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This was an inspiring conversation, promoting integrity in both thinking and doing. Thanks, DJ, for bringing Joe back again. He’s always a worthy guest.

I joined this forum after Nickell unfairly accused von Däniken of racism a couple of years ago — probably not the best example of “humanistic skepticism.” But hey, even Al Gore’s electric/gas bill topped $30,000 in 2006, Gandhi didn’t think too highly of the blacks, and even Jesus somehow failed to love that poor fig tree.

I love this guy.  He loves being a skeptic, he loves to apply the tools of the skeptic and scientist to answer riddles or solve mysteries, and he’s got his priorities straight about why we should do so.  Not to mention, he understands why skeptics should not be obnoxious.  He also dresses down those skeptics who eschew the process, bypassing the solving of mysteries and riddles altogether, to offer instead pat or unsubstantiated guesses--in other words, those skeptics who adopt skepticism as an ideological faction as opposed to a method of inquiry.  Too many skeptics act like such self-righteous know-it-alls, and who’s persuaded by it?  It doesn’t go unnoticed when skeptics try to speak with authority about subjects they know little about.  It bothers me too that so many are adopting more the scorning Ted Haggard or Kent Hovind tent preacher style than the Joe Nickell forensic detective style.

What fun or value is there in being a skeptic, or being around skeptics, if all they do is snort that the “Gods/Ghosts/UFOs didn’t do it” and preach atheist gospel all the time?  Joe Nickell towers above these snark-squad pseudoskeptics.

I listened to this podcast earlier this evening, and have found myself a new skeptic
hero.  I appreciate his advocacy of humanistic skepticism and the importance of
listening to people.

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Here is the exchange between DJ Grothe and Joe Nickell that is being used by George (unless he can show me otherwise). I would suggest a listen to the entire interview, it is fascinating and Joe once again exudes his humanistic skepticism.

Starting at 18:00 into the podcast -

D.J. Grothe: Some people have argued, because some of these pictures can only be seen from the air, that, they’ve argued even in best selling books, that the Nasca Lines were created originally as alien aircraft landing strips.

Joe Nickell: Yes, Erich von Däniken, in his notorious book, Chariots of the Gods, followed by various sequels of, Gold of the Gods and still more, and even more chariots and still beyond. [Däniken] cranked out these books, imitated by others, and there are a few skeptical books pointing out the fallacies of these. He [Däniken] suggested that the Nasca figures, rather than being made by the ancient Nasca culture, which I can go into evidence for that they made them, but he ignores that, and suggest that these - in an almost implicitly racist way I think, he’s not overtly, but, the implication behind his pointing out these things in his tone is that these ancient non-white people weren’t sophisticated enough to do things like make Nasca drawings (giant drawings), or build pyramids, or carve the stones on Easter Island and he disparages the what he calls the “old heave hoe” method of standing one of these statues up and suggest this is ridiculous, that it can’t be done. In fact, if you go to Easter Island you can see the quarry. [Joe goes on to explain in greater detail]

In the very recent podcast, I think Nickell carefully distinguished between his humanistic attitude toward believers and his contempt for brazen woo-masters like von Däniken.
Did Nickell unfairly accuse von Däniken of racism?  I think his statement is far too nuanced, careful and accurate for it to conclude such a thing--if anything, he’s just saying that von Däniken is a crank whose reasoning is flawed in myriad ways.

Joe Nickell: ...[Däniken] ignores that, and suggest that these - in an almost implicitly racist way I think, he’s not overtly, but, the implication behind his pointing out these things in his tone is that these ancient non-white people weren’t sophisticated enough to do things like make Nasca drawings…

Either you, jholt, or Nickell, will have to show me where exactly Däniken in any of his books did that. “Non-white people weren’t sophisticated enough to do things like make Nasca (sic) drawings”? Show me where Däniken ever suggested anything like this.

BTW, Nickell (and others before him) tells us how and why the people of Nazca supposedly produced the small drawings; like this one of the monkey, for example:

http://perutravelnews.info/photos/Nazca-monkey.jpg

The true mystery, however, lies in the kilometers-long lines. They don’t represent any animals. Sure you can call it an “abstract art,” but visible to whom? Why? Can you imagine the people of Nazca walking with a stick in their hands (perhaps for several days) in order to perform some ritual dancing? I can’t.

http://i.pbase.com/v3/93/399693/2/49231343.PhotosVacation2005PeruIMG_0843.jpg

if anything, he’s just saying that von Däniken is a crank whose reasoning is flawed in myriad ways.

No, he is saying that Däniken “implicitly” tells us that the people of Nazca couldn’t produce the lines because they were not white. But I guess you would have to be a “humanistic skeptic” to understand…

if anything, he’s just saying that von Däniken is a crank whose reasoning is flawed in myriad ways.

No, he is saying that Däniken “implicitly” tells us that the people of Nazca couldn’t produce the lines because they were not white. But I guess you would have to be a “humanistic skeptic” to understand…

So Nickell says that von Däniken ignores evidence that the Nazcas made the figures, wrote a “notorious” book which he “cranked out” and is full of fallacies, and also ridicules suggestions that the pyramids and statues on Easter Island were constructed by the inhabitants of their civilizations, and this does not equal Nickell saying that VD is a crank whose reasoning is flawed?  Hmmm.

IIRC, Däniken never said that the people of Nazca didn’t produce the figures. If you want to discuss his books, read them first. I must point out again, though, that my disagreement is with Nickell accusing Däniken of racism. And more now than before, since Nickell now calls himself a “humanistic” skeptic. That’s all.

IIRC, Däniken never said that the people of Nazca didn’t produce the figures. If you want to discuss his books, read them first. I must point out again, though, that my disagreement is with Nickell accusing Däniken of racism. And more now than before, since Nickell now calls himself a “humanistic” skeptic. That’s all.

I’m not discussing von Daniken per se, I’m discussing what Nickell said about him. 

Like I said in a prior post, “… I think Nickell carefully distinguished between his humanistic attitude toward believers and his contempt for brazen woo-masters like von Däniken.” Being humanistic IMHO doesn’t require holding one’s tongue and speaking nicely to or about flagrant perpetrators of horseshit like von Daniken was. 

Is it fair for Nickell to have said “...in an almost implicitly racist way I think, he’s not overtly, but, the implication behind his pointing out these things in his tone is that these ancient non-white people weren’t sophisticated enough to do things like make Nasca drawings (giant drawings), or build pyramids, or carve the stones on Easter Island...” That’s a very, almost overly cautious statement.  Frankly, not having any of von Däniken’s books and having no interest in reading them, I can’t evaluate whether I agree with Nickell’s opinion. 

I have no more to say about this particular matter.

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I read a few Daniken books decades ago.  Nickell’s claim that Daniken’s theories bespoke “implicit racism” isn’t a novel accusation.  The “implicitly racist” accusation almost always crops up against pop naysayers and historians when they try to ascribe significant technological or improbable cultural phenomena or achievements to “old world influences”, usually Europeans.  If I recall correctly, Daniken’s theories fell into two categories.  Daniken would offer theories suggesting the purposes of the artifacts were tied to the aliens, such as his idea the lines were “road maps” and beacons for space aliens.  However, Daniken would also at times credit technological style know-how to alien contact. 

Daniken was just a mystery monger.  Archeological coincidences, improbabilities, curiousities, and unanswered puzzles were mother lode for him to mine tall tales, and the Nasca lines fit the bill.  Daniken was an equal opportunity pillager.  Stonehenge in England, the Turkish Piri Reis map, the semitic peoples’ Bible stories, India’s Iron Pillar and more all had an alien hand behind them. 

Be that as it may, Nickell may or may not be wrong about Daniken, but duh...even “humanistic skeptics” can be wrong judging other people.  Safe to say, they will be just as prone to misjudging other people as non-humanistic skeptics or non-skeptics or non-humanists.

This will be my last post in this thread. I will not discuss Däniken’s theories, as I believe he is wrong to speculate that our planet had been visited in the past by aliens. But I have read probably all of his books — interestingly enough Däniken is the most read non-fiction writer of all time — and I can say with certainty that in none of his books have I ever came across anything that might sound racist or offending. If anyone can prove me wrong (please provide proper sources, not just a couple of sentences taken out of context) I will react accordingly and apologize for my mistake.

Now, Nickell is surely free to say as he pleases, but in all honesty I am not impressed at such behaviour. I have never belonged to any organization and when I discovered CFI I felt as if this could just be my chance. Sadly though, it was people like Nickell unfairly accusing Däniken of racism, Dacey and Kurtz distorting what we know (or should know) about human nature to fit their agenda, and Flynn with his repulsive and arrogant monolog on Christmas, who discouraged me to become a member of CFI.

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In Skeptic magazine [Vol. 13 No. 4 2008] there’s some great pieces that include criticisms and insight into some of Däniken’s work and views. Tim Callahan’s essay, A New Mythology, touches very briefly on Däniken and the “gods” of ancient myth were actually extraterrestrials...”, but it is more of a tour de force of skepticism into “consider(ing) the [grand New Age] myth as a whole and try to understand what need it fills in its adherence.”

But, for the purpose of this discussion I wanted to offer this section by Daniel.

Racism?

One very serious criticism of the idea that many ancient monuments required alien builders is that this a often seems to be based on racism. For example, it’s common for von Däniken’s books to describe skilled workers of ancient art and architecture and then say things like, “with the best will in the world one cannot imagine savages making them.”

Is he saying that all ancient humans were “savages” who were too primitive to build their own monuments? Actually, he seems to make an exception for the people of Europe. One anthropology textbook calculated that 96 percent of von Däniken’s examples “are from places other than Europe.” The textbook author wrote that von Däniken is apparently “utterly astounded by the archaeological records of ancient Africa, Asia, and North America. He is so astounded, in fact, that he thinks that only through the assistance of men from outer space could those black, brown, yellow and red people have produced the prehistoric works that archaeologists find on these continents.”

Why does von Däniken mostly ignore ancient European accomplishments such as Stonehenge or the temples of the Greeks? Skeptic James Randi thought he knew the answer: “because these wonders are European. built by people he expects to have the intelligence and ability to do such work.” Randi blamed this double standard on von Däniken’s “personal prejudices,” saying von Däniken “cannot conceive of our brown and black brothers having the wit to conceive or the skill to build the great structures they did leave behind.”—[Daniel Loxton]

Piques my interest now to read them again, because I think Randi’s exaggerating.  I thought Daniken did write about Stonehenge, using it because he could get away with making an alien visitation story out of it.  It’s origins are mysterious, and the greco-roman remains haven’t had any popular mystery left to them after the Renaissance.  Besides the henges, are there any European relics from antiquity impressive enough to help Daniken make such a case?  All the “wow” finds locate someplace else.  Googling Daniken offers him some defense, from Chariots of the Gods, “Let us not forget that we too were semi-savages 8,000 years ago.” Daniken wasn’t an archaeologist or academic, just a storyteller, and didn’t see the warning that circulated throughout academia--the official notice declaring the term “savage” as racist de facto.

“...[Däniken] cannot conceive of our brown and black brothers having the wit to conceive or the skill to build the great structures they did leave behind.”

This is simply garbage. Randi doesn’t know what he’s talking about as he probably never read Däniken’s books. Däniken has indeed written several books about Europe. Die Rätsel im alten Europa and Odyssey of the Gods — An Alien History of Ancient Greece are the ones I remember reading. In his books Däniken looks for reasons why “our brown and black brothers” built the structures, and tries to look for evidence (unsuccessfully, IMO) that they did it either to imitate the “gods” or to attract their attention.

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Aesopo,

I am having a hard time following your reasoning and I think it comes from what is meant by “implicitly racist”. Searching out a smoking gun is futile and no one I’ve quoted is saying directly that Däniken is a racist. The term “racism” or “racist” in these insistences are not some academic bogeyman. In these cases it’s possible the person’s “tone” as Joe describes may come completely unintentional and is unacknowledged by the author due to factors not always clear. Randi proposes that it’s possibly from “personal prejudice”, or possible comes from blatant ignorance, which is where my money is when reading Däniken’s nonsense.

Several examples critics cite to imply reveal Daniken’s “implicit racism” point to his use of the term “savage”.  It once was a term used in academia to denote people of “preliterate” cultures.  For various reasons, one being that the word is shared with many pejorative definitions also, this use of the word fell out of favor.  What language did Daniken write the books in, anybody know?  It was German, was it?  I wonder what word he used that translated into “savage”.

As I say, I’m interested to read the books to get a sense myself.  On the face of it, I would say the evidence is thin Daniken’s strange aliens hypothesis reflected “implied racism”, and Daniken’s motives could well have been mercenary.  He sold one helluv-a-lotta books.

Only point I’d like to make is that Nickell’s statement was par for the course, and whether he’s right or wrong to say it, I fail to see what it has to do with him trying to be a “humanistic secularist”.

Something like the Pazca Lines are about the people of the Pazca culture and he simply dismisses that they had the ability to perform these feats free of ET influence and intervention in their own time, why, because to Däniken they are evidence of ET because the people created in ways that are not easily understandable and they lacked the where-with-all to give them meaning or purpose, or the ability to construct them as they were.

Okay, I have an idea. How about this?

Däniken thought so highly of “our brown and black brothers” that he simply could not accept that they would spend all their resources and energy in building enormous structures for their imaginary gods. You see? Däniken’s theories are implicitly humanistic because he thinks that our ancestors actually had a valid reason to create their lines and pyramids. Ridiculous, isn’t it? Of course it is. Däniken is simply wrong about his astronauts and that’s the end of the story. Anybody who tries to look for “something more” in his books in simply wasting his and mine time.

I’ll give all of you guys a nickel if you return to talking about Joe Nickell. 

I’ll give all of you guys a nickel if you return to talking about Joe Nickell. 

I like Nickell’s illustrations.

I’ll give all of you guys a nickel if you return to talking about Joe Nickell. 

I like Nickell’s illustrations.

There’s a nice 19th century feel to that drawing.  Has he been officially diagnosed with Multiple Persona Disorder? 

Only point I’d like to make is that Nickell’s statement was par for the course, and whether he’s right or wrong to say it, I fail to see what it has to do with him trying to be a “humanistic secularist”.

Let’s call it a consciousness raising (you know, like Dawkins, the gays, and the feminists do ): you don’t need to accuse people of being racist (or Hitler) to prove them wrong...(whispering) especially if you call yourself a “humanistic skeptic.”

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you don’t need to accuse people of being racist (or Hitler) to prove them wrong...(whispering) especially if you call yourself a “humanistic skeptic.”

That’s true.  I’ve come to believe skeptics can get as sucked into logical fallacy with their assertions as anyone else.  But in the quote indicated, Nickell is concluding that Daniken’s errors stem from “implicitly racist” assumptions.  His argument wasn’t “aliens did not make those lines because Daniken is implicitly racist”, it was “Daniken’s operating assumption that Incas couldn’t have made those lines unassisted is implicitly racist.”

Turning this around, what if we were to discover a can of coca cola entombed in the heart of the Tikal pyramid?  Would it be “implicitly racist” for Randi or Nickell to operate from an assumption the Mayans alone did not put it there?  (And I think it’s fair to assume they would start with that assumption.) But what if archaeologists had also uncovered other strong supporting evidence of Mayan coca cola manufacturing, evidence which they were either ignorant of or pretended didn’t exist?  It could well be that to Daniken, the Nasca lines and other artifacts from antiquity are odd finds which are as implausible in their time and place as finding this coca cola can entombed in this Mayan pyramid would be to us.

If he thought them completely capable and accepted the features as simply not fully understood by researchers, do you think he would still argue they are evidence of ET? I think this is where Aesopo is missing the point on what Joe says: “in an almost implicitly racist way I think, he’s not overtly, but, the implication behind his pointing out these things in his tone is that these ancient non-white people weren’t sophisticated enough...”

Nickell’s statement’s been lumped together with similar statements by Randi, and Daniel Loxton who apparently cited the both of them with statements of his own, and taken all together the accusation against Daniken isn’t that narrowed.  Loxton’s quote pointed out the use of the term “savages”.  I understand what Nickell was saying.  I’m not sure he was fair to Daniken.  Daniken’s knowledge on the subject isn’t sophisticated enough for us to presume anything about his incredulity--that he couldn’t understand how ancient peoples made these artifacts could well stem from ignorance and misconceptions about the cultures and archaeological record rather than problems he had with skin color.

1. Nickell says he has broken every “rule” he now advises- that is how he learned them.

2. The brief, reserved “Racism” comment seems insufficiently relevant to warrant discussion. It is telling of the hypersensitivity to the “r” word in our society.

3. There is nothing about Joe’s approach that merits a philosophical branding of “humanism”. “Don’t be a jerk to people, even stupid credulous people” is hardly novel or insightful. It has been Penn & Teller’s M-O for decades (among others). I found the interview uncharacteristically boring. A droning “play nice with the believers” message. Thanks Joe, hey got anything for us about treating others as we want to be treated?

It has been Penn & Teller’s M-O for decades (among others)

Actually, P&T;’s MO has been to be a jerk to the credulous for powerful effect. See their episodes where they have fake psychics make believers cry and then reveal it was a scam to teach them how gullible they are.

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