Summary: Interview with Ancient Aliens Debunked filmmaker Chris White who swamps the Ancient Alien theories with science, but relies on Biblical inerrancy for core beliefs. Join Skeptiko host Alex Tsakiris for an interview with Chris White, creator of the popular documentary film, Ancient Aliens Debunked. During the interview White discusses the film as well as his controversial conservative Christian beliefs: Alex Tsakiris: Here’s what Ancient Aliens, the TV show says is one of the most compelling bits of evidence for the Ancient Alien proposition, and that’s the site of Pumapunku and the ruins there. That’s where you start the film. So, take us through Pumapunku, and how that’s debunked. Chris White: The main thing that the Ancient Astronaut theory proponents suggest is that these angles are too perfect and the stone-cutting is too amazing to be anything that any ancient peoples could have done. We could talk about what the site actually was and so on but the main thing is that the stonemasonry there at Pumapunku is not difficult to do. There’s lots of things that they say are true about Pumapunku that are not. For example, they say that these stones are granite and diorite and therefore they’re too hard. Not only is that not true if they were granite or diorite but they’re not granite or diorite. They’re red sandstone and ambercite. They are not as heavy as they say they are and they’re not as in the right-angles as they say they are. Later, Mr. White offers opinions on the limitations of Islam and Buddhism, and the primacy of Christianity: Chris White: In Islam they have a lot of rules that say, “Give to the poor. Fast. Be nice to people.” Those are rules that they’re following because of threat of whatever. Alex Tsakiris: You can’t generalize like that, Chris. Chris White: I think it’s dangerous when we say, “Oh, we know that these people are just as good.” I think you can analyze—not their personality -- I’m not talking about whether they’re good or not but you can analyze the very tenants of what they’re trying to do. And I think very few times do people understand Hinduism or Buddhism or Islam or any of these things… Alex Tsakiris: Chris, how many Buddhist monks have you met? How many Buddhist monks have you encountered and really sat down and experienced, and talked to? Chris White: It’s really not about the individual; it’s about what they are claiming that any individual would claim… Alex Tsakiris: How is it not about the individual? It’s only about the individual. Chris White: Because nobody has reached the very thing that they need which is freedom from Nirvana or getting to Nirvana. Show me a Buddhist that would claim that right now. Everybody’s saying, “Oh well, the suffering is caused by tanha.” Tanha is sin. It’s our desires to do bad things that we don’t want to do. That’s the reason that any Buddhist is trying to do the ascetic practices. They try to eat less rice, go onto a hill, do whatever because they’re trying to defeat the innate desire to sin. Now, that’s their path. If you understand that they’re hoping that one day, if they do all the right meditations and they eat the less food and they give away enough possessions and they’re nice enough to people, it will happen and they will be diminished in their level of desiring to sin. That’s Buddhism. Ancient Aliens Debunked Website Play It: Listen Now: Download MP3 (80 min.) Read It: Today we welcome filmmaker, radio host, and podcaster, Chris White to Skeptiko. Chris’ latest documentary, Ancient Aliens Debunked, has caused quite a stir among Ancient Alien believers, as you might expect, as well as skeptics and even Evangelical Christians, as Chris himself is quite public about being a Conservative Christian. There’s a lot here to unpack and Chris, I’m really glad that you’re joining me today on Skeptiko to do just that. Welcome. Chris White: It’s great to be here, Alex.
