Hex

Context. Archaeologists do work on non-literate societies all the time, and they can start to get understanding based on what they find where, how much it is repeated, special treatment/materials, etc.

Actual texts? They're just gravy, but ... The artifacts come first, the documents are ancillary (Evidence = proof, Text may = Propaganda/Bias/MYTH).


ETA: Oh, and if you want to look at artifacts 'speaking', look to Ian Hodder's works on 'Thick Description'. Mind that I'm a bit skeptical about pushing the evidence that far, but it doesn't stop people from trying now and then ...

ericmurphy

But since we know the flood never happened, Dave, there is absolutely no reason to assume any such thing.

David Rohl is not right, but even if he were, he would still not make Egyptian civilization less than 4,500 years old. There is substantial evidence of human habitation in Egypt long before 4,500 years ago, evidence that if your flood actually happened, would have been buried beneath a mile of sediment.

Dave, you simply cannot be made to understand that no one here believes the flood ever actually happened, and you've never presented any evidence that it did happen. Therefore, any claim you make that depends on the existence of the "Flood" is invalidated right out of the gate. The earliest evidence of civilization in China could be as much as 8,000 years old, which predates the existence of the earth in your playskool cosmogony.

ericmurphy

No. It's the height of rationality to hold the position that there was no flood. Not only have you failed, after over a year of trying, to identify a single scrap of affirmative empirical evidence that any such thing happened, but a global flood would require the violation of multiple laws of nature, and as your hero Henry Morris himself states, it would require supernatural suspension of those laws.

There is physical evidence for Egyptian civilization, Dave. You know, pyramids and stuff. The physical evidence indicates that those structures are contemporaneous with your flood, if not predating it, which all by itself rules out your "flood" as even a possibility.

Everything we know about antiquity has more evidence to support it, Dave, because there is zero evidence in support of your "flood." You proved this, all by yourself.

ericmurphy

Sixteen-thousand-year-old pottery in China, Dave. Explain to us how pottery could predate not only your "flood," not only human civilization, not only the existence of humans, not only the existence of the planet, but also the existence of the universe.

Explain to us how this evidence fits into your playskool cosmogony.

Dave Hawkins

You keep repeating all these >5000 YO Carbon 14 dates as if they were proven. They are not. In fact, they are based on faulty assumptions about C14 levels throughout history.

shirley knott

And yet you have not presented any of this evidence anywhere, even when you have debated the subject.
How very odd...

Dave, there is no even moderately convincing evidence for a global flood and a planetful of evidence that one has not occurred in the last 10 million years, at least.

It does your side no good at all for you to continue to misrepresent the facts as you do. One begins to suspect that a commitment to dishonesty is a pre-requisite for Biblical Literalism and YEC-ism. Of that, there is quite a great deal of evidence!

no hugs for thugs,
Shirley Knott

Minimalist

Cultic figurines and remnants of religious practices are definitely evidence of cultic rites. I would not presume to remind you that images of Yahweh were supposedly forbidden so when other figurines show up in religious settings it has to be considered as evidence of polytheistic practice.

That Asherah was a member of the Canaanite pantheon is beyond dispute. What Professor Dever is saying is that in the countryside these Canaanite practices remained in force well into the historical period. Such disputes are even reflected in the OT itself as the priests who wrote it were always bitching about the "high places." If people were not conducting rituals at these country shrines, why would they be constantly complaining? Dever also holds to the belief that the majority of the "Israelite" nation was composed of refugees from the Canaanite cities which were crushed by the Sea People. In this he disagrees with Israel Finkelstein who holds that the Israelites arose from nomadic herders who were forced to settle down when their agricultural trading partners were destroyed. In any case, both agree that Israel arose in the early Iron Age and that there were no patriarchs, no captivity in Egypt, no Exodus and no Conquest.

Minimalist

It's funny, I know another fundie, also named Dave who makes the same sort of absurd suggestion that people who look at facts are "closed-minded" but people who believe iron-age fairy tales are not. Are you sure you are in Missouri and not South Korea?

Roger Pearse

I'm not sure that you got my point. How do we know that a statue is 'cultic'? How do we know that something is a 'remnant of religious practice'? I'm not sure that archaeology alone can tell us such a thing.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Hex

*SIGH*

WHY DO THE CURVES AGREE?

Need I say more about why you're wrong about ¹⁴C, Afdave? :huh: