Talk:Mu (mythical lost continent)

Chemical Symbols

Please consult the following page to ascertain the proper chemical symbols: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_elements_by_symbol (i.e., Magnesium = Mg) Also, SiAl, SiMg are chemical compounds, and while not an exact chemical formula, they do indicate the presence of those chemical elements. Jchurchward (talk) 13:55, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

• See my reply on your talk page. Briefly, those words are not formulas and are not based on the element symbols. They are names that the geologists made up from the element *names*, and should be written the way geologists write them --- "sial" and "sima", without caps. All the best, --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 18:59, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

The Madrid Codex

In a section of the late Mayan period Madrid Codex that is sometimes called the Troano Codex, fanciful archaeologists in the days before Mayan glyphs had been translated thought they were able to interpret illustrations as "records" of a continent in the Pacific, destroyed by volcanic activity. (That was the origin of the Mu-Story.) Supposedly, a similar legend has been translated from unspecified "Sanskrit tablets" that describe a continent called Rutas, by the french writer Louis Jacolliot.

This was part of the article on Lemuria. After changing the Rutas redirect to Louis Jacolliot, I decided to delete it there, since it would belong here. --Zara1709 10:01, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Subtitles

I think the page should have a better division to subtitles. Now the text for example suddendly jumps to describe Mu in fiction and art. I, however, am too incompetent to do this.

Done. It even jumped from semi-fiction, to pure fiction, to geologist criticism, and back to fiction. --GunnarRene 17:56, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Odd sentence

Geologists maintain that we may be quite certain that no such Pacific continent existed. What? What kind of sentence is that?

CT

Small item: I noticed that Chrono Trigger was added as an appearance in other works. I'm pretty sure I know that game backwards and forwards (or used to anyway) and I don't recall any Mu references. There's a creature called a "Nu." Perhaps there's a land mass on the global map located where Mu supposedly was? I'd just like some clarification, and I don't want to edit the page without it.

I read a spanish book a while ago which claimed to have proof.Rocks with information on dinosaurs.

by the way these rocks where found somewhere in peru.

Augustus Le Plongeon, Mu, Atlantis, and the Mayas

It says Augustus Le Plongeon held that the Mayas were older than Atlantis, and that the survivors of Mu's destruction founded Maya civilization... but then it says Le Plongeon thought Mu was Atlantis. This doesn't hang together. (Also, the bracketed footnote with the name of the section's author doesn't seem to conform to Wikipedia policy.) 71.82.214.160 03:55, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. He couldn't have read his reference! And at the moment, links to mailing lists inside an article are a nono.--Dougweller (talk) 19:29, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Disputing Augustus LePlongeon & the Lost Continent of Mu

In the books by Augustus LePlongeon, his use of Mu or Moo was as a proper name, i.e., "Queen Moo and the Egyptian Sphinx." Leplongeon did not believe in a lost Pacific Ocean continent - his lost civilization was in the Yucatan and Central America and extended to Atlantis. I believe that the article should be changed to reflect that the 'Lost Continent of Mu' was an invention of James Churchward. Jchurchward (talk) 15:05, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi, good to see you here. But I thought Mu was invented by the Abbe Charles-Etienne Brasseur. He found an abridged copy of a work by Diego de Landa, a Spanish monk who assumed Mayan had a phonetic alphabet. Brassuer was looking at a Mayan codex, and found a couple of symbols very vaguely (very!) similar to Landa's 'M' and 'U', decided they said Mu and were the name of a land flooded by a catastrophe. Isn't that how it all started? Doug Weller (talk) 18:42, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

In "Queen Moo & The Egyptian Sphinx" Chapter VI (page 66) - Le Plongeon mentions the Land of Mu and in the next sentence:

The description of that land given to Solon by Sonchis, priest at Sais; its destruction by earthquakes, and submergence, recorded by Plato in his "Timaeus," have been told and retold so many times that it is useless to encumber these pages with a repetition of it.

Therefore the concept of a sunken Pacific Ocean continent named Mu was conceived by James Churchward and publicized in his 1926 book, "The Lost Continent of Mu Motherland of Man". Note that there are also mentions of the Land of Mu on pages xi, & xliv, & 144 of the same book. The link leads to a scanned copy of the book. Jchurchward (talk) 00:51, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

"Although Augustus Le Plongeon used the term prior to Churchward to describe a sunken continent, his reference was to Atlantis, which he envisioned was in the Atlantic Ocean."
I don't get it, this article is about "Mu the lost continent", right ? So it doesn't matter if this legendary continent is believed to be in Atlantic or Pacific Ocean. Anyway, the introduction shouldn't be : "Mu, as a name of [...] was first used by Churchward". It should be something like : "Mu is the name of legendary lost continent. The term was first used by Augustus Le Plongeon and Brasseur De Bourbourg to describe a civilisation whom they thought they had found in maya codex and was popularized by Churchward with his book "The lost continent of Mu".
Well, something like that, anyway...kition 18:51, 20 September 2008 (UTC))

I believe that the text accurately reflects the usage of 'The Lost Continent of Mu.' Although mentioned by Le Plongeon from an mistranslation, it was not referenced as 'The Lost Continent of Mu.' The 'Lost Continent of Mu' as described, i.e, 'as the name of a sunken Pacific Ocean continent' was first used by James Churchward is accurate. Jchurchward (talk) 15:45, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

SiAl... plate tectonics = no sunken continents?

Some points on the introduction: - Oceanic crust is also made up of aluminosilicate minerals - indeed the mantle itself is made of silicate minerals. Just keep the point about continental crust being lighter. - Plate tectonics doesn't say there can't be submerged continental crust. There is plenty of submerged continental crust - it's the areas of the continental shelf, i.e. shallow seas. The Sea of Japan, the Sunda Sea, a large part of the South China Sea. That's all continental crust. Bathymetry makes it clear whether there are sunken continents in the middle of the Pacific. And indeed, there aren't. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.173.33.50 (talk) 09:26, 14 May 2007 (UTC).

Actually that last statement is incorrect. There is a sunken continent in the pacific, it's called Zealandia (continent). It submerged about 23 million years ago, probably a wee bit too long ago to be the source of the Mu legend. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.72.253.21 (talk) 10:38, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Earthquakes and volcanic activity regularly break off chunks of continent and send them into the sea. It happened in Sumatra (albeit the piece that broke off was already underwater) and resulted in a large tsunami that killed over 100,000 people. Land does not sink, sea levels rise! The Bahamas were once 10 times larger than they are today, but a comet exploding over North America nearly 13,000 years ago melted enough ice to raise sea levels nearly 400 feet. That would have seemed like the land was sinking to the people who lived there and anywhere else in the world near the coast. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.56.76.128 (talk) 16:33, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Music

What about the song "justified ancients of Mu mu" by the KLF? Surely an example of a reference to Mu in the field of music...82.211.95.178 16:16, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Video Game Refrences

Why are Illusion of Gaia and Terranigma listed twice? I'm not so sure they belong in the first list of games that just simply mention Mu. 24.78.225.171 (talk) 12:13, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

"The Queen was also know as Romy Ellich of the third dynasty" is a fairly random statement out of nowhere! I thought it might be a cryptic clue to something or other. Maybe the Mind of Mu communicating with us? The phrase "Romy Ellich" is only referenced on this page, zero other hits. I'd like to know what it's all about! 86.154.76.96 (talk) 03:29, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Mu in the arts and entertainment section

WP:POPCULTURE says such sections "should contain verifiable facts of genuine interest to a broad audience of readers. Although some information can be verified from primary sources, this does not demonstrate whether such information has been discussed in independent secondary sources. If a cultural reference is genuinely significant it will be easy to find a secondary reliable source to attribute that judgment. Quoting a respected expert as attesting to the importance of a subject as a cultural influence is encouraged." Which is why I have removed some and the rest need justification.--Doug Weller (talk) 10:36, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Relevance of section of weight of continental masses

How is it relevant to this article to discuss whether an island can sink because it is composed of heavy material? The claim (quoted directly in the article) is that lost continents sunk / were destroyed by catastrophe (earthquake, volcano, rise in sea level). So what does this paragraph about the composition of continental masses have to do with the article? OK, no lost continents could have sunk simply because of their composition--great. But since none of the believers in these theories claim that any islands sunk in that way, what does this have to do with the article? I don't personally believe in Mu / Lemuria / Atlantis, &c, but this section seems like it is just a random "scientific" fact thrown in for the sake of sounding important, when it really has nothing at all to do with the claims of the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.243.3.27 (talk) 14:48, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I hope that the new text makes it more clear (1) why continents cannot sink or be destroyed, and (2) that an island-size Mu would not explain the "facts" that Churchward used to prove its existence. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 02:27, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

As I said, I do not believe in the existence of Mu, &c. The reason for my doubt is largely based on the lack of verifiable evidence and other considerations (such as those related to plate-tectonics, though I sometimes flirt with alternate theories like the expanding earth hypothesis). But I don't know enough about the parameters of natural catastrophies (especially cataclysmic ones like meteor impacts or global warming / sea level rise) to say whether they can sink / destroy an island or small continent. According to wikipedia policy, there should be sources cited from people who do know such things, if they are to be presented in the article (one way or the other). I see no such citations in the amended text, so I would say it should be removed, or at least marked as needing citations in about 5 or 6 places.

I have no problem with noting that most of the publications dealing with the topic are related to "New Age" viewpoints, but I have seen several treasure hunters (purely pragmatic concern, rather than "spiritual") and even a few anthropologists on the Travel Channel and Discovery Channel and such, who, contrary to the New Agers, see Mu and Atlantis as simply lost human civilizations (such as the one responsible for language in Linear A), rather than super-advanced civilizations with alien technology and Akashic Records. So to say that all who believe in / publish about lost continents are new age is somewhat misleading. 24.243.3.27 (talk) 23:31, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Common ancestors

This sentence is badly worded:

Moreover, the weight of all archaeological, linguistic and genetic evidence is contrary to the claim that the ancient civilizations of the New and Old Worlds have a common origin.

The consensus of modern scientists is that all civilization had a common origin, based on genetic, linguistic and archaeological evidence (e.g., mitochondrial eve, PIE, Lucy). So this sentence should either be reworded to clarify what is being claimed (I suppose it is trying to claim something to the effect that there is no direct, immediate connection between ancient European and new world civilizations), or it should be tagged with cite needed, or should be removed as WP:OR. 24.243.3.27 (talk) 20:10, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I had the same issue. That statement definitely does conflict with the "Recent African origin of modern humans" article, which states "According to both genetic and fossil evidence, archaic Homo sapiens evolved to anatomically modern humans solely in Africa, between 200,000 and 100,000 years ago..." 72.187.96.184 (talk) 01:21, 23 June 2009 (UTC) JAHIIIWolf

I believe that "civilization" is being used in the sense of "the society, culture, and way of life of a particular area". In that sense, all humans have a common origin, sub-Saharan Africa, but civilizations arise in different times and places, and are only necessarily related in that all civilizations are built by humans. ClovisPt (talk) 04:37, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that was the intended meaning. This point needs to be made more explicit; it seems that many readers misunderstand "civilizations" as "peoples". --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 05:45, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

My issue is not with the possible confusion of "civilization" and "people" (per se--though this could also be an issue). My problem is specifically with the claim that "ancient civilizations of the New and Old Worlds have [no] common origin". This is very confusing, since all related fields of scientific study conclude that they do have a common origin. The point the article is trying to express is, I believe, that ancient civilizations of the New and Old Worlds have no direct connection. I'm not sure how that point should be worded in the article, but the current wording is deficient (on multiple levels--per the confusion of "culture" with "peoples," as well as at this point). 64.234.10.32 (talk) 03:57, 26 June 2009 (UTC)