12:37.640 --> 0:12:40.960 about mysteries, all the better. Right, do you think Oprah 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:43.280 will have that sort of power? And I always ask 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:47.360 this Tony in some fashion in two hundred years, Yes, yes, 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:51.120 people will be rereading the works of of Oprah looking 0:12:51.160 --> 0:12:53.880 for the lost works of Oprah and her disciples. Dr 0:12:53.960 --> 0:12:58.960 phil Across Susie Ormon. All right, let's take a quick break, 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:01.040 and when we get back, we're gonna tell about some 0:13:01.120 --> 0:13:03.640 of the people who are trying to get at the 0:13:03.679 --> 0:13:14.160 bottom whether or not Atlantis could have ever existed. All right, 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:18.120 we're back. Let's talk about some people who have looked 0:13:18.120 --> 0:13:21.439 at this fascinated idea of I guess it's sort of 0:13:21.480 --> 0:13:28.800 like archaeology meets history meets geography meets could Atlantis have existed? Yeah, yeah, 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:31.520 this is where it gets, uh, gets even more interesting 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:35.000 because after about the sixth century, you didn't really hear 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:39.000 much about Atlantis for a long time until you reach 0:13:39.080 --> 0:13:42.280 the beginning of the European Age of Exploration during the 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:45.640 fifteenth century. So we're out there, we're exploring the ocean, 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:50.760 and we are in fact discovering new lands. But then 0:13:50.800 --> 0:13:52.640 of course we're mapping our ways too. But this is 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:56.040 our Our maps were populated by many a non existent creature, 0:13:56.080 --> 0:13:59.120 which we've discussed before talking about the science of sea monsters. 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:03.440 So too, do non existing islands pop up throughout the Atlantic. 0:14:03.480 --> 0:14:07.440 It's especially the Atlantic. So in some ways you have 0:14:07.840 --> 0:14:10.360 you're on the cusp of discovery, right, and you have 0:14:10.600 --> 0:14:15.360 these large swaths of undiscovered land in oceans, and so 0:14:15.440 --> 0:14:17.440 it would make sense that people would try to say, 0:14:17.520 --> 0:14:22.400 I think that I have found where Atlantis went under. Yeah, 0:14:22.920 --> 0:14:27.120 and then you have a sect of these people who 0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:31.440 you might consider scientific atlantists. Yes, And and this also 0:14:31.440 --> 0:14:34.160 picks up a lot when we discover America, because oh 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:36.240 my goodness, here is a world and it has people 0:14:36.240 --> 0:14:38.720 living on it who we've never discovered before. So that's 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:40.960 even more fuel for the fire right And and in fact, 0:14:41.320 --> 0:14:45.160 some would end up saying, hey, America is the Atlantist 0:14:45.840 --> 0:14:49.920 and well it's not. Yes. Els brag de Camp divides 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:56.120 Atlantist enthusiasts or atlantists into three categories, the scientific, the 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.920 pseudo scientific, and the occultists. Um, we'll start with the 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.360 scientific because that's the reasonable place to start. And really, 0:15:03.400 --> 0:15:06.240 they it's kind of a progression, right as you sort 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:09.400 of drift off a little a little more, a little 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:12.880 more from having a firm grasp in reality, but it's 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:15.720 trying to be rooted in in reality, it's trying to 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:18.440 be rooted in data. But then sort of drifting off. 0:15:18.480 --> 0:15:22.160 I was thinking about this, that that cognitive bias that 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:25.800 we sometimes experience when we're trying to create that picture 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:27.800 that we want to see. Yeah, he's sort of like 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:32.600 the scientists, the scientific atlantists are saying, could it be true? 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:34.800 Let me see, here's my theory about how it could be, 0:15:34.960 --> 0:15:38.360 And then the pseudo scientific the the the desire for 0:15:38.480 --> 0:15:41.560 to be true takes over. And then with the occultists, 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:44.280 just any other nonsense you might have lying about the 0:15:44.320 --> 0:15:48.000 house gets thrown into it, your fantasy. They're the most fun. Yes, 0:15:48.920 --> 0:15:52.800 so yes for scientific atlantists, Uh, they are again they're 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:56.640 looking for an ancient culture that could have possibly inspired Plato. 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:00.200 And and they're not necessarily even getting into the whole 0:16:00.480 --> 0:16:04.320 uh worry over an actual Atlantic island or some sort 0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:07.520 of large land mast sinking into the ocean. So in 0:16:07.600 --> 0:16:12.960 the sixteen seventy nine, Olaf Rudbek Uh supposedly found Atlantis 0:16:13.000 --> 0:16:18.280 in Sweden, and then subsequently other individuals found Atlantis and 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:22.680 Uh in the Tunisia and Nigeria and South Africa, uh, 0:16:22.840 --> 0:16:26.920 just about everywhere else. Right, Um, the best theories that 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:30.200 have been put forth regarding the location of Atlanta tend 0:16:30.280 --> 0:16:34.560 to put it in Minoan crete or in tar TESSAs, 0:16:34.680 --> 0:16:37.920 which is a harbor city and the surrounding area on 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:42.120 the southern coast of the Iberian Peninsula that was abandoned 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:45.280 to floodwaters, most likely before the Common Era. Meanwhile, the 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:49.600 Eastern Mediterranean Minoan Empire I really did suffer overwhelming disaster 0:16:49.880 --> 0:16:53.240 around fift dred BC. And this was a Bronze Age 0:16:53.240 --> 0:16:56.760 power that flourished from the twenty seven century BC to 0:16:56.840 --> 0:17:01.480 around the fifteenth century BC. Oh, that's an example of 0:17:01.520 --> 0:17:05.760 scientific Atlantis. Now you have pseudo scientific Atlantis, and a 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:10.560 good example is Augustus Leclegan. I'm glad you tackled that. 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:13.000 When you have more of the French tongue. Anyone who 0:17:13.080 --> 0:17:15.520 is proficient in French may take issue with that, but 0:17:15.600 --> 0:17:18.159 I tried. Let it be known, I tried. Um. He 0:17:18.240 --> 0:17:21.359 spent a lot of years in the Mayan ruins of 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:26.040 the Yucatan. He became quite an expert. He claimed to 0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:31.600 understand the Mayan alphabet, and he considered Egyptian higher growth 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:37.040 like hieroglyphics similar to the Mayan. And he claimed to 0:17:37.080 --> 0:17:39.280 be able to to sort of sort all of this 0:17:39.920 --> 0:17:44.399 by using a modification of something called rascille de Bobuls's 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:49.000 modification of a de Landis alphabet. So all of those 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:51.959 words just falling out of my mouth, I think already 0:17:52.000 --> 0:17:56.480 gives you an idea that this guy was completely obsessed. 0:17:56.880 --> 0:18:00.960 No doubt he was a scholar, but he is uh 0:18:01.119 --> 0:18:03.919 carving things together in such a way that he was 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:09.520 really really was world building and doing it with language. Yeah, 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:11.320 and I think world building is key here, Yeah, because 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:13.720 he's taking what he knows about mind culture and then 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:18.000 he's connecting it. He's forming connective tissue to not only 0:18:19.000 --> 0:18:22.119 the real ancient Egypt, but to this imagined Atlantis and 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:26.919 just stitching together a world anew. Can you imagine him 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:30.440 living today and tackling like the moon landing hoax? Oh yeah, 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:32.720 he would have a huge following online, I'm sure you know. 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:36.119 That's one of the things that continually amazes me looking 0:18:36.160 --> 0:18:39.200 around at a variety of topics, not just this one online, 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:43.320 is just how much material there is out there supporting 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:49.920 just bad theories, bad ideas about say, uh, how recently 0:18:49.920 --> 0:18:54.960 the dinosaurs, uh when extinct, or where Atlantis is or was, 0:18:55.160 --> 0:18:58.600 or just it's it's it's a little depressing at times. Well, 0:18:58.640 --> 0:19:01.280 I think it speaks to this idea that humans have 0:19:01.400 --> 0:19:05.840 to chew on something and sometimes and a lot of 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:09.280 the problem here is that our experience is so subjective 0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:11.760 that it's hard to say, well, this is the thing 0:19:11.880 --> 0:19:13.920 all that. It's actually not that hard. In fact, you 0:19:13.960 --> 0:19:17.200 can take scientific data and help yourself guide yourself into 0:19:17.359 --> 0:19:21.680 the right area of exploration. Nonetheless, we are world builders, 0:19:21.680 --> 0:19:24.320 we are storytellers, and we gotta chew on something. I 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:29.639 found an hour long h amateur documentary on YouTube the 0:19:29.680 --> 0:19:33.960 other day where a man was arguing for the recent 0:19:34.000 --> 0:19:38.399 existence of dinosaurs based on evidence in the Bible. But 0:19:38.480 --> 0:19:41.119 here's the thing. He wasn't trying He didn't seem to 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:44.639 have any other point, but there are dinosaurs in the Bible. 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:46.760 He wasn't trying to push any kind of like new 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:49.000 uh you know, Young Earth kind of a model. He 0:19:49.040 --> 0:19:52.280 wasn't trying to disprove evolution. He was just saying, hey, 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:54.680 there are dinosaurs in the Bible, and here's an hour 0:19:54.760 --> 0:19:57.960 of me talking about it. Because for him, that is 0:19:58.000 --> 0:20:03.480 the thing that obviously is problematic, and if he could 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:07.440 just figure out how dinosaurs fit into this, then all 0:20:07.440 --> 0:20:09.840 of it would make sense. Again, you have the cognitive 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:12.400 bias at play that when you are faced with something 0:20:13.200 --> 0:20:16.000 that really refutes the data in front of you, you 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:18.200 will double down and find a way to make it fit. 0:20:18.920 --> 0:20:23.879 Speaking of pseudo scientific atlantist, another individual worth mentioning is 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:28.480 Paul Schlieman. And Paul Schleiman was actually the grandson of 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:32.240 Heinrich Schleiman, who actually dug up Troy. We mentioned earlier 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:34.439 about the finding of Troy, and really Troy is a 0:20:34.520 --> 0:20:37.280 real place in addition to you know, whatever else it 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:41.200 might be in the in in the popular mindset of man. 0:20:41.520 --> 0:20:46.400 But yeah, nineteen twelve, Paul Schleiman um gave the New 0:20:46.480 --> 0:20:50.080 York American magazine a sensational tale about how his grandfather 0:20:50.119 --> 0:20:54.679 had left secret papers instructing him not to instruct him 0:20:54.720 --> 0:20:57.159 to break open an owl headed vase and supposedly they 0:20:57.200 --> 0:21:01.960 were Atlantis secrets in side. But nothing ever came of that, 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:06.199 no vase was ever presented, no documents, so um, but it. 0:21:06.440 --> 0:21:08.840 But it added just a little more fuel to the fire, 0:21:09.160 --> 0:21:13.720 all right, Um. The last category here would be, as 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:16.640 you mentioned before, the occult atlantis, and this these really 0:21:16.640 --> 0:21:18.960 are the people that are going to bring the life 0:21:18.960 --> 0:21:23.040 to the party. Here yeah, with occultist Atlantists, and occultist 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:26.640 doesn't just mean I know it brings to my mind, uh, 0:21:27.119 --> 0:21:31.159 images of individuals and dark cloaks meeting in secret rooms 0:21:31.200 --> 0:21:34.920 and discussing Atlantis. But really, um, we're talking about here 0:21:35.000 --> 0:21:40.880 is just any additional crazy idea, conspiracy theories, fictional imaginings. Um, 0:21:40.920 --> 0:21:42.720 you know, the same kind of energy that would go 0:21:42.840 --> 0:21:49.760 into rectifying the Old Testament with with with modern um paleontology, 0:21:50.240 --> 0:21:51.919 that's the kind of energy you're getting here. So you're 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:55.720 getting everything from uh you know, ancient airplanes sailing through 0:21:55.720 --> 0:22:00.800 the skies of Atlantis, to know magical powers, um, bisexual 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:05.199 Lemurian's astral bodies, you name it. It's gonna wind up 0:22:05.240 --> 0:22:08.159 in this version of Atlantis and Atlantis thought, Yeah, it 0:22:08.160 --> 0:22:11.320 gets super cosmic on this level. You could trace some 0:22:11.480 --> 0:22:15.200 of this new life breathed into the legend to someone 0:22:15.280 --> 0:22:20.520 named Ignatious Donnelly, who penned Atlantis the Antediluvian world elishments 0:22:20.600 --> 0:22:23.959 before the flood, before the flood, the flood, because there 0:22:24.000 --> 0:22:26.080 have been many flood in the Big Flood, the Big 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:28.800 Biblical flood, Yeah, that one. Uh, so we're talking about 0:22:28.840 --> 0:22:31.960 eighteen eighty two and donally argued that small islands have 0:22:32.040 --> 0:22:34.719 disappeared in eruptions, so why not a continent. So this 0:22:34.800 --> 0:22:36.879 is his place of logic that he's beginning at, right, 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.120 which doesn't really hold out because it's of course it's 0:22:39.160 --> 0:22:41.320 one thing for an island to sink, but for a large, 0:22:41.880 --> 0:22:45.119 massive piece, so an actual continent to sink, it just 0:22:45.160 --> 0:22:48.560 doesn't hold up with our our modern understanding of geology. Now. 0:22:48.560 --> 0:22:52.399 He also cited many alleged resemblances between the appearance and 0:22:52.480 --> 0:22:56.119 cultures of the peoples of America, Europe, and the Near East, 0:22:56.119 --> 0:22:59.399 and insisted that therefore the civilizations of all must have 0:22:59.520 --> 0:23:06.400 come from m Atlantis. It's like they're all humans. So well, 0:23:06.440 --> 0:23:10.360 he starts with a good observation, there's something universal here 0:23:10.400 --> 0:23:13.800 there there are there are aspects of various cultures that 0:23:13.840 --> 0:23:16.600 seemed to be connected. There's some sort of connective tissue here. 0:23:16.880 --> 0:23:21.520 What could the reason be? Answer Atlantis Atlantis instead of 0:23:21.560 --> 0:23:24.280 saying like maybe genetics, but of course there's not a 0:23:24.320 --> 0:23:27.480 great understanding of genetics at that time anyway, so you 0:23:27.560 --> 0:23:30.320 gotta give him a little room. But the problem here 0:23:30.359 --> 0:23:34.000 is that he completely besides coming from this place of logic, 0:23:34.240 --> 0:23:37.280 he completely ignores Plato Smith and he replaces it with 0:23:37.320 --> 0:23:39.760 a variation on the biblical myth of the flood that 0:23:39.840 --> 0:23:42.480 wiped out everything except for Noah his family into his 0:23:42.520 --> 0:23:45.399 menagerie of animals. He wrote that Atlantis was sunk in 0:23:45.400 --> 0:23:47.439 the middle of the Atlantic Ocean during the flood, but 0:23:47.480 --> 0:23:50.440