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Ancient Astronauts, Cosmic Collisions And Other Popular Theories About Man's Past by William H. Stiebing, Jr.
01/03/2008 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 
Pub: Prometheus Books. 217 page illustrated enlarged paperback. Price: $ 25.00 (US). ISBN: 0-87975-2855-8. Buy Ancient Astronauts, Cosmic Collisions And Other Popular Theories About Man's Past in the USA - or Buy Ancient Astronauts, Cosmic Collisions And Other Popular Theories About Man's Past in the UK  check out website: www.prometheusbooks.com
I'm sure you'll agree this an awfully big name for such a small book. Even smaller when the text content is actually 175 pages with the rest devoted to footnotes that might have been better served at the bottom of the text pages, index and bibliography. What it does do is compared what is known from scientific sources against the material from the like of von Däniken and Velikovsky, who is at least become obscure since this book was written in 1984. The main reason in drawing this book to your attention is that von Däniken's pyramid theories looked liked they had re-surfaced again in 'Stargate' and the associated TV series and continued more recently in 2004's 'Alien Vs Predator' film even if the hint with these is Man did them themselves for alien masters. Logistically, this brings them in-line with Man's capabilities. If anything and you are looking for ideas from the past to develop fiction from then it might pay to use what we really know was done as your starting point than the old chestnuts that caught the public imagination with little to back it up once it was closely examined.
Don't be put off by this book's age. After all, if you saw it in the library, you'd still pick it up to see what it was about and the Dewey system might well put it amongst those books purely from the title description.
Stiebing goes through all the theories and not only explains but shows how ancient man was ingenious with his solutions to building pyramids but also places like Atlantis certainly couldn't have been anywhere described and things like the Great Flood unlikely. Even the ancient astronauts pictures have been shown to be misinterpretations when compared to other illustrations from the time. All such things have been covered in television documentaries in the past few decades but having a physical small book in your collection to refer to makes for an easier reference.
The main reason so few scientists have gotten into discussions on these subjects is because as academics they didn't give it any attention. Stibing actually spends a chapter looking at this point of view showing that there is a need for scientists to fight back on such erroneous views or we could end up with more situations like creationism/intelligent design getting more coverage than scientific proof. Had they gotten involved and derided such ideas as poppycock from the start, we might have been spared such numerous books appearing on the shelves. Considering how much Science Fiction is based on or extrapolating from real science this is always something important to consider. Buy, read, inwardly digest and ponder how you fell for any of this stuff in the first place.
GF Willmetts
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