rigorousintuition.ca

Belligerent Savant wrote:

tazmic wrote:
http://www.forbiddenarcheology.com/

I recall first stumbling upon Michael Cremo's book [Forbidden Archeology] about 10 years ago or so when I began questioning much of our established history/origins [or I should say, when I began following up on some of the curiosity I've maintained on this topic]..

Although to this day I remain highly skeptical of the established theories of human evolution and the origins of man [to clarify, that is not to say I'm necessarily a proponent of "Intelligent Design", or at least whatever passes for current intelligent design theories, nor do I discount some of the other aspects of evolution -- evolution does indeed occur in nature, but the concept of apes evolving to hairless bipedal humans simply through this theory of 'evolution' has never satisfied my intuitive sense of our origins, but that's a whole other multi-paragraph discussion for some other time.. or not], shortly after reading his book and becoming intrigued, I dug a bit deeper into this man known as Michael Cremo and found, among other things, that he is also known as Drutakarma Dasa:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Cremo

Michael A. Cremo (born July 15, 1948, Schenectady, New York), also known as Drutakarma Dasa, is an American Hindu creationist whose work argues that modern humans have lived on the earth for billions of years. Cremo's book Forbidden Archeology has attracted attention from Hindu creationists and paranormalists, but has been labeled as "pseudoscience" and "antievolutionism" by some representatives of the scientific community. Cremo has referred to himself as a "Vedic creationist."

Also of potential interest:

Cremo's father, Salvatore, was a military intelligence officer. Michael Cremo went to high school in Germany and spent much of his summers travelling throughout Europe. He attended George Washington University from 1966 to 1968, then served in the United States Navy.

This may shed a bit more light on Mr. Cremo's potential agenda, not to mention the sources of funding for publishing such books...

Of course, that's not to say there isn't any validity to the findings of his book, but it's always good to know the background of any given author and their potential agendas for publishing certain works when performing due diligence in research...

or whatever...

tazmic wrote:Thanks for the backgrounder Belligerent Savant. There are certainly some incredible claims in the book. I remember thinking the more extreme ones were stretched out somewhat to confirm his beliefs.

Belligerent Savant wrote:it's always good to know the background of any given author and their potential agendas for publishing certain works when performing due diligence in research...

I agree. Rather amusingly, Cremo thinks the suppression of the fossil evidence for extreme human antiquity, is due to confirmation bias.

cptmarginal wrote:Whoa, that is awesome!

8bitagent wrote:Nope, it's not the "bigfoot" from the infamous Patterson footage...

barracuda wrote:He's from Kent.

This ape is doing something for which its body is ill-adapted, after lengthy contact with humans. In other words, it merely indicates the well-known propensity of primates to "ape" mankind, not a natural development analogous to the assumed course of hominid development.

Stephen Morgan wrote:

barracuda wrote:He's from Kent.

The Key Environmental Non-judgemental Taskforce?

Lately he's been overheard in Mayfair.

Burnt Hill wrote:

Lately he's been overheard in Mayfair.

Not so sure I'd want to meet his tailor though.

Stephen Morgan wrote:This ape is doing something for which its body is ill-adapted, after lengthy contact with humans. In other words, it merely indicates the well-known propensity of primates to "ape" mankind, not a natural development analogous to the assumed course of hominid development.

A gorilla has achieved fame for walking upright on his hind legs like a human at a British animal park.

Ambam, a Western lowland gorilla, was filmed strolling about his enclosure by animal researcher Johanna Watson.

She posted the clip on YouTube, where it has been viewed by more than 250,000 people.

Ambam, a 21-year-old silverback, is part of a bachelor group of the critically endangered animals at Port Lympne Wild Animal Park, which is run by an international conservation charity, The Aspinall Foundation.

Gorilla that walks like a man Gorilla keeper Phil Ridges said Ambam, who now weighs 485 pounds, had been hand-reared at another animal park when he was a one-year-old for several months because he was ill.

Family trait?
He said the human-like walking style seemed to run in the family.

"Ambam's father Bitam used to display the same behavior if he had handfuls of food to carry," Ridges said in a statement. "Ambam also has a full sister, Tamba, and a half sister ... who also sometimes stand and walk in the same way."
Look ma, no hands! Gorilla walks on hind legs Ridges added that Ambam could also carry more food if his hands were freed from walking and it also meant "he doesn't get his hands wet when it is raining."

The Aspinall Foundation runs gorilla rescue and rehabilitation projects in Congo and Gabon.