posted on Apr, 1 2011 @ 07:36 AM
reply to post by Chakotay
That's not entirely true. While it is true that metals and other materials can degrade very quickly given the right conditions it is not true that
there will be no traces left.
SOME evidence will always remain. For example- most of the perishable artefacts of our past have been lost to time and yet we still have literally
millions of pottery sherds, metal fragments, bone, stone, etc. Textiles- perhaps the most fragile relic of our past- have been known to survive over
1000s of years.
Now while it's true that not every flying machine from thousands/millions of years ago would have degraded in such a way as to leave evidence if it
were true that flying machines and advance civilization/technology were ubiquitous on Earth before a major cataclysm there would be some form of
evidence about this.
As archaeologists we can recognise the 'footprint' of metal objects that have degraded in the soil in which they rest. The minerals and components
of the materials that the object was made of when it was last laid on or in the ground will remain present in the soil- nothing can be utterly
destroyed.
We would see similar trace minerals and compounds in the soil that would betray the existence of these ancient civilizations.
And while I agree that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence given our obsession with the past I would wager that we would have found
something by now.
And before I hear things like "But the archaeologists wouldn't be looking for it so they wouldn't notice it!" that's not quite true. I can say
that in my experience we're actually very open minded people. We may come up with a hypothesis to explain something before we actually do the dig or
the research, or even afterwards to explain and artefact that we can't quite place. But when we realise we're wrong because the science doesn't
support our our original idea we will change our minds. Archaeology is a science led field and we don't just ignore good evidence because it
doesn't fit our worldview.
*Note- I am an archaeology and conservation student at University and I have been on several digs but I am not yet a fully qualified archaeologist. I
don't want to mislead anybody.