The “complementary”, “multidisciplinary university project” team described in my previous article seems to have decided to:
– on the one hand, revolutionise the world of archaeology (in the words of Pablito (it), aka Professor Paolo Debertolis: "Per me il problema è che queste grandi scoperte sono in mano solo agli archeologi che non hanno sufficiente competenza per gestire scoperte di questo tipo, mentre il tutto dovrebbe essere affrontato in maniera interdisciplinare" - “For me, the problem is that these great discoveries are solely in the hands of archaeologists - who do not have the competence necessary to deal with discoveries of this sort - when the proper approach ought to be an inter-disciplinary one”.
– on the other hand, to bring to the Osmanagic Foundation a veneer of the science in which it is so sorely lacking (a certain "Kingleo" (it), who seems about to join the "SB Research Group": "Penso quindi che il nostro ruolo possa essere quello di "appoggio" tecnico scientifico ( che mi sembra sia mancato sino ad oggi ). Si è scavato sinora con molta buona volontà ma con poche competenze tecniche e scientifiche. [...] Se invece si da l’impressione ( e non solo ) che vi siano dei ricercatori SERI che conducono le ricerche in maniera professionale ...bè, anche quello che si scoprirà sarà visto sotto un’altra luce." "So I think that our role would be to act as scientific and technical "support” (which seems to have been lacking hitherto). Thus far, a good deal of goodwill has been directed to the excavations, but not much in the shape of technical and scientific expertise. [...] If instead you gave the impression (and not just the impression alone) that you were serious researchers who conducted your investigations in a professional manner ... well, any future discovery would be seen in another light.")

Unfortunately for the "SB Research Group", and for Mr. Osmanagic, these claims would appear to be somewhat wide of the mark, and, given the absence of any geologist on the team, the SBRG might be well advised, or so it seems to me, to get into the habit of first acquiring some information on a subject before coming up with various theories about it. On several forums, Professor Debertolis, AKA Pablito, has just published a report (here in English, here in Italian) on the latest team expedition to Visoko, during which he and his colleagues took a closer look at some of the "megaliths" discovered in the Ravne tunnel. We learn that some of these "megaliths" (sandstone blocks for whose presence in the tunnel there is no evidence of human intervention, given that they might very well form part of the Lasva conglomerate through which the tunnel is dug) contained a sealed "groove", and would therefore not be "monoliths" but different kinds of lidded receptacles that Pablito unhesitatingly compares to giant bivalves [1]

Certainly, there is nothing to prevent the imagination from running riot, and to prevent one from wondering, as does Pablito, about what might be inside the giant mussel ... but the SB Research Group never seems to have come across Occam’s Razor. Before inventing fantastical theories involving a totally unknown civilization hiding "something " in containers shaped like sandstone blocks and burying them deep in some tunnel, is it possible to find a simpler explanation for the presence of these "grooves", that also happens to be consistent with the present state of archaeological and geological knowledge? The answer is a resounding “yes”; what we are most probably dealing with here is simply the remnant of a bedding plane that has survived the erosion of the block, as shown in the examples below:

Examples of this sort of block, with “grooves” caused by stratification, are to be found amongst the “discoveries” of the Foundation (who, as only to be expected, describe them as “artefacts”!):

Ah, but - argues Pablito - proof of these being artificial containers is provided by the presence on the "lid” of this:

These "objects" he interprets as "fine metal tubes", which perhaps served to "sink" the lid in question (since, as far as he is concerned, there is no doubt that the sandstone that forms the "bivalves" is an artificial material). I suggest to Professor Debertolis that he present his theory to any conference or meeting of sedimentologists; he would be guaranteed to send the audience into fits of laughter at the spectacle of someone falling into the basic pseudo-scientific trap of interpreting simple concretions as metal objects …

At any rate, this is hardly what you would call getting off to a flying start for a “multidisciplinary university project” team composed of “serious researchers conducting investigations in a professional manner”, supposely providing the "scientific and technical" back-up in which the Osmanagic Foundation has been so sadly lacking!

Update - March 6

My little article has given rise to some controversy on a forum (it) where Professor Debertolis posts. It began with a post from Kingleo [2], who looks as if he might well be about to join the "SB Research Group”, and who accuses the French of collectively stealing the Mona Lisa :-), perhaps forgetting that the painting was brought to France by Leonardo himself, and sold on by his heir to King François I. On a more serious note, another contributor to the forum mentioned (it) the fact that, besides the "metal tubes" on the surface of the lid, inside the "megalith K4" is a round metal object: "In precedenza nel K4 è stato rilevato con l’ecografia un oggetto metallico rotondo alla testa del megalite". I imagine that he is here alluding to this Foundation website article (bs), which describes the use of GPR in April 2010 in the Ravne tunnel. If that is the case, then it should be noted, first, that the Foundation article speaks quite definitely about radar, and not ultrasound: two completely different sorts of waves! And, secondly, it should be noted that the references in the Foundation paper were to "megalith” K2, and not K4. Whatever … Yet again, before considering the possibility of an artifact being deliberately buried in the sandstone block, one should have begun by first eliminating the possibility of a naturally-occurring metal concretion. If there are concretions adhering to the surface of the block, then there is no reason why there shouldn’t also be some on the inside! And as for the comparison that that particular poster makes between Mr. Osmanagic and Heinrich Schliemann, I’m not sure that it is really flattering to Mr. Osmanagic :-)