Was this the most serious Fraud in the History of Science?
In 1865, Astronomer Royal of Scotland, Charles “Piazzi” Smyth, published “Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid”, an instant best-seller that, for all the wrong reasons, was to radically change the course of history. It also, eventually, changed the laws of publishing and the rules of what counted as a ‘revised’ or ‘re-edited’ edition.
However, in 1865, there were no such rules and no strict scientific protocols and peer review was largely conducted as a sort of gentleman’s agreement, where social status largely ruled the roost.
Had Academia enforced what are now commonly accepted as normal scientific protocols, it’s possible Smyth’s original work could still have been published but the five (5) ‘revised’, ‘re-edited’ and/or ‘abridged’ versions of his book made during his lifetime would never have been allowed under the same title and his devious and somewhat irrational train of thought might never have taken hold as the accepted doctrine.
Smyth’s original, 1865, 1st edition of “Our Inheritance…” was a massive book and clearly a work of considerable scholarship but was such heavy and difficult reading, I suggest very few indeed would have persisted with any great dedication.
However, almost 100 years later, in 1959, I committed many weeks to a dedicated study of this recommended authority, until glaring ‘errors’ in applied geometry and numerous unsustained and highly biased assumptions caused me to abandon it as a reliable reference.
Not until 2002 did I even become aware of the full scope of Smyth’s religion-inspired duplicity or how it had imbedded itself so effectively as fact that it effectively blocked all further debate.
Promoted as fact to the present day at the highest levels, Smyth’s fraud, initiated in 1865, continues to block critical evidence about the truth, 1st uncovered by Flinders Petrie in 1883 and fully proven in 1925.
Critical Evidence – buried for a 150 years.
The Feud that changed the course of History
In 1865, at just 12years of age, child prodigy, William Matthew “Flinders” Petrie, the son of Smyth’s closest personal friends, eagerly read Smyths instant best-seller “Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid”.
However, finding what he considered unscientific bias in Smyth’s work, the young Petrie personally challenged the forthright and esteemed author, setting in place a public feud that’s radically altered the course of history.
Piazzi Smyth allowed his religious and Imperial convictions to override his scientific impartiality. He vigorously persisted in his deception for decades and is thus largely responsible for Global Warming.
Were it NOT for Smyth’s duplicity:
- A Solar-based power economy could have been developed 155 years ago.
- The greatest mystery of our past would have been completely resolved and
- ‘Global Warming’ might never have eventuated at all.
Petrie’s basic reactions were typically precocious but not inappropriate. However, whilst his outrage was possibly overdone, given his youth and later actions, it’s hard to suggest what else he could have done.
Hidden Implications of Global Significance
Petrie in Egypt
Despite his extreme youth, Petrie followed through with his challenge. He worked for years to become a world-class surveyor, significantly improving the accuracy of the instruments available at that time. To hone his skills, he conducted surveys of numerous historic sites and his (1872) survey of Stonehenge is still recognised as definitive.
In 1881/82, at 27yo, Petrie eventually went to Egypt and carried out his own survey of the Giza plateau, publishing his findings in “The Pyramids and Temples at Gizeh(sic)”, in 1883. On page 40, in chapter VI (inset) Petrie reveals the base of the Great Pyramid as being accurate in its alignment – to a mean error of “somewhat less than .6 inch” (ie 15.2mm).
The precision-in-construction on such a large building, as physically demonstrated by Petrie, is not logically feasible without what we now call ‘laser’ technology (Only re-invented in the late 20th century).
Petrie thus defined the pyramid as built to meet the ‘scientific imperatives’ of a previously unknown (solar) technology of potentially global significance.
Although Petrie was by no means entirely blameless, (being himself forthright to the point of rudeness) had the claims he published in 1883 been properly checked, it is inconceivable that the Ancient (now MACE) Technology would not have been discovered at least a century earlier, thus avoiding almost all of our present problems with global warming and climate change.
In the event, when Petrie’s book was first published, Smyth, by then a popular and very prominent public figure, vehemently attacked Petrie’s scholarship, saying the precision Petrie claimed was not physically possible and obviously only claimed out of spite to discredit himself.
Although Petrie was later completely vindicated by a further survey 40yrs later, by JH Cole, in 1925, the damage had been done. Petrie’s book remained in limbo for 119yrs, only resurfacing in 2002 when it was republished, in full on the Internet by Graham Oaten of Melbourne, ably assisted by Ronald Birdsall.
The cost of debunking a far more senior adversary
Although Petrie went on to an illustrious career in Archaeology, his forthright nature and feud with Smyth clearly had a lasting impact on his personal reputation amongst his peers.
Despite later being knighted, in 1923, for “his introduction of scientific methodology to the field of Archaeology” that changed forever how archaeological field research was conducted, he appears to have made little comment when his earlier work was finally confirmed “in all essential detail” by JH Cole, in 1925. As a result, his seminal discoveries at Giza have essentially been allowed to drift in limbo for 150 years.
Despite his knighthood, Petrie was also shunned for his pragmatic views on eugenics and spent his later years perfecting the dating techniques that still allow ancient sites and their contents to be correctly dated.
The “laser” precision of the Great Pyramid, as defined by Petrie in 1883, has yet to be generally acknowledged.
Why Rules were introduced and how history gets warped
In hindsight, it would appear that Smyth was not intentionally evil, but rather grossly misled by the passion of religious convictions, widely popular at that time, in the mid-to-late Victorian England, when Britain was at the height of its Imperial power.
It might be thought that the significance of his claims might have waned once he was discredited but his book had been a major best-seller and, ipso facto, has continued to act as a major reference, despite reservations expressed by many writers.
Despite the bias and deception, the “within 8 inches” precision claimed in “Our Inheritance…” continues to dominate in Archaeology. Despite the fact that Petrie’s findings, of far greater accuracy, preclude any possibility of the pyramid having been built without lasers, it’s Smyth’s definition that still dominates the literature.
My repeated attempts to debate this matter with authority figures in Archaeology have simply been ignored.
However, back in 1959, even Smyth’s “optical” precision had been more than enough to support my own conclusion that:
“All pyramids, worldwide, must be part of a previously unrecognised Solar technology of global significance”.
To my own satisfaction at least, over the last 60 years I have shown how lasers, geopolymers and formwork could have been used in the known time-scale to produce the accepted “optical” precision of the Great pyramid and have used the techniques in several projects.
I wrote my first book, “The Perfect Pyramid” (c2004) about my theory and discoveries but it seemed unlikely that, as an aging rank-amateur, I could ever do very much more.
However, my research had also uncovered an avalanche of new evidence from a great many fields of endeavour and, as I closed in on the ultimate solution, I felt compelled to continue for as long as I was able.
Beyond the Deception
My own personal commitment to solving this mystery had begun with my reading (notably) of a 1st edition copy of “Our Inheritance...”
It was 30 years before I learned that (5) ‘revised’ editions of “Our Inheritance…”, were so different as to be an entirely different work, and later still before I learned of Petrie’s, (1883) “Pyramids and Temple’s...” and JH Cole’s 1925 survey, that finally proved my suspicions to be correct.
For reasons both good and bad, my study of Smyth’s original work over a 2-3 month period, had radically changed the course of my entire life.
The ‘good’ is that it quickly led me to the conclusion the Great Pyramid had been built in response to an as-yet undefined “scientific imperative” that included the use of Solar energy on a scale that’s still unmatched 60 years later.
The ‘bad’, is the work also contained apparent ‘schoolboy errors’ in geometry, plus blatantly obvious bias impossible and seemingly out of character with the acknowledged credentials of the author, the highly acclaimed ‘Astronomer Royal of Scotland’ (from 1846-1888).
Summing up on the ‘Buried’ Evidence
Only in 2002, with the re-publication, initially on the Internet, of Petrie’s 1883 book “The Pyramids and Temples at Gizeh(sic)” (courtesy of Graham Oaten of Melbourne and Ronald Birdsall) did I finally discover:
- That I was by no means the 1st to seriously doubt Smyth’s integrity.
- That his duplicity had indeed changed the course of history.
Essentially, the true significance of Smyth’s long-sustained fraud revolves around the truism that, in any construction or manufacturing process, “it is inherently impossible to build to a greater precision than is allowed for by your system of measurement”. (ie however small, a margin of error, ±, is totally inevitable.)
By redefining the mean error as “somewhat less than 0.6inch”, Petrie had removed even the remotest possibility the Great Pyramid could have been built with mere ‘optical’ instruments. It thus represented a near-perfect example of a technology far more advanced than any yet to hand (c1883).
Since it’s obviously easier to copy than to invent from scratch, I totally fail to comprehend why, when the evidence of an advance technology was proven in 1925, no one took the next and obvious step, of investigating further.
The Convenience of Ignorance
Despite the independent confirmation, in 1925* by JH Cole, of Petrie’s 1883 survey results, leading Egyptologist, Mark Lehner, covered Petrie’s work in his major, 1997 reference work “The Complete Pyramids”, but totally failed to even mention Petrie’s more precise data, or its confirmation by JH Cole, in 1925, or the all-but inevitable implications of that knowledge.
In the 1980’s, French scientist Joseph Davidovits conducted extensive scientific, spectral analyses, proving the extensive use of 3 geopolymers in the pyramids’ construction. Davidovits’ developed modern geopolymer technology based directly on his finds, but his conclusions too, have been derided, ignored and/or totally dismissed. If these facts don’t represent a prime face case of the long-term perpetuation of dubious practice, then I’d like to know what does?
When BAD is GOOD – and lingering questions
From a holistic perspective, historians in the future may well come to see the lengthy delay in the recovery of this technology as extremely fortunate and, most probably, even the inspired intervention of a ‘higher power’.
It will be argued, not unreasonably, that the very lack of this technology has spurred the advancement seen across all areas of science over the last century that, very probably, may never have occurred at all had the MACE technology been recovered sooner.
However, whilst I anticipate (perhaps conservatively) that these extraordinary circumstances and events will go down in history as the subject of debate for centuries to come, in retrospect, I’ve come to wonder just how significant the original “Laser precision” was in increasing the performance of the Great Pyramids.