Using Google Earth to Find Ancient Cities

An anonymous reader writes "A story in the online site of the Aussie science mag Cosmos discusses how archaeologists are using sophisticated satellite images to find previously undiscovered cities. What 's really cool is how some are simply using Google Earth — and discovering all sorts of previously unknown sites!"

Re:No comments and the side is already quite slow,

[Anonymous Coward]

Why was NASA employing an archaeologist?

satellite imagery

[l2718]

You are right to point at the older story -- we need to make a distinction. The scientific point here is the use of satellite imagery to locate old cities. To social point is that Google Earth has made satellite images infinitely more accessible -- you don't need to be part of NASA anymore.

Re:Google must be a treasure trove...

[mr_mischief]

Ley lines probably do exist in some form or another. Magnetic deposits in the crust, auroras, the Earth's own main magnetic field and all kinds of things mean it's not completely improbable that lines of energy flow from one point of the globe to another naturally. The major magnetic field of the Earth from its rotating iron and nickel fore surely has fluctuations in it that cause energy imbalances. Those imbalances will be settled by moving electrons around.

That it's some mystical "mana" energy that flows from place to place is fantasy. So is the idea that the lines are permanently positioned and don't move as the fluctuations which cause the energy imbalances would cause the flow of energy to fluctuate too. The idea that a great deal of energy is included shows a basic misunderstanding of electricity since any large amount of energy would discharge into any sufficient path to ground. A nexus where two lines of energy meet but keep flowing past that point as two separate lines is pretty doubtful.

The whole ley line, nexus, and rift/gateway type of system is a great feature of fantasy fiction and role-playing games. There's no reason for scientists to bother investigating it IRL though. If someone could show some predictably repeatable phenomenon that could only be explained by magical energy of some sort, then there'd be some scientists willing to court the Nobel for finding evidence of that.

Re:Michael Crichton had the idea in 1980's Congo

[xenocide2]

Yes, but the difference is that we're not limiting the people viewing the pictures to Jane Goodall. That's the social point here -- getting the data is tricky, but sifting through it is simple enough. That's why many scientists guard their data carefully before publication I suppose; they don't want someone else beating them to the discoveries.

Re:Nice, but. . .

[kabocox]

Do these cities have StreetView yet? It could provide a vivid picture of what life was like in ancient times. :)

It's only a matter of time.

Re:Google must be a treasure trove...

[mr_mischief]

I think much of what people think of as magical is very often an oral and literary history of the misunderstandings and exaggerations of real, verifiable phenomena of a completely non-magical nature.

In the particular case of ley lines many possible phenomena like magnetic ores, auroras, swap gas, early morning fog over distant mountains, fault lines, weather fronts, and maybe even stratus clouds could have been seen as evidence of something we'd explain away in the days of science and skepticism. If you consider wind or water the sources of magical energy by their very nature, then the jet stream or large rivers become your ley lines.

The whole point is that people who engage in magical thinking aren't engaging in scientific thinking. There's no hypothesis. There's just belief in something and perhaps anecdotal evidence to reinforce the belief. They're not being bad scientists. They're being non-scientists.

So what are the observations? A compass goes wild along this side of this mountain, along pretty much a straight line (where the magnetite is). The air is sometimes cooler on that side of the street than this one (because it takes time for cool, dense air and warm, lighter air to mix at a weather front) when there are large storms. There are lights in the sky that dance and change color. There's a crack in the Earth, and great movement and destruction is unleashed from it (fault lines).

Now, over thousands of years, with little or no influence from science, how were the people seeing those things and talking about them supposed to explain them? The only point to be made about these explanations today is that we have a better understanding now and don't have to keep retelling the myths as anything more than myths.