In my work experience putting things in a computer is the thing that preserve the least. We still have papers from the 70s all the computer stored data from the 90s is long gone. Storing physical artifacts is pretty passive compared to storing digital artifacts that require regular medium and formats change.

Its situational.

We've got some sites sealed, because the mere act of opening them will destroy them. We don't have the technology to safely examine them - yet. So we keep them under lock and key for future generations to solve that problem.

Sometimes you do have to make a hard choice. Taking it out of the ground might partially destroy it, but leaving it where it lies might also destroy it. (Particularly sites close to mining sites.)

But generally speaking - putting anything on display in a museum will wreck it. Most archeological works on display are duplicates, whilst the preservation and maintenance work is done as far away from ordinary people as possible. One part pays for the other.

The people involved in this stuff absolutely want to share that knowledge! They want people to grow and learn. To experience new ideas and endless wonder. But they're also extremely pragmatic.

Thank you for teaching us your knowledge! It's not intellectual property theft now you're sharing it.

Please, pragmatically, make photo or 3D model or something so that it's backed up on a website somewhere. Just in case an accident happens again, like at the Library of Alexandria in 48 BC, or the National Museum of Brazil in 2018 AD.

And if I can help, I'd love to try with you.

You seem to know about this subject.

1) what types of potential excavations are currently sealed and what is the hypothesis of the contents?

2) what is the most shocking thing you know that others don’t know that you’d be willing to share, or at least surprising.

3) why are there gatekeepers on knowledge and archaeology?

> 1) what types of potential excavations are currently sealed and what is the hypothesis of the contents?

The most famous for is probably the main tomb for the First Qin Emperor. That is to say, the main tomb for the place with the terracotta army. The army figures almost immediately started to flake and decay after being exposed - lacquer disappearing in a space of minutes. We believe there may be some mercury rivers or pools inside the main tomb that may rapidly be lost if we were to open it, as well as the other artifacts.

> 2) what is the most shocking thing you know that others don’t know that you’d be willing to share, or at least surprising.

Nothing much. I doubt anything would surprise anyone. Maybe that people have always been people? Some people have the mistaken impression ancient people were mentally slow.

I've only really dipped a toe into this field, with some translation work (and that was a little while ago, now). I've translated a lot of equivalents to "Y sleeps around" and "I've got a nice dick, call me" anywhere from a few thousand years right up to the invention of writing. Graffiti from three and four thousand years ago is about the same as you get on toilet stalls, today.

> 3) why are there gatekeepers on knowledge and archaeology?

In my experience, there isn't really. Not on what we know. There is a _lot_ of stuff that never makes it to media, or front of house at a museum, because its... Boring. Not a lot of people interested in Boris' accounting ledger for seeds and growth on the farm. Especially not when we have thousands from similar farms from the same era. Not unique, not interesting, not widely publicised. (But recorded diligently, all the same. Often in public records.)

There are gatekeepers on gaining more knowledge. Some of that is just bureaucratic nonsense. Some of it is that we've got limited resources and so need to triage where to supply them. And some of it is to stop over-eager morons from accidentally destroying knowledge that we don't have the skill or tools to safely extract, just yet.

There are sometimes a few things that have actual gatekeeping on exploring them, because they're political firecrackers. Like the potential site of Biblical artifacts in Moslem nations, for example. Or anything in China that goes against the current Party message. But those things are very few and far between.

Thanks, I appreciate you taking the time to respond.

A few more if you'd indulge me.

1) Do you have any conclusions or Bayesian probabilities on the notion that there was a relatively advanced ancient civilization in our past that has for whatever reason been suppressed/lost knowledge? Variations of this would be biblical stories of catastrophe actually being WMD's supported by various cultures like the Vedas.

2) Any opinion on Atlantis, Mu, Graham Hancock or something along the lines of _unsure but deeply mysterious and deserves more attention?"

3) What ancient culture fascinates you the most at the moment?

I am currently quite involved with learning about ancient cultures and my tone is obviously of the more fringe type, but it's mostly because from my absorption of the materials there is a lot of similarity and connection that stirs conclusions counter-factual to the "mainstream narrative." I mostly just am curious and keep an open mind. Currently I'm studying a lot on the Thracians - to me it feels like the proto-indian-european culture that is pre tower of babel and got associated with vikings/mongolians and seem to be related to abrahamiac religions by being proxy to one of the tribes that eventually got to Ireland and is also Gaulish/Celtic/Irish/Scottish by that degree. Which oddly I found some others coming to the same conclusion but that's pretty fringe. I guess it's fringe because it directly interferes with a lot of "religious calendars" - it does seem that archaeology is gated by dogmatism and if I recall the religious institutions have been quite involved (Jesuits/etc). I'm not reaching into conspiracy, just naming groups and their incentives.

Megaliths are absolutely fascinating and the explanation given by and large seems "hand-wavy."

The mystery of the moundbuilder culture world-wide is also fascinating.

And most interestingly is the evidence of overwhelmingly stunning know-how of measuring the stars and various mathematics. We definitely have a programmed view of history being archaic or barbaric when it's quite likely they were advanced beyond our imagination. The Babylonian tablets really are something. It's also interesting that our most ancient accounts of story begin with "in those ancient days..." (Gilgamesh).

Also stupidensously interesting is that many tombs of megaliths have evidence of extremely large quantities of mercury. Mesoamerica has this, the Qin dynasty tombs... very weird. Especially considering the electromagnetic properties of it.