Forbidden History: Prehistoric Technologies, Extraterrestrial Intervention, and the Suppressed Origins of Civilization (14 page)

Based on the pattern above, I will not be surprised if our planet experiences another major cometary encounter during the twenty-first or early-twenty-second century. This predicated future event may have already been foreshadowed by the 1908 extraterrestrial impact (I believe it was cometary in origin) in the Tunguska region of Siberia.

Extraterrestrial events have recently been acknowledged as also playing a major role in the development of human culture in the very distant past. The March 3, 2000, issue of
Science
magazine includes an article on stone tools from southern China dated to approximately 800,000 years ago. What is particularly interesting about these tools is their association with tektites, glassy fragments of molten rock that resulted from a meteorite impact (the result of a comet or asteroid colliding with our planet). It seems that the impact scorched the landscape, dramatically altered the local environment, exposed the rocks from which the stone tools were ultimately manufactured, and paved the way for early human innovation. In the devastation of the impact and its aftermath, new opportunities for cultural development arose.

Clearly the evidence continues to accumulate that extraterrestrial and, in particular, cometary events have directly influenced the course of human civilization. I stand by the ideas presented, and themes discussed, in
Voices of the Rocks
. More than ever, I believe we must learn from the past even as we prepare for the future. Let us hope that we learn in time.