Agnos1

[ August 04, 2002: Message edited by: Agnos1 ]</p>

King Arthur

Yup. I was referred to by Bede, I believe, as an enlightened atheist. I kind of like that.

Fundamentalism of any kind is bad, religious or atheistic. I see a lot of atheistic fundamentalism here. It bends the truth every bit as much as religious fundamentalism.

The boogy-men religious fanatics are not gonna take over the world. The concept of "God" will probably not ever go away. So, we had better learn to deal with it.

My own personal opinion is that beating theists over the head with inconsistencies or whatever will only make them angry, withdrawn, and even more dogmatic and inflexible.

I think the majority of theists lean toward the more liberal side of their religion. Ask a Southern Baptist how they feel about the Southern Baptist convention and you're likely to hear that they despise what's going on there and are mostly embarrased to be associated with it. Ask most Catholics about the abuse recently uncovered in churches and you'll find out that most Catholics are horrified and upset.

Religion gives people a social place where there are usually other relatively nice people who think like they do. It gives structure and meaning to their lives.

However, make'em mad and watch them turn fundamentalist-mean on you. Same thing with atheists.

Good luck. It sounds like Amen agreed that the books I presented were good. He says that archaeologists will suggest others. Fine. I'm sure they would. What are they? List them. By the way, the one by Currid that I recommended sort of fills a gap, so you probably won't find another introduction quite like it.

King Arthur

These are not "laughable" claims. These are claims very similar to those made by responsible and respectable archaeologists.

Perhaps "cleaned up after themselves" was silly, but it should have gotten the point across. People repaired damage and moved things around. They dug into other strata and screwed up the remains of previous generations. You know this. Archaeologists are not even always sure that they have the right place.

They cannot "disprove" anything. They can cast doubt on it.

You see, Finkelstein is currently trying to get scholars to change the conventional ceramic chronology. He believes it is incorrect. He also places a high amount of confidence in these chronologies, believing that he can date the ceramic remains to within 25 years! His new chronology is based on red slip ware pottery that he found in a stratum where it should not have been. Is he right? If so, then archaeologists have been dating a lot of stuff incorrectly for a long time. If he is wrong, then it still shows that remains can be out of place.

I repeat. Archaeology cannot write reliable history.

How do you know that you actually "debunked" something? How do you know that evidence won't turn up later to prove you wrong and the historian right? How do you know for sure that what you discovered wasn't somehow displaced or the stratum misdated in some way?

I don't doubt that, but the books that I mention seemed to be pretty consistently referred to. Can you please provide some of the others you believe would be suggested? Have you read Currid's book? If so, what was your opinion? Before his book, most people on a dig or starting archaeology probably would have received the information as photocopied "class" notes.

Amen-Moses

Because in the first case I found a nonexistant (according to the historian) village purely by logical deduction, i.e before turf was even broken. Even after excavating the whole village the historian was adamant that it was just a farm because it wasn't in his "records".

In the second case the historian claimed that records showed that the Roman farm/villa complex we were excavating got it's water supply from a spring, his claims were based on the Anglo Saxon naming of certain features which indicated a natural spring. I argued that the water supply came from a river almost 3 miles away based again upon field walking that turned up broken clay pipes from various locations in a straight line between the river and the dig. I eventually found the point at which the pipes broke the river bank. My arguments against the spring theory were Geologically based but even after I found the archeological evidence for the pipe source (which I believe the later Saxon farmers mistook for a natural source) he was reluctant to back down.

The third occasion (which was the same "non-existant" village from example one) was on revisiting the site several years later I found that the historian had included within the reconstruction the claim that the village was occupied througout the Saxon period and was only abandoned due to the black death (he based this again on the names of various features and "records" he had apparently discovered after I discovered the village). The archeological evidence showed two periods of occupation with a break of several centuries, in fact from about 5th century until 1066 (we can date this accurately because 1067 is written on the church built on the edge of the old village and it is of a Norman building style) the site could not really support the title of village, more like deserted Saxon monastary (here I am using a later term to describe something which even Saxon records such as they are do not give a description of, all we do know is that the earlier settlement, probably late Roman in origin and most likely a way station, is covered by a few hundred years of Saxon occupation debris followed by several centuries of natural sediments surrounded by a late Saxon wall and attached to a late Saxon church).

Amen-Moses

Amen-Moses

A book is a book, I have half a dozen books on my shelf that all give a completely different view of the Spartans, they are all scholarly works and each gives convincing arguments but they can't all be right can they?

Amen-Moses

King Arthur

So you have no experience in Near Eastern Archaeological digs?

What did you use to date your findings? It's not an exact science, is it? Lots of room for error.

I take it that the reason you won't provide any books or review the ones I gave is because you're not that familiar with Near Eastern Archaeology. Only your local archaeology. Where? Britain?

I'm sure it's interesting and fun though. I've very much enjoyed the digs that I have been on though they are very hard, sweaty, and dirty work. Occasionally there are rewards. It's nice to see the pottery come back to life as others restore it (I always hope they're putting all of humpty's pieces back together right). It's also interesting to see hoards of Bullae unearthed and then try to read the ancient Palaeo-Hebrew with which they were stamped.

King Arthur

BTW, I'm not real familiar with the archaeology there in Britain. Did the Romans mostly use clay pipes there as opposed to the lead pipes that were used in Rome? No trap. I'm just curious.

<a href="http://www.novanet.it/com/personale/togliard/nemi/eng_in_e.htm" target="_blank">Lead Pipes and Rome</a>
<a href="http://www.nipissingu.ca/department/history/muhlberger/orb/lead.htm" target="_blank">Lead and the Fall of Rome!</a>

For others, Frontinus (~ 35 - 104A.D.) is a good ancient source for Roman waterworks information though I don't have a link for him at the moment.

Ah... Here's <a href="http://www.ukans.edu/history/index/europe/ancient_rome/E/Roman/Texts/Frontinus/De_Aquis/text*.html" target="_blank">Frontinus</a>. Vitruvius, whom I presented earlier, talks about these pipes too. One can see from Frontinus and Vitruvius' works that Romans were much more advanced than Vorkosigan led you to believe with his earlier response.

[ August 04, 2002: Message edited by: King Arthur ]</p>

Amen-Moses

Originally posted by King Arthur:
So you have no experience in Near Eastern Archaeological digs?

Nope, do you?

What did you use to date your findings? It's not an exact science, is it? Lots of room for error.

Depends on which method is used. When a Norman church has a date on the front then it is usual to accept that as pretty accurate. Pottery finds are only accurate to within a few decades and are not conclusive on their own. Coins are much more indicative, especially where statistical methods can be used. Carbon dating is better but is expensive and only usually used to clear up ambiguities or where no other dating can be used.

I take it that the reason you won't provide any books or review the ones I gave is because you're not that familiar with Near Eastern Archaeology. Only your local archaeology. Where? Britain?

I have only been on digs here in Britain and it is here that I learned archeological methods but the methods are the same wherever you dig, the pottery varies (which is why we usually rely on local experts for dating pottery) as does architecture etc.

The reason I don't provide any books is that I don't really think I am qualified to say which are or are not accurate, I prefer to go by the evidence itself not what someone else happens to write about it. In areas of contention I look for agreement between different archeologists, if I can't see the evidence myself nor see a consensus in the field then I am quite happy with "I don't know yet" as an answer.

Amen-Moses

Amen-Moses

Originally posted by King Arthur:
BTW, I'm not real familiar with the archaeology there in Britain. Did the Romans mostly use clay pipes there as opposed to the lead pipes that were used in Rome? No trap. I'm just curious.

Depends on which part of the country you are in. Milton Keynes sits on a large clay layer so clay is usual, in North Wales we saw mostly stone, Southern England mostly lead or lead/clay mix. It would have been extremely expensive to create a 3 mile lead pipe wherever you were btw. Lead isn't that common an element you know.

Romans were much more advanced than Vorkosigan led you to believe with his earlier response.

I'm not sure what responses you are referring to but the Romans were extremely advanced, in fact I would much prefer to live in one of the Villas I excavated than my Victorian Terrace (providing I can keep the electricity and gas supplies of course ), one had a fantastic combined hot water/central hot air heating/bathing system which even covered the slave quarters (mind you they had last dibs on the supply so it may have cooled somewhat by the time it got to them).

One of the things that has always amazed me is that you never see carpets in Roman reconstructions but we know that the Persians had been making rugs for thousands of years before the Roman Empire period and they conquered a fair amount of the region (if not all of it) surely they would have taken that technology to the rest of the empire?

Amen-Moses

[ August 04, 2002: Message edited by: Amen-Moses ]</p>

King Arthur

Yup. You already asked.

Don't usually find much of this in the NE.

Coins are good but can be misleading as well at times.

Carbon dating is now being used in the NE in conjunction with the main thing - ceramic chronology. However, the results are disappointing to many.

[quote]
<strong>The reason I don't provide any books is that I don't really think I am qualified to say which are or are not accurate, I prefer to go by the evidence itself not what someone else happens to write about it. In areas of contention I look for agreement between different archeologists, if I can't see the evidence myself nor see a consensus in the field then I am quite happy with "I don't know yet" as an answer.</strong>

This is baloney and you know it. How do you learn in the field?? You learn from experts. Who write the books? Those same experts. If you know who the experts are, then it is no problem to trust their books. If you are telling the truth, then you know what archaeologists and experts to trust. Perhaps you worked with some though I doubt they were NEAs. There is no problem with suggesting a text for introduction to archaeology. Teachers do it all the time. They don't choose nut scholars. They choose mainstream scholars. It really ain't that hard. Even you can do it if you desired. However, you don't seem to want to because it might bolster my case.

Oh, just read the book. You're not gonna get a straight answer from anyone here.