Haran

The statement of mine that you quoted was in reference to Lemaire touring and talking about the ossuary. Scholars will sometimes do his with a new and especially exciting find.

This is probably the normal thing for normal, non-controvertial discoveries. However, many times, controversial finds are revealed publically (either through and authors' book or some type of media) and then addressed in peer-reviewed journals. Even though BAR may be a popular magazine about current archaeology and not a peer-reviewed journal, its articles are written by well-known scholars and it is probably read periodically by many scholars.

Artemus

I understood the context of your original post. It is definitely not normal to tour and publicize a discovery prior to the completion of peer review. Ever. Take for example the recent announcement of the discovery of the oldest "modern" human skull ever: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2978800.stm
That is a big discovery. Very big in their discipline. Notice the last line of the story:
"The Ethiopian discoveries are reported in the journal Nature." This is the norm. I can find hundreds of similar announcements by simply searching the news stations' web pages. Can you give me any examples where legitmate scholars initially skipped peer review to publicize major discoveries? Cold fusion is all that I know of (but I haven't really looked).

Now, one cannot help but ask what the motivation might be to skip peer review. The discovery would be no less important had they waited. Their book would have been more credible with skeptics such as myself with the strength of peer review behind it, and it may have even sold more copies. Could it be that they feared their discovery would not pass muster?

Vorkosigan

BAR has a summary here:
http://www.biblereview.org/bswb_BAR/bswbbar2806f1.html

"The James ossuary may be the most important find in the history of New Testament archaeology," says Hershel Shanks, editor of Biblical Archaeology Review. "It has implications not just for scholarship, but for the world's understanding of the Bible."Lemaire was said to have authenticated. "The ossuary has been dated to approximately 63 A.D. Lemaire details his full investigation in the November/December 2002 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review, the leading popular publication in its field."

He also lied and said the patina had been tested by the IGS and that it had the cauliflower pattern...Laboratory tests performed by the Geological Survey of Israel confirm that the box's limestone comes from the Jerusalem area. The patina--a thin sheen or covering that forms on stone and other materials over time--has the cauliflower-type shape known to develop in a cave environment; more importantly, it shows no trace of modern elements.

"The new find is also significant in that it corroborates the existence of Joseph, Jesus' father, and James, Jesus' brother and a leader of the early Christian church in Jerusalem."

No hesitation, restraint, or balance at all. Complete acceptance of it as a real artifact. Face it Haran, Shanks lied and cheated throughout this, and showed zero scholarly thinking on the issue.

Vorkosigan

Sauron

Indeed. The key individuals on the "pro" side - people like Lemaire, Shanks, Witherington, etc. - were fully aware that there was a pending IAA examination. Therefore, 'scholarly practice'would have been for them to withhold public engagements, not schedule speaking tours, decline book publications, etc. until the results of that IAA examination were available. Not only to protect their own credibility in this matter, but also to incorporate any new information that the IAA investigation might have surfaced.

Yet they did the opposite - in fact, given the blinding speed at which such speaking engagements, etc. were scheduled, it seems like they couldn't wait to get started. This was not a scholarly process - indeed, it was marked by several distinctly non-scholarly events, which godfry n. glad and Vorkosigan listed earlier.

I think the remaining possibilities are that Shanks, Lemaire, and Witherington:

1. realized that the IAA investigation wasn't complete, but they were temporarily blinded by their own bias in this matter, and proceeded anyhow;

2. were convinced that the IAA investigation would be a "shoe-in" for their position, and thus felt safe going out on a limb (prematurely) in favor of authenticity;

3. were so engrossed in their own speciality fields that they didn't realize the mandatory involvement of geology and chemistry in validating such a find. And the uncomfortable truth that if the artifact failed chemical and geological tests, then whatever historical and epigraphical evidence they might have had; well, it would not be sufficient to prop up the artifact's claim. Indeed, Witherington made an embarassing, yet revealing remark about carbon dating only a short while ago:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...threadid=54175
"The Shroud went through a huge fire and Carbon 14 dating dates carbon. When something catches on fire, it is carbonized," said Witherington. "I think what they dated was the fire, not the age of the shroud."'

It doesn't really matter whether it was (1), or (2) or (3). None of them qualify as "scholarly practice".

NB - note that I am being charitable in these three options. I deliberately left out the obvious 4th option - that Shanks, Witherington, etc. pushed the ossuary for personal gain, to financial motivations, to inflate their own credentials and standing, etc. While that option is possible, I didn't think I needed to include it to make my point. To wit, that even being as charitable as possible in analyzing how the 'pro' side approached the ossuary issue, there is still no way that their approach could be called "scholarly practice."

Sauron

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Haran
Oh, really?

Haran, please provide a link to such an article by Altman, with that kind of language in it. Make sure that it is dated chronologically "at the beginning" of the ossuary debate, and not after she had been attacked.

Spenser

Well Well Well, If this isn't just the kind of gloating party that I'd love to be a part of. I got into an online argument with a guy that rested his entire hat on the historicity of Jesus on that discovery channel special and the ossuary which I was skeptical of. And even if one were to have conceded it as genuine I still don't see it as 100% positive proof for the almighty.

What is funnier to me is the face on the Shroud of Turin. Now that is comedy...

Sauron

Haran, you sound like you're just making this all up as you go. Can you come up with three examples of sober historical or scientific organizations that announced unusual or outrageous discoveries in popular media first, while the peer review followed second? I mean, deliberately announced in the popular media, as opposed to being leaked?

The only one I can think of off-hand is the cold fusion announcement and the human cloning announcement (Raelians) - both of which turned out to be bombs, thus illustrating the foolishness of rushing a claim before it is ready. And I wouldn't count the Raelians in the class of "sober historical or scientific organization", either.

No, Haran, I'm sorry. In point of fact, the process for controversial finds is *far more likely* to go through a lengthy peer review process before being publically announced - as compared to a run-of-the-mill discovery. This prevents embarassment, false starts, and (in some cases) lawsuits.

It's another corollary of the maxim that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence".

Vorkosigan

delete

Vorkosigan

LOL. Sure Sauron....the Chinese dinosaurs in National Geographic...oh yeah, that turned out to be a fraud too. Are we sensing a pattern here?

Altman was attacked in the media. "And just who is this Rochelle Altman anyway? Has anyone ever heard of her?" Shanks knows who she is now! LOL. The "blind as a bat" remark was in her original articles in Jewsweek (Nov 2) and elsewhere on the web. It was (1) absolutely correct and (2) addressed to no one in particular. The attacks on Altman were addressed to her particularly, and part of a larger strategy. No moral equivalence at all.

From Paul Flesher's article at BibInterp:

• I don't understand the suggestion that part of the inscription is two or three hundred years later, [shanks] said. And just who is this Rochelle Altman anyway? Has anyone ever heard of her? Shanks was obviously not interested in engaging in scholarly analysis but rather wanted to win the point by innuendo and personal attack. After admitting he could not follow her analysis, he decided to imply that she had no right to participate in the scholarly discussion.

and Lemaire:

• Andre Lemaire was by this time clearly angry. He attacked Altman’s work, again not dealing with her arguments, but wondering whether anyone had heard of her and saying that she dealt in rumors, not scholarly analysis. Following that, he turned to my dialect analysis without mentioning me by name, saying instead that he did not want to embarrass someone who was obviously a junior scholar whom he did not know. [Note: I helped found the journal Aramaic Studies and presently serve as the President of the International Organization for Targumic Studies.] He then made a few remarks about the evidence I discuss but not about the conclusions I have drawn from it

See the personal attacks? The Right side didn't indulge in this crap. The Wrong side did.

Altman has now been dead right on the Ossuary ("it's a cheap fake") and on the Jehoash inscription. She thinks the Temple Ostracon is a fraud too. I won't bet against her.

Incidentally, the idea that the whole inscription is fake answers the puzzling question of why the two seem to run together. They were either faked at the same time, or as Altman argues, reworked at the same time.

It's a fraud! <puffs victory cigar> It's going to be a wonderful summer. It's a fraud! <long, slow, satisfied puff on that victory cigar>

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

Haaretz Article

But the Antiquities Authority found that the inscription cut through the ancient limestone box's patina, proving that the writing was not ancient. In addition, it said, "the inscription appears new, written in modernity by someone attempting to reproduce ancient written characters."

Not much new here, just posted for completeness.