This episode discusses the universality of the egg as a symbol across Human cultures, and its connection with the idea of the “Cosmic Egg.” The reasoning for the ubiquity of the egg symbol is not difficult, and the show acknowledges it: eggs are representative of fertility and new life. The viewer is then presented with the idea of the Cosmic Egg, which connects the use of eggs in mythology across Human cultures to say that the universe originated from an egg. Evidence of this idea is given with examples from many different creation myths. Up to this point, as long as we’re in the realm of mythology, I really can’t dispute. Then the Ancient Alien Theory comes in: the Cosmic Egg represents the Big Bang, about which the aliens told the ancients, and that’s why it is so common a theme. This is given support by a discussion of the Dogon people of Mali, whose creation story tells of an egg as the focal point of the universe and that their gods visited Earth by travelling in eggs.[1] Widespread iconography of people emerging from eggs is also brought up, which is then coupled with the assumption that the eggs must be spacecraft. This is one of the major issues with the Ancient Alien Theory: there’s no room for metaphor or imagination in the work of the Ancients, all of their depictions must necessarily of things they witnessed in reality.
Moving into modern times, there are two connections they highlight: modern sightings of egg-shaped UFOs and a 1984 find in Portugal known as the Algarve Egg. The latter will already be familiar to regular viewers of the show, because it has been discussed previously and was also prominently featured on an episode of Georgio Tsoukalos’ spinoff, In Search of Aliens (they even use some of the same footage).
Tsoukalos discusses it with Peter Daughtry, a researcher of the egg, and the viewers get a story that implies the Algarve Egg may come from Atlantis. The voice-over then goes into a discussion of the symbol on the egg: it is reminiscent of a caduceus (a rod intertwined with two snakes), a symbol which is indicative of fertility (though is now associated with the medical profession because of its association with the Greek god Asclepius). After further discussion about other egg-shaped “alien technology” which is supposedly used by the Druids and the Oracle at Delphi, the viewer is brought back to the symbol, which we are now to understand is not merely a symbol at all, but an image of the DNA strand.
Here the Ancient Alien Theory meets up with my least favorite pseudoscientific idea: Intelligent Design. The Ancient Alien Theory claims that humanity could not possibly have evolved independently on Earth, that there must have been interference. It is essentially the same claim as those who adhere to Intelligent Design, the only difference is the name given to the interfering entity. If you’re reading this blog, I probably don’t have to tell you that there is no evidence in scientific reality for this concept, but it doesn’t hurt to repeat it as often as possible. Unfortunately, this type of thought is making its way into (ostensibly) prestigious peer-reviewed journals, which allows adherents of non-scientific ideologies to use such articles to support their irrational claims. One such article is “The ‘Wow! Signal’ of the Terrestrial Genetic Code” published in Icarus in 2013.[2] The authors of the article claim to find intentional patterns in how various elements of DNA is coded and claim that these must be artificial. They are adamant that they do not support religiously-minded intelligent design, but adhere to the idea of Panspermia. Panspermia is the idea that life may have originated extraterrestrially and then flourished here. Panspermia doesn’t require intelligence or intention behind it: microbes from a meteorite hitting the earth three billion years ago is panspermia. The show, however, immediately transfers to “Directed Panspermia” without explaining the difference, and we’re back to Intelligent Design. Whenever I hear about Directed Panspermia, I can’t help but think of the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode[3] where they find out that a group called the Preservers actually did “seed” the primordial ooze of various worlds. It makes more sense there, though, because they had to explain why all of the aliens are humanoid and it’s not as fun if the explanation is “because actors are human-shaped.”
Having made these points, the show goes in an odd(er?) direction: to claim that the egg-like shape of the Thalamus gland in the Human brain is an indicator of the truth of the Cosmic Egg idea. They say the aliens who manipulated our DNA and all the rest put this clue in the center of our heads where, by the way, we can’t see it. Not being a biologist, I have no idea why the Thalamus is shaped as it is, but I’m sure there’s a more reasonable explanation than that.[4]
The show ends with a very brief mention of the idea of the Holographic Universe, which claims that all of existence is merely an illusion being broadcast for our benefit from a singularity. There was an episode of Star Trek: TNG about this idea, too, and it was better written.[5] Here’s a place where they could have really delved into a serious idea from the ancient world: Plato’s Ideal Forms and the concept that we are all living in the Cave and seeing only shadows of what truly exists. That might be asking too much.
[1] There’s no evidence, however, that these gods looked anything like Robin Williams. 
[2] Available here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/256719897_The_Wow_signal_of_the_terrestrial_genetic_code if you are of a mind to read the original.
[3] “The Chase,” season six, episode twenty
[4] If YOU are a biologist or anatomist or doctor or just someone who knows the answer to this, please let me know. I’m curious. J
[5] “Ship in a Bottle,” season six, episode twelve.
History with the Szilagyis 