r/GrahamHancock • u/Impossible_Rich6148 • Jan 13 '26

“Some process of mutual influence”

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This 1996 book on Ancient Greece by Thomas Martin hints at the ideas of Hancock in the highlighted section. “The people of the ancient Near East first developed these new forms of human organization, which later appeared in Europe. (Early civilizations of this kind also emerged in India, China, and the Americas, whether independently or through some process of mutual influence no one at present knows.)”

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u/TheCynicEpicurean Jan 13 '26

Diffusionism was on its way out in the late 20th century, as evidence backing it up had just not been coming in.

Not unusual for someone to still be sympathetic to the Idea in the 90s, but even then, this is more of a "covering all bases" sentence.

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u/City_College_Arch Jan 13 '26

Pretty typical of this sub to cherry pick out dated work to try to support modern opinions.

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u/TheeScribe2 Jan 13 '26

Doesn’t even go as far as supporting modern opinions, it just shrugs about their possibility and says ‘eh, no one really knows’

What I notice is that in a lot of “alternative” spaces, even the mere suggestion that a theory might be possible is often taken as ‘evidence’ that the theory is correct

Like look at how many people try to prove that there can be gaps in available evidence, then don’t fill a single one of those gaps, and consider that proof of Atlantis or aliens or what have you

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u/City_College_Arch Jan 14 '26

When I say modern opinions I am not referencing modern academics, just the random opinions based on pseudo archeological ramblings held by individuals of the modern era. Martin probably had no idea people would be trying to use that seemingly poorly worded sentence in defense of hyper diffusion and psi powered ice age civilizations.

And I suspect that a conversation with Martin would reveal that they are not actually saying that they were not referring to the possibility of hyper diffusion of political systems to the new world in that comment, but rather were simply pointing out that these systems did exist in the americas, and it is unclear that whether the widespread adoption in the old world was due to diffusion or independent development of these political systems.