DNA analysis of the elongated skulls

[cormac mac airt]

21 minutes ago, papageorge1 said:

 

You mean these are non-scientists doing the DNA sequencing in each case? My suspicion that something interesting is going on is high at this point.

Speaking strictly for myself there is no actual evidence that ANYONE performed the alleged DNA testing. All there is is an unsupported and therefore meaningless claim. That's not science, that's science fiction.

cormac

[Harte]

56 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

It's like I said earlier, it's terribly easy to "claim" that "scientists" have conducted this or that "test." Even though the fringie making the claim has no scientist he can point to and no published lab findings he can present, the mere claim is enough to draw in the gullible. That's a lot less work, isn't it? But it surely will never blow the lid off our "entrenched" world view. It can't even scratch the lid.

What exactly goes into a wish sandwich? Is shinola one of the ingredients, perhaps?

Only if you can't tell the difference.

Harte

[stereologist]

1 hour ago, papageorge1 said:

You mean these are non-scientists doing the DNA sequencing in each case? My suspicion that something interesting is going on is high at this point.

I don't think any DNA sequencing has been done. It's cheaper that way. Besides, the gullible don't care if the work is done or not. They don't care which way the evidence points.

The only interesting thing going on is watching the gullible take this hook, line, and sinker.

[papageorge1]

1 hour ago, stereologist said:

I don't think any DNA sequencing has been done. 

Did you even read the OP article?

[Hanslune]

3 minutes ago, papageorge1 said:

Did you even read the OP article?

Papageorge did you read it?

 

Quote

Here is the apparent quote from the geneticist who did the testing:

"weasel words".

[papageorge1]

11 minutes ago, Hanslune said:

Papageorge did you read it?

 

"weasel words".

Do you think these skulls and the DNA tests really exist? What do you suspect is going on?

[cormac mac airt]

13 minutes ago, papageorge1 said:

Do you think these skulls and the DNA tests really exist? What do you suspect is going on?

Do the skulls exist? Yes. Do the alleged, and valid, DNA tests and results exist? There's not a shred of verifiable evidence to support that contention, leaving the claim as dubious at best and an outright lie at worst. Which leaves only what the gullible will allow themselves to believe.

cormac

[kmt_sesh]

33 minutes ago, Hanslune said:

Papageorge did you read it?

 

"weasel words".

That same line caught my eye when I read it: "Here is the apparent quote from the geneticist who did the testing:"

Papageorge, is this how a scientific finding of any sort is presented? An "apparent" quote? Either it is a quote or it isn't. Putting modifiers like "apparent" in front of it disqualifies credibility. And "the geneticist"? What, a name or institution can't be listed? Keeping it that deliberately generic and vague confirms that the article is not credible.

Do you understand this, papageorge? The article is deliberately vague so that no details need to be provided. There is no scientist, there is no genetic test. Yes, it's a lie. Fringe authors routinely do that.

[kmt_sesh]

21 minutes ago, papageorge1 said:

Do you think these skulls and the DNA tests really exist? What do you suspect is going on?

See my preceding post. There are no DNA tests. It's fringe fraud. The skulls, on the other hand, seem authentic. And hardly shocking. We have several just like them in our South American collections at the museum.

[kmt_sesh]

The article in the OP is very short on names and credentials. No historians, no archaeologists, no geneticists, no scientists of any caliber. One name mentioned is Graham Hancock. I already wrote a post about that, so no need to repeat myself. About the only other name mentioned is Brien Foerster. This fellow is a fringe proponent and a tour guide. Hancock has more standing, and that's not saying much.

There's a good Snopes article on this topic. It quotes a passage from RationalWiki:

• Foerster has little in the way of relevant scientific qualifications but runs a tour company and was a regular on the very unscientific History Channel show Ancient Aliens, the museum is a private company owned by a man with no scientific qualifications, not an academic institution, and the results were announced not in a peer reviewed journal but on Facebook. Suspiciously, the geneticist who supposedly conducted the tests refused to own up and his or her identity was kept secret by Foerster.

So, no, the Paracas skulls don't belong to aliens. The smarmy folks who try to present them as aliens are frauds.

[kmt_sesh]

24 minutes ago, cormac mac airt said:

Do the skulls exist? Yes. Do the alleged, and valid, DNA tests and results exist? There's not a shred of verifiable evidence to support that contention, leaving the claim as dubious at best and an outright lie at worst. Which leaves only what the gullible will allow themselves to believe.

cormac

Read the Snopes (RationalWiki) quote in my preceding post. It's a gem. Foerster is the one who originally claimed the "DNA findings." Most of us know that already. What I didn't realize is that Foerster released the "DNA results"...on Facebook. And wouldn't give anyone the "geneticist's" name. LOL Isn't this what all reliable researchers do?

Honestly, how do people fall for this? It's just painful.

[lilthor]

The Paracas skulls are intriguing enough that one would expect "mainstream" geneticists to have been all over them and produced a complete DNA analysis a long time ago.

But, instead, they won't touch them for some strange reason.  Of course, this leaves a vacuum which gets filled by privateers and 'fringe" investigators.

What are the "experts" afraid of?

It's disingenuous for the debunkers here to p*** and moan about the credentials of privateers when their own venerated experts are too scared to seek the truth.

Edited September 26, 2017 by lilthor

[jmccr8]

4 minutes ago, lilthor said:

The Paracas skulls are intriguing enough that one would expect "mainstream" geneticists to have been all over them and produced a complete DNA analysis a long time ago.

But, instead, they won't touch them for some strange reason.  Of course, this leaves a vacuum which gets filled by privateers and 'fringe" investigators.

What are the "experts" afraid of?

It's disingenuous for the debunkers here to p*** and moan about the credentials of privateers when their own venerated experts are too scared to seek the truth.

It may be that there is no usable material to test or that due to the evidence of this custom has been noted to have existed for thousands of years globally that it is well understood and there is no need to investigate it further.

jmccr8

[lilthor]

Just now, jmccr8 said:

It may be that there is no usable material to test or that due to the evidence of this custom has been noted to have existed for thousands of years globally that it is well understood and there is no need to investigate it further.

jmccr8

That's a lot of conjecture with little to back it up.

These skulls absolutely scream for deeper analysis and the silence from orthodox archaeology is telling.

[kmt_sesh]

2 minutes ago, lilthor said:

The Paracas skulls are intriguing enough that one would expect "mainstream" geneticists have been all over them and produced a complete DNA analysis a long time ago.

But, instead, they won't touch them for some strange reason.  Of course, this leaves a vacuum which gets filled by privateers and 'fringe" investigators.

What are the "experts" afraid of?

It's disingenuous for the debunkers here to p*** and moan about the credentials of privateers when their own venerated experts are too scared to seek the truth.

There have been DNA studies of South American human remains. That's common knowledge. I haven't read into them much myself because it's on the opposite side of the world from my own primary area of interest, so I can't say whether legitimate DNA analysis has been conducted on the Paracas remains. But they're garden-variety Peruvian remains. They're not rare. Archaeologists are in fact very angry with such frauds because folks like Foerster freely desecrate legitimate human remains for their own amusement, profit, and attention (the fake Gaia,com "mummy" has caused something of an uproar).

If you wish to support folks like Foerster, that's your right.(But "credentials of privateers"? Really?)  If you choose to believe in the fraud, that's your right. But cease from trying to make others think that scientists avoid studying such remains. That's patently misleading.

[lilthor]

Just now, kmt_sesh said:

There have been DNA studies of South American human remains. That's common knowledge. I haven't read into them much myself because it's on the opposite side of the world from my own primary area of interest, so I can't say whether legitimate DNA analysis has been conducted on the Paracas remains. But they're garden-variety Peruvian remains. They're not rare. Archaeologists are in fact very angry with such frauds because folks like Foerster freely desecrate legitimate human remains for their own amusement, profit, and attention (the fake Gaia,com "mummy" has caused something of an uproar).

If you wish to support folks like Foerster, that's your right.(But "credentials of privateers"? Really?)  If you choose to believe in the fraud, that's your right. But cease from trying to make others think that scientists avoid studying such remains. That's patently misleading.

These skulls stand apart from indigenous Peruvian remains in many obvious ways.  To call them "garden variety" appears deceptive and, frankly, somewhat cowardly.

But I get it...you're of the "I don't want to know the truth" crowd.

[jmccr8]

1 minute ago, lilthor said:

That's a lot of conjecture with little to back it up.

These skulls absolutely scream for deeper analysis and the silence from orthodox archaeology is telling.

If there is nothing to say then my experience is that there is no reason to say anything especially when looking at how is was employed by many cultures like the Huns, you have been involved in discussions about this in the past and nothing has changed so saying that science isn't clamoring all over each other to find out what they already know doesn't really confuse me.

jmccr8

[jmccr8]

Just now, lilthor said:

These skulls stand apart from indigenous Peruvian remains in many obvious ways.  To call them "garden variety" appears deceptive and, frankly, somewhat cowardly.

But I get it...you're of the "I don't want to know the truth" crowd.

It is known that they were representative of status and region which is why there are variations in the skull shapes, individuals would be recognized by the shape of their heads so it would seem that you don't want to know the truth and are trying to be deceptive.

jmccr8

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

tell me that scientists don't dream of discovering evidence of aliens or unknown humanity and I'll happily call you a liar. So if there is evidence, scientifically verifiable evidence of whatever there is zero chance they'll not put their name to their research.

[kmt_sesh]

To those interested in a more rational approach, here's a good web page on the professional archaeology of the Paracas area:

http://www.arqueologia-paracas.net/about-english/

Archaeology and studies have been ongoing there for 90 years. I don't think we have any human remains from Paracas in our own museum's collections, but we have a lot of Peruvian burial bundles. Occasionally we display the "conehead" skulls, but in an educational context. This is one reason I get so bothered by silly "alien" claims. They're childishly offensive to people who once lived their lives and were buried by loved ones. Now all that's left of them is bones, textiles, and some figurines. We should treat them with more respect.

[lilthor]

8 minutes ago, jmccr8 said:

If there is nothing to say then my experience is that there is no reason to say anything especially when looking at how is was employed by many cultures like the Huns, you have been involved in discussions about this in the past and nothing has changed so saying that science isn't clamoring all over each other to find out what they already know doesn't really confuse me.

jmccr8

Nearly all significant archaeological remains are DNA tested these days...it's inexpensive and highly revealing.  It's sad when a so-called archaeological "expert" says, in effect, "if you've analyzed one South American skull, you've analyzed them all".

Edited September 26, 2017 by lilthor

[kmt_sesh]

5 minutes ago, lilthor said:

These skulls stand apart from indigenous Peruvian remains in many obvious ways...

No, they certainly don't lilthor. You are wrong. Cranial deformation was common throughout South America. Such skulls are now in museums all over the world. The silly twaddle Foerster tried to pass off about cranial volume is an obvious fraud, as anyone familiar with human anatomy would know (Harte contributed a good post about this earlier). Look at the link in my previous post. There's been archaeology at Paracas for almost a century now.

 

Quote

But I get it...you're of the "I don't want to know the truth" crowd.

Yeah, I guess you're right. That's why I have two college degrees and work at a museum. I'm so afraid of facts. Thanks for outing me.

[Kenemet]

20 minutes ago, lilthor said:

The Paracas skulls are intriguing enough that one would expect "mainstream" geneticists to have been all over them and produced a complete DNA analysis a long time ago.

But, instead, they won't touch them for some strange reason.  Of course, this leaves a vacuum which gets filled by privateers and 'fringe" investigators.

What are the "experts" afraid of?

It's disingenuous for the debunkers here to p*** and moan about the credentials of privateers when their own venerated experts are too scared to seek the truth.

In the first place, the government (which owns the skulls) may not have asked for genetic testing.

In the second place, there may not be any usable DNA to extract.  They'd have to go after the pulp of teeth, and for folks who ate a stone-ground bread, teeth wear very quickly.

Third, the skulls are similar to both modern and ancient people (including people living at this time)

Fourth, there have been legitimate studies of the bodies: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-004-1127-8

[jmccr8]

1 minute ago, lilthor said:

Nearly all significant archaeological remains are DNA tested these days...it's inexpensive and highly revealing.  It's sad when a so-called archaeological "expert" says, in effect, "when you've analyzed one South American skull, you've analyzed them all".

Okay so why aren't you making the same claim about other skulls from different times and places and asking WHY DON'T THEY TEST THEM, what is it about these skulls that have been found within a certain context that are known to have a regional or status related significance in S.America that they did in the other global discoveries of this technique and made the same representations.

jmccr8

[kmt_sesh]

6 minutes ago, lilthor said:

Nearly all significant archaeological remains are DNA tested these days...it's inexpensive and highly revealing.  It's sad when a so-called archaeological "expert" says, in effect, "if you've analyzed one South American skull, you've analyzed them all".

No, nearly all archaeological remains are not DNA tested. It's not nearly so cheap as someone has led you to believe. Nor is it at all easy to extract viable DNA from ancient human remains. If it survived in the first place. And overriding all is a compelling reason to do so, because almost invariably you will inflict damage on the remains, even if only a little. There has to be a compelling scientific reason to do so. Common skulls in a South American museum are not going to attract a lot of attention.