Extraterrestrials
Did Ancient Extraterrestrials
Visit Earth?
Article ID: JAF9376 By: Robert Velarde
In the beginning, ancient aliens visited planet Earth,
significantly influenced human history, and possibly even engineered human life
to evolve.
Furthermore, as a result of ancient alien visitations,
history is replete with clues regarding these alien astronauts.
Flying saucers and little green men may seem the stuff of
1950s B-movies, yet ideas like the ones just described are gaining momentum not
only in popular culture but also in some scientific circles.
In the 2012 motion picture Prometheus, director
Ridley Scott touted the concept that aliens visited Earth and seeded human life
on it.
The more lighthearted adventure, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of
the Crystal Skull (2008), also
gave direct nods to alien involvement on Earth.
The older film, Stargate (1994), made a direct connection
between Egypt and ancient aliens, and the seminal film 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) involved aliens in the
development of human intelligence.
Besides film, the 2011 book The Ancient Alien Question by Philip Coppens added further
speculations about ancient aliens.
Such ideas have also made their way into millions of
homes via the History Channel television program Ancient Aliens, currently in
its seventh season.
Moving beyond pop culture, co-discoverer of DNA Francis
Crick held to the possibility of directed
panspermia - the belief that life on Earth did not come about on its own,
as naturalism holds, but was instead seeded extraterrestrially.
Atheist Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, also lends
credence to this perspective.
But are not ideas about ancient extraterrestrials nothing
more than supermarket tabloid fodder?
CHARIOTS IN
SPACE
The rise of modern interest in
ancient astronauts rests strongly on the 1968 book Chariots of the Gods?
Unsolved Mysteries of the Past, first
published in German and penned by Swiss author Erich von Däniken one year
before NASA’s Apollo 11 mission landed men on the moon.
Von Däniken’s book became a bestseller
and, in 1970, a popular documentary film. Von Däniken followed
his success with a variety of sequels including Return to the Stars (1970), The Gold of the Gods (1973), Miracles of the Gods (1975), In Search of Ancient Gods (1976), and more.
Von Däniken’s basic premise is that
evidence strongly points to the reality of ancient alien involvement in human
history.
This is found, he argues, in evidence provided by ancient
artifacts and, in his view, technological achievements that would not have been
possible without the assistance of far more advanced technological beings
(i.e., aliens).
As such, von Däniken
concludes that the pyramids of Egypt and Stonehenge, for example, offer
evidence of alien construction.
Von Däniken also seeks to bolster his
claims by pointing to artwork allegedly depicting aliens, and biblical examples.
Despite critics of von Däniken, who
claimed his convoluted arguments represented faulty pseudoscience, the ideas
found in Chariots of
the Gods? Its various
sequels, and in the 1970 documentary, captured the imagination of people the
world over.
The Unidentified Flying Object craze that continued
throughout the 1970s and beyond, fueled at least in part by von Däniken’s
influence, ultimately resulted in numerous motion pictures portraying the
reality of intelligent alien life, such as Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), popular television
programs, including The X-Files (1993–2002), and more recent
television ventures such as the previously mentioned program Ancient Aliens.
THE CASE FOR
ANCIENT ALIENS
The popular evidence for ancient
aliens is often presented as compelling and insurmountable.
Supporters point to religious writings, artifacts,
artwork, and other sources, but each of their interpretations is diametrically
opposed to common sense and a large body of consensus that in no way ties the
evidence to aliens.
The first episode of Ancient Aliens is called “The Evidence,” but what
it offers is sheer speculation.
One would think it would marshal its best arguments, but
instead viewers are treated to the likes of an Egyptian model of a bird that is
supposedly a model of a real aircraft, a gold Columbian figurine (also said to
be a model of an aircraft), and Sanskrit texts that speak of Vimana (again said
to be aircraft or alien spaceships).
Following a truly circuitous path of reasoning, it is
then argued that ancient civilizations were probably all connected via air
travel, including many runways the world over.
Additional supposed scientific evidence fares no better.
Directed
panspermia, for example, is a completely ad hoc theory. It has no
basis in empirical evidence—what modern science is supposed to value.
Instead, since biology has no viable explanation for the
origins of life, some suppose that aliens must somehow have seeded life on
earth or otherwise jumpstarted human evolution.
Several applicable general observations arise regarding
problems with evidence for ancient aliens.
First, there is the error of reading into the evidence
rather than drawing out from it what is actually present.
Just as in biblical hermeneutics, we want to practice
drawing out from the text what the author truly intended rather than reading
into it what is really not there.
Instead of looking to support presuppositions, we should
strive as much as possible to evaluate any evidence we encounter objectively.
Second, as Ockham’s razor informs us, we should not seek
to multiply or expand explanations beyond what is necessary. In other words,
simpler explanations are typically preferred.
Consequently, when encountering evidence such as
artifacts, artwork, legends, or other material, what explanation makes the best
and simplest sense?
Is it that ancient aliens visited our planet and helped
build artifacts such as pyramids or is it that such things can be explained
simply by appealing to human ingenuity alone?
The simplest explanations of the evidence point to human
beings, not outer space.
Third, ad hoc theories that are presented with the sole
intention of supporting ancient aliens offer little in the way of evidence.
Simply because proponents of biological evolution have
encountered difficulties explaining the origin of life does not mean that the
ad hoc theory of directed panspermia
is the solution.
In reality, even if accepted, this theory simply pushes
the problem of the origins of life back farther into the past.
After all, if alien intelligence seeded or influenced
life on Earth in some way, then who or what seeded or influenced the alien
life?
In short, directed
panspermia may explain the origins of life on Earth, albeit via unsupported
speculation, but it does nothing to explain the origins of life as a whole.
Fourth, arguments that require us
to admit, “Everything we know is wrong,” are
highly unlikely to be true.
If a theory requires that we jettison all that we know
about human history, including validations of architectural achievements, we
should not readily acquiesce to far-fetched ideas.
This does not mean that we are closed-minded, but it does
mean that we carefully evaluate all evidence, especially in cases where
accepting an alternative theory will cause us to toss out everything we
believed was true.
UFOS AND THE
BIBLE
Supporters of ancient alien
visitations and origins of human life sometimes also point to the Bible to add
credence to their conclusions.
Not only is Moses supposed to have seen UFOs on Mount
Sinai but Ezekiel, we are told, undoubtedly described UFOs in Ezekiel 1.
Some even argue that Jesus must have been a space alien
who, ultimately, was taken up to space.
Far from credible, these claims
fall squarely within the bounds of what James Sire calls worldview confusion in reference to biblical
interpretation: “Worldview confusion occurs whenever a reader of
Scripture fails to interpret the Bible within the intellectual and broadly
cultural framework of the Bible itself and uses instead a foreign frame of
reference” (emphasis in
original).
In the case of passages such as
Ezekiel 1, Sire adds, “Speculation is
piled on speculation, but the evidence for it is exceptionally thin. Each
passage of Scripture has to be made to mean something either other than it says or more than it says.”
One biblical scholar adds, “I do not believe for a minute that UFOs are
in the Bible. In every case mentioned previously [including Ezekiel 1], UFOlogists are reading their own meanings into the biblical text (eisegesis) rather than drawing their meanings from the biblical text (exegesis) … Ezekiel did
not encounter a UFO but rather experienced a vision of the glory of God.”
As far as claims that Jesus is or was an alien are
concerned, they, too, are based on wild speculation, worldview confusion, poor
interpretation, and a complete disregard of the cultural context of the New
Testament.
The biblical evidence is clear: Jesus’ origins are indeed
not of this earth, but neither is He from another planet: He is the Lord from
heaven, but He was in fact born as a human being, in the flesh (incarnated), in
a specific location (Bethlehem).
Nothing that He said or did, taken at face value within
its context, is remotely related to aliens.
THEOLOGICAL
IMPLICATIONS AND EVALUATION
If we were to play alien’s advocate
for a moment, granting validity to the existence of alien life, what
theological implications would result?
In reference to Christianity, what if intelligent alien
life exists?
We might wonder, for instance, whether or not we are the
only fallen and depraved life in the universe and, if not, how or if the
message of Christ applies beyond humanity.
C. S. Lewis pondered these sorts of
questions: “The eternal Son may, for all
we know, have been incarnate in other worlds than earth and so saved other
races than ours.”
This, however, seems a less than satisfying conclusion,
as it appears to require God to sacrifice His Son multiple times—an event that
appears singularly and definitively complete in the sacrificial atonement of
Christ.
There are other options, of course. Perhaps human beings
are the only sentient life in the universe; perhaps other intelligent races did
not fall as the human race did.
The key word here, though, is “perhaps.” We simply do not have enough biblical data to address
such hypotheticals.
What we do know is, given God’s loving and just nature,
He would certainly do what is right.
Furthermore, the discovery of intelligent alien life
would not change the overwhelming evidence for the existence of God, the resurrection
of Christ, the reliability of the Bible, or the depravity of human nature and
our overarching need of radical redemption.
SPACE INVADERS: GAME OVER
One early response to von Daniken, published in 1972, is
amusingly titled Crash
Go the Chariots.
The author, Dr. Clifford Wilson,
interviewed a physics professor about von Daniken’s ideas.
The
professor’s comments remain astute and relevant: “[Von Daniken] takes conjectures, accepts them as fact, builds on to
them way-out theories, and presents his ‘many small coincidences’ according to
his own preconceived notions. He deliberately chooses the unconnected, weaves a
semblance of connection around it, and puts his theories out as foregone
conclusions … it may make exciting reading, but one dare not accept it as
substantially credible.”
These remarks remain quite
applicable to similar sorts of arguments and reasoning presented by
contemporary proponents of ancient aliens.
In sum, the opposing evidence
results in “game over” for these modern space invaders, offering no
compelling reasons to abandon existing viewpoints.
This review first appeared in the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL, volume 37, number 06
(2014). The full text of this article in PDF format can be obtained by clicking here. For further information or to subscribe to the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL go to: http://www.equip.org/christian-research-journal/
Robert
Velarde has authored several books
including A Visual Defense (Kregel Publications, 2013), Conversations with C. S. Lewis (InterVarsity Press, 2008), and Examining Alternative Medicine (InterVarsity Press, 2001). He received his MA from
Southern Evangelical Seminary.http://www.equip.org/article/did-ancient-extraterrestrials-visit-earth/
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