by nathancahill on 5/13/16, 4:51 AM
You could literally throw a dart at a map of the Yucatan/Northern Central America and it would land on an "Ancient Mayan city". I grew up there, and our house was built on top of Maya ruins, we'd find hundreds of ruins in the surrounding mountains. We used to dig up full ceramic bowls and a ton of obsidian in the garden.
The hype around this kid is amazing.
by readams on 5/13/16, 4:09 AM
The claim that it's a cannabis field is at least as unsupportable as any other claims. It's a throwaway comment in the article, and frankly considering the remoteness of the location seems very unlikely.
by jonnathanson on 5/13/16, 1:49 AM
Usually you find the cannabis before you find the lost Mayan city. Kid's got it all wrong.
by St-Clock on 5/13/16, 12:24 PM
So we've been in Le Monde[1], now BBC and Hacker News. All of this because a tabloid newspaper from Montreal thought it was better to gain exposure than to protect and correct a young aspiring scientist. A local "mythbuster" [2] already debunked the whole story, but alas, the trashy newspaper is still pushing this fiasco from new angles every day.
I fear this whole story will be extremely bad for the kid and most news outlets should blame the newspaper instead of focusing on the kid or the bad science part.
[1] http://mobile.lemonde.fr/big-browser/article/2016/05/11/l-hi...
[2] http://journalmetro.com/opinions/inspecteur-viral/962214/ce-...
by spraak on 5/13/16, 3:19 AM
> "The whole thing is a mess - a terrible example of junk science hitting the internet in free-fall," wrote Dr David Stuart
Wouldn't it actually be an excellent example of 'junk science hitting the internet in free-fall' ?
by danso on 5/13/16, 3:33 AM
Maybe the link should be changed to Gizmodo instead of "BBC Trending" (which seems to be the linkbait division of BBC)...Gizmodo has much more detail and original reporting, e.g. contacting the Canadian Space Agency for comment:
http://gizmodo.com/experts-doubt-that-a-teen-found-a-lost-ma...
FWIW, the CSA doesn't seem to have much of an explanation...
> We asked De Lisle to respond to the claims made by experts that this is “junk science,” and that the objects in the satellite photos are probably abandoned milpas. To which he responded: “The area of interest covers more than 78 square kilometers, and many linear features that appear manmade are visible from space.” Which is not much of an answer.
If the Maya ruins end up being nothing, I think this story is a great example of how silly it is to think of science as one monolithic entity, where every scientist automatically has a clue about fields far outside of their expertise. The CSA were likely impressed with the kid's tracking of the stars...there's no reason to think the CSA has any expertise in what an actual Maya city looks like.
by smegel on 5/13/16, 1:55 AM
Before they get into a big flame-fest, maybe someone should go and, you know, check it out.
by partycoder on 5/13/16, 7:12 AM
Clickbait 2, the revenge of the clickbait
by Overtonwindow on 5/13/16, 1:34 AM
Whoops, well give the kid high marks for trying
by hudell on 5/13/16, 2:28 AM
I'm actually surprised that I saw the "it was false" news pretty much everywhere, without even seeing the original news anywhere.
by kangar00 on 5/13/16, 1:55 AM
It may be anything, but I think it's a little strange how they shot this down so fast without any evidence. Makes me wonder if this is a desperate attempt to deter looters.
by iopuy on 5/13/16, 12:18 PM
Off topic but what is the purpose of the photo of the young lady at the bottom of the article? At first I thought it was the teen that made the discovery, then I thought it might be the author (on mobile this information is not easily visible), finally I concluded it has something to do with another article and is spliced into the original in a very confusing manner.
by jackgavigan on 5/13/16, 2:11 PM
Cripes, people are such killjoys! The counter-claims pooh-poohing the lad's "discovery" smack of schadenfreudensuchen. So what if there's a bit of media hype? It's a nice feelgood story and the kid hasn't done anything wrong. In fact, that's the sort of curiosity and inquisitiveness we should be fostering in schoolkids.
by Pica_soO on 5/15/16, 7:12 PM
Lets give this a little twist.
Teen arrested for 'accidentally' finding marijuana with google maps. Claims the stars guided him there.
by yolesaber on 5/13/16, 2:58 PM
Obviously these so-called "scientists" are lizard-spawn who are covering their cloacas that this youth was able to deduce the location of their eldritch portals.
by mpitt on 5/13/16, 11:18 AM