The Freemasons should sue.
This series could be a great, wacko paean to the Lunatic Fringe - taking mundane elements, factual and mythological alike, and making really bizarre conclusions from them. Lots of shows do the same.
Instead, it takes itself seriously.
Leaving Freemasonry for a second, let's take this episode's treatment of Egyptian technology along with the Jew's depiction of Jacob's Ladder first.
In show's like this the Pyramids and obelisks of Egypt are always taken, a priori, as proof of "alien" intervention. Technologically primitive cultures simply couldn't build such sophisticated structures so it had to be "aliens", or an unknown, scientifically advanced civilization (i.e. Atlantis).
Fact is scientific anything has nothing to do with it - string, plums, squares and clever, precise usage of them was all it took. If we decided to make a replica of the Great Pyramid, we'd do it best by relying on the same methods, with a strong assist from modern machinery, rather than trying to invoke "scientific" technology, i.e., advanced math or anything beyond brute force machinery. And it would cost much, much more than it did the fourth and fifth Dynasty Egyptians. The Pyramids were built with very basic applied geometry and a strong application of People Power - a work force composed of strong backs dedicated, really dedicated, to constructing marvels. Even so, the Great Pyramid did exhaust Egypt's economy and workforce, briefly, but - this is rarely noted in treatments written or visual - both rebounded quickly enough to start doing it all over again. No doubt inspired by the confidence and pride of having done it successfully on such a grand scale.
The obelisks, appearing 600 years after the completion of the Great Pyramid, likewise reflected a Grand Vision accomplished with precise application of basic technology.
Moreover there's the point of how differently our ancestors though of reality. All ancients cultures centered reality on their local perspective, i.e. strictly what they have seen, or of what others have seen, of the world. They knew nothing of planets or galaxies or "Space" or the broadness of the Universe(s). For the Egyptians, the Universe was, functionally, Egypt, period.
Now for Jacob's Ladder, how hackneyed can you get? A ladder to Heaven with God at one end and Jacob on the other - how can this be constantly continue to be interpreted as proof of Aliens ascending and descending from spaceships, anymore than workmen flowing up and down from a roof-top? Yet it's a staple of Alien theorists.
Back to the Freemasons - seems, beginning with their origins in Egypt (according to the show) there's a straight line to the Age of Reason, which includes all of the values the Freemasons embody. The fact that those values, focused on the individual, had a nearly two thousand year incubation period beginning with The Sermon on the Mount and culminating with The Declaration of Independence is ignored; instead, the Freemasons seemingly sprung fully formed within the context of an admittedly humane culture whose philosophical energies were centered on the afterlife. Again, while Egyptian culture had a strong element of respect for all of it's subjects, they were not Liberal Humanists and trying to link the roots of Freemasonry to Egypt is untenable.
Likewise the Jews - Tenth Century Israel was no place for Humanists; its traditions included one god, the major god, who delighted in smiting his followers and massacring those who weren't. At the same time, pretty much every other Levantine God had shrines in pretty much every household. Hardly a hotbed of Liberal Humanism. The individuals living in it were largely subject to being smote on a whim, not valued as unique and important persons. Solomon's Temple, little more than a shack in stone, is a sorry starting point for any kind of integrated, humane world view.
In reality the Freemasons, while mimicking the trade guilds of the Middle Ages, is strictly an 18th Century phenomena. Absorbing, as they developed in detail, the liberal, individualistic values that define the West and, particularly, the America we know today. Extraterrestrial Aliens have no place in this process or its iterations.
Yet this show begins by characterizing George Washington as an Alien's adapt and takes it from there. Insulting, to say the least.
Then there's the Great Flaw common to all Alien Great Savior/Great Founder theories: equating technology with advancement (it's values that represents a culture's advancement from Strong-Man to Individualism, not technology, see Roman Empire) and ignoring the physics of space-flight. Assuming you could create an inertial bubble to surround a spaceship (keeping it from breaking up) and could accelerate it to a significant percentage of the speed of light, you can't make it violate the physics of time.
Fine, travel thousands of light years in a second, a day, a week or a month. That's your time; as far as the rest of the galaxy is concerned, it's still thousands of years. So a round trip of say, 500 years, is still going to be 500 years.
Time dilation is specific to the object in motion; fly from LA to NYC at an average of 500 MPH and you'll experience a time dilation of a few trillionths of a second but, as far as everyone else is concerned, those few trillionths are still there.
The point being, no matter how fast your technology lets you go don't expect to go home again. If it's still there chances are it won't be recognizable or, necessarily, have a place to land.
This series could be a great, wacko paean to the Lunatic Fringe - taking mundane elements, factual and mythological alike, and making really bizarre conclusions from them. Lots of shows do the same.
Instead, it takes itself seriously.
Leaving Freemasonry for a second, let's take this episode's treatment of Egyptian technology along with the Jew's depiction of Jacob's Ladder first.
In show's like this the Pyramids and obelisks of Egypt are always taken, a priori, as proof of "alien" intervention. Technologically primitive cultures simply couldn't build such sophisticated structures so it had to be "aliens", or an unknown, scientifically advanced civilization (i.e. Atlantis).
Fact is scientific anything has nothing to do with it - string, plums, squares and clever, precise usage of them was all it took. If we decided to make a replica of the Great Pyramid, we'd do it best by relying on the same methods, with a strong assist from modern machinery, rather than trying to invoke "scientific" technology, i.e., advanced math or anything beyond brute force machinery. And it would cost much, much more than it did the fourth and fifth Dynasty Egyptians. The Pyramids were built with very basic applied geometry and a strong application of People Power - a work force composed of strong backs dedicated, really dedicated, to constructing marvels. Even so, the Great Pyramid did exhaust Egypt's economy and workforce, briefly, but - this is rarely noted in treatments written or visual - both rebounded quickly enough to start doing it all over again. No doubt inspired by the confidence and pride of having done it successfully on such a grand scale.
The obelisks, appearing 600 years after the completion of the Great Pyramid, likewise reflected a Grand Vision accomplished with precise application of basic technology.
Moreover there's the point of how differently our ancestors though of reality. All ancients cultures centered reality on their local perspective, i.e. strictly what they have seen, or of what others have seen, of the world. They knew nothing of planets or galaxies or "Space" or the broadness of the Universe(s). For the Egyptians, the Universe was, functionally, Egypt, period.
Now for Jacob's Ladder, how hackneyed can you get? A ladder to Heaven with God at one end and Jacob on the other - how can this be constantly continue to be interpreted as proof of Aliens ascending and descending from spaceships, anymore than workmen flowing up and down from a roof-top? Yet it's a staple of Alien theorists.
Back to the Freemasons - seems, beginning with their origins in Egypt (according to the show) there's a straight line to the Age of Reason, which includes all of the values the Freemasons embody. The fact that those values, focused on the individual, had a nearly two thousand year incubation period beginning with The Sermon on the Mount and culminating with The Declaration of Independence is ignored; instead, the Freemasons seemingly sprung fully formed within the context of an admittedly humane culture whose philosophical energies were centered on the afterlife. Again, while Egyptian culture had a strong element of respect for all of it's subjects, they were not Liberal Humanists and trying to link the roots of Freemasonry to Egypt is untenable.
Likewise the Jews - Tenth Century Israel was no place for Humanists; its traditions included one god, the major god, who delighted in smiting his followers and massacring those who weren't. At the same time, pretty much every other Levantine God had shrines in pretty much every household. Hardly a hotbed of Liberal Humanism. The individuals living in it were largely subject to being smote on a whim, not valued as unique and important persons. Solomon's Temple, little more than a shack in stone, is a sorry starting point for any kind of integrated, humane world view.
In reality the Freemasons, while mimicking the trade guilds of the Middle Ages, is strictly an 18th Century phenomena. Absorbing, as they developed in detail, the liberal, individualistic values that define the West and, particularly, the America we know today. Extraterrestrial Aliens have no place in this process or its iterations.
Yet this show begins by characterizing George Washington as an Alien's adapt and takes it from there. Insulting, to say the least.
Then there's the Great Flaw common to all Alien Great Savior/Great Founder theories: equating technology with advancement (it's values that represents a culture's advancement from Strong-Man to Individualism, not technology, see Roman Empire) and ignoring the physics of space-flight. Assuming you could create an inertial bubble to surround a spaceship (keeping it from breaking up) and could accelerate it to a significant percentage of the speed of light, you can't make it violate the physics of time.
Fine, travel thousands of light years in a second, a day, a week or a month. That's your time; as far as the rest of the galaxy is concerned, it's still thousands of years. So a round trip of say, 500 years, is still going to be 500 years.
Time dilation is specific to the object in motion; fly from LA to NYC at an average of 500 MPH and you'll experience a time dilation of a few trillionths of a second but, as far as everyone else is concerned, those few trillionths are still there.
The point being, no matter how fast your technology lets you go don't expect to go home again. If it's still there chances are it won't be recognizable or, necessarily, have a place to land.
