I remember this old battered paperback that was passed around my father’s family — I think it was my uncle who got it first, and eventually it settled down on a bookshelf at my house. I read it, because I read every book that found its way to my home, but I disliked it rather thoroughly. It contained nothing but glib superficial explanations of the behavior of human cultures rooted in a belief that we couldn’t possibly have done anything. Everything was given to us by godlike alien beings. Every great accomplishment by non-European societies was in service to creatures in flying saucers who bestowed their technology on all the brown people who were otherwise helpless.
It annoyed me. Also the fact that the author based everything on the most superficial, biased analyses.
My father ate it up with a spoon, though, so I can sympathize a little with all those people who made his books so popular. Erich von Däniken had hit a sweet spot in the zeitgeist; trigger a little curiosity with odd phenomena and exotic places, and then satisfy it with pseudo-scientific explanations that sounded persuasive, it you’re most sophisticated analyses were the kind of thing you’d hear from a church pulpit. He’d tickle, then pretend to scratch the itch. It has become a familiar strategy for con artists who want to get rich off normal human curiosity, but who didn’t want to do the hard work of actually studying something in depth. Graham Hancock is the latest parasite to glom onto the game.
Well, von Däniken is dead. His hustle lives on, unfortunately, as long as there are inquisitive, gullible people who are satisfied with answers that are wrong, but that fit into an existing bias.
I remember being shocked when I discovered von Daniken was still alive. Based on his ideas, I had assumed he was writing in the early 20th century.
I read his books when I was 12 or so, I think the first one was even a Xmas gift from my parents. They were nice stories and theories, but even back then I remember thinking, yeah, nah.
As far as pseudoscientific hogwash goes, I preferred reading Heuvelmans. At least that stuff wasn’t offensive most of the time.
On top of everything else, he influenced the Alien franchise. It had already been hurt by the alien vs predator garbage but then Prometheus came along. Not even Noomi Rapache could save that film.
.
A more plausible approach was the Expanse TV series; finding very old alien tech.
There is also the approach in “Wayside Picnic” by the Strugatsky brothers; finding the junk left behind by a visit and failing to make sense of it. It was the inspiration for Tarkovsky’s Stalker.
If you want to have a stroke, read the …’books’…by David Icke. He is an unfortunate person who describes symptoms of schizophrenia but refuses to acknowledge it as such. He started the “shape shifting reptilian” BS.
@4 birgerjohansson
In a similar vein, Hard to Be a God. But here humans are the ancient astronauts.
Forget Däniken. Bob Weir is dead.
Not to worry. von Däniken will live on in the form of TicTok and other social media.
Good point.
I saw them three times as an older teenage kid, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Owsley was there doing the sound system.
They weren’t even that famous back then.
If you live long enough, you get to see your favorite musicians, artists, and authors die.
Also all your friends and family.
And, these days, you can see our democracy and the USA dying as well.
I’m just going to say it. Life is difficult sometimes.
Isaac Asimov did an excellent take down on von Daniken. He started by acknowledging that many criticisms of the works were of areas outside of the critic’s expertise. So Asimov went after the errors in von Daniken’s biochemistry.
I read that book when I was in the military. In addition to all the obvious flaws, I remember feeling vaguely insulted when he suggested using members of the military as labor for excavation sites “since we were all just sitting around not doing anything anyway.”
Checked out this book and another of his from the library when I was a kid. I had found the ancient alien stuff incredibly interesting when I encountered it in stories and wanted to know if there was anything to it in reality.
Only learned that EvD was an idiot who didn’t seem to realise he didn’t really understand what he was writing about.
Also important to remember, EvD was a racist: https://www.jasoncolavito.com/blog/erich-von-daniken-puts-out-official-statement-attacking-me-by-name
Also, the current publisher of his Dreck here in Germany is a well known distributor of right wing propaganda and conspiracy theories.
specialffrog@1: Considering D.s ideas are mostly based on colonial era racism, theosophy and H.P. Lovecraft, it’s no wonder you placed him in the past.