Ancient History

Overflow from Pyramids! Something that has always bothered me about Ancient History is that we believe what we read. Do you believe everything that you read about the present? I hear many people calling the current President of the USA a liar, but will future generations, many thousands of years think the same thing? I hear people say that the newscasters pump up the scare factor on many stories, which is true, but do you believe everything you hear?

When we read the ancient scrolls and scratchings on the walls, we say "Wow! They believed their dead turn into birds and flew to the stars, which are really their ancestors. What interesting beliefs they had!" Why do we not say "Wow! They had many fiction writers of amazing talent! And some interesting cultural stories aimed to amuse!" Sure, the same stories appear in many texts of some cultures, so since the writings are by different people and yet still contain the same essence, it must be what they actually believed, right? I ask you: What about aliens?

We have many stories in our current time frame about aliens. When they appear in a movie or a book or a news article, does someone have to explain the concept of a space alien? No. Why? Because everyone at this time knows and shares a common-ish set of ideas about space aliens, but does that mean that aliens actually exist here among us now and everyone alive at this time believes this to be true? No. Though, it doesn't rule out our peaceful space brothers living among us to guide us on the true path to enlightenment so that we can shed our warlike ways and join the Galactic Brotherhood of Peace and Harmony, which is our birthright - it just means that most people do not believe this, just that they know about it because it is part of our culture. Knowledge about vs believing to be True.

Next time you watch the History Channel or Discovery Channel or hear someone smugly telling you what any person not currently alive believed to be true, I say you scoff at them! Scoff! Because you now know the truth - that there is no truth.

-Edward

PS No real place to edit this into the idea above - Were all of the people of the past homogeneous? In modern times, if you visit any country in this World, you would find that not everyone believes exactly the same thing, nor wears exactly the same cloths. Yet, we are to believe that Ancient Peoples all believed the same thing? Didn't they have different political parties? Didn't they have different religious beliefs? Or is it just my ignorance of what we currently know about these Ancient Peoples! I say it is the former!

PPS No real place to edit this into the PS above - What about StarTrek? What about other SciFi? All people of the future have the same beliefs and all wear those same jump suits. Is there no diversity in the future? Or the past? I find that hard to believe - more likely a lack of imagination. The future and past are probably much more like today then they are like what we current think those times were like. Nothing really ever changes.