Archaeologist at Cardiff University, a specialist in zooarchaeology and the ancient Mediterranean, and the scientist who took the mainstream side in the four-hour exchange with Graham Hancock on the Joe Rogan Experience in April 2024.
Why that exchange matters
It is the closest thing the Lost Civilization Hypothesis has had to a direct public test. Dibble’s argument was not that Hancock is impossible but that the claim is checkable: a global seafaring civilisation would leave a signature in the aggregated record, and he brought the aggregate, radiocarbon date distributions, faunal and botanical assemblages, and the shipwreck record, and showed what it contains. Hancock’s reply was that the evidence lies on drowned continental shelves that have not been surveyed.
Where it left things
Nobody was converted, which is the usual result, but the exchange produced the clearest statement on record of what each side thinks would count as evidence, and it is the reason the debate since has been about survey coverage rather than about individual sites. Fingerprints of the Gods is the book the argument is ultimately about.
Connections
Graham Hancock · Lost Civilization Hypothesis · Fingerprints of the Gods · Kenneth Feder · Ancient Apocalypse · Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis · JRE 2136