From: Mark Cashman <mcashman@ix.netcom.com>
Date: Wed, 3 Mar 1999 10:34:47 -0500
Fwd Date: Wed, 03 Mar 1999 13:26:07 -0500
Subject: Re: Zecharia Sitchin

>From: Kathleen Andersen <KAnder6444@aol.com>
>Date: Tue, 2 Mar 1999 23:22:11 EST
>To: updates@globalserve.net
>Subject: Re: Zecharia Sitchin

>Now boys, you too Larry Hatch.....let's not get too hasty here
>with good old Zacharia Sitchin's theories. Let's go back some
>years ago to the "Shiva Theory". This name was proposed by
>Harlan Smith of the University of Texas at Austin and Stephen
>Jay Gould of Harvard. If you recall this involves the theory of
>mass extinctions on a periodic level and includes the following:

>"The most likely explaination of what drives the comets toward
>the earth's region of the solar system is  "Nemesis" - a
>companion star to the sun, named after the Greek goddess of
>divine justice"

>Now granted we are talking about something like another sun, but
>its not so far fetched to have a body traveling in an elongated
>orbit.

Unfortunately, like Sitchin's theories, the Nemesis theory,
while much less ambitious, has not a single stitch of empirical
evidence. Yes, there have been some extinctions, but it seems
clear that such factors as disease spread from continental drift
and perhaps near-earth asteroid impact (in the case of the
dinosaurs) are responsible. It is not clear that a "shower" of
comets is necessary to explain such extictions, and, moreover,
there are no signs of such large recent bombardments on the moon
or on Mars.

A summary of other problems with that theory can be found in

http://www.faqs.org/faqs/astronomy/faq/part5/section-6.html

These include the disappearance of an apparent periodicity in
extinctions, and the fact that such an object would be
detectable in astronomical surveys.

Ultimately, though, what John is saying is that...

---

1) Myths, legends, and ancient writings are uncertain at best in
their accuracy. Distinguishing between recording of actual
unusual events, historical allegories, made-up "portents", and
flowery language used to describe something mundane can be very
difficult. Basing important portions of human history on such
items requires extensive corroboration in the form of material
from other sources (preferably some from other cultures), and
physical artifacts.

2) Sitchin's authority on Sumerian literature is disputable. As
one example, the Sumerian FAQs

http://pubpages.unh.edu/~cbsiren/sumer-faq.html

do not list a single one of Sitchin's works.

The same is true of

http://www.sron.ruu.nl/~jheise/akkadian/index.html#index

These sites and other references also show that Sumerian myths
do not appear to contain unusual elements when compared with
other mythologies.

Also, of over 5000 web hits on "Sumerian", only 261 reference
Sitchin, and those 261 are almost entirely new age, not
archaeological. The ones which do not reference Sitchin are
almost entirely archaeological.

Mainstream archeological thought, based on the work of many
scientists in the field, do not support Sitchin's unique
interpretation of Sumerian material, as is documented at

http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Corridor/8148/hafernik.html

---

At this point, I am sure that the usual "mainstream scientists
have their heads up their a**" comments will be posted. Please
restrain yourself.

The fact that mainstream science does not give credence to UFOs
cannot be used to argue that they do not accept Sitchin for the
same reason. That is because the texts which Sitchin interprets
are available for examination by any scholar, while UFOs
represent a much more difficult scientific problem due to their
transience.

The biggest strike against Sitchin is that the standard
interpretations of the Sumerian texts and mythologies do not
appear to bear much if any resemblance to his interpretations.
Now, Sumerian scholars are not going to care if a bunch of
Sumerian myths claims that humans were made by certain gods, and
so forth, because they don't believe those myths have any
empirical foundation anyway. So no reason exists for them not to
develop translations which at least parallel Sitchin's
interpretation. Yet, they don't.

In short, it would appear that there is no reason to give
special consideration to Sitchin's lone account of what are, at
best, obscure myths, subject to a variety of intepretations.

------
Mark Cashman, creator of The Temporal Doorway at
http://www.temporaldoorway.com
- Original digital art, writing, and UFO research -

UFO cases, analysis, classification systems, and more...
http://www.temporaldoorway.com/ufo.htm
------