The Richat Structure and the Atlantis Debate
Almost a Decade of Speculation
Almost a decade of speculation began on September 4, 2018, when the YouTube channel Bright Insight presented a provocative but carefully framed idea: not only might the lost city of Atlantis have actually existed, but its true location may have been hiding in plain sight for thousands of years—overlooked simply because scholars and enthusiasts alike had been searching in all the wrong places.
That proposal did not emerge in a vacuum. The debate over the location of Atlantis has long resembled a mirror maze. Plato never finished his account, and what he did record was already several steps removed from the original source. In the centuries since, countless researchers, amateurs, and even national interests have attempted to anchor Atlantis in their own proverbial backyards.
From the Mediterranean to the Americas, most theories suffer from the same fundamental flaw: selective reading driven by confirmation bias.
Yet among the many proposed candidates, the Richat Structure—also known as the “Eye of the Sahara” in Mauritania—stands apart. Unlike most suggested locations, which match only one or two vague elements of Plato’s description, the Richat Structure aligns with too many of the specific geographical, structural, and environmental features Plato described to be casually dismissed as coincidence.
Importantly, this is not a modern invention. The Richat Structure was speculated to be Atlantis shortly after its original discovery, but the idea was largely relegated to footnotes and passing remarks while attention shifted to more popular or politically convenient locations that fit modern expectations better than Plato’s actual text. In contrast, the Richat Structure consistently matches the narrative in ways that other sites simply do not.
When confronted with this accumulation of matches, critics often retreat to the claim of “mere coincidence.” Yet coincidence is frequently invoked not as a reasoned conclusion, but as a psychological escape hatch—used when facts become uncomfortable. An honest observer would at least concede that the correlations are reasonable, intriguing, and worthy of serious consideration.
The Core Objections
Critics typically advance two primary objections.
First, geologists describe the Richat Structure as a natural formation—often characterized as a volcanic, tectonic, or uplift-related structure.
Second, many classicists assert that Atlantis was never intended to be a real place at all, but rather a philosophical allegory devised by Plato to convey moral and political ideas.
While both objections sound authoritative, they oversimplify the historical, literary, and archaeological context in which Plato was writing.
Plato, Allegory, and Real Places
Plato was generally explicit when presenting allegory. When he used fictional narratives, he almost always grounded them in real or believed-real locations. This was not unique to Plato; it was standard practice among Greek and earlier authors. Crucially, Plato never claimed firsthand knowledge of Atlantis. He openly stated that his account was derived from third-hand sources—Solon, Egyptian priests, and earlier records.
These are the same priests that told and showed other Greeks mentioned what has come to be called The Lost Labyrinth of Hawara, and considered Evidence of Atlantis, or at least its influence, in ancient Egypt, though many Egyptian texts also make references they did not build the civilization but rather discovered it when it was abandoned and more or less cooped what was already there (some going as far as claim their deities actually created Egypt and merely left it to humans).
In this sense, Plato was not inventing fiction; he was doing what passed for historiography in his era: recording inherited tradition as faithfully as possible. History, myth, and philosophy were not yet separate disciplines.
Many real locations later became vehicles for allegory without losing their historical reality. Troy is the most famous example—dismissed as legend for centuries until archaeology proved otherwise. To argue that Atlantis must be fictional simply because Plato used it philosophically misunderstands how ancient writers worked and how often real places were later moralized.
Geology Does Not Equal Impossibility
Identifying the Richat Structure as a natural formation does not preclude human use. The precise mechanism and timing of its formation remain debated, but even if it were entirely natural, that fact alone says nothing about whether humans could have built upon it.
Human civilizations have repeatedly constructed settlements within volcanic craters, tectonic basins, and circular geological formations—sometimes knowingly, sometimes unknowingly. Natural formations often provided strategic, agricultural, and defensive advantages.
To assume that no ancient civilization would have exploited such a unique and resource-rich structure—especially during a time when the Sahara was not a desert—is not skepticism; it is assumption.
Environmental Context Matters
During the period when Atlantis is said to have existed, North Africa was not the barren landscape seen today. The Sahara underwent multiple “Green Sahara” phases, characterized by rivers, lakes, forests, wildlife, and sustained human populations. Evidence for freshwater sources, seasonal rainfall, fish, and large animal life in the region is well established.
In such an environment, the Richat Structure would have been a highly attractive location for settlement.
Measurements, Technology, and Misconceptions
Another frequent objection concerns Plato’s measurements, which do not match the Richat Structure with mathematical perfection. But expecting precision is unreasonable. Plato was not surveying the site himself; he was transmitting inherited measurements filtered through generations of retelling. The dimensions are close—not perfect—and that is exactly what one would expect.
Modern misunderstandings about “advanced civilizations” further distort the discussion. Popular culture imagines Atlantis as impossibly futuristic, but Plato’s description requires no technology beyond what is already known to have existed in antiquity. Gears, plumbing, metallurgy, and complex stonework predate classical Greece. Even Rome adopted technologies invented elsewhere.
“Advanced,” in Plato’s context, meant sophisticated relative to contemporaries—not anachronistic science fiction.
Archaeology, Looting, and Political Reality
The stonework described by Plato is consistent with construction methods found in the region. Yet no comprehensive scientific excavation has ever been conducted at the Richat Structure.
Artifact fragments have been reported across the site and surrounding areas, but widespread looting—often illegal—has stripped these finds of context, selling them into private and Western markets and irreversibly damaging the archaeological record.
Since the late nineteenth century, serious scientific investigation has been effectively impossible due to geopolitical, religious, and governmental restrictions. The ruling theocratic structures of the region make long-term, systematic research unfeasible. As a result, neither proponents nor skeptics can place boots on the ground to properly test their claims.
Arguments For vs. Against the Richat Structure as Atlantis
Arguments Supporting the Richat Structure
Matches Plato’s concentric-ring description unusually well.
Located beyond the Pillars of Heracles (as described by Plato).
Existed in a region that was once lush, fertile, and inhabited.
Close (though not perfect) dimensional correspondence.
Natural defensive geography consistent with Plato’s account.
Longstanding but historically neglected speculation.
Lack of excavation prevents disproof.
Arguments Against the Richat Structure
Classified as a natural geological formation
Lack of formal archaeological excavation
Atlantis often interpreted as allegory
Modern political barriers prevent investigation
Where the Case Is Stronger
When weighed honestly, the arguments for the Richat Structure are stronger than the arguments against it—not because they prove the case conclusively, but because the objections rely heavily on assumptions, dismissals, and modern biases rather than decisive counter-evidence.
Most importantly, the absence of proof is not proof of absence—especially when political reality prevents the very investigations required to settle the question.
Consider Göbekli Tepe
No one, for example, retained any memory or recorded tradition of what is now known as Göbekli Tepe. Its existence was entirely unknown until modern archaeology uncovered it, revealing not only the site itself but a network of far older structures throughout the surrounding region.
Notably, Göbekli Tepe appears to have been deliberately buried, rather than simply abandoned—a conclusion supported by the archaeological evidence. This intentional covering occurred around the same general period during which Atlantis is said to have vanished and when several other early civilizations are described in ancient traditions, including some from India, as having declined or disappeared.
Despite this, some have attempted to claim Göbekli Tepe as proof of the biblical Garden of Eden. Such assertions lack any substantive evidentiary basis. There is no credible archaeological, geographical, or textual support for linking Göbekli Tepe to Eden.
Moreover, traditional biblical chronologies place Eden as a cultivated garden roughly 6,000–7,000 years ago, not nearly 12,000 years ago—the period during which Göbekli Tepe is believed to have been constructed and subsequently buried.
Other texts, on the other hand, such as from Sumer give indications the origins of their civilization and hints of others went back 40,000 years in the past from their time or roughly 50,000 years ago in modern context. That;s seldom noted either.
Göbekli Tepe instead serves as a reminder of how easily profound chapters of human history can vanish from cultural memory entirely, only to be rediscovered millennia later. This alone cautions against dismissing ancient accounts—such as Plato’s—as mere fiction simply because their physical correlates have not yet been found or properly investigated.
Conclusion
Atlantis has neither been conclusively proven nor definitively disproven. What remains clear is that the Richat Structure deserves serious, unbiased consideration. Until political realities allow proper scientific exploration, certainty on either side is premature.
In the meantime, intellectual humility—and a willingness to follow evidence rather than comfort—remains the most honest position. It should never be reduced to a matter of believing it to be true because one wants to believe it is true, any more than another chooses to deny it is true simply because they want to believe it is untrue.
This must apply to everything or one falls into the trap of both willful ignorance (stupid on purpose) and arrogance (assuming one's own opinion or senses are superior when they are not).
