Mageth

It's by no means certain that the "Pillars of Hercules" used by Plato refers to the Strait of Gibraltar.

enrious

Four things:

1) In Plato's story of Atlantis, Atlantis is seen as a decadent, brutal warlike nation. Old Athens, on the other hand, is seen as an advanced, peaceful civilization who nonetheless is able to defeat the brutish Atlanteans.

Atlantis was the brutal warlike nation of savages while Athens was the center of advanced culture, knowledge and civilization.

In other words, Atlantis believers picked the wrong city!

2) Where is the mention of Atlantis prior to Plato? Why was the story in Timaeus and Critias at least third hand and supposedly placed 10,000 years prior? Why did one of Plato's followers respond, "He that created Atlantis destroyed Atlantis," when asked if it was real. (He was referring to Plato).

3) Plato's Republic discusses what a perfect society would be and discusses at great length what would define such a society. T&C is set on the day following the Republic discourses. Plato looks out and asks if anyone knows of a story where such a civilization existed and fought off lesser neighbors.

In effect he said, "Ok class, let's put into practice what we learned yesterday...does anyone know of a story involving such a great civilization as the Republic mentioned yesterday?

Are we surprised that Critias stands up and starts telling the story that was told to him by his father, who was told it by someone else...and at that it was passed on by yet someone else?

Critias wanted to get that "A".

Oh, did I mention that Plato said basically, "This is no bullshit."
The irony is that seems to be the que that he's about to lay down some bullshit.

4) If these advanced Atlanteans went to Egypt to teach them how to build pyramids, why don't we have pyramids springing up whole cloth suddenly?

The archeological record matches what you'd expect of a culture learning to build pyramids without advanced, prior knowledge. There is an "evolution" of pyramids that can still be seen to this day. Pyramids started small, went up scale, had some mistakes, and eventually they got it right.

Which is precisely what'd you'd expect to find if the Egyptians didn't have any help from a (suprisingly) advanced Atlantis.

EDIT: Just read the above responses in detail and note that I've repeated earlier comments. Sorry 'bout that.

I'd like to add to Lobstrocity's point regarding the strength of the pyramid shape by pointing out that is the strongest and most simple shape you can easily make. That there are pyramid shaped structures throughout the cities of ancient man points not to help from others but rather to the commonality of intelligence among them.

Majestyk

Not to support Plato's Atlantis, I think that there may be some evidence for the existence of "lost" ancient civilizations.

Graham Hancock speculated on the possibility of some previous civilization having global influence, based on similarities of ancient structures, on the scale of the Pyramids of Egypt, on different continents. The similarities were not the construction methods but, his assertion that the structures themslves were representative of constellations that would not be visible in the sky at the time of construction but at common time in the earth's axial oscillation. 10kBC(?). (I think that's an accurate description of his proposition)

Rhaedas

The main connection was with the pyramids in Giza and the stars in Orion's belt, as they were in 10,000 B.C.E. The book I saw this in I believe was titled "Secret of the Sphinx", and discussed the implications of the weathering of the Sphinx on its probable age.

IIRC it wasn't only those pyramids, but a whole slew of them that matched to where stars were in that area of the sky back then.

Don't know how valid the pyramid-stars thing is, but certainly the weathering of the Sphinx is a hard fact that makes one wonder about the early history of that area.

Jesse

Some sites with articles that debunk Hancock's (and others') ideas about lost civilizations, "forbidden archaeology", etc.:

http://www.thehallofmaat.com/maat/index.php

http://www.ramtops.co.uk/

http://www.intersurf.com/~chalcedony/wildside.shtml

http://www.antiquityofman.com/

beastmaster

In particular I recommend this thorough critique of Hancock:

http://www.thehallofmaat.com/maat/article.php?sid=42

Majestyk

It's been a few years since I came across Hancock's propositions. I noticed then that he had a tendency to leap from one speculation to another. That star chart evidence did seem rather compelling at the time.

I guess it's hard to title your next book "Maybe, I Was Wrong" when. publishers and producers are offering you advances for the title "Look, I Was Right".

MortalWombat

So Plato's story of Atlantis was basically the progenitor of all those chain letters that start with "the following story is completely true, I am not making this up..."? Some things never change.

Corwin

Plato made excessive use of allegory.... and frequently didn't specify that that's what he was doing. (It was a common technique, and generally didn't need to be emphasized...)

velvetfinger

Whoa, this will keep me busy for a couple of days. Thanks a heap, people.