Viewpoints

Lpetrich,
What kind of technical things? Please explain. Is there no difference between mere story-telling of grandeur and myth versus "knowledge of the self" as is dealt with in the Vedas and elucidated in the Upanishads? The tales of Homerian epic can have a similarity with the Indian epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata only to the commonality of majesty, grandeur, bravery, sacrifice, law and morals. I am arguing that tales can and do get passed along, but abstractions on the self cannot be recapitulated "as heard"!

How far back does Harappa go? 5000 years maybe. Astronomical configurations mentioned in the Mahabharata date much further before that. Therefore, I am questioning the existence of "literacy gap" in the first instance, arguing that the gap actually lies in our possession and interpretation of relatively modern archaeological artefacts.

I would say that there is no necessity for "insertion" of the Indian epics to plug archaeological sink-holes.

lpetrich

Viewpoints:
What kind of technical things?

LP:
Lots and lots of things at the present day. Do you know what a partial differential equation is? What the Riemann Tensor is? What an elementary-particle Gauge Theory is?

Viewpoints:
Please explain. Is there no difference between mere story-telling of grandeur and myth versus "knowledge of the self" as is dealt with in the Vedas and elucidated in the Upanishads? The tales of Homerian epic can have a similarity with the Indian epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata only to the commonality of majesty, grandeur, bravery, sacrifice, law and morals. I am arguing that tales can and do get passed along, but abstractions on the self cannot be recapitulated "as heard"!

LP:
What is your point? That the Vedas have to have been written as soon as they had been composed?

My point is that they had *not* been -- and where do the Vedas refer to writing? Especially the one considered the oldest, the Rig Veda? Homer's _Iliad_ contains exactly *one* mention of writing; could it be that that is one more mention than in the Vedas?

Viewpoints:
How far back does Harappa go? 5000 years maybe. Astronomical configurations mentioned in the Mahabharata date much further before that.

LP:
WHAT astronomical configurations???

Are there precise observations of eclipses, occultations, and the like?

Viewpoints:
Therefore, I am questioning the existence of "literacy gap" in the first instance, arguing that the gap actually lies in our possession and interpretation of relatively modern archaeological artefacts.

LP:
I notice a lack of counterevidence; a lack of clear evidence of writing in India between 1500 and 500 BCE.

phaedrus

LP

Well two in place of one yeah

So what? That's typical example of your dragging in irrelevant issues and constructing straw theories, Phaedrus.

Please enlighten me as to what are irrelevant issues i have dragged in and which straw theories have i constructed.

Linguistic evidence is NOT used in isolation; the positions that Elst criticizes are examples of linguistic evidence used alongside of other evidence, such as the distribution of wild plants and animals.

Isnt that called linguistic paleontology? Isnt that considered part of linguistics? And the article offers Zimmer's comments on the same too. . Linguistic paleontology bases itself on the semantic reconstruction of lexemes, the interpretation of which is often problematic. For example, while talking about horses, do we presume that the ancients knew the difference between a half-ass or hemione or onager? Was the word used to indicate a domesticated animal or a wild one or is it their horse or some other cultures’? Doesn’t this field constrict itself to words instead of grammatical structure like comp. Linguistics?

Is comparative linguistics a proper science? I know there have been others who have asked this, but seriously can anyone demonstrate the scientific nature of this field? The problem of glottochronology comes to my mind…*I think this area is open to debate, especially the methodology and its current relevance, will take it up in another post*

Regarding the proto issue…..what do you think of this?…
Phaedrus:
So we are back at square one….so whom did the incoming populations invade then? ...
LP:
The descendants of the Harappans.

Continuing to answer each others posts yeah? Could you point out to me to the papers or links where this particular theory has been proposed and with evidence that the immigrants “invaded” descendants of the Harappans and which sites witnessed these battles? Or is it just your speculation?

That the authors of the Vedas had been unfamiliar with the Harappans, giving a sequence like
Later (had writing)
Vedas (had no writing)
Harappans (had writing)

So where did the harappans go? They just disappeared leaving only populations which had no inkling whatsoever of neither the civilization nor the script? Yet again we are on speculative ground.

We can check on whether there is any writing to be found in Nanda remains.

Great idea, I am sure no one has thought about it. ;-) The 3 BC date is then but just an estimation based on whatever evidence in hand. The question remains, if these great dynasties have survived for so long without writing, then what could be the reason for reacquiring it?

And forgot to ask you regarding the analogy you had provided regarding that a trader returning back …etc. In a feudal society like the kingdoms of the past, where the control is centralized with the king and the priests, can a trader (s) contribute to writing?

And regarding brahmi, what reasons do you attribute for the differences between this script and kharosthi?

Consider Mycenaean Greek and Hittite.

Those two I got from witzel’s article, just two in the long history of linguistics? Both findings being in 1952 and 1912 respectively, so all the remaining are just theories?

So you are claiming that only settled people would ever be willing to compose big orally-transmitted epics?
Among nomadic people, the transmitters of these epics would wander along with the rest of the group.

Yup just like your claim about the descendants of harappans and stuff. Seems logical to me that such intellectual activity would be the forte of civilized people who have settled down and are part of an established civilization.

E-Z. Just walk in. Phaedrus, your kvetching strikes me as EXTREMELY stupid. It makes me wonder how serious you really are, Phaedrus.

Sigh talk about the world looking stupid to stupid people. As a result of my questioning it has now dawned on you I hope that - no one “invades” empty towns they just walk in. And now coming back to invasion part as I repeatedly asked you if you wish to use terms like “invade” and “invasion” please substantiate it. And btw what happened to those issues you haven’t responded to yet…does this mean you acquiesced on them?

phaedrus

To all

For a nice update (1996) take a look at....

THE SEARCH FOR COMMON ORIGINS: A SURVEY OF THE HISTORY OF INDO-EUROPEAN STUDIES

I found it interesting and informative and gives more thrust to what i had been saying earlier about an integrated approach like Renfrew pointed out in his interview and the politicisation of the issue. The paper ends with this particular paragraph...

Viewpoints

LP: Lots and lots of things at the present day. Do you know what a partial differential equation is? What the Riemann Tensor is? What an elementary-particle Gauge Theory is?

I do. Yet what does that mean? Is this transmitted knowledge in the verbal tradition?

LP: What is your point? That the Vedas have to have been written as soon as they had been composed?

Composed? I hope you are aware that Vedas are construed to be "srutis". Vyasa is accorded a position of an editor *only* by the Indians. But that is not what I am saying. I am telling you that you can transmit tales not abstract knowledge in the verbal tradition. You can keep telling your children and their children and their children that William Tell shot an arrow to split an apple, you can hardly tell them what William Tell thought about the value of an apple.

LP: WHAT astronomical configurations??? Are there precise observations of eclipses, occultations, and the like?

Read the astronomical observations on the positions of Ursa Major (called Saptarshis) and movement based predictions in the second chapter of the twelfth Canto of the
Bhagvat Puran.

LP: I notice a lack of counterevidence; a lack of clear evidence of writing in India between 1500 and 500 BCE.

What about the Brahmanas dated 1000 to 700 BCE?

It should be remembered that even "reasonably close" dating of the ancient Vedic texts has been next to impossible for most European scholars who were fascinated with the chronology of the Hindus. Unable to swallow huge timelines that dwarfed Biblical concepts of origin and creation, most have tried to swallow the smaller camel. Hence, we have a funny situation wherein comparative religion apologists have said that dating the texts even based on internal evidence is remarkably difficult and in the next breath have hazarded expert opinions of fixing these within a time frame.

What I am arguing is that archeological data, given the ravages of time and tide are not the best evidences to reconstruct ancient civilizations in the absence of validating time periods, especially true of the Hindu people where extremely abstract existential concepts were formulated given that the evolutionary development of mental processes is inconsistent with relatively recent archaeological digs.

lpetrich

LP earlier:
So what? That's typical example of your dragging in irrelevant issues and constructing straw theories, Phaedrus.

Phaedrus:
Please enlighten me as to what are irrelevant issues i have dragged in and which straw theories have i constructed.

LP:
Read what I had written

LP earlier:
Linguistic evidence is NOT used in isolation; the positions that Elst criticizes are examples of linguistic evidence used alongside of other evidence, such as the distribution of wild plants and animals.

Phaedrus:
Isnt that called linguistic paleontology? Isnt that considered part of linguistics? And the article offers Zimmer's comments on the same too. . Linguistic paleontology bases itself on the semantic reconstruction of lexemes, the interpretation of which is often problematic. For example, while talking about horses, do we presume that the ancients knew the difference between a half-ass or hemione or onager? Was the word used to indicate a domesticated animal or a wild one or is it their horse or some other cultures’? Doesn’t this field constrict itself to words instead of grammatical structure like comp. Linguistics?

LP:
Phaedrus, you are making yourself look like a total idiot. Do you REALLY think that linguists and archeologists are absolute dummies? One can *check* which words get used for what. As a result, one can be confident that *ek'wos refers to true horses only, though it can refer to both wild and domestic ones. This is because donkeys get referred to with different words that are probably not ancestral IE (Latin asinus, Greek onos, etc.). Interestingly, when Sumerians first learned of horses, they called these beasts "mountain donkeys" (anshe kur) or "fast donkeys" (anshe zi-zi).

Phaedrus:
[a lot of stuff about how must use archeological evidence alongside of linguistic evidence]

LP:
A big waste of time.

Phaedrus earlier:
So we are back at square one….so whom did the incoming populations invade then? ...

LP earlier:
The descendants of the Harappans.

Phaedrus:
Continuing to answer each others posts yeah? Could you point out to me to the papers or links where this particular theory has been proposed and with evidence that the immigrants “invaded” descendants of the Harappans and which sites witnessed these battles? Or is it just your speculation?

LP:
What alternative term would you prefer to use for the arrival of the Aryans, since "invasion" is so offensive to you, Phaedrus?

LP earlier:
That the authors of the Vedas had been unfamiliar with the Harappans, giving a sequence like
Later (had writing)
Vedas (had no writing)
Harappans (had writing)

Phaedrus:
So where did the harappans go? They just disappeared leaving only populations which had no inkling whatsoever of neither the civilization nor the script? Yet again we are on speculative ground.

LP:
That's exactly what happened. And it had happened to Greece after the collapse of the Mycenaean palaces. Your perpetual whines that this or that has not been proved to your satisfaction are getting annoying, especially when you show much lower standard for the theories you like.

Phaedrus:
... The question remains, if these great dynasties have survived for so long without writing, then what could be the reason for reacquiring it?

LP:
What's the reason for adopting *any* technological advance? Don't be stupid, Phaedrus.

Phaedrus:
And forgot to ask you regarding the analogy you had provided regarding that a trader returning back …etc. In a feudal society like the kingdoms of the past, where the control is centralized with the king and the priests, can a trader (s) contribute to writing?

LP:
A trader can *invent* writing if necessary. Phaedrus, you are making yourself look absolutely stupid.

[some final Phaedrus kvetching deleted]

lpetrich

LP earlier:
Lots and lots of things at the present day. Do you know what a partial differential equation is? What the Riemann Tensor is? What an elementary-particle Gauge Theory is?

Viewpoints:
I do. Yet what does that mean? Is this transmitted knowledge in the verbal tradition?

LP:
That knowledge can be transmitted even if only a small fraction of the population understands it or cares about it.

LP earlier: What is your point? That the Vedas have to have been written as soon as they had been composed?

Viewpoints:
Composed? I hope you are aware that Vedas are construed to be "srutis". Vyasa is accorded a position of an editor *only* by the Indians.

LP:
What is your point? That the Vedas were revealed instead of being composed? But were they immediately committed to writing after humanity had acquired them by whatever means?

Viewpoints:
But that is not what I am saying. I am telling you that you can transmit tales not abstract knowledge in the verbal tradition. You can keep telling your children and their children and their children that William Tell shot an arrow to split an apple, you can hardly tell them what William Tell thought about the value of an apple.

LP:
Don't be too sure about that; it's possible to insert William Tell's opinions about apples into an epic about him; consider the sort of details the Iliad and the Odyssey have.

LP earlier: WHAT astronomical configurations??? Are there precise observations of eclipses, occultations, and the like?

Viewpoints:
Read the astronomical observations on the positions of Ursa Major (called Saptarshis) and movement based predictions in the second chapter of the twelfth Canto of the Bhagvat Puran.

LP:
That seems too imprecise; I'd much prefer some tracking of Moon and planet movements, such as when the Moon passed some planet or other.

LP earlier: I notice a lack of counterevidence; a lack of clear evidence of writing in India between 1500 and 500 BCE.

Viewpoints:
What about the Brahmanas dated 1000 to 700 BCE?

LP:
Anything on when they had been written down? Do the Brahmanas themselves refer to writing as something commonplace? They could have been transmitted orally, as the Vedas had been.

Viewpoints:
It should be remembered that even "reasonably close" dating of the ancient Vedic texts has been next to impossible for most European scholars who were fascinated with the chronology of the Hindus. Unable to swallow huge timelines that dwarfed Biblical concepts of origin and creation, most have tried to swallow the smaller camel. Hence, we have a funny situation wherein comparative religion apologists have said that dating the texts even based on internal evidence is remarkably difficult and in the next breath have hazarded expert opinions of fixing these within a time frame.

LP: What kind of codswallop is that? By the early nineteenth century, Biblical-literalist chronologies had become discredited among educated Europeans. By that time, it was already evident that the Earth was much older than the adding up of Biblical begots would indicate.

And it could well be that a lot of those Indian stories were exaggerated, in the same way that the lifespans of earlier Biblical personages were exaggerated, which in turn was probably derived from an early Mesopotamian tradition of similar exaggerations.

Viewpoints:
What I am arguing is that archeological data, given the ravages of time and tide are not the best evidences to reconstruct ancient civilizations in the absence of validating time periods, ...

LP:
I'm not sure what you mean. Are you saying that the lack of physical evidence must not be allowed to get in your way?

Viewpoints:
... especially true of the Hindu people where extremely abstract existential concepts were formulated given that the evolutionary development of mental processes is inconsistent with relatively recent archaeological digs.

LP:
What, precisely, are you claiming?

copernicus

LP, I agree with you that Phaedrus is not really ultimately serious about arguing with you, but I don't think his kvetching method is "stupid". His method of arguing is simple: admit nothing and question everything. When asked direct questions about what position he takes on matters, he feigns complete neutrality and objectivity. He does not argue against the AIT, he merely points to articles or picks at pieces of evidence. He is not required to defend any position at all other than negative ones like "the linguistic evidence is weak" or "there was no evidence of violent invasion". In his own mind, he cannot lose an argument where he takes no substantive position at all. So the kvetching makes sense, because it is the only way that he can take sides without actually coming out and admitting to what he believes.

Phaedrus, you constantly twist and misunderstand things. LP talked about linguistic evidence, which has to do with comparative reconstruction. Linguistic paleontology uses linguistic evidence and non-linguistic evidence to draw conclusions about the culture and environment of speakers of a reconstructed language. You can certainly question the relevance of any single reconstructed construct--e.g. horse. What makes the case against linguistic paleontology difficult is that there are too many coincidences to dismiss. That is why Renfrew himself accepts the need to consider linguistic evidence. Linguists and archeologists are certainly engaged in quite a bit of debate over the PIE homeland. What is relevant to this thread is that no one seriously thinks that India was the homeland anymore. All of the positive evidence, both linguistic and archeological, suggests a homeland somewhere around the area of the Black Sea, and probably to the north of it.

LP already answered this with his discussion of Ferdinand de Saussure's famous laryngeal hypothesis. Basically, Saussure's internal reconstruction of PIE (not the same as the
comparative method) made certain predictions about the existence of sounds he called laryngeals. Those sounds were not attested in any IE language at the time. After Hittite was deciphered and discovered to be Indo-European, written symbols were found for sounds in precisely the locations that Saussure had predicted. Hence, the hypothesis was confirmed by subsequent data, a classic test of a scientific method. See Everything you ever wanted to know about Proto-Indo-European (and the comparative method), but were afraid to ask! for more details.

We are always on speculative ground. You ask questions that can only be answered speculatively. In the case of what happened to the Harappans, most scholars speculate that they formed the historical basis of the so-called untouchable caste. That isn't the only possible explanation for their disappearance, nor does there have to be any explanation in order for the AIT to be true. Oops! I forgot. You aren't really attacking that theory. Just asking questions.

Unfortunately for your negative argument, Phaedrus, oral histories are almost universal in non-literate human cultures, but Indo-European culture is especially famous for its "bardic" tradition and the cult of the hero. Neither Vikings nor Celts used writing to record their histories, but they had an extensive literature, much of which was lost. Celtic druids actually banned writing in favor of keeping oral histories. India is remarkable for its oral tradition, which has thrived in parallel with writing. The oral tradition seems to have declined in the face of writing (especially mass literature) elsewhere. I have heard Sanskrit chants in which suffixes, stems, and roots of words are analyzed--a linguistics lesson passed from generation to generation by the oral tradition. Perhaps you associate the oral tradition so deeply with civilization because it is a hallmark of your culture. It has not survived well in other cultures that have adopted writing.

Come off it, Phaedrus. LP responded to this nonsense in detail several times. Nobody claims that there is absolute proof of violent invasion, least of all LP. Your persistent use of straw man arguments is annoying.

[ August 18, 2001: Message edited by: copernicus ]

phaedrus

*wondering where this thread is going*

LP

Read what I had written

You had written nothing in specific

Phaedrus, you are making yourself look like a total idiot. Do you REALLY think that linguists and archeologists are absolute dummies? One can *check* which words get used for what. As a result, one can be confident that *ek'wos refers to true horses only, though it can refer to both wild and domestic ones. This is because donkeys get referred to with different words that are probably not ancestral IE (Latin asinus, Greek onos, etc.). Interestingly, when Sumerians first learned of horses, they called these beasts "mountain donkeys" (anshe kur) or "fast donkeys" (anshe zi-zi).

Well as i mentioned earlier for idiots the world looks idoitic. What stupid logic are you using here??? Well regarding thinking about people being dummies, yup being on this thread has broadened my definition of that. Didnt you read what i said, how do you make out the difference whether the horse they are referring to is domesticated, wild or their neighbours'?? And how exactly are you refuting my position when you said - "Interestingly, when Sumerians first learned of horses, they called these beasts "mountain donkeys" (anshe kur) or "fast donkeys" (anshe zi-zi)". Isnt this what i suggested. We are trying to impose our modern knowledge on the interpretation of what the ancients referred to


Phaedrus:
[a lot of stuff about how must use archeological evidence alongside of linguistic evidence]

LP:
A big waste of time.

Trying to question the status quo is always a waste of time for those in their own well. As Alvin Toffler had said "The illiterate of the future are not those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn."


And how Phaedrus:
Continuing to answer each others posts yeah? Could you point out to me to the papers or links where this particular theory has been proposed and with evidence that the immigrants “invaded” descendants of the Harappans and which sites witnessed these battles? Or is it just your speculation?

LP:
What alternative term would you prefer to use for the arrival of the Aryans, since "invasion" is so offensive to you, Phaedrus?

Umm talk about stupidity, how did that answer my question exactly?

That's exactly what happened. And it had happened to Greece after the collapse of the Mycenaean palaces. Your perpetual whines that this or that has not been proved to your satisfaction are getting annoying, especially when you show much lower standard for the theories you like.

You idiot, it should be that is what "could" have happened. If you are so sure, simple request....prove it. And what are the theories i like??

Phaedrus:
... The question remains, if these great dynasties have survived for so long without writing, then what could be the reason for reacquiring it?

LP:
What's the reason for adopting *any* technological advance? Don't be stupid, Phaedrus.

Looks like the comprehension levels are dipping altogether. Elaboration : If they had done so well without writing, what is reason for acquiring it? If you are going to say common sense says that, because it improves the organising capability or for record keeping and what not... Then again the same old question about how come there was no writing in the pre-mauryan era among the wealthy kingdoms like Magadha. It is all just speculation based on our common sense and falls short of any historic reality.

A trader can *invent* writing if necessary. Phaedrus, you are making yourself look absolutely stupid.

Yet again you prove your stupidity by saying this. Let me elaborate more so that can comprehend. If the trader invented the writing, how can the writing spread?. Why should the whole kingdom adapt it without the king or the priests (intellectuals) giving a diktat?
It is not the internet where something just spreads without control.

phaedrus

copernicus

Pretty good assessment of my position

And yet again you bring up the homeland issue...and as i mentioned earlier i am aware of what the stance of academics is on this issue.

Regarding comp.linguistics...refer to my response to Lp...Those two I got from witzel’s article, just two in the long history of linguistics? Both findings being in 1952 and 1912 respectively, so all the remaining are just theories?

Will get back on this issue, just getting some opinions from the academics itself on the state of the field given the controversies (glottochronology...) and lack of funding.

Regarding your points about oral tradition, the issue being discussed there was - can nomadic tribes indulge in intellectual activity? And my speculation was no, i think it would be the forte of established civilizations.

Come off it, Phaedrus. LP responded to this nonsense in detail several times. Nobody claims that there is absolute proof of violent invasion, least of all LP. Your persistent use of straw man arguments is annoying.

He hasnt and i repeatedly asked whether he prefers to use invasion and invaders still ...if he does he has to substantiate it. In case you didnt notice, all of the academia have long ago stopped using those words. And i find you consistent lack of logic very amusing *still wonders how can anyone invade an empty town* (Duh!!)

Back in a while...work is going to keep me occupied for couple of days....