Graham Hancock Quote
The earth and all life upon it endured and was devastated by what can only be described as a globally distributed firestorm at the onset of the Younger Dryas around 12,800 years ago. In this planetary debacle, 10 million square kilometers of trees and other plant matter burned.To put that in perspective, the United Kingdom was in a state of traumatic shock in late June and early July 2018 after 4,942 acres of Lancashire moorland were consumed by wildfires. That's an area of just 20 square kilometers, but firefighters and emergency services from seven counties were utterly overwhelmed by the blaze and the military had to be brought in to assist.Meanwhile, a report in the dated July 2, 2018, opined that California's wildfire season had started early, with two 'major fires' already fought at huge expense and requiring evacuation of local residents. These two fires were estimated to have consumed 85,000 acres, which sounds an awful lot but in fact converts to just 344 square kilometers.The previous years, 2017, was California's most destructive wildfire season then on record, with a total of 1.25 million acres burned. The cost of dealing with the disaster, including fire suppression, insurance, and recovery expenditures, was estimated at US$180 billion. Yet 1.38 million acres converts to just 5,585 square kilometers--an insignificant fraction (around 0.05 percent--that is, a twentieth of 1 percent) of the 10 million square kilometers destroyed in the Younger Dryas wildfires.
The earth and all life upon it endured and was devastated by what can only be described as a globally distributed firestorm at the onset of the Younger Dryas around 12,800 years ago. In this planetary debacle, 10 million square kilometers of trees and other plant matter burned.To put that in perspective, the United Kingdom was in a state of traumatic shock in late June and early July 2018 after 4,942 acres of Lancashire moorland were consumed by wildfires. That's an area of just 20 square kilometers, but firefighters and emergency services from seven counties were utterly overwhelmed by the blaze and the military had to be brought in to assist.Meanwhile, a report in the dated July 2, 2018, opined that California's wildfire season had started early, with two 'major fires' already fought at huge expense and requiring evacuation of local residents. These two fires were estimated to have consumed 85,000 acres, which sounds an awful lot but in fact converts to just 344 square kilometers.The previous years, 2017, was California's most destructive wildfire season then on record, with a total of 1.25 million acres burned. The cost of dealing with the disaster, including fire suppression, insurance, and recovery expenditures, was estimated at US$180 billion. Yet 1.38 million acres converts to just 5,585 square kilometers--an insignificant fraction (around 0.05 percent--that is, a twentieth of 1 percent) of the 10 million square kilometers destroyed in the Younger Dryas wildfires.
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About Graham Hancock
Born in Edinburgh, Hancock studied sociology at Durham University before working as a journalist, writing for a number of British newspapers and magazines. His first three books dealt with international development, including Lords of Poverty (1989), a well-received critique of corruption in the aid system. Beginning with The Sign and the Seal in 1992, he shifted focus to speculative accounts of human prehistory and ancient civilizations, on which he has written a dozen books, most notably Fingerprints of the Gods and Magicians of the Gods.
Experts have described Hancock's investigations of archaeological evidence, myths and historical documents as superficially resembling investigative journalism, but lacking in accuracy, consistency and impartiality. They define his work as pseudoarchaeology and pseudohistory because they consider it to be biased towards preconceived conclusions by ignoring context, misrepresenting sources, cherry picking, and withholding critical counter-evidence. Anthropologist Jeb Card has described Hancock's writings as being paranormal in nature, and his idea of an Ice age civilization as a modern mythological narrative that due to its emphasis on alleged secret and spiritual knowledge (including psychic abilities and communing with souls and "powerful nonphysical beings" via the use of psychedelics), is incompatible with the archaeological scientific method. Hancock portrays himself as a culture hero who fights the "dogmatism" of academics, presenting his work as more valid than professional archaeology and as "a path to truly understanding reality and the spiritual elements denied by materialist science", though he often cites science in support of his ideas. He has not submitted his writings for scholarly peer review and they have not been published in academic journals.
He has also written two fantasy novels and in 2013 delivered a controversial TEDx talk promoting the use of the psychoactive drink ayahuasca. His ideas have been the subject of several films, as well as the Netflix series Ancient Apocalypse (2022), Hancock makes regular appearances on the podcast The Joe Rogan Experience to discuss his work.