David Pratt

Channelling *

Published September 27, 2017

Channelling is a modern term for mediumship that claims to provide contact with the spirits of the departed. It has become fashionable now for channellers to claim communication with entities from Atlantis and or Lemuria/Mu! As a means of assisting in the quest for Atlantis, channelling, in the opinion of your compiler, is about as useful as a packet of sausages. Recent articles regarding psychics and police work have only strengthened my scepticism^(a)^(h). Simon Singh, a well-known author, recently penned an article on the subject^(c)^(d).

My principal objections to the use of so-called channelled information are listed in Joining the Dots ^[p.63].

(1) Channelling sources have frequently been shown to be fraudulent or demonstrate manifestations of schizophrenia.

(2) Channelled ‘information’ relating to Atlantis frequently contradicts accepted scientific knowledge.

(3) Channelled ‘information’ repeatedly conflicts with commonsense.

(4) Channelled ‘information’ is not acceptable in a court of law.

(5) Channelling sources often contradict each other.

(6) No published medium, psychic or psychotic, has ever offered a verifiable location, date, or identity for Atlantis.

We should also keep in mind that the name Atlantis was a Hellenised name concocted by Solon or Plato to identify the homeland of the Atlantean invaders, hundreds if not thousands of years after their island was submerged. So when it is claimed that messages have been received from Atlantis or past lives experienced there, how do the mediums know that Atlantis was the source of their ‘communication’, since Atlantis would have been known by a different name or names to its inhabitants and they could not have been aware of a name invented many centuries after their demise. Furthermore, how do we explain these ancient Atlanteans communicating in English or any other modern vernacular language?

Psychic Archaeology has been defined as “the process of using psychic abilities to locate objects of centuries past.” It gained wider public awareness in 1978 with the publication of two books, Psychic Archaeology ^[781] by Jeffrey Goodman and The Secret Vaults of Time ^[1881] by Stephan A. Schwartz. They both touch on the subject of Atlantis, but only in the context of the ‘revelations’ of Edgar Cayce. In the 21st century, Luciano Pederzoli published The Megalith Builders – Psychic archaeology and the Nuragic civilization(n). His book deals specifically with “the reconstruction of an entire life is presented – from birth to death – of an important individual who lived on the Italian island of Sardinia approximately 3,500 years ago, at the peak of what is known as the Nuragic civilization, which is now gradually attracting more attention from progressive scholars,”

A book-length paper by Luciano Pederzoli on the Researchgate.net website that purports to offer information about life in Sardinia during and before the Nuragic period^(o). It is claimed that it was developed through the use of regression hypnosis. Pederzoli has published a number of papers about channelling and Out-of-Body Experiences^(p). This is not for me.

When law courts allow channelled information to be admitted in evidence, I will be happy to reconsider my opinion. While speaking of courts, I should point out that the evidence of witnesses is preferred where there is corroboration, partly in recognition of the fragility of memory^(f) and partly because of the risk of lying. How do you corroborate that the ‘spirit source’ of a medium is real? A recent study^(g) of a high-profile medium Allison DuBois would do little to encourage channelling as a dependable tool.

Further psychic pscandals^(l) have even led their representative organisations to call for greater controls^(k).

A lengthy paper^(j) by Eric Pement, soberly discusses the subject of channelling from a religious viewpoint.

David Pratt, in a paper on Pole Shift theories, has highlighted the conflicting information generated by psychics when exploring the subject^(m), noting that “A number of psychics, with the help of their ‘spirit guides’, have offered dramatic and generally conflicting accounts of past and future pole shifts. All their ‘prophecies’ have so far failed to come true.”

In the meanwhile, it might be worth reading an article by Karla McKlaren, a former New Age leader, on her conversion to scepticism^(e). Also consider a 2016 large-scale study⁽ⁱ⁾ which concluded that “The results don’t prove that relatively poor analytical thinking skills cause people to become believers in psychic phenomena, but they are certainly consistent with the idea that a lack of these skills may leave people more prone to developing such beliefs.”

Easter Island

Published May 16, 2012

Easter Island (Rapa Nui) with its strange statues, known as moai, remains one of the great archaeological mysteries. As with most ancient enigmas, various writers have tried to link Easter Island with either Atlantis, Mu or extraterrestrials.

Herbie Brennan in his early book, Occult Reich ^[027], touched on the subject of Lemuria with the following two gems, “Atlantis, in earliest times, was actually part of Lemuria” and “the degenerate line of Lemuria is still with us, although only just and obviously dying. It is represented by the primitive aborigine of Australia.” He also claimed that a volcanic upheaval brought a tiny speck of Lemuria to the surface. “It rose complete with a host of giant statues……..now known as Easter Island.”

I cannot subscribe to such silliness and would not normally include Easter Island in this encyclopedia, but in recognition of the level of general interest in the subject, I have included a link^(a) to the serious archaeological work that continues on the island. This study is now in its fifth season and is directed by Dr Jo Anne Van Tilburg. One aspect of the work was to demonstrate that many of the Easter Island ‘heads’ have buried bodies, often, until now, with hidden petroglyphs^(t). A recent (June 2015) blog^(g)has proposed that some of the markings represent tattoos.

Van Tilburg has been working on Rapa Nui for more than three decades. Her Easter Island Statue Project is supported in part by UCLA’s Cotsen Institute of Archaeology. “A 2019 report from her radically alters the idea that all standing statues in the Rano Raraku quarry were simply awaiting transport out of the quarry,” Van Tilburg said. “That is, these and probably other upright Moai in Rano Raraku were retained in place to ensure the sacred nature of the quarry itself. The Moai were central to the idea of fertility, and in Rapanui belief, their presence here stimulated agricultural food production.”^(aa)

>The moai story is not quite finished yet. A previously unknown statue was discovered in a dried-up lake on the island in 2023^(aj).<

The other great Easter Island mystery⁽ⁱ⁾ is the rongorongo script found there. All attempts to decipher it have failed^(c)(d). An extensive article by Jacob Mikanowski offering insights into the history of the island and its script and the many efforts to decode it is available online^(q). David Pratt has also compared rongorongo with ancient Chinese and Indus Valley scripts^(r). Pratt has written several papers on various aspects of Easter Island^(s).

Jean-Michel Schwartz has noted ^[1792.93] the views of Dr Heine Geldern who “pointed out strong resemblances between rongo-rongo signs and certain archaic Chinese characters, particularly from the Shang period.”

Similarities between rongorongo and symbols carved on the Ingá Stone in Brazil have also been noted^(v).

Some years ago Andis Kaulins wrote An Astrological Zodiac In the Script of Easter Island^(x), in which he also links the Easter Island script with the Indus Valley as well as possible calendrical and astronomical associations.

“In 1932, Wilhelm de Hevesy was the first academic to suggest a link between Rongorongo and the Indus script of the Indus Valley Civilization in India, claiming that as many as forty Rongorongo symbols had a correlating symbol in the script from India. For a while, the idea was entertained and debated until radiocarbon dating of the Indus Valley culture was placed between c. 3,300 – 1,900 BC, a finding which officially separated the two cultures by over 2,000 years. Recent research, however, has opened the debate again as the finding of Indus Valley DNA in Australian Aborigines suggests contact between the two cultures c. 2,000 BC.”^(v) There is also an extensive study of the two scripts available on the Academia.edu website.^(w)

Although a link between the Indus Valley or even the Chinese cannot be ruled out, the suggestion by Professor Nors Sigurd Josephson that there is a possible Greek connection with Easter Island does appear to be extreme. Nevertheless, he claims that “In parallel with the over one thousand ancient Greek linguistic roots that are met in the language of Easter Island and, the relative to it, Polynesian languages, we also meet a big number of ancient Greek grammatic peculiarities, like noun endings and verbal types” ^[^1904][1905].

More recently (2021), Alexandros Angelis has endorsed Josephson’s idea and for good measure has suggested a linkage between the Greek and Aztec languages^(ae).

A new suggestion has recently emerged linking Easter Island and the ongoing discoveries at Göbekli Tepe in Turkey^(b). This dates back to early 2010 and has now been given greater prominence in Robert Schoch’s recent book, Forgotten Civilization ^[867]. On a lighter note, when Robert Schoch, suggested a link between Göbekli Tepe and Easter Island^(m), despite the eleven millennia time difference, it was no surprise that Jason Colavito scornfully dismissed the idea⁽ⁿ⁾>as well as Schoch’s wild suggestion that the rongorongo writing dates back 12,000 years^(ai).<

Pre-Colonial contacts between Easter Island and South America have recently been supported by DNA evidence^(f). This would appear to be contradicted by a 2017 study by a team from the University of California -Santa Cruz, which appears to rule out pre-European contact with South Americans! Details are published in the October 12th edition of Current Biology.^(p)

The Milwaukee Journal of June 17th, 1923 had a headline that announced the disappearance of Easter Island^(e), proving that you really can’t believe everything you read! Coincidentally, 1923 also gave us an early attempt^(h)to link Easter Island with Atlantis.

For a long time, it has been thought that warfare had wiped out much of its early population. This has now been debunked by a new study, led by Binghamton University anthropology professor Carl Lipo and published in the Feb. 2016 edition of the journal Antiquity^(j). Shortly afterward, a further study suggested a more complex explanation for the early social collapse on the island has been put forward by Dr Valentí Rull, who is a senior researcher at the Spanish National Research Council in Barcelona^(k).

A further report^(o) from Lipo highlighted further the complexity underlying the societal disintegration that took place on the island. Lipo outlined the commonly held explanation as follows; “One of the resources that they supposedly used up was trees that were growing on the island. Those trees provided canoes and, as a result of the lack of canoes, they could no longer fish. So they started to rely more and more on land food. As they relied on land food, productivity went down because of soil erosion, which led to crop failures…Painting the picture of this sort of catastrophe. That’s the traditional narrative.” Lipo’s studies have employed new technologies that have disproved these popular ideas and forced a radical rethink.

There is a brief Smithsonian video clip available^(l) that deals with the cutting and transportation of the moai.

The latest moai theory has come from a team of researchers, led by Carl Lipo, from New York’s Binghampton University, who have concluded that the statues were placed at locations where potable water was available^(u). To me, it seems an excessively elaborate way of marking locations.

A recent study has added some confusion to conventional assumptions regarding early warfare on the island, claiming that there is evidence now that “Easter Island society did not collapse prior to European contact and its people continued to build its iconic moai statues for much longer than previously believed, according to a team of American researchers” Their conclusions were published in the February 2020 issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science.^(y)

Joseph Davidovits who controversially proposed that Giza’s Great Pyramid stones had been cast rather than carved has also claimed that other well-known structures had been created in a similar manner, such as at Tiwanaku and Puma Punku in Peru^(ac) and Easter Island^(ad). Davidovits also offers a video justifying these claims^(ag).

In the April 2020 edition of the Journal of Archaeological Science, Lipo et al offered a new paper^(z)further debunking the Rapa Nui societal collapse theory and 2021 saw the collapse theory under further attack^(ab).

In 2022 the proposed connection between the Easter Island and the Indus scripts was given a further airing. This time, the author Daniel F. Salas introduces this lengthy paper with ” The Indus Valley script glyphs have a visual relationship with the star constellations along the ecliptic. The Indus script has an established visual relationship with the Polynesian Easter Island script. The Polynesians used the stars to navigate, the use of the same pictorial image of the stars points to a very old navigational system. As for the Polynesian script a seasonal date can be found, using the same navigational system it can be said it happens in the Indus valley script. These dates for the Indus Valley script indicate a season of harvest of a particular plant.”^(af)

Also in 2022, a BBC article by Sarah Brown offered the latest ideas on how the moai were moved from the quarry to their final location. There appears to be some agreement that the method used is described by Brown as “the marriage of ingenious design and flawless sculpting, which enabled these humanlike statues to stand upright and rock forward from side-to-side while being guided by ropes, granting the statues the ability to ‘walk’.”^(ah)

^(a) https://www.eisp.org/

^(b) https://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=176228

^(c) https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0387982418/deniartsystems

^(d) https://www.boloji.com/articles/14555/deciphering-rongorongo

^(e) https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1499&dat=19230617&id=9f1EAAAAIBAJ&sjid=XyEEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5420,3683626 (inaccessible Sept. 2016)

^(f) https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2014/10/new-dna-evidence-confirms-pre-colonial-contact-between-easter-island-and-south-america/

^(g) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-general/new-photos-reveal-giant-easter-island-moai-statues-are-covered-mysterious-symbols-020389

^(h) https://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/139600431?searchTerm=Atlantis discovered&searchLimits=

⁽ⁱ⁾ https://www.damninteresting.com/the-other-mystery-of-easter-island/

^(j) https://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113412616/longstanding-mystery-surrounding-easter-island-has-been-solved-021616/

^(k) https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-04/f-wrh040716.php

^(l) How Were Easter Island’s Gigantic Statues Actually Carved? | Smithsonian Magazine (archive.org)

^(m) https://web.archive.org/web/20160911175943/https://www.robertschoch.com/articles/schochgobeklitepenewdawnsept2010.pdf See: Sept/Oct 2010 edition of New Dawn Magazine (Issue 122)

⁽ⁿ⁾ https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/robert-schochs-wacky-easter-island-gobekli-tepe-theory-the-hypocrisy-of-alternative-dating

^(p) https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/12/science/easter-island-dna-south-america.html

^(q) https://web.archive.org/web/20200508065544/http://cabinetmagazine.org/issues/64/mikanowski.php

^(r) https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/arqueologia/eastern_island/easter03.htm#7._Rongorongo_

^(s)https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/arqueologia/eastern_island/easter.htm

^(t) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-general/new-photos-reveal-giant-easter-island-moai-statues-are-covered-mysterious-symbols-020389

^(t)https://www.news.com.au/travel/world-travel/pacific/easter-island-discovery-experts-unravel-mystery-of-ancient-statues/news-story/00bc37226b08dcecdb088fdb091277ea

^(v) https://web.archive.org/web/20200506032241/http://www.ancient-wisdom.com/easterislandindusvalley1.htm

^(w) https://www.academia.edu/2384225/Rongorongo_and_the_Indus_Script

^(x) https://easterislandscript.blogspot.com/2010/01/astrological-zodiac-in-script-of-easter.html

^(y) https://www.heritagedaily.com/2020/02/easter-island-society-did-not-collapse-prior-to-european-contact-new-research-shows/125663

^(z) Rethinking Jared Diamond’s “Collapse” of Easter Island – Anthropology.net (archive.org)

^(aa) https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/easter-island-moai-0013007

^(ab) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/07/210713090153.htm

^(ac) https://www.geopolymer.org/archaeology/tiahuanaco-monuments-tiwanaku-pumapunku-bolivia/

^(ad) https://www.geopolymer.org/library/video/they-came-from-america-to-build-easter-island/

^(ae) https://grahamhancock.com/angelisa1/

^(af) https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/indus-valley-easter-island-scripts-daniel-salas?trk=articles_directory

^(ag) https://www.geopolymer.org/library/video/they-came-from-america-to-build-easter-island/

^(ah) The ‘walking’ statues of Easter Island – BBC Travel

^(ai) https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/rongorongo-a-go-go-robert-schochs-12000-year-easter-island-delusion *

^(aj) New Moai statue that ‘deified ancestors’ found on Easter Island | Live Science *

Tagged Alexandros Angelis, Andis Kaulins, Atlantis, Carl Lipo, Chinese, Daniel F. Salas, David Pratt, DNA, Dr. Jo Anne Van Tilburg, Easter Island, Gobekli Tepe, Heine Geldern, Herbie Brennan, Indus Valley, Inga Stone, Jacob Mikanowski, Jason Colavito, Jean-Michel Schwartz, maoi, Nors Sigurd Josephson, Phaistos Disk, Polynesia, Rano Raraku, Rapa Nui, Robert Schoch, Rongorongo script, tattoos, Valenti Rull, Wilhelm de Hevesy

Plate Tectonics

Published May 30, 2010

Plate Tectonics is the name given to the widely accepted geological theory that explains the observable fact of continental drift. Abraham Ortelius, a 16th-century cartographer was one of the first to suggest that Africa, Europe and the Americas had at one time been joined together. In the 17^th century Sir Francis Bacon is claimed to have been similarly struck by the complementary profiles of South America and Africa, but this, according to G.L. Herries Davies, is an exaggeration of what Bacon actually wrote^(j). Alexander von Humboldt writing at the end of the 18th century, also commented that the ”lands bordering the Atlantic Ocean had once been joined.” Decades later Snider-Pellegrini expressed similar ideas that eventually led to the theories of ‘continental drift’ and plate tectonics.

In 1912, Alfred Wegener and Frank Taylor first outlined the concept of continental drift, which proposed that the surface of the Earth is in motion albeit very slowly. At first the idea was considered preposterous by the scientific community but gradually gained acceptance as evidence in its favour accumulated. In the early 1960’s the theory of ‘sea-floor spreading’ was developed and gradually the idea that the Earth’s surface consists of a number of plates that move relative to each other gained acceptance and evolved into the theory of plate tectonics that we have today. However, there are some anomalies that the present theory does not explain so further revision is probably required.

These anomalies together with the geographical match between the two continents led to the formulation of the Expanding Earth Hypothesis^(b).

When sea-floor spreading was identified in the Atlantic, some writers investigated where it might fit into the drama of Atlantis. It is not surprising that plate tectonics has been claimed by some, such as Frank Joseph, to support the existence of Atlantis, while others, including sceptic Paul Jordan, maintain that it makes the existence of Atlantis in the Atlantic an impossibility.

A further sceptical view of Atlantis in the Atlantic, by Benjamin Radford, claims^(k) that “plate tectonics demonstrate that Atlantis is impossible; as the continents have drifted, the seafloor has spread over time, not contracted. There would simply be no place for Atlantis to sink into. As Ken Feder notes, ‘The geology is clear; there could have been no large land surface that then sank in the area where Plato places Atlantis. Together, modern archaeology and geology provide an unambiguous verdict: There was no Atlantic continent; there was no great civilization called Atlantis.'” This, of course, is perfectly true, except that Plato placed Atlantis in the Atlantic Sea, which many believe was a reference at that particular time to the Western Mediterranean!

An interesting website on the subject of the problems associated with the theory of plate tectonics by David Pratt is worth a read^(a)(d)(i).>N.C. Smoot has also written^(p) about anomalies encountered with the conventional theory of plate tectonics and possible solutions.<

Equally critical is the opening chapter of Thomas J. Krupa’s book Biblical Flood, Noah’s Ark and the Star of David^[¹⁰¹⁰^]. Sustained opposition to the theory has found expression in the NCGT Journal^(e)since 1996.

Robert Bauval has written a paper on the possible effect that plate tectonics may have had on the accuracy of the orientation of the Giza pyramids^(m).

Marvin Herndon has proposed a new theory, which he has entitled ‘Whole-Earth Decompression Dynamics’; a subtle combination of plate tectonics and the Expanded Earth Hypothesis^(g). The idea of subduction is also challenged by the New Pangaea Theory (NPT)^(h).

The starting point of NPT is that “252 million years ago our planet was impacted by a massive comet, a comet far larger than the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. This previous impact was so powerful it fractured the Earth’s crust, began the breakup of Pangaea and wiped out most of the life on the planet.”^(o)The author, J. Chris Everett, proposes the comet, 100km in diameter, was absorbed into the body of our planet.

P.P. Flambas, author of Plato’s Caribbean Atlantis^[¹³⁶⁸^] in which he has proposed a modification to the current theory of PT, which he has called the ‘Hydraulic Hypothesis’ to explain shortcomings in accepted PT theory and support his Atlantis location.

A July 2016 report was published on the rate of tectonic movement, estimated to be comparable to the speed of fingernail growth^(f).

In 2020, it was reported that “scientists are beginning to understand the importance of another characteristic of any planet likely to support life, and it is one that fits squarely into (James) Lovelock’s view of Earth as a dynamic participant rather than a passive backdrop: an active system of drifting continents, otherwise known as plate tectonics. On the face of it, the connection between life, with its relatively brief cycles and dizzying complexity, and plate tectonics, with its much slower cycles and ostensibly simpler interactions, appears tenuous. But on Earth, at least, that connection is direct and deep.” ⁽ⁿ⁾.

Evidence of plate tectonics has now been identified on Mars^(c)! In October 2019 NASA confirmed that a number of ‘marsquakes’ have been confirmed on the ‘Red Planet’^(l). So far, the evidence suggests that our planet is more moon-like than earth-like.

^(a) https://davidpratt.info/tecto.htm

^(b) https://web.archive.org/web/20171105200137/https://www.grisda.org/origins/15053.htm

^(c) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120809155831.htm

^(d)https://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/2012/11/27/serious-issues-with-plate-tectonics-2/

^(e)http://www.ncgtjournal.com/index.html

^(f) https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/23/science/continental-drift-tectonic-plates.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fscience&action=click&contentCollection=science&region=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront&_r=1

^(g) http://www.nuclearplanet.com/510090.pdf

^(h) https://web.archive.org/web/20170429173617/https://newpangaeatheory.com/the-enigmas/

⁽ⁱ⁾ An Alternative to Plate and Expansion Tectonics – Thunderbolts Forum (v2.0) (archive.org) (new link) *

^(j) https://www.researchgate.net/publication/238388608_Francis_Bacon_and_Continental_Drift

^(k) https://www.livescience.com/23217-lost-city-of-atlantis.html

^(l) https://www.universetoday.com/143625/insight-has-already-detected-21-marsquakes/