From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of I Heart Gradios How Stuff Works. Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt nol is here in spirit they call me Ben. We are joined as always with our super producer Paul Mission controlled decad Most importantly, you are you. You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know. For a check in, Matt, I know usually I ask, I ask you first, but I just want to say, after interject, I am so glad to see you man. Yeah, it's been too long. It has been we uh, you know, for any of you that don't know out there, let's just give him a little bit hind the curtain. We record three times a week this show, so we we usually have a time like time to be together in a room talking, catching up before recording and everything and uh and has been notes all the time. We are friends outside of this magical darkened room where we record. Yea, so not having that has been uh, it's it's not been great. So it's also happy to see you, sir, thanks man, it feels a good Yeah, yeah, I was. Um, let's see, Paul and I were in Texas and then we're in Chicago for a second, and I am hopefully by the time all our fellow listeners hear this, I will have returned from Brussels. Wow, that's cool. I'm going there tomorrow as we record this. Oh my gosh. And now now with all that update, all that prool, like I have to ask how are how are you doing? Man? Almost almost almost sent you some prank text it was at the Alamo, but decided against it. Oh Man, I would have accepted. Uh, I'm doing really well. You know, everything in my life is focused on my son, and we're doing this thing where every morning he makes a picture of a letter and then we talked about what that letter is, and then the whole day is about that letter. So like walking around going to the grocery store, pointing out things that are like start with b uh. It's so it's so much fun. And uh yeah, the whole thing was my wife's idea. And she's so talented and smart about doing these kind of things. She makes every day unique and exciting for my son's h It's really great. That's that's what's going on with me. Ben. That's great. I want to ask you how you're doing personally and what's going on, but I have a feeling you would respond no comment. Okay, So let's go ahead. Let's go ahead and get into the episode. Everyone. We're talking pyramids today, right, Yes, pyramids. Pyramids some of the oldest known structures built by human beings so far as we know. And uh, these structures have also captivated human beings. Uh, not not just in the recent days when they're seen as mysterious and enigmatic, but during the times that they were built, right, and especially coming across Let's say you're walking along a river. You're following a river in exploration of some kind, and out in the distance you see something towering and it has sharp angles to it, which you don't find anywhere in nature. And as you get closer, you realize how large this structure is. It's not just the mountain in the middle of the desert. Yeah. Yeah, it's fascinating to put ourselves back in space and time. In a previous episode, we explored these stories of pyramids in other parts of the world, which is a real it's a real thing. You know what I mean, Like one of the early as pyramids we know about would be the zig Rats in Mesopotamia. Right, They don't get a lot of street credit. You know, a lot of people never heard of Mesopotamia until Ghostbusters came out in the eighties. No, no, no, maybe the Exorcists to be fair, because isn't Pozuzoo Maybe pezuzos Samarian. It all sounds familiar. It all sounds familiar, right. So in that episode, we we explore what pyramids are getting to the architecture of the structures, how they're typically built and so on, and we talked about how there are multiple different kinds of pyramids, right, and this this reminded me of a conversation that it's a little tangential, but I thought you would enjoy. I saw one of those Internet hypotheticals right when it was it hypothetical questions your friends post on the Internet, and it said, Okay, here's the gist. If someone gave you ten million dollars right now, cash in hand, with the following caveats, would you take the money. Here are the caveats. One, a snail will follow you for the rest of your life. Two if the snail touches you, you will die. And then there were a couple of other snail related things. My first question with that was, well, what type of snail? Because not all you know, when we see the word snail, we all think of like the same um crenulated shell and the you know, the like living booger that crawls around under it. But there are different sorts of snails, and there are different sorts of pyramids. So the thing that is interesting about this for our purpose is that there's so many misconceptions about pyramids, right. Uh. People think when we think of a pyramid, we think of the angular structure you're describing. I love that moment you took us back to where there's someone maybe living um a hunter gatherer lifestyle or something, and they're they're walking along the river and then they see the seat of human civilization breathtaking and they don't get immediately killed by the security forces or of some kind, right right, or the crocodiles or the other wildlife. Yes. Uh, so when we think of pyramids, we think of pyramids in Egypt, located in uh northern Africa. It's all because of the movie Stargate, just completely because of the movie Star, which is an amazing documentary. It is. Uh So it's strangely because as we found there are pyramids and other parts of the world, right they're they're not just in Egypt. We in our previous episodes we found them in South America. We are we knew that they were in South America where we also found them in Africa, parts of Asia. Um. I mean, it's it's fascinating, and we keep talking about this because anytime we bring up pyramids, you just get back to the question of why, Like why, why the heck why did you do with that? Like what is it? Why? Why did you do that? Yeah, that's my favorite part too, you know, like obelisk, yes are weird. Remember when we went to uh we went up to d C and we filmed some stuff about the Washington Monument. Yes, which, once upon his time was going to be you know, a statue of George Washington, but now it's you know, it's this ridiculously phallic thing you can crawl up inside of and reach the top. Yeah. Man, the tip. I don't know that's what it's all about. But but really the just that that um, that concept is still baffling to me. UM with all the varying types like you're talking about the zigger outs, the you know, the more angular pyramids, the stepped pyramids, all these things. It's just, um, they're so symbolic, and I think outwardly symbolic of something to have that shape. It also goes back to, you know, the construction process of you know, building up in that way right, right, But still it's just I don't know, there's something so mysterious about it. It's true, yet we know that we know that the primary purposes of pyramids and pyramid like structures I would also include baby mounds in the North American continent. We know that the primary purposes tended to be spiritual or funereal. Right, these are gigantic tombs taj Mahal style, or these are in the case of some zigarettes, holy sites, sacred sites of worship wherein rituals are enacted. At least that's our best understanding from the work of archaeology and our right the work of some brilliant archaeologists and then also the work of some uh just morally bankrupt ones back in the day. And then that's you know, like the the racism that gave rise later first to the idea of law civilizations, and then later to the idea of extraterrestrials. Because the people and for we have to hit this fact. The people who wrote a lot of early early stories about discovering these different amazing structures in different parts of the world, they they were somehow, on some level offended by the idea that the ancestors of the local people could have built those. So there you have it. We know that that's the that's the craziest thing. We know that pyramids, despite being ancient, the ancient pyramids and structure as we talked about, remain controversial today, not just because of the institutionalized discrimination and stuff, but also because people continue to claim that they have discovered more ancient pyramids thanks to Google Earth. May don't you know I love Google Earth and Light Are I know that's true? We will will? We all do. They are amazing tools. It just it gives an opportunity to at least search from behind a computer screen the entire planet for things that look angular or out of place or you know, square, rectangular, right. And it's not to say that these things don't exist somewhere in the world, because in many parts of the world, the surrounding ecosystem will eat everything made by man, you know what I mean. You can build something in a jungle and it can just for all intents and purposes, it can vanish. And I think you know, you and I probably both still check in to see how many new ruins or ancient sites are found just in the Amazon alone. There's a ton. Uh So, so we know that these things do exist, but we also know that there's a lot of exaggeration and a lot of hyperbole involved in these claims. Generally, these discoveries become controversial for one reason or another, and it's not it's not a case of you know, someone pretending to be a scientist a line or selling snake oil, as is so often the case in a lot of scientific research. The scientists, the archaeologist, the experts. Uh. They say one thing, maybe in a relatively obscure journal of some sort, and then someone someone else says, hey, this would be a great headline for my my blog, my my pop culture news thing, right website, my French website. Sure, and then then all of a sudden, what the scientists really we're saying gets convoluted and telephoned into something different. And that's where we get into these claims of ancient hitherto unknown civilizations, or they try to find something that is a selling point for a pyramid because in mainstream news or in fringe websites just saying hey, here is a pyramid found that confirms long held beliefs that this group of people lived in this way you know, or this crop or etcetera, etcetera. We want once some h perbole, you know, we want some some superlatives like when you graduate high school. Well, yeah, and the reader and or listener or whoever. I think this is just my opinion, who wants to have that discovery moment, that eureka moment where it's oh, civilization was older, or civilization did exist in this part of the world, or you know that that kind of I don't even know exactly what it is. It's that it's a mystery being solved, right, and you want that answer even if it doesn't even if it's a question that you weren't even really asking in that moment, but you see the potential for this answer to a cool thing. I'm not sure. Yeah, we like we like patterns and solutions. Yeah, we like seeing uh, we like seeing the bridge between concept, day and concept. The human beings are all about connection, right, I think I think that's a think it's profoundly as stupe man, because now we're talking about psychological drive and so what what does this what does this drive mean when we read about pyramids, Well, it means, like you said, they're all these claims, uh that this is the oldest one. Here's the biggest revelation that you're going to get with regards to this whole thing, and we're gonna give it to you right now, such as let's say it's let's say it's and you're at the Independent and you get a you know, a tip about some seashell constructions in Brazil and you post it up and you put a title that says something like world's oldest pyramids are discovered in Brazil. But that's literally all you have to put at the title. That's what they put, World's oldest pyramids are discovered, Right, Because with this kind of reporting, people love seeing an st an e s t the big st the old st these strange st right. And so when we when we see the world's oldest pyramid, we think, what Brazil, That is definitely not Egypt. Uh So, so the story with this is interesting because this is just one of a pattern of um oldest pyramid claims. Right, the Brazil Pyramids date back to two thousand BC, two thousand, three thousand BC or BC, whatever you prefer, and the construction techniques are different, because again, not every pyramid is created equal. These are as you said, met built of seashells, and they were built over a long period of time, but four, I think, starting in maybe two or so, about four years before the articles published, teams of researchers based in the area had been trying to figure out what was up with these things because they had been um largely deconstructed, yes, or broken down, right, that's just over through natural processes and stuff, or you know, destroyed. And they were literally called in that article. The remnants were called piles of ancient rubbish. Yeah exactly, Yeah, they were. They were deliberately built. But while archaeologists estimate there used to be a ton of them, a thousand pyramids, there's some thousands and thousands of years old, only ten survive in any recognizable way. Uh. They thought the structures were a hundred and sixty ft high with bases that were up to thirty seven acres, so this makes them much bigger than the earliest examples in Egypt, not as high. H and also they took a long long time to build, so that's a claim, and that's that's a fairly reputable claim. The one thing that makes it different when you really think about pyramids in Egypt is that pyramids in Egypt have survived in not the best condition. But as pyramids go, their their top notch you know what I mean. Uh, they are what fans of classic cars called all uh cherry condition, right, yes, yeah, So unfortunately a lot of the pyramids in Brazil are not like that. They don't exist anymore. But now you can claim that's the this is the oldest pyramid. Well yeah, And again, when you're establishing the age of something like that, let's say the primary construction is made of seashells. Um the mode of determining the age of those is to then carbon date somehow the the structure or whatever is made up of those things. And if you're dealing with seashells, I guess by carbon dating the shells themselves is how you get that number or that range. But still, I there's so much variance there. I guess that's why you have something like some of these are two thousand, three thousand years old, some of them are up to five thousand years old, and those estimates to get so ballparky at some point, you know, speaking of people. One could say, however, that you know what, the margin on the margin on the dating process here maybe pretty large, but it doesn't invalidate everything. So sorry, Egypt, that's it. Brazil has what what we now know as Brazil has the oldest pyramids. But this was not the only claim for the oldest pyramid. The debate continues today. We'll tell you more about it after a word from our sponsors. We're back and we're going to jump to a different part of the world in a different time. Yes, so we were in the nineties, and to be exact, let's jump to just a couple of years ago. And in Kazakhstan. That's right, Matt. A report came from an archaeologist working at the Kazakh National University, A fellow named Victor novo Zenov uh This apologies for the mispronunciation. There. He claimed that specialist working at the saya Kinski Archaeology Institute in Karganda, Kazakhstan, led by a guy named Igor Kukushkin, had discovered the world's oldest pyramid in wait for it, Kazakhstan. There we go, there we go, and that's another oldest pyramid and it's um. You know, it's another one of these super captivating headlines, captivating stories. The headline itself was world's oldest pyramid was found and it's in Kazakhstan. That was from Nature World News, so you know, slightly different publication, but still it's that same kind of title that's just gonna get your attention. Um. So it's believed to be built roughly a thousand years earlier than some of the more prominent pyramids that are found in Egypt. A thousand years before that is that's pretty significant if if that's proven right. So, it's located in this place called the Sarayaka Steps and uh, it's near the city of Karganda. It's like three thousand nine miles northeast of Cairo, Egypt. You know, that's that's a long way. That's a comparison, really long way. Um. And you know, it's similar in appearance to some of the other pyramids that exists there the pyramid of Dojer or Joe Josser. I don't know how to pronounce any of those things. I'm sorry, but again it's uh, it's really interesting. You can find the article on it if if you go and look and um, you know, there's more you can find here. It popped up on it popped up in a couple of places in sixteen that you know, Yahoo wrote about it. You can also find the statement from novol Zenov who believes that this was This is what they call a step pyramid, so it doesn't have that complete um flat angle like a pyramidic gizer or something, but he believes it was a mouslim built for a local king. Still, the age of it seems legit, but does that make it the oldest pyramid or structure of this type? No, say researchers. In Indonesia. You see geophysicist Danny Hillman not the witha. And again, thank you, thank you to everyone who tuned into our episode on the wrong manyak Rang manyak Uh and told us that if our pronunciation was terrible, at least it was endearing and amusing. So hopefully that's what we're going for here, folks. Improv rules, uh, Yeah. This This geophysicist based on the Indonesian Institute of Sciences analyzed a site called Gunung Padang in Java in Indonesia, and they said that this this thing that people thought was just a weird hill for a long long time was actually a pyramid, and a very very old pyramid. This is, by the way, one of the more well researched claims at this point, which is not a ding on the other pyramids. This is just to say that the site in Indonesia and the team in Indonesia had more time to spend and access to better tech. Yeah, they did. They had ground penetrating radar and a couple of other things. And they also took photographs of the site and published them and made them available so that you could see you could really see it rather than just being you know, some text on a website somewhere that always lends credibility. If you go to science alert dot com, you can find some images, some aerial photographs um that we're taken, and some like closer up to the structures. It's it's really fascinating to see. Uh, I don't know this one. This one gets me. This is compelling. Yeah, this is compelling that this what's strange about this one is that while it was presented in an academic setting, I think on December twelve at the Annual Media in the American Geophysical Union, it was still considered highly controversial. But the research is compelling. You can you can read it in depth if you just just check it out online. It looks like there are four separate layers and they were built over thousands of years. So the first layer, the one that we would consider or the surface, looks to be about three thousand, five hundred years old. The second layer, however, it looks to be eight thousand years old. And then they get to the really crazy stuff. This is where it becomes super controversial, right. The third layer, according to their estimate, is somewhere between nine thousand and twenty eight thousand years old. Twenty eight thousand, I mean maybe honestly, maybe maybe we just don't know yet, man, But that seems a bit of a stretch. I mean, it's pretty crazy if you look at it too. They've got a an example of the layering. It shows you all the different ones in the structure and how uh how it looks, and that initial period, the initial layer that you're talking about the one that's that has that range of age. It is the most sharply angled um, the most basic pyramid structure like part of the entire thing. And you know, if that truly could have been built even just at the minimum of that number nine thousand years ago, that is so significant for humanity and the history you know of of bipedal intelligent things walking around on this earth. That's pretty dangn cool. I can't wait to get to Indonesia one day, man. There's so much history there that we just don't know about in the West, you know. So one thing we do have to say about this about this site is that when when I mentioned that the research was considered controversial, I mean, it's a ton of people are criticizing the teams conclusions and their methods. They're they're very much going hard on the pain with this. Right now, the presentations that they made remain non peer reviewed, which is a big criticism by their their opponents. But time will tell, right, the wheels of archaeology grind slow but exceedingly fine, if we're paraphrasing, And they've been at this since so it looks like they're they're giving it a serious go and this is not going to be the last ancient site that's found, right, so we know that there may be even older stuff out there. And the I you know, it's almost it's almost the wrong way to phrase the question when we say, let's search for the oldest man made thing, because there are so many things we don't know. Let's just search for all the old stuff. That's that's what we need to do, right, because so much of it has already disappeared. But this leads us to we had a long preamble here, but this leads us to, uh something that anything captivated us. You you hipped me to this matter. More and more people have started to claim that Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Egypt, Brazil, that they have nothing on the true old structures, that there are much much older pyramids out there in some of the world's most remote locals. We always think of Egypt when it comes to pyramids, But what about Alaska? And we'll talk about that right after a word from our sponsor. Here's where it gets crazy, it's true, fellow conspiracy realist. In recent years, various groups have claimed pyramids created by some unknown civilization can be found in both Alaska and Antarctica. Now we've explored the Antarctic a theory briefly before, yes we have. And but before you even get into that, let's let's establish here just the concept of uh general belief in how humanity began, you know, in the fertile crescent um in in parts of Africa, whereas euphrates exactly where the rivers, where where the water was, where the um the land again was fertile, and people could survive easy more easily, let's say, even though life was a struggle, um. And then humanity spread out from there, going to all corners of the earth over over the course of time. Right. So when you introduce an idea that perhaps there's an even older version of humanity that existed in some other part of the world, um, that's that's why it's such a controversial idea, because it goes against the basic understandings that are that are generally accepted. I see that's a good point, because you know, the most popular theory for human human arrival on North and South America as we call them today is the crossing the Baring Straight via the bearing Land Bridge, which was about twenty thou years ago. And I think. So the issue with that is, for instance, there's a twenty eight thousand year old pyramid and Indonesia. Uh. The the issue with this idea of a pyramid in Alaska is how is one of um pure resources and timeline right? Because if you if you notice, a lot of these pyramids that we've mentioned in other parts of the world are built in more human friendly environments, you know what I mean. So the idea of pyramids being built in these freezing areas, it seems like something that would turn our understanding of history completely on its head if this were true. So what about antarcticle. Let's just do a quick Okay, we talked about this for Chuck Out the other episode. If you have time, and let's just say in nineteen you know Tennis, the early nineteen tens, the teens there too. Uh, some British explorers were hanging out in Antarctica. They were looking around, going, this is a pretty desolate barren. I'm not seeing much here until they saw rock, nice pointy rock, and they said, hey, let's put this on our map. It's a pyramid. Uh, it's the pyramid rock. It's a type of pyramid. Um. Finally, that's what it is. Uh, you know, it was probably some kind of natural formation or you know, from shearing from ice or something. Jen. Really, let's say that that's probably what it was. It isn't necessarily exactly what it was or who knows what they found. There may be a mystery out there in Antarctica still with the old pyramid rock. Um, we haven't been able to find it thus far, neither of us have been to Antarctica. But that this, uh, let's call it a seed. This concept of, oh, there's a pyramid on this map of Antarctica. Somebody labeled that. That becomes a catalyst for all kinds of stories. Right. Yes, some were admittedly fiction, such as at the Mountains of Madness written by HP Lovecraft in UH. Some were more rumor mill kind of stuff reported as if they were true in newspapers. Right and in the following decades, uh. But from two thousand twelve to two thousand sixteen there was a new round of rumors spreading, and they were based on photographs that apparently showed some something, some geographical feature in Antarctica with regular triangular sides. The kind of stuff that, to your point met earlier in the show, would not occur in nature, and so it was the argument about the face or pyramid on Mars all over again. People on one end we're saying this is true. Someone's covering this up. This is stuff they don't want you to know. And then there were other people saying, well, if we don't get photographs of this thing at multiple angles, how do we know this is not just a trick of perspective, which is different from from immediately calling bs. It's just saying, go back there, take more pictures. Yeah, let's let's verify. What is it the old adage trust but verify? Yeah? Yeah, right, And uh, it's funny because there were even more rumors spreading. I think the uh the favorite is our our returning a returning champion of our show, buzz Dr Rendezvous Al Dren returned in this story because the thing in sixteen. Towards the end of twenty sixteen, there was this rumor that he posted a picture of this ice pyramid as people were calling it and then said we are all in danger, evil chev and then he rapidly deleted it. Yeah, that was the rumor, That was the rumor. But what if he really did that? How crazy would that be? If Dr Rendezvous was like, look at this pyramid, they're here too, Oh my god. Oh man, I don't know, that would be that would be out of character for him. Yeah, I really would. Oh gosh. That's because he's known sort of as a you know, as someone who's trolled conspiracy theorist before, or what he calls conspiracy theorists. But anyway, so that's that's Antarctica at this point. Don't get us wrong. There's a lot of very strange stuff that happens on that continent, and it's part of the reason I think that you and I want to go, and maybe we can talk Paul into going with us. But he's had some Iceland experience. I think maybe he would. He would be fantastic as like a guide and a oh spiritual advisor. I think, okay, yeah, Paul, can you come with us? Cool? He says, yes, great, he's in Let us know. Also, if you have been to Antarctica, we'd love to hear your adventures. So Alaska, let's talk about this one. This is this is a little more recent, and this is a bit more enigmatic. According to a couple of people, there's something strange buried in the ground about fifty miles from Mount McKinley. Today, the most well known proponent of this idea is a writer new ethologist named Linda Molton. Howe, here's how this story starts. All right, travel back with us to Anchorage in nineteen ninety two, this is just for comparison, the same year that the Brazilian research team began digging into the Seashell Pyramids. Yeah, same year, there was a television news broadcast from Channel thirteen out of Anchorage, and they had a segment about this discovery by geologist another one more time scientists of an underground pyramid that they said was many times the size of existing pyramids in Egypt and specifically the Great Pyramid of Giza exactly. So here's how it here's the rumor, here's how it went out. So u s scientists were concerned about nuclear tests being conducted underground by the government of China, so they set up seismic equipment in Alaska to monitor this possibility of nuclear testing. And keep in mind, just while this is all happening, it's President George H. W. Bush who in the White House, good call, good call. Uh. This discovery, again was only allegedly reported and a scientist getting a quarter. This is a campfire story. If you're listening, you, Matt, Paul, and I were all gathered around a camp fire, So let's use our campfire voices. So the next day, a scientist visits the station, this Channel thirteen out of Anchorage, and he says, could I get a copy of that video? No such broadcast exists, they responded, and he was stonewalled. Twenty years later, a retired military officer named Douglas A. Muchler claimed to have seen this Channel thirteen report and he gave this information to ufologists and investigative journalist Linda Malton, how how confirmed the nuclear test, but seems to agree with Mushler that there's more to the story. You see, she believes that there is a pyramid and that any information about it has been covered up by someone or some organization thing something. Oh man, that's that's awesome. It's awesome. Has even more fuel to the fire here, because you see, it was also a video that came out apparently recently, that that showed footage of this pyramid. Uh, that a team of explorers stumbled upon. Right, but there are some problems with the video too. Oh, there's certainly problems with the video. My understanding is that has this thing it's called text of voice, oh right, right right, where people want to disguise their voices and accents or what what have you, or just to be able to type something anonymously and then have the computer vocalize it. Can you do a computer voice to me? Uh? Mine would just probably be misconstrued as Stephen Hawking. Oh, I see yeah. I want to stay away from that one. Huh yeah. Yeah. But it's a similar thing where it's a program that is vocalizing the words there. But the I just want to get this really fast because this is the most mind bling thing for me with this whole story, this campfire story there, because you know it mentions that this this person, Linda how confirmed the nuclear test that China conducted, right, Well, we we can also confirm that that occurred, or at least there was reporting about it in places like the New York Times, in the Chicago Tribune um in May specifically of when China conducted a large test and the signals or the vibrations from that test were registered throughout the United States. Specifically, there a system of detection devices that are all over the planet right right, and have been since shortly after the invention of nuclear weapons. Yeah, so, so that story itself has that it's that grain of truth thing where when you're looking into a campfire story like this, you begin to see the walls, they're illuminating. You're like, oh, there, we're actually in a space. This really does exist wherever this is or whatever this is. But then you go looking a little bit further and you get to that point where, um, Linda says, you know, the the actual location of where this pyramid is though, has been secreted away. It's been covered up. And then it goes back to your original question when we're talking about pyramids in general, the question your motive why cover this up? Why this guy's is it? Is it perhaps a sacred site for local cultures, or is it a site that is considered unclean for some reason. The problem with with both of those claims is that other holy places throughout the world have almost always become tourist destinations, and you can make money off of those things, and that's nice, but here's the thing. Yes, Hound Alaska, where it was located, I'm not gonna get tourism out there. Probably you've got to build a bunch of civilization first, or maybe someone already did. That's the argument, right, that's the argument. So it is true, though you're absolutely right that there wasn't just one test in There was a test on the twenty one of May, a test on the twenty five September, and a failed test on November two, all in the same year. So this this was extensive testing. But the one you had mentioned in the New York Times article, it's true that was the largest underground test the government of China had taken at that time. So it is true. But the problem here is that there's very little indication of a pyramid in Alaska from anybody other than these sources that we've named. It does lead us to something interesting that we we had never covered before, which was the existence of a Bermuda triangle in Alaska, the Alaska and Bermuda Triangle. This is the kind of thing that a lot of more mainstream television producers love. You know, you can see I'm sure you can find a cheesy episode about this. But but just so that everyone has the concept, maybe we can explore this and if there's more sent to it later. Uh, there is this belief that much like the Devil's Triangle in the Pacific or the Bermuda Triangle in the Atlantic, Alaska has its own triangle in which people disappear. Uh. It's an area sparsely, very sparsely populated wilderness. It's very cold, it's a inhospitable location. Wild animals abound, right. And this this triangles thought to stretch from Barrow, Alaska in the north, which I think was popularized in Thirty Days of Night, to Anchorage in south at the left, all the way down to Juneau. And it's different because it largely goes over land right, rather than ocean. Maybe there's a bay or two that it crosses, you know, And in this case it's it's generally just I think one of the concepts here is that it's generally forest areas, it's mountain areas. There's a lot, there's a lot of it's very cold, there's a lot of ice, there's a lot of snow, there's a lot of all of these things that are somewhat inhospitable for humans. Right and within this triangle area um in the center of at least before you get out to the edges, and you know, a lot of the claims that have to do with the Devil's Triangle, Music Triangle and all these things. They have to do with a lot of magnetic anomalies. A lot of times they have to do with weather patterns that occur within those spaces. Um and you could at least you can imagine something occurring here. We're in this some it's not desolates just uh, it's not a place where a lot of humans gather and have all of their stuff, right. I think we should do an episode on this in the future. Well, I think so too, because the disappearances that have occurred over this little triangle with in Alaska there are there are many, and they're pretty frightening. Since more than sixteen thousand people have vanished in this this area mapped out as the Triangle. Uh, this contributed to an average of roughly four missing person reports for every one thousand people in Alaska. That is more than double the national average. Gosh, so not only are there relatively few people in this part of the world, but a lot of them go missing. Maybe maybe Alaska is just a place where people get off the grid, you know, or maybe they they end up at the pyramid. That's okay, Okay, look, before we wrap up, let's let's talk about the biggest, at least most fascinating out their concept for why a pyramid in Alaska would be covered up. All right, do you want me just tell you what it is? Yes, I think you know it. We've been talking about ancient like human civilization building it or something like that. But the concept that perhaps all of these pyramids across the world the big conspiracy, we're all influenced by the same extraterrestrial force that shaped humanity, that perhaps seeded intelligence on this earth plane, like a an intelligent pan spermia kind of thing. Um. That to me is the most captivating version of this of like, that's why a lot of these secrets are still hidden. That's why we don't truly understand the pyramids in Egypt. That's why we truly don't fully understand why they're everywhere and all of all of humanity was so fascinated by that shape and that structure. As kind of a sacred geometry argument too, yea, so stargate star gate. I mean not to not to diminish that that would that would be amazing if it's were somehow true. There the counter argument people make for that, of course, is that at the time, given understanding of construction technology, that was the easiest thing to build that would last for a long time. You know what I mean? I know, I know. I wish you know what, Matt. I hope the truth is out there too. I met Hey tell you what, uh if if we do meet extraterrestrials uh in our lifetimes, if I ever meet them, even if you're not there, I I Am going to try to get them to build a pyramid, even if they don't care what it is and they're just like they think it's our our hello ritual. If they spend the rest of their time with our species thinking that instead of you know, waving or shaking hands or vocalizing, you build somewhat a pyramid as a way of greeting them from It'll be great. Yeah, it'll be worth it. I'm so down with that. Let's get t shirts with pyramids on them. I want. What I want to see is let's do a pyramid on the ground right when it's kind of nice to see, kind of surrounding when it depends. It doesn't matter what kind of music gradic could be whatever, but then above it is an inverted version that has lights on the top of it and the bottom that's like hovering down or coming down. So it's like as above, so below, and it's kind of like the old UFO pictures where the UFO would be casting a tractor beam down on the ground. We could also, Oh, you know what, let's go with that design. That's brilliant. I have a caption. Tell me what you think aliens the first pyramid scheme? No, not yet, Yeah, let's do it and you're good. Uh, well, no, mad Frederick. But but we want to hear your thoughts. Have you ever been to Antarctica? Do you think this there's some sand to this Alaska pyramid idea? Or do you think it's just another rumor in the echo chamber of the internet. Perhaps most importantly, and this will help us with an upcoming episode, what's your take on this idea of a again, for lack of a better phrase, Alaskan Bermuda triangle. We'd love to hear from you. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Uh if you want to meet our favorite part of the show, your fellow listeners, find us on Here's where it Gets Crazy our Facebook page where um I have recently asked for some suggestions for upcoming episodes, and we've got like hundreds of responses, so we've got to go through. Have you checked that out? I haven't been on facebooking weeks. That's awesome. No you don't. I'll take one for the time. But check it out. That thread still active and let us know. Uh, let us know by writing to us with your ideas for upcoming episodes or your feedback. Uh. And if you if you don't care to sit on and write something out, or you don't like the social means, you can call us. Yeah, that's right, get your get those vocal cords involved and call one eight three three s T d W y t K. Leave us a message. Tell us what you're thinking about an episode. Tell us I'll answer one of the questions that we ask in one of the episodes. Give us suggestion for something you want to hear. Uh, any of it, All of it make us laugh. That's my favorite thing ever. Just if you just be funny. I love it. It's it's not a not a lot to ask and to put our money where our mouth is here shout out to e j on. Here's where it gets crazy. Who heard us? Talking about Skyrin and win ahead and posted some pictures of us complete with with our helmets, with our horned helmets. I don't even know which helmets those are in the game, Like, is that an iron helm that you're wearing, Ben, that's that's the one from the ads. Okay, original advertisement, but it's actually it's not that great helmet. Hold on, hold on, no, looks like he's wearing an oblivion helm. No. No, no, he's not. He's not. That's in the game. I think it is interesting. Uh. And then I went back and just asked e J for Dadrek Garberg. It came through, So that was really cool. Thanks so much. You can see what we're talking about if you go on here's where it gets crazy. But if you say I don't like social meds, it's I don't like talking on the phone. We totally get it. You can write twist directly. We are conspiracy at i heeart radio dot com. Stuff they Don't Want You to Know is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast Us, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of I Heart Gradios How Stuff Works. Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt nol is here in spirit they call me Ben. We are joined as always with our super producer Paul Mission controlled decad Most importantly, you are you. You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know. For a check in, Matt, I know usually I ask, I ask you first, but I just want to say, after interject, I am so glad to see you man. Yeah, it's been too long. It has been we uh, you know, for any of you that don't know out there, let's just give him a little bit hind the curtain. We record three times a week this show, so we we usually have a time like time to be together in a room talking, catching up before recording and everything and uh and has been notes all the time. We are friends outside of this magical darkened room where we record. Yea, so not having that has been uh, it's it's not been great. So it's also happy to see you, sir, thanks man, it feels a good Yeah, yeah, I was. Um, let's see, Paul and I were in Texas and then we're in Chicago for a second, and I am hopefully by the time all our fellow listeners hear this, I will have returned from Brussels. Wow, that's cool. I'm going there tomorrow as we record this. Oh my gosh. And now now with all that update, all that prool, like I have to ask how are how are you doing? Man? Almost almost almost sent you some prank text it was at the Alamo, but decided against it. Oh Man, I would have accepted. Uh, I'm doing really well. You know, everything in my life is focused on my son, and we're doing this thing where every morning he makes a picture of a letter and then we talked about what that letter is, and then the whole day is about that letter. So like walking around going to the grocery store, pointing out things that are like start with b uh. It's so it's so much fun. And uh yeah, the whole thing was my wife's idea. And she's so talented and smart about doing these kind of things. She makes every day unique and exciting for my son's h It's really great. That's that's what's going on with me. Ben. That's great. I want to ask you how you're doing personally and what's going on, but I have a feeling you would respond no comment. Okay, So let's go ahead. Let's go ahead and get into the episode. Everyone. We're talking pyramids today, right, Yes, pyramids. Pyramids some of the oldest known structures built by human beings so far as we know. And uh, these structures have also captivated human beings. Uh, not not just in the recent days when they're seen as mysterious and enigmatic, but during the times that they were built, right, and especially coming across Let's say you're walking along a river. You're following a river in exploration of some kind, and out in the distance you see something towering and it has sharp angles to it, which you don't find anywhere in nature. And as you get closer, you realize how large this structure is. It's not just the mountain in the middle of the desert. Yeah. Yeah, it's fascinating to put ourselves back in space and time. In a previous episode, we explored these stories of pyramids in other parts of the world, which is a real it's a real thing. You know what I mean, Like one of the early as pyramids we know about would be the zig Rats in Mesopotamia. Right, They don't get a lot of street credit. You know, a lot of people never heard of Mesopotamia until Ghostbusters came out in the eighties. No, no, no, maybe the Exorcists to be fair, because isn't Pozuzoo Maybe pezuzos Samarian. It all sounds familiar. It all sounds familiar, right. So in that episode, we we explore what pyramids are getting to the architecture of the structures, how they're typically built and so on, and we talked about how there are multiple different kinds of pyramids, right, and this this reminded me of a conversation that it's a little tangential, but I thought you would enjoy. I saw one of those Internet hypotheticals right when it was it hypothetical questions your friends post on the Internet, and it said, Okay, here's the gist. If someone gave you ten million dollars right now, cash in hand, with the following caveats, would you take the money. Here are the caveats. One, a snail will follow you for the rest of your life. Two if the snail touches you, you will die. And then there were a couple of other snail related things. My first question with that was, well, what type of snail? Because not all you know, when we see the word snail, we all think of like the same um crenulated shell and the you know, the like living booger that crawls around under it. But there are different sorts of snails, and there are different sorts of pyramids. So the thing that is interesting about this for our purpose is that there's so many misconceptions about pyramids, right. Uh. People think when we think of a pyramid, we think of the angular structure you're describing. I love that moment you took us back to where there's someone maybe living um a hunter gatherer lifestyle or something, and they're they're walking along the river and then they see the seat of human civilization breathtaking and they don't get immediately killed by the security forces or of some kind, right right, or the crocodiles or the other wildlife. Yes. Uh, so when we think of pyramids, we think of pyramids in Egypt, located in uh northern Africa. It's all because of the movie Stargate, just completely because of the movie Star, which is an amazing documentary. It is. Uh So it's strangely because as we found there are pyramids and other parts of the world, right they're they're not just in Egypt. We in our previous episodes we found them in South America. We are we knew that they were in South America where we also found them in Africa, parts of Asia. Um. I mean, it's it's fascinating, and we keep talking about this because anytime we bring up pyramids, you just get back to the question of why, Like why, why the heck why did you do with that? Like what is it? Why? Why did you do that? Yeah, that's my favorite part too, you know, like obelisk, yes are weird. Remember when we went to uh we went up to d C and we filmed some stuff about the Washington Monument. Yes, which, once upon his time was going to be you know, a statue of George Washington, but now it's you know, it's this ridiculously phallic thing you can crawl up inside of and reach the top. Yeah. Man, the tip. I don't know that's what it's all about. But but really the just that that um, that concept is still baffling to me. UM with all the varying types like you're talking about the zigger outs, the you know, the more angular pyramids, the stepped pyramids, all these things. It's just, um, they're so symbolic, and I think outwardly symbolic of something to have that shape. It also goes back to, you know, the construction process of you know, building up in that way right, right, But still it's just I don't know, there's something so mysterious about it. It's true, yet we know that we know that the primary purposes of pyramids and pyramid like structures I would also include baby mounds in the North American continent. We know that the primary purposes tended to be spiritual or funereal. Right, these are gigantic tombs taj Mahal style, or these are in the case of some zigarettes, holy sites, sacred sites of worship wherein rituals are enacted. At least that's our best understanding from the work of archaeology and our right the work of some brilliant archaeologists and then also the work of some uh just morally bankrupt ones back in the day. And then that's you know, like the the racism that gave rise later first to the idea of law civilizations, and then later to the idea of extraterrestrials. Because the people and for we have to hit this fact. The people who wrote a lot of early early stories about discovering these different amazing structures in different parts of the world, they they were somehow, on some level offended by the idea that the ancestors of the local people could have built those. So there you have it. We know that that's the that's the craziest thing. We know that pyramids, despite being ancient, the ancient pyramids and structure as we talked about, remain controversial today, not just because of the institutionalized discrimination and stuff, but also because people continue to claim that they have discovered more ancient pyramids thanks to Google Earth. May don't you know I love Google Earth and Light Are I know that's true? We will will? We all do. They are amazing tools. It just it gives an opportunity to at least search from behind a computer screen the entire planet for things that look angular or out of place or you know, square, rectangular, right. And it's not to say that these things don't exist somewhere in the world, because in many parts of the world, the surrounding ecosystem will eat everything made by man, you know what I mean. You can build something in a jungle and it can just for all intents and purposes, it can vanish. And I think you know, you and I probably both still check in to see how many new ruins or ancient sites are found just in the Amazon alone. There's a ton. Uh So, so we know that these things do exist, but we also know that there's a lot of exaggeration and a lot of hyperbole involved in these claims. Generally, these discoveries become controversial for one reason or another, and it's not it's not a case of you know, someone pretending to be a scientist a line or selling snake oil, as is so often the case in a lot of scientific research. The scientists, the archaeologist, the experts. Uh. They say one thing, maybe in a relatively obscure journal of some sort, and then someone someone else says, hey, this would be a great headline for my my blog, my my pop culture news thing, right website, my French website. Sure, and then then all of a sudden, what the scientists really we're saying gets convoluted and telephoned into something different. And that's where we get into these claims of ancient hitherto unknown civilizations, or they try to find something that is a selling point for a pyramid because in mainstream news or in fringe websites just saying hey, here is a pyramid found that confirms long held beliefs that this group of people lived in this way you know, or this crop or etcetera, etcetera. We want once some h perbole, you know, we want some some superlatives like when you graduate high school. Well, yeah, and the reader and or listener or whoever. I think this is just my opinion, who wants to have that discovery moment, that eureka moment where it's oh, civilization was older, or civilization did exist in this part of the world, or you know that that kind of I don't even know exactly what it is. It's that it's a mystery being solved, right, and you want that answer even if it doesn't even if it's a question that you weren't even really asking in that moment, but you see the potential for this answer to a cool thing. I'm not sure. Yeah, we like we like patterns and solutions. Yeah, we like seeing uh, we like seeing the bridge between concept, day and concept. The human beings are all about connection, right, I think I think that's a think it's profoundly as stupe man, because now we're talking about psychological drive and so what what does this what does this drive mean when we read about pyramids, Well, it means, like you said, they're all these claims, uh that this is the oldest one. Here's the biggest revelation that you're going to get with regards to this whole thing, and we're gonna give it to you right now, such as let's say it's let's say it's and you're at the Independent and you get a you know, a tip about some seashell constructions in Brazil and you post it up and you put a title that says something like world's oldest pyramids are discovered in Brazil. But that's literally all you have to put at the title. That's what they put, World's oldest pyramids are discovered, Right, Because with this kind of reporting, people love seeing an st an e s t the big st the old st these strange st right. And so when we when we see the world's oldest pyramid, we think, what Brazil, That is definitely not Egypt. Uh So, so the story with this is interesting because this is just one of a pattern of um oldest pyramid claims. Right, the Brazil Pyramids date back to two thousand BC, two thousand, three thousand BC or BC, whatever you prefer, and the construction techniques are different, because again, not every pyramid is created equal. These are as you said, met built of seashells, and they were built over a long period of time, but four, I think, starting in maybe two or so, about four years before the articles published, teams of researchers based in the area had been trying to figure out what was up with these things because they had been um largely deconstructed, yes, or broken down, right, that's just over through natural processes and stuff, or you know, destroyed. And they were literally called in that article. The remnants were called piles of ancient rubbish. Yeah exactly, Yeah, they were. They were deliberately built. But while archaeologists estimate there used to be a ton of them, a thousand pyramids, there's some thousands and thousands of years old, only ten survive in any recognizable way. Uh. They thought the structures were a hundred and sixty ft high with bases that were up to thirty seven acres, so this makes them much bigger than the earliest examples in Egypt, not as high. H and also they took a long long time to build, so that's a claim, and that's that's a fairly reputable claim. The one thing that makes it different when you really think about pyramids in Egypt is that pyramids in Egypt have survived in not the best condition. But as pyramids go, their their top notch you know what I mean. Uh, they are what fans of classic cars called all uh cherry condition, right, yes, yeah, So unfortunately a lot of the pyramids in Brazil are not like that. They don't exist anymore. But now you can claim that's the this is the oldest pyramid. Well yeah, And again, when you're establishing the age of something like that, let's say the primary construction is made of seashells. Um the mode of determining the age of those is to then carbon date somehow the the structure or whatever is made up of those things. And if you're dealing with seashells, I guess by carbon dating the shells themselves is how you get that number or that range. But still, I there's so much variance there. I guess that's why you have something like some of these are two thousand, three thousand years old, some of them are up to five thousand years old, and those estimates to get so ballparky at some point, you know, speaking of people. One could say, however, that you know what, the margin on the margin on the dating process here maybe pretty large, but it doesn't invalidate everything. So sorry, Egypt, that's it. Brazil has what what we now know as Brazil has the oldest pyramids. But this was not the only claim for the oldest pyramid. The debate continues today. We'll tell you more about it after a word from our sponsors. We're back and we're going to jump to a different part of the world in a different time. Yes, so we were in the nineties, and to be exact, let's jump to just a couple of years ago. And in Kazakhstan. That's right, Matt. A report came from an archaeologist working at the Kazakh National University, A fellow named Victor novo Zenov uh This apologies for the mispronunciation. There. He claimed that specialist working at the saya Kinski Archaeology Institute in Karganda, Kazakhstan, led by a guy named Igor Kukushkin, had discovered the world's oldest pyramid in wait for it, Kazakhstan. There we go, there we go, and that's another oldest pyramid and it's um. You know, it's another one of these super captivating headlines, captivating stories. The headline itself was world's oldest pyramid was found and it's in Kazakhstan. That was from Nature World News, so you know, slightly different publication, but still it's that same kind of title that's just gonna get your attention. Um. So it's believed to be built roughly a thousand years earlier than some of the more prominent pyramids that are found in Egypt. A thousand years before that is that's pretty significant if if that's proven right. So, it's located in this place called the Sarayaka Steps and uh, it's near the city of Karganda. It's like three thousand nine miles northeast of Cairo, Egypt. You know, that's that's a long way. That's a comparison, really long way. Um. And you know, it's similar in appearance to some of the other pyramids that exists there the pyramid of Dojer or Joe Josser. I don't know how to pronounce any of those things. I'm sorry, but again it's uh, it's really interesting. You can find the article on it if if you go and look and um, you know, there's more you can find here. It popped up on it popped up in a couple of places in sixteen that you know, Yahoo wrote about it. You can also find the statement from novol Zenov who believes that this was This is what they call a step pyramid, so it doesn't have that complete um flat angle like a pyramidic gizer or something, but he believes it was a mouslim built for a local king. Still, the age of it seems legit, but does that make it the oldest pyramid or structure of this type? No, say researchers. In Indonesia. You see geophysicist Danny Hillman not the witha. And again, thank you, thank you to everyone who tuned into our episode on the wrong manyak Rang manyak Uh and told us that if our pronunciation was terrible, at least it was endearing and amusing. So hopefully that's what we're going for here, folks. Improv rules, uh, Yeah. This This geophysicist based on the Indonesian Institute of Sciences analyzed a site called Gunung Padang in Java in Indonesia, and they said that this this thing that people thought was just a weird hill for a long long time was actually a pyramid, and a very very old pyramid. This is, by the way, one of the more well researched claims at this point, which is not a ding on the other pyramids. This is just to say that the site in Indonesia and the team in Indonesia had more time to spend and access to better tech. Yeah, they did. They had ground penetrating radar and a couple of other things. And they also took photographs of the site and published them and made them available so that you could see you could really see it rather than just being you know, some text on a website somewhere that always lends credibility. If you go to science alert dot com, you can find some images, some aerial photographs um that we're taken, and some like closer up to the structures. It's it's really fascinating to see. Uh, I don't know this one. This one gets me. This is compelling. Yeah, this is compelling that this what's strange about this one is that while it was presented in an academic setting, I think on December twelve at the Annual Media in the American Geophysical Union, it was still considered highly controversial. But the research is compelling. You can you can read it in depth if you just just check it out online. It looks like there are four separate layers and they were built over thousands of years. So the first layer, the one that we would consider or the surface, looks to be about three thousand, five hundred years old. The second layer, however, it looks to be eight thousand years old. And then they get to the really crazy stuff. This is where it becomes super controversial, right. The third layer, according to their estimate, is somewhere between nine thousand and twenty eight thousand years old. Twenty eight thousand, I mean maybe honestly, maybe maybe we just don't know yet, man, But that seems a bit of a stretch. I mean, it's pretty crazy if you look at it too. They've got a an example of the layering. It shows you all the different ones in the structure and how uh how it looks, and that initial period, the initial layer that you're talking about the one that's that has that range of age. It is the most sharply angled um, the most basic pyramid structure like part of the entire thing. And you know, if that truly could have been built even just at the minimum of that number nine thousand years ago, that is so significant for humanity and the history you know of of bipedal intelligent things walking around on this earth. That's pretty dangn cool. I can't wait to get to Indonesia one day, man. There's so much history there that we just don't know about in the West, you know. So one thing we do have to say about this about this site is that when when I mentioned that the research was considered controversial, I mean, it's a ton of people are criticizing the teams conclusions and their methods. They're they're very much going hard on the pain with this. Right now, the presentations that they made remain non peer reviewed, which is a big criticism by their their opponents. But time will tell, right, the wheels of archaeology grind slow but exceedingly fine, if we're paraphrasing, And they've been at this since so it looks like they're they're giving it a serious go and this is not going to be the last ancient site that's found, right, so we know that there may be even older stuff out there. And the I you know, it's almost it's almost the wrong way to phrase the question when we say, let's search for the oldest man made thing, because there are so many things we don't know. Let's just search for all the old stuff. That's that's what we need to do, right, because so much of it has already disappeared. But this leads us to we had a long preamble here, but this leads us to, uh something that anything captivated us. You you hipped me to this matter. More and more people have started to claim that Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Egypt, Brazil, that they have nothing on the true old structures, that there are much much older pyramids out there in some of the world's most remote locals. We always think of Egypt when it comes to pyramids, But what about Alaska? And we'll talk about that right after a word from our sponsor. Here's where it gets crazy, it's true, fellow conspiracy realist. In recent years, various groups have claimed pyramids created by some unknown civilization can be found in both Alaska and Antarctica. Now we've explored the Antarctic a theory briefly before, yes we have. And but before you even get into that, let's let's establish here just the concept of uh general belief in how humanity began, you know, in the fertile crescent um in in parts of Africa, whereas euphrates exactly where the rivers, where where the water was, where the um the land again was fertile, and people could survive easy more easily, let's say, even though life was a struggle, um. And then humanity spread out from there, going to all corners of the earth over over the course of time. Right. So when you introduce an idea that perhaps there's an even older version of humanity that existed in some other part of the world, um, that's that's why it's such a controversial idea, because it goes against the basic understandings that are that are generally accepted. I see that's a good point, because you know, the most popular theory for human human arrival on North and South America as we call them today is the crossing the Baring Straight via the bearing Land Bridge, which was about twenty thou years ago. And I think. So the issue with that is, for instance, there's a twenty eight thousand year old pyramid and Indonesia. Uh. The the issue with this idea of a pyramid in Alaska is how is one of um pure resources and timeline right? Because if you if you notice, a lot of these pyramids that we've mentioned in other parts of the world are built in more human friendly environments, you know what I mean. So the idea of pyramids being built in these freezing areas, it seems like something that would turn our understanding of history completely on its head if this were true. So what about antarcticle. Let's just do a quick Okay, we talked about this for Chuck Out the other episode. If you have time, and let's just say in nineteen you know Tennis, the early nineteen tens, the teens there too. Uh, some British explorers were hanging out in Antarctica. They were looking around, going, this is a pretty desolate barren. I'm not seeing much here until they saw rock, nice pointy rock, and they said, hey, let's put this on our map. It's a pyramid. Uh, it's the pyramid rock. It's a type of pyramid. Um. Finally, that's what it is. Uh, you know, it was probably some kind of natural formation or you know, from shearing from ice or something. Jen. Really, let's say that that's probably what it was. It isn't necessarily exactly what it was or who knows what they found. There may be a mystery out there in Antarctica still with the old pyramid rock. Um, we haven't been able to find it thus far, neither of us have been to Antarctica. But that this, uh, let's call it a seed. This concept of, oh, there's a pyramid on this map of Antarctica. Somebody labeled that. That becomes a catalyst for all kinds of stories. Right. Yes, some were admittedly fiction, such as at the Mountains of Madness written by HP Lovecraft in UH. Some were more rumor mill kind of stuff reported as if they were true in newspapers. Right and in the following decades, uh. But from two thousand twelve to two thousand sixteen there was a new round of rumors spreading, and they were based on photographs that apparently showed some something, some geographical feature in Antarctica with regular triangular sides. The kind of stuff that, to your point met earlier in the show, would not occur in nature, and so it was the argument about the face or pyramid on Mars all over again. People on one end we're saying this is true. Someone's covering this up. This is stuff they don't want you to know. And then there were other people saying, well, if we don't get photographs of this thing at multiple angles, how do we know this is not just a trick of perspective, which is different from from immediately calling bs. It's just saying, go back there, take more pictures. Yeah, let's let's verify. What is it the old adage trust but verify? Yeah? Yeah, right, And uh, it's funny because there were even more rumors spreading. I think the uh the favorite is our our returning a returning champion of our show, buzz Dr Rendezvous Al Dren returned in this story because the thing in sixteen. Towards the end of twenty sixteen, there was this rumor that he posted a picture of this ice pyramid as people were calling it and then said we are all in danger, evil chev and then he rapidly deleted it. Yeah, that was the rumor, That was the rumor. But what if he really did that? How crazy would that be? If Dr Rendezvous was like, look at this pyramid, they're here too, Oh my god. Oh man, I don't know, that would be that would be out of character for him. Yeah, I really would. Oh gosh. That's because he's known sort of as a you know, as someone who's trolled conspiracy theorist before, or what he calls conspiracy theorists. But anyway, so that's that's Antarctica at this point. Don't get us wrong. There's a lot of very strange stuff that happens on that continent, and it's part of the reason I think that you and I want to go, and maybe we can talk Paul into going with us. But he's had some Iceland experience. I think maybe he would. He would be fantastic as like a guide and a oh spiritual advisor. I think, okay, yeah, Paul, can you come with us? Cool? He says, yes, great, he's in Let us know. Also, if you have been to Antarctica, we'd love to hear your adventures. So Alaska, let's talk about this one. This is this is a little more recent, and this is a bit more enigmatic. According to a couple of people, there's something strange buried in the ground about fifty miles from Mount McKinley. Today, the most well known proponent of this idea is a writer new ethologist named Linda Molton. Howe, here's how this story starts. All right, travel back with us to Anchorage in nineteen ninety two, this is just for comparison, the same year that the Brazilian research team began digging into the Seashell Pyramids. Yeah, same year, there was a television news broadcast from Channel thirteen out of Anchorage, and they had a segment about this discovery by geologist another one more time scientists of an underground pyramid that they said was many times the size of existing pyramids in Egypt and specifically the Great Pyramid of Giza exactly. So here's how it here's the rumor, here's how it went out. So u s scientists were concerned about nuclear tests being conducted underground by the government of China, so they set up seismic equipment in Alaska to monitor this possibility of nuclear testing. And keep in mind, just while this is all happening, it's President George H. W. Bush who in the White House, good call, good call. Uh. This discovery, again was only allegedly reported and a scientist getting a quarter. This is a campfire story. If you're listening, you, Matt, Paul, and I were all gathered around a camp fire, So let's use our campfire voices. So the next day, a scientist visits the station, this Channel thirteen out of Anchorage, and he says, could I get a copy of that video? No such broadcast exists, they responded, and he was stonewalled. Twenty years later, a retired military officer named Douglas A. Muchler claimed to have seen this Channel thirteen report and he gave this information to ufologists and investigative journalist Linda Malton, how how confirmed the nuclear test, but seems to agree with Mushler that there's more to the story. You see, she believes that there is a pyramid and that any information about it has been covered up by someone or some organization thing something. Oh man, that's that's awesome. It's awesome. Has even more fuel to the fire here, because you see, it was also a video that came out apparently recently, that that showed footage of this pyramid. Uh, that a team of explorers stumbled upon. Right, but there are some problems with the video too. Oh, there's certainly problems with the video. My understanding is that has this thing it's called text of voice, oh right, right right, where people want to disguise their voices and accents or what what have you, or just to be able to type something anonymously and then have the computer vocalize it. Can you do a computer voice to me? Uh? Mine would just probably be misconstrued as Stephen Hawking. Oh, I see yeah. I want to stay away from that one. Huh yeah. Yeah. But it's a similar thing where it's a program that is vocalizing the words there. But the I just want to get this really fast because this is the most mind bling thing for me with this whole story, this campfire story there, because you know it mentions that this this person, Linda how confirmed the nuclear test that China conducted, right, Well, we we can also confirm that that occurred, or at least there was reporting about it in places like the New York Times, in the Chicago Tribune um in May specifically of when China conducted a large test and the signals or the vibrations from that test were registered throughout the United States. Specifically, there a system of detection devices that are all over the planet right right, and have been since shortly after the invention of nuclear weapons. Yeah, so, so that story itself has that it's that grain of truth thing where when you're looking into a campfire story like this, you begin to see the walls, they're illuminating. You're like, oh, there, we're actually in a space. This really does exist wherever this is or whatever this is. But then you go looking a little bit further and you get to that point where, um, Linda says, you know, the the actual location of where this pyramid is though, has been secreted away. It's been covered up. And then it goes back to your original question when we're talking about pyramids in general, the question your motive why cover this up? Why this guy's is it? Is it perhaps a sacred site for local cultures, or is it a site that is considered unclean for some reason. The problem with with both of those claims is that other holy places throughout the world have almost always become tourist destinations, and you can make money off of those things, and that's nice, but here's the thing. Yes, Hound Alaska, where it was located, I'm not gonna get tourism out there. Probably you've got to build a bunch of civilization first, or maybe someone already did. That's the argument, right, that's the argument. So it is true, though you're absolutely right that there wasn't just one test in There was a test on the twenty one of May, a test on the twenty five September, and a failed test on November two, all in the same year. So this this was extensive testing. But the one you had mentioned in the New York Times article, it's true that was the largest underground test the government of China had taken at that time. So it is true. But the problem here is that there's very little indication of a pyramid in Alaska from anybody other than these sources that we've named. It does lead us to something interesting that we we had never covered before, which was the existence of a Bermuda triangle in Alaska, the Alaska and Bermuda Triangle. This is the kind of thing that a lot of more mainstream television producers love. You know, you can see I'm sure you can find a cheesy episode about this. But but just so that everyone has the concept, maybe we can explore this and if there's more sent to it later. Uh, there is this belief that much like the Devil's Triangle in the Pacific or the Bermuda Triangle in the Atlantic, Alaska has its own triangle in which people disappear. Uh. It's an area sparsely, very sparsely populated wilderness. It's very cold, it's a inhospitable location. Wild animals abound, right. And this this triangles thought to stretch from Barrow, Alaska in the north, which I think was popularized in Thirty Days of Night, to Anchorage in south at the left, all the way down to Juneau. And it's different because it largely goes over land right, rather than ocean. Maybe there's a bay or two that it crosses, you know, And in this case it's it's generally just I think one of the concepts here is that it's generally forest areas, it's mountain areas. There's a lot, there's a lot of it's very cold, there's a lot of ice, there's a lot of snow, there's a lot of all of these things that are somewhat inhospitable for humans. Right and within this triangle area um in the center of at least before you get out to the edges, and you know, a lot of the claims that have to do with the Devil's Triangle, Music Triangle and all these things. They have to do with a lot of magnetic anomalies. A lot of times they have to do with weather patterns that occur within those spaces. Um and you could at least you can imagine something occurring here. We're in this some it's not desolates just uh, it's not a place where a lot of humans gather and have all of their stuff, right. I think we should do an episode on this in the future. Well, I think so too, because the disappearances that have occurred over this little triangle with in Alaska there are there are many, and they're pretty frightening. Since more than sixteen thousand people have vanished in this this area mapped out as the Triangle. Uh, this contributed to an average of roughly four missing person reports for every one thousand people in Alaska. That is more than double the national average. Gosh, so not only are there relatively few people in this part of the world, but a lot of them go missing. Maybe maybe Alaska is just a place where people get off the grid, you know, or maybe they they end up at the pyramid. That's okay, Okay, look, before we wrap up, let's let's talk about the biggest, at least most fascinating out their concept for why a pyramid in Alaska would be covered up. All right, do you want me just tell you what it is? Yes, I think you know it. We've been talking about ancient like human civilization building it or something like that. But the concept that perhaps all of these pyramids across the world the big conspiracy, we're all influenced by the same extraterrestrial force that shaped humanity, that perhaps seeded intelligence on this earth plane, like a an intelligent pan spermia kind of thing. Um. That to me is the most captivating version of this of like, that's why a lot of these secrets are still hidden. That's why we don't truly understand the pyramids in Egypt. That's why we truly don't fully understand why they're everywhere and all of all of humanity was so fascinated by that shape and that structure. As kind of a sacred geometry argument too, yea, so stargate star gate. I mean not to not to diminish that that would that would be amazing if it's were somehow true. There the counter argument people make for that, of course, is that at the time, given understanding of construction technology, that was the easiest thing to build that would last for a long time. You know what I mean? I know, I know. I wish you know what, Matt. I hope the truth is out there too. I met Hey tell you what, uh if if we do meet extraterrestrials uh in our lifetimes, if I ever meet them, even if you're not there, I I Am going to try to get them to build a pyramid, even if they don't care what it is and they're just like they think it's our our hello ritual. If they spend the rest of their time with our species thinking that instead of you know, waving or shaking hands or vocalizing, you build somewhat a pyramid as a way of greeting them from It'll be great. Yeah, it'll be worth it. I'm so down with that. Let's get t shirts with pyramids on them. I want. What I want to see is let's do a pyramid on the ground right when it's kind of nice to see, kind of surrounding when it depends. It doesn't matter what kind of music gradic could be whatever, but then above it is an inverted version that has lights on the top of it and the bottom that's like hovering down or coming down. So it's like as above, so below, and it's kind of like the old UFO pictures where the UFO would be casting a tractor beam down on the ground. We could also, Oh, you know what, let's go with that design. That's brilliant. I have a caption. Tell me what you think aliens the first pyramid scheme? No, not yet, Yeah, let's do it and you're good. Uh, well, no, mad Frederick. But but we want to hear your thoughts. Have you ever been to Antarctica? Do you think this there's some sand to this Alaska pyramid idea? Or do you think it's just another rumor in the echo chamber of the internet. Perhaps most importantly, and this will help us with an upcoming episode, what's your take on this idea of a again, for lack of a better phrase, Alaskan Bermuda triangle. We'd love to hear from you. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. Uh if you want to meet our favorite part of the show, your fellow listeners, find us on Here's where it Gets Crazy our Facebook page where um I have recently asked for some suggestions for upcoming episodes, and we've got like hundreds of responses, so we've got to go through. Have you checked that out? I haven't been on facebooking weeks. That's awesome. No you don't. I'll take one for the time. But check it out. That thread still active and let us know. Uh, let us know by writing to us with your ideas for upcoming episodes or your feedback. Uh. And if you if you don't care to sit on and write something out, or you don't like the social means, you can call us. Yeah, that's right, get your get those vocal cords involved and call one eight three three s T d W y t K. Leave us a message. Tell us what you're thinking about an episode. Tell us I'll answer one of the questions that we ask in one of the episodes. Give us suggestion for something you want to hear. Uh, any of it, All of it make us laugh. That's my favorite thing ever. Just if you just be funny. I love it. It's it's not a not a lot to ask and to put our money where our mouth is here shout out to e j on. Here's where it gets crazy. Who heard us? Talking about Skyrin and win ahead and posted some pictures of us complete with with our helmets, with our horned helmets. I don't even know which helmets those are in the game, Like, is that an iron helm that you're wearing, Ben, that's that's the one from the ads. Okay, original advertisement, but it's actually it's not that great helmet. Hold on, hold on, no, looks like he's wearing an oblivion helm. No. No, no, he's not. He's not. That's in the game. I think it is interesting. Uh. And then I went back and just asked e J for Dadrek Garberg. It came through, So that was really cool. Thanks so much. You can see what we're talking about if you go on here's where it gets crazy. But if you say I don't like social meds, it's I don't like talking on the phone. We totally get it. You can write twist directly. We are conspiracy at i heeart radio dot com. Stuff they Don't Want You to Know is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast Us, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.