Michael Cremo on Coast to Coast AM, 3/1/10

Listened to the March 1, 2010 interview with Michael Cremo on Coast to Coast AM.  It was pretty much impossible to get any entertainment out of his “forbidden archaeology” stuff because of a combination of his overpoweringly wacky ideological stances toward a weak-sauce new age spiritualism and his apparent personal quest against evolution and established theories of history and human origin.  His evidence is entirely anecdotal, most of it coming from 19th century sources, and his new age consciousness-based belief system is groan worthy.  Consider me unimpressed.

Hour 1...

It starts off with a rather lame complaint about evolution, not a very strong start.  He claims the reason evolution is given so much weight is because scientists are "very attached" to "certain ideas and theories that they've got a lot of time, money, reputation, and power invested in” and “they're very hesitant to change their ideas to these things.”  This was not an actual refutation since he doesn’t actually address any of the evidence, it was just him bitching and ranting.

He goes on to play the anti-government card (since a lot of Coast listeners are quite the anti-establishment lot) with, "the supporters of the current theories of human origins have a government enforced monopoly in most of the education systems around the world," throwing in an ironically distorted, not to mention poorly paraphrased, quote from Mencken, “if there's some people who want the government's support to enforce their ideas, they're most probably idiots" (actual quote: “the kind of man who wants the government to adopt and enforce his ideas is always the kind of man whose ideas are idiotic”).

As far as passive aggressive ad hominem attacks go, it doesn’t get much more transparent than this.  It’s downright silly because Mencken himself reported on the side of evolution in his coverage of the Scopes Monkey Trial.  He goes on to bitch about evolution claiming, “no other ideas are allowed to be taught or even mentioned.”  Oh, the persecution.

Tsk, Mr. Cremo, tsk.  Not a strong start.

Let’s quickly take a look at thefreedictionary.com’s definition of the word theory in relation to theory of evolution.

the·o·ry  (th-r, thîr)
n. pl. the·o·ries

1. A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena.
2. The branch of a science or art consisting of its explanatory statements, accepted principles, and methods of analysis, as opposed to practice: a fine musician who had never studied theory.
3. A set of theorems that constitute a systematic view of a branch of mathematics.
4. Abstract reasoning; speculation: a decision based on experience rather than theory.
5. A belief or principle that guides action or assists comprehension or judgment: staked out the house on the theory that criminals usually return to the scene of the crime.
6. An assumption based on limited information or knowledge; a conjecture.

You’ll notice the wide range of meaning between definitions #1 and #6.  On one end (definition #1) a theory is widely tested, explains past observations and can make accurate predictions about future observations.  On the other (definition #6), it means an assumption, or mere conjecture, weak-sauce.  Quite a difference.

Evolution deniers love to pull this straw man out when attacking the theory of evolution.  Mr. Cremo does exactly this, he attacks the theory of evolution up as if it were defined under definition #6 when the evidence supporting it clearly places it under definition #1.  Shame on you, Cremo.

Second, about the anti-government rhetoric about evolution and its powerful legislative cronies bullying everyone into submission, he’s being a bit dishonest here.  He’s referring to creationism being ruled unconstitutional and thus not allowed to be taught in public schools but he’s deliberately obscuring the fact that it’s because it is “demonstrably religious” and is not actual science.  Why would you teach non-scientific stories as if they were scientific, in a science text book no less?  You wouldn’t.  The legislation is in place to prevent religious zealots from using legislation to sneak unscientific stories into science books.  How hard is that to represent honestly?  Again, shame on you, Cremo.

Back to the show..

He spoke about how he got into “forbidden archaeology” and “alternative history” as a result of getting interested in “secret knowledge” due to his father being a military intelligence officer and living in various places around the world as a child.  Oh boy, I know where this is headed.. ye olde wise ancient texts.

He talks about finding “missing evidence” from the textbooks in ancient texts and in wild claims and anecdotes from centuries past.

He talks a bit about the infamous hematite spheres but he manages to completely lose me with this faulty line of reasoning, “these objects were given to an independent company of metallurgists to examine and they said they could not explain how they could have formed naturally in the layers of the earth which means they have to have been made by someone with human-like intelligence long, long, long ago.”  No, no it doesn’t -- it means the results are inconclusive.  This conclusion does not logically follow from the mere fact that a couple of metallurgists could not readily explain it.  Tsk.

Next up, human footprints next to dinosaur footprints.  Anyone remember this little bit of creationist stuff that was thoroughly explained (debunked) long ago?  Yeah, me too.  Apparently he’s on top of some brand new “interesting developments” that show it’s actually, really, possibly true!  And.. and?  He’s currently writing a book about it.

Why isn’t he authoring a profound research paper to be submitted to a well-respected science journal to finally set the record straight, you ask?  Simple, that’d be science and he doesn’t seem to be terribly interested in that sort of thing.  Pseudo-science has no use for the peer review process as it gets in the way of immediate private publication and invitations to join “the circuit” to speak at fringe conferences from here to Daytona.  I mean, really, how do you expect the man to earn his research money back (couldn’t get a grant, remember?) if he’s got to go through a lengthly process of refining and re-submitting his paper for review before he can gain any bit of actual legitimacy with which to push a legit book?  That’s preposterous.  The proper course is to write the book first then do only friendly interviews and lectures, no need wasting time listening to the nay-sayers, they’re probably part of the conspiracy anyway.

Next up, he explains that the reason we have no clear physical evidence of ancient civilizations is because humans don’t make stuff that lasts and it’s all dissolved, that is except for the stone stuff.  This was about the only reasonable thing he said.  He does fail to mention any indirect ways of detecting human occupancy and highly technical civilizations that may have existed.  You’ve got to cherry pick your points, I guess.  I suppose ancient civilizations mastered the problem of greenhouse gas emissions early on and had some sort of 100% efficient waste disposal process we’ve yet to understand.  They also must not have carved up the landscape for urban development in any way that couldn’t be mistaken for natural features.  What a wise lot they were.

Next up, more anecdotal evidence, this time about 1920s miners who found a “polished wall” deep down in the depths of the earth.  Once they found the wall, the mine was shut down and all of the miners were reassigned to work another mine.  This leaves me with a few questions.  First, what were the results of the excavation of the wall?  What’s the probability it was naturally occurring?  What is it made of?  How long has it been there?  If it wasn’t natural, who may have built it?  Why might they have built it?  We don’t get answers to any of these questions, of course, because he quickly moves on to the next topic.  Presumably this wall was hidden by those evil anti-science scientists who have too much invested in their world view to allow research into such a powder keg of a dig site because the only hits I can get on this mine from Google is stuff Cremo himself has said about it.  Color me skeptical.  Without any evidence, all I can say is anecdote noted, moving along.

Hour 2...

Next up, ancient flying machines -- well, carvings of them at least -- or are they dimensional transports.  Either way, a quick name drop of Von Daniken and we’re on to the next topic.

Next up, we finally get to his carefully planned ideological spiel.  We find out his grand theory of everything (definition #6) is that life de-evolves from some sort of “pure consciousness” into physical matter.  The man makes his view clear as mud with this little blurb-like thing he seems to read or recite:

“[..it’s] the process by which a pure conscious self becomes covered by the lower energies of mind and matter.  I believe it’s a process that can be reversed and consciousness can be restored to its original pure state.  I think that’s the real purpose of human existence, from which we’ve become distracted by the current materialistic system of education and culture, which wants to keep us working hard, producing and consuming more and more material things because that’s generating huge amounts of wealth and power that flow into certain circles, pockets of certain individuals.”

Welp, there you have it.  His theory of everything had everything.  We’ve got some origin, a little true form, the ultimate purpose, and a little bit of social commentary about the heathens, their materialism, and those secret circles of power wielders who control everyone.  It’s got a little something for everyone.

Next up, we get a little conspiracy talk.  He claims there’s a “knowledge filter” that those evil scientists use to cover up the true knowledge and that he and other researchers in “alternative history” are working on the real truth.  That truth?  It’s all about “mind and consciousness”.

It’s funny that he talks about the “knowledge filter” as if it’s a bad thing -- something evil scientists cook up to prevent true knowledge from proliferating.  Michael Shermer’s treatise of the knowledge filter in his book The Borderlands of Science: Where Science Meets Nonsense describes is as “a mental module that screens incoming ideas for their veracity [...] helping us discriminate between truth and illusion.”  The best knowledge filter that has ever been invented, he says, is science.  I think that sums it up nicely.

Next up, he says there are 3 reactions in the scientific world to his work.  Those camps are:

1. the “fundamentalist materialists” who are opposed to him and thwart his attempts to lecture by getting his appearances cancelled;
2. ...
3. ...

Well, he started to describe these camps but went off on a tangent on #1 and never got back to the other two camps.  My loss, I guess.

His story was about a lecture to be held in Russia that was abruptly cancelled by some sort of sinister influence from an unnamed oppressor which was itself thwarted when his supporters managed to find another venue for him.  The result, he claims, was more people attended the lecture due to the shady circumstances to silence him and the need to know what it was he was about to say that needed, so desperately, to be concealed.  The next year, he claims, he was able to speak at the original venue without any problems, concluding that the unnamed oppressors that initially stopped him had “learned their lesson.”  Meh.

A bunch of unnamed garden gnomes stole my socks a few months ago, I just know it.  Around the same time I found my lucky socks.  I think it’s clear that the combined power of my lucky socks, and the rise in consciousness I experienced as I wore them, removed the power those gnomes had to manipulate my remaining socks by casting an invisible aura of protection around them.  Those gnomes were given their comeuppance by being unable to steal any more socks and I’m sure I will not be bothered by them any longer.  And everyone lived happily ever after (except for the gnomes, who are evil and are never happy about anything).

Next up, Henry Stopes’ infamous “human face” shell that Cremo claims was found in the Red Crag formation, “in layers of rock about 2.5 million years old”, which was brought to the British Association of the Advancement of Science.  Sounds impressive, right?  A few google searches later and I’m asking myself some questions that Cremo neglected to mention.  Why didn’t he mention that Stopes didn’t find the fossil himself, that it was given to him by another collector.  Why he didn’t mention that it’s under dispute, which part of Red Crag it was actually found in (there are apparently areas with much more recent deposits).  Why he didn’t mention that no serious journal at the time accepted his find for publication.  Why he didn’t mention that an article appeared in a 2009 issue of Lithics that explained the artifact as merely a fossil that was carved in the medieval era?  Meh.

I should be used to Mr. Cremo’s half-stories by now.  Shame on me for expecting him to be thorough.  Still, what happened to teaching the controversy?

Returning from the break, we’re back to the matter of the shell.  He reiterates what he’s already said about it then adds lots of talk about its current whereabouts being unknown.  You know where this is headed, right?

“it’s very mysterious, what happened to it.  There are photographs of it, it was shown at two scientific meetings, this is what happens sometimes with this evidence for extreme human antiquity, it just disappears sometimes.  Whether it was due to some kind of suppression or whether it’s just lost...”

He then mentions a jawbone found in the same general area, mentions that it too has “disappeared” and speculates that while it remains to be seen, it may well have been suppressed.  Since Mr. Cremo isn’t exactly forthcoming with the details and it’s clear when he does go into detail, it’s yet to actually be the full story, I must ask Mr. Google what he knows.  A google search shows this jawbone to be of an anatomically modern human, appeared in the 1850s at Red Crag, it was not actually found at the site but found elsewhere, allegedly in a pile of rock and debris taken away from a Red Crag dig site, it was sold and passed through the hands of several people before finally being analyzed by competent individuals, it was taken to the Ethnological Society of London where cursory examination showed that it was a modern jawbone, not fossilized, and not even from Red Crag.  Moreover, it “disappeared” due to losing public interest, because that’s what tends to happen when something is bunk.

This stuff happens all of the time with false or erroneous claims.  They get sorted out and the matter promptly goes away.  There’s no grand conspiracy when someone digs up a dog bone, mistakes it for a genuine dinosaur fossil, then throws it in the trash when it’s been shown to be misidentified.  When strong evidence shows that it is the current scientific view that is in error, that view changes accordingly.  This conspiratorial “suppression” stuff in regard to artifacts that apparently had little merit, and promptly disappeared, doesn’t hold water.  Let’s face it, people throw away useless junk.

Mr. Cremo appears to be deliberately omitting important details about his artifacts of interest to try to convince me there just maybe, possibly, could be some sort of sinister anti-scientific grand conspiracy going on in the scientific community to filter the real true-truth from science.  Also, his exclusive use of discoveries made over a century ago that couldn’t even pass muster in the known science of that era is fishy.  Meh.

It’s been all anecdotal, so far.  Let’s see if he can finish on a high note.

Next up, “human devolution”!

“..what I’m proposing is that there’s evidence for a subtle mind element associated with the human organism that has some very unusual powers like remote viewing, telepathy, mind over matter, psychokinesis, and as I’ve said there’s a lot of scientific evidence for this but it’s been subjected to the same knowledge filtering process that has been involved with the stones and bones, the archaeology evidence for extreme human antiquity.”

All that evidence, filtered!  It’s almost as if someone took all the claims, all the “evidence” and used critical thinking facilities to filter it down until nothing was left.  Reduced, like so much balsamic vinegar and cooking wine.  Oh, those evil scientists.  All those fun mythological stories of old, all the ancient texts that talked about weird things.  Well, if it’s in the text and those texts are old, they MUST be true, to some extent, amirite?  Sadly, a lot of people live by this line of reasoning.  Shame on those who filter their knowledge with something as dastardly as science.

Next up, Marie and Pierre Curie and their wacky esoteric supernatural beliefs.  He begins by explaining how smart they were, how they and some of their smart friends were suckered by an illusionist into believing the parlor tricks they witnessed were bona fide evidence of supernatural feats, then adds a snide, “but you don’t read about this in your physics textbooks.”  Well of course you don’t read about it in physics textbooks.  Why?  Glad you asked, that’s because it’s not physics.

Next up, out-of-body experiences.  He claims there is evidence that a conscious “self” can exist outside the body and mentions a couple of doctors who have studied out-of-body experiences.  He cites a study where some doctors were studying people who claimed to have had out-of-body experiences (while undergoing surgery) to see if they were “telling the truth or [if] they [were] just making up some wild stories.”  First, this doesn’t pass the smell test.  Either he’s misrepresenting the study or the study itself sounds fishy.  The flaw in this “telling the truth or just making up stories” determination is obvious.  Hallucinations can easily be convincing enough for the subject to legitimately believe they were floating miles in the air drinking martinis made out of cloud dust, talking to Snoopy in another dimension, speaking telepathically with giant insectoid aliens from another planet, or simply floating in the room, able to see everything that was going on (what’s to keep patients from hearing what is going on in the room during their surgery, what with surgeons often doing a play-by-play on what they’re doing during the surgery?).  Just because you honestly believe a hallucination was real doesn’t make it real.

Anyway, he uses the doctors’ conclusion that the people in the study were most likely telling the truth about their hallucinations (I’d have been surprised if this wasn’t the case) to further support his theory of everything claim that,

“we live in a multi-level cosmos.  There’s one level dominated by ordinary matter, it’s inhabited by beings who have adapted to the conditions there, that’s where we find ourselves now.  Beyond that, there’s a more subtle realm of mental energies, it’s inhabited by beings adapted to the conditions there.  People have different names for them: astral beings, angels, gods, goddesses, things of that sort.  Then beyond that there’s the level of pure consciousness and that’s where I think we start out -- on that level of pure consciousness; but if a conscious self drifts down to the lower levels it becomes covered by the lower energies and this is part of the great wisdom, traditions of the world.  Practically they all say something like that.”

Cremo got a bit pushy with the new age ideology, eh?  Flimflam, sir, flimflam.  I suppose it should be expected since this is where he wanted to take us in the first place.  It seems like the man aspires to be some kind of cult guru.

Next up, he talks about the cycle of “cosmic catastrophes”, repopulation of the earth, asserts life exists elsewhere in the cosmos, then does a little 2012 speculation.  Meh.

Next up, why is there no evidence of ancient civilizations?  Wait just a damn minute, we already covered this.  Anyway, he reiterates it’s because they’ve decayed -- but that’s not all, that’s just for material things in a material world (for material girls).  Mr. Cremo points out that at the higher levels of reality, there is no decay!  It’s preserved, much like a hard drive backup! How does he know this?  Why, his theory of everything proves it, of course!

Hour 3...

He mentions he’ll be speaking at the “Alien Shift Conference” in LA, later this month.  LOL.  Alien shift, fo’ sho’.  Cremo spoke a little about people he’s met at these conferences.  Don’t get me started on them.

Time to hit the phones.

Caller 1: Guy asks if Cremo believes in UFOs.  He thinks some of them are extra-terrestrial or “extra-dimensional”.

Caller 2: Woman calls to say she agrees with his take on consciousness.  He accepts the ego stroke and strokes himself a little more for good measure by spewing some social commentary on how we’re materialistic slobs.  Woman then asks about 2012 in a weird way.  I can’t really explain the wackiness of this, so I’ll just quote:

“you were talking about 2012, now what I’ve gathered -- I’ve been reading John Major Jenkins -- it’s interesting because I’ve also talked to several different astrologies and astrologers about this.  Now, according to what the Mayans say and according to everything, it will happen, it’s called.. that we will pass through the Milky Way.  Now, we have a magnetic field and so does the Milky Way, and they said that there may be some disturbances going through the middle of it.  And I’m, you know, people get all shook up and I’m going ‘why?  If there’s nothing we can do about it, just pray that, you know, we’re all going to be here the next day.’  They say it’s going to take 60 to 70 hours to go through it starting Dec 20th and ending sometime on Dec 22nd and I just, you know, how do you feel about that?”

LOL.  There’s so much wrong with that, I won’t even bother picking it apart.  Callers say the craziest stuff.

Caller 3: Guy wants to know if Cremo “believes that the extinctions that happen at the end of ages occur because of karmic ties or would they happen anyway” and he also wants to know what Cremo’s take on some Vedics astrology thing is.  Meh.

Host question: Host wants to know which, out of all the civilizations Cremo has investigated, seems to have better knowledge, better abilities than the others.  This one couldn’t be easier, it should be a slam dunk.. yet Cremo falls flat on his ass by saying “everyone has to make their own decisions about such things [..] you’ve got to think what looks best to you, so different people are going to make different decisions about that one.”  He goes on to say he finds the Vedics to have the “fullest set of knowledge”, but qualifies it by saying it’s his personal choice.  Wha?

It’s a question with a definite answer, it’s not a matter of taste or opinion.  There is one civilization that has a more complete understanding and control of worldly things than any of the others that have ever existed on this planet in the past.  That civilization is, of course, the modern world in which we live.  The way he tries to blanket everything with his new age mumbo jumbo makes him say some truly stupid things.  Vedic, indeed.

He talks a bit about the various forms of astrology in different cultures and explains that’s where he got his multi-level consciousness bit.

Caller 4:  The caller’s voice is hilarious.  He asks about hieroglyphics and the “appearance of time” in them.  Cremo explains how time works on the different levels of reality:

“...time on our level is basically a destructive force, [...] anything that comes into existence goes out of existence.  You’ve got past, present, future.  But on the higher level of reality, time doesn’t operate in that way.  So time is something that.. if we’re going to talk about beginning.. beginnings and endings are something that happen on our level, on the highest level, that is beyond time as we know it, there are no beginnings and endings.”

Meh.  More new age mumbo jumbo.

Host asks if mainstream science is accepting any of what Cremo claims.  Cremo claims:

“gradually they’re pushing things back, not as far as it really goes.  In the time since I’ve brought out Forbidden Archaeology, they have pushed human existence back a little bit further than they used to believe.  Also, one thing that they used to believe was that humans existed by themselves, they didn’t believe in the co-existence of humans and ape-men.  They believed that ape-men evolved into humans, but now they’re starting to accept the idea that humans have co-existed with various types of ape-men.”

The first part is kind of a cheap pat on the back.  It’s not unusual that new evidence has been found or analyzed differently in the past 15 years that refined the timetable a little.  Not surprising at all.  The second part, however, about “ape-men” (whatever they are) is nebulous.  Given the context, I can only assume he’s talking about parallel evolution (the Darwin’s “Out of Africa” model) vs. the multiregional hypothesis, which  was proposed in the 1980s and suggested that there has always only been a single human species that evolved, worldwide -- seemingly what Cremo is claiming “they” believed.

The problem is that wasn’t what “they” believed when his book came out.  It was a novel competing hypothesis to Darwin’s 100+ year old hypothesis.  In fact, by the time Cremo’s book came out, the “Out of Africa” model had already been corroborated by a study of mitochondrial DNA while the multiregional hypothesis was facing the embarrassing problem of explaining why Neanderthal genes were conspicuously absent from modern humans (which goes against the proposed model).  Further evidence only served to support the “Out of Africa” model and since the 1990s, there has been near consensus that the “Out of Africa” model is the correct one.  There was no sudden switch in belief, the multiregional hypothesis was never the prevailing model.  Meh.

Caller 5: Guy says he agrees with much of what Cremo has said, disagrees with some.  Claims he’s been researching the same things since 1978 and has one question to help him understand where Cremo is coming from, he asks about how Cremo dates things.  Cremo says he gets his datings from “geological studies of the formations and the objects and things like that” (LOL) and describes his dating methodology as:

“my methodology is simply to say [to scientists]: according to methods you consider reliable, here’s what the age of this formation is.  So how do you explain the presence of this human bone, or human artifact, or human footprint in formations of this age?  So either they have to change all their ideas about the evolution of the human species or they have to admit all their dating methods are wrong, either way I win.”

Wow. First, there are many ways to explain how things get moved around.  Second, those footprints may not be human footprints.  Third, why must it ALL be changed?  Fourth, the either-or conclusion is laughable.  What a crazy leap of logic on that one.  Vintage Cremo.

Caller 6: Guy makes a comment about the nature of the hematite spheres.  Weak.

Caller 7: Guy talks about haunted temple then asks Cremo about some destruction-bringing mythical figures.  This particular mythology isn’t terribly interesting.  Moving along.

Caller 8: Guy asks about Vedics cycles.  Cremo talks about how everything is destroyed in cycles.  Again, not terribly interesting but consistent with Coast’s paranoid doomsday schtick.

Caller 9: Guy asks lame consciousness vs time question.  Cremo takes the opportunity to reiterate his weird new age beliefs about levels of reality.

Caller 10: Guy asks where Jesus fits in Cremo’s world because no Coast show would be complete without serving up a caller asking how Jesus fits into the guest’s worldview. Cremo says Jesus was an avatar. An avatar. As in the movie Avatar. Yes, the movie. Avatar. He goes on to compare “spiritual truth” with gold in that they’re both valuable and demand respect. Meh.

Horrible, horrible interview.  Too much new age mumbo jumbo, too much bad archaeology, too much pseudo-science, too much shilling.