The long-running TV series "Ancient Aliens" has long been a strange mixture of the daring, the dazzling and the dubious. On the positive side, the show often draws our attention to interesting anomalies worthy of our attention, anomalies that have too often been wrongly swept under the rug by mainstream scientists. Also on the positive side, "Ancient Aliens" often raises objections to doubtful dogmas of academia that should indeed be questioned. On the negative side, "Ancient Aliens" often pushes its owns doubtful dogmas, along with speculations that are not very credible.
Such strengths and weaknesses were shown in a recent episode of "Ancient Aliens" entitled "The Human Experiment," one that was a weird smorgasbord of interesting journalism, unbelievable speculations, weighty considerations well-worth pondering, and untrue claims. The episode was mainly devoted to advancing an unbelievable claim constantly repeated on the show: that humans became humans because extraterrestrials tinkered with our DNA.
The reason why this claim is unbelievable is not because of some impossibility that extraterrestrials visited us in the past. The two main reasons why this claim is unbelievable are these:
(1) There are no conceivable modifications in DNA that can explain the physical origin of human bodies, because DNA does not specify anatomy, contrary to the mythical claims to the contrary that have often been made by scientists and science writers. DNA uses a system called the genetic code in which chemicals in DNA (called nucleotide base pairs) stand for amino acids that make up proteins. But under such a system there is only a very limited capacity for specification. DNA (and the genes that make up DNA) can only specify low-level chemical information such as the amino acids that make up proteins, and the contents of RNA molecules. When scientists discovered the genetic code used by DNA, they only discovered an extremely limited coding scheme completely incapable of specifying complex three-dimensional structures such as the layout of a human body or the structure of an eye or the layout of the human reproductive system or even the structure of any cell. Read the posts here, here and here for more on why DNA cannot be a specification of anatomy. In the post here you will read quotations from more than twenty biologists, chemists and doctors who say that DNA is not a blueprint or a recipe or a program or an algorithm for building a human body.
(2) Things such as the origin of language and the origin of the human mind cannot possibly be explained by extraterrestrials tinkering with human DNA. Because DNA does not specify anatomy, DNA changes cannot explain the physical structure of the brain. Also, the brain does not explain the human mind or the capabilities of human memory, for reasons abundantly explained in the posts of the site here. In short, DNA does not explain brains, and brains don't explain minds. So the idea that humans got their advanced minds and language by extraterrestrials modifying our DNA is unbelievable.
I would describe the "ancient astronaut theorists" constantly evoked on the "Ancient Aliens" program as being half-rebels or quarter-rebels. On one hand, such theorists are willing to rebel against the silly origins dogmas of academia, by pointing out that human minds and human culture appeared on the scene too quickly to be explained by any ideas of mainstream professors. On the other hand, such ancient astronaut theorists seem to accept "hook, line and sinker" some of the least believable ideas of mainstream professors. Our ancient astronaut theorists seem to uncritically accept incorrect ideas that DNA is some "explain-it-all" molecule that can explain human minds and anatomy. It is no such thing, but merely a piece in the grand puzzle of human origins. Such ancient astronaut theorists also seem to accept "hook, line and sinker" unwarranted claims that human minds can be explained by brains.
In the recent "Ancient Aliens" episode on DNA, we had several misstatements about DNA. The narrator claimed that DNA is a molecule that defines every creature on Earth. DNA is no such thing, but merely a very important chemical database used by living things. The structure of cells is not specified by DNA, nor is the anatomy of organisms. We had a statement by biologist Kirsten Fisher, making this give-us-the-wrong-idea claim: "The DNA code is essentially like a language consisting of genes that confer particular traits like eye color, hair color, all these traits basically that we recognize." DNA is only a code by which nucleotides stand for amino acids, and is not "essentially like a language," because it has nothing but the tiniest vocabulary consisting only of about 25 nouns (each an amino acid), no verbs except "stop," no adjectives, and no grammar.
DNA has no power to specify things three-dimensional arrangements of parts the way languages do. While DNA may be important in determining eye color and hair color, it is very false indeed to claim that it confers "all the traits basically that we recognize." DNA does not specify human anatomy or even the anatomy of cells, nor does it specify human intellectual traits such as the ability to think, consciousness, morality, the ability to form memories, the ability to recall memories, and so forth. For example, the traits that we have ten fingers and ten toes and two eyes and one nose and one mouth are not specified by DNA. So it is very false to claim that DNA confers "all these traits basically that we recognize." The genome is not a blueprint," says Kevin Mitchell, a geneticist and neuroscientist at Trinity College Dublin, noting "it doesn't encode some specific outcome.""DNA cannot be seen as the 'blueprint' for life," says Antony Jose, associate professor of cell biology and molecular genetics at the University of Maryland, who says, "It is at best an overlapping and potentially scrambled list of ingredients that is used differently by different cells at different times."
We should have suspected that we were being given the wrong idea by biologist Fisher by the fact that she only gave the specific examples of eye color and hair color as traits conferred by DNA. When she said, "The DNA code is essentially like a language consisting of genes that confer particular traits like eye color, hair color, all these traits basically that we recognize," it sounded like some male suitor saying, "I'm so rich: I have a pencil and a small jar of coffee and every other thing a man could possibly dream of having."
We then hear another scientist (Adam Siepel) making the also untrue statement that "in a sense DNA is a program that gets run by the computer, and the computer is a cell." No, DNA is not a program, and it lacks the essential characteristic of a computer program, which are conditional logic statements such as "if/then" statements. The correct computer analogy for DNA is to compare to not to a program but to a primitive database -- not a modern relational database which can include logic in the form of stored procedures, but merely the simplest databases that merely have data. Although cells are vastly more complex than molecules (way too complex to be explained by anything in DNA), cells are not computers that run programs.
Beware of biologists using phrases such as "essentially like," "basically" and "in a sense." Alarms bells should go off in our minds when we hear such words, and we should be suspicious that at best someone is saying something that is not literally true, and that at worst someone is starting to shovel baloney.
In the "Ancient Aliens" episode I am discussing someone claims that DNA is "essentially digital." That is untrue. Information either is digital or is not digital, and calling something "essentially digital" is like saying someone is "essentially pregnant." When information is digital, it consists of sequences equivalent to ones and zeros, sequences such as 1010101001111100010101. None of the information in DNA is digital.
The "Ancient Aliens" episode unconvincingly tries to cite human genetic engineering with CRISPR as something that helps supports claims that aliens tampered with human DNA. It is suggested that "DNA knots" are evidence of extraterrestrial tampering. We have a rather ridiculous attempt to persuade us that some short slightly winding symbol found in ancient Egyptian art is a depiction of the double helix, something we are told "cannot be by chance." Someone describes the DNA double helix co-discoverer Francis Crick as someone who promoted the idea that extraterrestrial visitors were the origin of "human DNA." But in his paper on the topic, Crick merely spoke vaguely of extraterrestrials being the origin of "terrestrial organisms," and said "the scientific evidence is inadequate at the present time to say anything about the probability."
We hear the very strange suggestion that humans are smarter than chimps because we have two fewer chromosomes than chimps. After a long attempt to convince us that humans arose because extraterrestrials modified our DNA, the episode went into a discussion of other topics. There was a discussion of people claiming that they were abducted by extraterrestrials, people such as Betty Hill and Barney Hill. We hear an interesting account from a woman who claimed that her pregnancy ended when extraterrestrials extracted the growing 4-month-old child from her womb.
The "Ancient Aliens" episode then has some noteworthy footage of blindfolded children apparently demonstrating powers of clairvoyance. The demonstration seems persuasive, because the large completely opaque blindfolds are very solid material maybe twice as large as large sunglasses, extending way below the eyes; and the children are looking straight ahead at targets two meters away at eye level, without tilting their heads backwards (ruling out the "looked through the bottom crack of the blindfold" objection made by skeptics). The footage is from the film "Superhuman: The Invisible Made Visible" by Caroline Cory.
I strongly suspect that neither cheating nor faking is going on here, because of the factors mentioned above and because similar clairvoyance results by children have been very well documented in the Soviet Union and China, as discussed in my post here, entitled "EHF: Reports of Chinese Kids With Paranormal Powers." I asked only one person from China whether she had ever heard of such reports, without any reason to think that she had. She said that she had a relative who had demonstrated such powers as a child (including the power to see inside a closed box), and that this relative was brought to Beijing to be tested by the government.
The fact is that we have nearly two hundred years of well-documented evidence for human clairvoyance, from all over the globe, provided by a host of reliable witnesses. The evidence stretches back all the way to the report of the French Royal Academy of Medicine issued in 1831, one finding in favor of clairvoyance. Clairvoyance has been well-documented by esteemed authorities such as Professor William Gregory, a chemistry professor at the very prestigious University of Edinburgh who documented at very great length his observations of clairvoyant subjects. The written nineteenth century evidence and early twentieth century evidence for clairvoyance during states of hypnotism and trance is extremely abundant, and clairvoyance was well-demonstrated in a host of public exhibitions and experiments. The fact that so many contemporary professors deny the existence of clairvoyance is one of the most outrageous modern examples of denying solid evidence, typically made by people who never studied the original source evidence (such as the cases discussed here).
The fact that the "Ancient Aliens" episode on DNA has presented some modern evidence for clairvoyance is commendable. But in the same episode we are shown the filmmaker Caroline Cory who has filmed this evidence, participating in a panel discussion with ancient astronaut theorists. Perhaps to fit in with all of their talk about extraterrestrials tinkering with human DNA, Caroline suggests that extraterrestrials might have upgraded our DNA to give humans the power of clairvoyance. Caroline not only suggests this idea, but says "I guarantee you" that extraterrestrials are modifying our DNA.
This explanation makes no sense at all. Clairvoyance and other psychic phenomena such as telepathy and near-death experiences can never be explained by anything in DNA, nor can they be explained by anything in human brains. Such phenomena can only be explained by ideas such as the hypothesis that humans have souls, or some spiritual capability that is the equivalent of having souls. This is very probably why materialists have for so long stubbornly refused to accept almost two hundred years of very convincing evidence for clairvoyance: because they know that once you admit the existence of clairvoyance, the existence of something like a human soul is all but certain.
There is no evidence that people who score higher on ESP tests or clairvoyance tests have different DNA than average people. There is no evidence that anyone has DNA much different from average people, with the exception of people with birth defects. Contrary to clickbait headlines exaggerating small changes, human DNA has changed very little over the past two thousand years, with the main changes being mainly related to not-very-important things such as eye color, hair color and lactose digestion. So genome analysis does not support a claim that extraterrestrials are modifying our DNA.
It's rather a shame that the "Ancient Aliens" show originally chose the title of "Ancient Aliens." That title is kind of a ball-and-chain that its writers are tied to, a kind of prison that limits them. It would have been better if the show had a more noncommittal title, something like perhaps "Mysterious Beginnings" or "Contrarian Theories." That way, the show could have progressed beyond its Erich von Daniken beginnings. But with the title "Ancient Aliens" the show is kind of chained to an original hypothesis, not very free to move out to more credible theorizing. Conversely, I am glad that I chose for this blog the noncommittal title of "Future and Cosmos," along with a subtitle ending with the phrase "...and other weighty topics." With such a title and subtitle I have felt free to move in whatever direction I felt was most consistent with what I have learned during years of study on a very wide variety of topics, without having to feel that I have to stay consistent with some box-me-in title. If you ever start a new blog detailing your thoughts on philosophy, politics, science or religion, I advise picking some blog title that does not box-you-in to some position you may later move away from.
Postscript: On the Travel Channel's UFO Witness show, we have an account by one of the people claiming an alien abduction experience. We are told the account arose after "hypnotherapy." But accounts told under hypnosis are suspect, because under hypnosis subjects can be extremely suggestible. This was reported by Professor William Gregory as far back as the nineteenth century, on the page here, where he indicates that hypnotized people can be made to believe almost anything suggested. To judge the reliability of the "abduction account," we would need to read a transcript of what the hypnotist and patient said. Did the account of extraterrestrials arise after such an idea was suggested by the hypnotist? Or did it arise when the hypnotist acted neutrally, asking something like "Tell me about what happened on the night when you were puzzled by what happened"?
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