Notes from tired Egyptian whose job is explaining that humans built the pyramids

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• Hacker News
• one piece of "evidence" some conspiracy believers cite to prove aliens is, roughly: a bunch of places around the world independently all built similar pyramid-like structures (egypt, machu picchu, etc.). so it must be aliens.

  the fact that the easiest way to pile up a bunch of big rocks without it crumbling down is to have a wide base and a narrow top is seemingly forgotten.

  by john_strinlai
• It strikes me that it also might be the best way to build a tall structure, for the ancients. It takes modern materials to build skinny and tall.
  by qup
• >without it crumbling down

  Which is an underappreciated part. They didn't only build pyramids, it's just pyramids had a much higher chance of actually surviving the millennia so it looks like early human civilizations were weirdly obsessed with pyramids. You never hear any theories about how aliens built the Colossus of Rhodes, but the pyramids get it because they're still around.

  by slg
• It would be interesting to know who by Country or Language who believes ETs built the pyramids.

  Personally I expect US would be the leader. The reason is because over the last 50 years there have been lots of shows describing how and why Space Aliens built the pyramids. Some of these shows were well produced.

  In the US, it seems we are at the point if a show is based on fantasy, it is believed as fact.

  by jmclnx
• id say theres more here on the balkans
  by gnoll_of_gozag
• I think the more likely explanation is racism. If the pyramids were in Europe, nobody would challenge their human origin but pyramids are in Africa Surely aliens are involved.
  by bji9jhff
• the article has a huge 'flash sale' and is selling shit. Not the best evidence to declare huge swathes of people racist. c If you search "extraterrestrial origins of Stonehenge" you'l find the same shit. 'Muh aliens' crowd are happy to attribute anything to aliens. The pyramids of bosnia? Nazca lines? Moai?

  And why is it bad that people feel wonder at places literally called "wonders" and build stories around them? That's universal, not sinister. Egypt is steeped in religion, myth, and all kinds of craziness; most Egyptians don't hold a strictly secular, "logical" view of the world either, and no one calls them "racist" for it. From my time living in Cairo, people attributed most things to Israel and god, lol.

  I also don't get tying a whole continent (an arbitrary construct) to a single race. There's no such thing as "the African race."

  Weird comment. Hammers and nails, imo.

  by gaiagraphia
• This is provably incorrect. Stonehenge is the target of alien conspiracies as well.
  by applfanboysbgon
• Maybe you are just really, really determined to find racism in everything? Your claim is wildly wrong; I live in Europe and there is no shortage of kookiness and crackpotry around all the megalithic structures that dot the landscape, down to having actual cults worship them.

  This isn't recent either. When Tolkien put the lines about Orthanc and the Stone of Erech looking unearthly into the Lord of the Rings, he reflected on the early Medieval people and their superstitions regarding Roman ruins. "There once was a race of giants that built X" was a common idea, and fanciful medieval authors would invent all sorts of humanoids that weren't human and were responsible for various wonders or evils.

  Burial mounds in Ireland (sídh) are linguistically associated with the "fair folk" (aos sí) until today.

  by inglor_cz
• This is such a weirdly misanthropic view of humanity. Why are people so desperate to find evil in this world when ignorance is not only nicer to believe, it’s insanely more accurate?

  Like I get it, you’re depressed, but this doesn’t automatically make everyone everywhere that doesn’t believe some random facts “racist”.

  by kulahan
• Saying that aliens built them is as likely as claiming magic built them.
  by WalterBright
• For real
  by iamarobot
• Magic is explicitly something outside the realm of possibility, but I get what you’re saying.
  by kulahan
• The Testament of Solomon indulges this craziness.

  > the text describes how Solomon was enabled to build his temple by commanding demons by means of a magical ring that was entrusted to him by the archangel Michael.

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testament_of_Solomon

  by echelon_musk
• Reminds me of my career explaining how to build simple webpages without using large abstraction libraries/frameworks for JavaScript.
  by austin-cheney
• the wild thing about this is that _we have contemporaneous records of how they were built_. They know the names of architects and managers. There's no mystery to it at all.
  by empath75
• links?
  by soperj
• the aliens could have planted those records tho
  by spogbiper
• There are egyptian paintings showing colossal statues being dragged on sledges by crews of men with ropes. -- https://www.science.org/content/article/scienceshot-ancient-...
  by ahazred8ta
• If aliens built the pyramids they did a pretty shit job. You can see the evolution where they started building a pyramid and realized it would be too high so they changed the angle half-way up. If they had computers and geometry they probably would have gotten it right from the start.
  by comrade1234
• Related: Masonry Techniques of the Inca’s Master Builders

  https://www.earthasweknowit.com/pages/inca_construction

  This article was a fantastic read, and thoroughly debunks a lot of ancient alien style stuff.

  by data-ottawa
• Very informative article with excellent photographs.

  You should post it to HN for greater visibility instead of being buried in the comments.

  by rramadass
• Egyptians were clever. They had rivers, water and advanced water-management technology.

  The shaduf, which is a hand-operated lever with a bucket, to lift water from rivers and canals for irrigation.

  The Nile River annually flooded which was monitored because it determined agricultural success.

  As well, the Nile served as a transportation route. Huge stone blocks transported through and evidence suggests that canals and harbours were built near some pyramid complexes to help move materials closer to construction sites.

  https://aeraweb.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/aeragram15_1-...

  Clever people. Not as advanced as the Romans but they had technology and prospered for a long while.

  by doublerabbit
• The question is how did these clever people build the pyramids. When you read about it you realize no one really knows. There are theories that have evolved over time but there isnt great evidence for any of it. Its largely people thinking about how it could have happened - not how it DID happen.

  Of course that doesnt means aliens did it.

  by nonethewiser
• > People dramatically underestimate what thousands of organized humans can accomplish when they are adequately fed, aggressively supervised, and denied alternative career paths.

  Somehow I feel personally attacked.

  by yongjik
• The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them..."
  by prmph
• "I personally can't conceive of how one might built this, and I must be a million times smarter than people 4500 years ago, ergo people didn't build this." is how the Ancient Aliens theory always sounds to me.
  by AdmiralAsshat
• Wait until you hear about "I don't remember leaving my phone in the toilets" ergo "There must be alternative parallel timelines we regularly jump to and from"
  by cassepipe
• This is a strawman argument, their real one is: "These megalithic structures would be tremendously difficult for anyone to build even today with all of our modern technology, and yet they did it hundreds of times before even inventing the wheel, in several places across the world."
  by an0malous
• Its more like “We dont know how they built it so Im not going to assume they used a 2km long ramp.”
  by nonethewiser