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megan l. (FOX) Do any of you scientists think that the ancient ruins of either egypt or some in south america could have an exteraterrestrial connection?

 Hi Megan,


I am a fan of the show "Stargate SG1," which often has Egyptian-themed episodes involving extraterrestrials and that handsome archaeologist Daniel Jackson.  However, in real life, the pyramids in Egypt do not have an extraterrestrial connection.  They were built by people, probably slaves, to be the tombs of the Egyptian Pharaohs.  I remember from taking archaeology and art history courses when I was in college that there is a lot of evidence for the learning process that took place over many years to build the Egyptian pyramids.  The ancient Babylonians and Sumerians in Mesopotamia (a region which I believe is part of Turkey and Iraq today) built huge, stepped platforms that were sort of pyramid-shaped called ziggurats.  The earliest pyramids built by the Egyptians as tombs were actually stepped pyramids, not entirely unlike smaller versions of the ziggurats.  Over time, the very human architects and engineers of ancient Egypt modified and improved their design until they built the smooth-sided pyramids that we can see in Giza today.  I am not very familiar with the archaeology of the pyramids in South America, but they were also built by people over a long period of time, just like the Egyptian pyramids.  Sorry, no aliens!  Just a lot of very hard work and human ingenuity.

 Kris

 Hi Megan,

As Kris says, our ancestors were pretty clever folk and with the help of many of their people (some of whom were slaves), they built some amazing structures.  In Peru in the not so distant past (maybe 500 - 600 years ago), the Inca built structures of huge stones.  Many people question how the Incas could build with these stones and fit them together so precisely (at Sacsahuaman, for example).  All it takes is a good engineer and a lot of workers and the Inca had both!  Quarries have been found close to Sacsahuaman, Ollantaytambo, and at Machu Picchu.  In some cases in the ancient world, slaves were used to create these buildings.  In other cases, the workers were not slaves, but were working for the state, doing their civic duty. 

So to answer your question directly, I have seen no evidence of an extraterrestrial connection in Peru.