I think the archaeologist almost surely meant this and the reporter completely screwed up the story.<p>It would be functionally insane to think that authoritarianism came fundamentally out of a New World archaeological site that is 3000 years ago. For example, in order to sustain this belief you would have to believe that someone from this culture traveled to Africa and then invented time travel, so that they could go back to the mid-2000s BC and give the idea to the Old-Kingdom Egyptians.<p>Just to give some numbers by rectal extraction: I am about 98% sure that a seasoned academic from Stanford would not be so clumsy with his speech as to say outright that he thought this had happened; I am only maybe 75% sure that a given reporter understands a given scientist&#x27;s research, so given that we have this report I&#x27;d estimate .98 * .25 &#x2F; (.98 * .25 + .02 * .75) = 94% chance that the reporter misunderstood the scientist, and only a 6% chance that the scientist really believes what the reporter was saying. It&#x27;s possible but I definitely think it&#x27;s highly unlikely.