Order of Kilopi
Gosh, I'm just going to have to be more feminine in my posts. You are the second person who assumed I was male. I hope that doesn't imply women are never hard headed scientific types. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif[/img]On 2002-07-16 16:53, nebularain wrote:
Why, thank-you, sir!On 2002-07-15 20:09, beskeptical wrote:
I find your posts to be quite intelligent as are many of the posters on this board.
Established Member
[img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_redface.gif[/img] It's funny, as I was writing my reply I had this "check in my spirit," if you will, that I shouldn't be assuming the gender, but I ignored it and went on anyway. Well, you know what they say about the definition of the word "****U*me".On 2002-07-16 17:16, beskeptical wrote:
Gosh, I'm just going to have to be more feminine in my posts. You are the second person who assumed I was male. I hope that doesn't imply women are never hard headed scientific types.
[img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img]
(For those who never heard: When you assume, you make an A-- out of YOU and ME.)
Hee-haw! Hee-haw!
Established Member
Hey, I'm the other offender here, and I take full responsibility for my error. In fact, I remember having almost the exact same point of self doubt when I made my goof too. I should have listened to my instincts.
But to come to nebularain's (and my own) defence a little, is it really so surprising to assume masculinity here? On a board like this, the membership is heavily weighted towards the masculine. Without obvious clues such as a feminine handle, it's natural to "play the odds" and assume the writer is male.
Now, let's say for example we were on (let's say) a cooking forum instead. I'm sure most people would have assumed you were female, even if you weren't. It's just the image that's brought to mind.
Sometimes stereotypes are accurate enough to be useful, as long as you understand that they aren't universal in scope. I for one am overjoyed to see so many intelligent female posters here. In fact I find you ladies to be some of the best and most interesting posters here.
(Now I probably just put my foot in it here somehow with this post. I usually find that whenever I attempt to defend myself, I somehow end up making things worse. Please go easy on me [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img] )
Order of Kilopi
No worry mate, I'm not offended. And I would definitely say guessing a poster is male here would give you better than 50:50 odds of being correct. I have thought about changing Beskeptical. I started using it on another board where it made more sense. I have a picture in my mind of certain posters which I'm sure is not what they really look like. We'd probably all be in shock if we posted our pics. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif[/img]On 2002-07-16 23:03, David Hall wrote:
Hey, I'm the other offender here, and I take full responsibility for my error. In fact, I remember having almost the exact same point of self doubt when I made my goof too. I should have listened to my instincts.
But to come to nebularain's (and my own) defence a little, is it really so surprising to assume masculinity here? On a board like this, the membership is heavily weighted towards the masculine. Without obvious clues such as a feminine handle, it's natural to "play the odds" and assume the writer is male.
Established Member
Actually the phrase thank you sir isn`t nesscessarily assuming the recipient of the comment is male. Its like the dear sir at the start of a letter.Despite what PC people tell you, if you dont know whether the person is male or female, sir is used, its just good grammar.(unlike most of my posts which are full of horrible grammatical mistakes). I`ve got to admit though i have made the assumption that most of the posters on a board like this are male.
Order of Kilopi
Booo. Correct by outdated standards. It needs to go. That would definitely by politically incorrect in my book and I'm really not very picky.On 2002-07-17 05:48, jumbo wrote:
Actually the phrase thank you sir isn`t nesscessarily assuming the recipient of the comment is male. Its like the dear sir at the start of a letter.Despite what PC people tell you, if you dont know whether the person is male or female, sir is used, its just good grammar.(unlike most of my posts which are full of horrible grammatical mistakes). I`ve got to admit though i have made the assumption that most of the posters on a board like this are male.
"Dear Sir or Madam would you read my book? It took me years to write, won't you take a look? .... And I want to be a paperback writer."
Sorry, I got carried away. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]
Established Member
yep the dear sir thing is dated but dear sir or madam implies that after meeting the person in question that you were unsure as to their gender. Thats why i try to use either a neutral expression or preferably the persons name failing that i go to the grammatical default version. I don`t think dear humanoid or dear biped is snappy enough. Oh, and beskeptical seems to make perfect sense to me especially on a scientific board. It kinda reminds me to keep an open mind,but not so open my brains fall out!
Order of Kilopi
Thankyou for such a nice compliment. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img] Would you use a neutral or double gender heading if you had met the person? It's usually when you write but don't know who will read the letter isn't it?On 2002-07-17 17:33, jumbo wrote:
yep the dear sir thing is dated but dear sir or madam implies that after meeting the person in question that you were unsure as to their gender. ... I don`t think dear humanoid or dear biped is snappy enough. Oh, and beskeptical seems to make perfect sense to me especially on a scientific board. It kinda reminds me to keep an open mind,but not so open my brains fall out!
I use the stuffy, 'To whom it may concern,' or the not formal enough, 'Dear folks,' but I'm not happy with either alternative. Oh well, progress is slow. There could be worse things. I could've been born in an earlier time or into another culture. That would have been hard. I wonder if Galileo ever let the girls borrow his telescope?
Established Member
I don't know, "Dear Homo sap" has a certain ring to it! [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_rolleyes.gif[/img]
Hey, BeSkep, if you really do think about changing your handle to be more "feminine" (and I for one don't think it necessary, but you're the one who has to field the various questions that arise), you could try 'Beskeptigal' instead. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]
The (or not) Curtmudgeon
Established Member
Silas,On 2002-07-11 22:17, Silas wrote:
...maybe the speed of light was much higher in the past,.... This has a serious problem. ...since the speed of light is involved in physics and chemistry, and if the speed of light was once much greater, those distant stars could not possibly show the emission and absorption lines we see in spectroscopy.
Would you please show me what fundamental physics (or chemistry) equation you are referring to that you think would change if the value of c changes?
G^2
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Gsquare on 2002-07-18 23:25 ]</font>
Established Member
The problem I have with taking two hundred years out of Egyptian cronology is that it has to be re-inserted somewhere else. That's not easily done. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away... If we move the New Kingdom dates up about 200 years, then the Middle Kingdom and the Second Intermediate Period have to take up the slack. There'e not much to work with in the Middle Kingdom, only two dynasties. I don't think the evidence supports doubling the Second Intermediate period.
Established Member
Maxwell's Equations. The speed of light is involved in electromagnetism. If the speed of light were vastly different, then magnetism, specifically, would be very different, and this would cause huge changes in observed light near large magnetic fields.On 2002-07-18 23:21, Gsquare wrote:
Silas,On 2002-07-11 22:17, Silas wrote:
...maybe the speed of light was much higher in the past,.... This has a serious problem. ...since the speed of light is involved in physics and chemistry, and if the speed of light was once much greater, those distant stars could not possibly show the emission and absorption lines we see in spectroscopy.
Would you please show me what fundamental physics (or chemistry) equation you are referring to that you think would change if the value of c changes?
G^2
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Gsquare on 2002-07-18 23:25 ]</font>
The speed of light is also involved in electricity, from Maxwell's Equations, and electric fields are involved in molecular chemistry. The standard ionic bond that holds atoms together in such molecules as ammonia is caused by the attraction of opposite electric charges. If the speed of light were vastly different, such forces would also have a different strength, and molecular chemistry would be observably different.
Silas
Established Member
I seem to recall during my cosmology lectures being told of a book written by an australian professor about various universe with slightly different values of the fundamental constants and what the universes would be like. If i remember the name i`ll post it,it sounded rather interesting.
Established Member
The only websites I can find that offer any guidlines in dating ancient Egypt suggest a erro marign of up to 300 years for dates prior to 2040 BC, plus or minus 30 years for dates down to 669 BC, after which the quoted dates are presumably more certain. No indication at all given of how the quoted dates were arrived at, and no two sites agree on dates.On 2002-07-15 18:11, The Curtmudgeon wrote:
Hmm, okay, but just saying that doesn't establish that the arguments are in error.On 2002-07-14 21:02, samsara15 wrote:
I CAN'T BUY THOSE ARGUMENTS. SORRY.
I could go into more detail about what the arguments, pro and con, actually are, but then this isn't Bad Archaeology, is it? I've put the links in my previous post just so that those who are interested in the topic can go read the arguments for themselves (and although I didn't put any links directly for the "Establishment" position, all the sources I did link to have complete bibliographies). Pointless, and disruptive, for me to go into more detail here.
Nebularain, as for your comment about whether everything Rohl presented is correct, I would tend to agree with you. Reading Rohl, I found his presentation style (you can tell the book was written with the TV production in mind [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_razz.gif[/img] ) sometimes got in the way of his arguments, and a few at the end of the book actually impressed me as being a bit "too good", even while I truly would like to believe them. Nevertheless, his point about the ~200y problem being an Egyptian chronology problem is amply demonstrated by James' work, who got to that same point from a totally different direction, and then went surveying all through the Middle/Late Bronze Age Med cultures and found the problem replicated. In fact, it was reading James' tome (not too bad a description of it: it's weighty both in size and content) that really convinced me about the scope of the problem. Rohl touches on just the Egyptian and Biblical chronologies (which, unfortunately, has left him open to some criticism from the anti-Bible crowd, although reading him shows beyond a shadow of a doubt that he's certainly not a Biblical literalist, and he came to this problem completely through Egyptological questions, and only later discovered that his proposed solution also solved some Biblical chrono questions). James shows that the problem is very much more wide spread, with evidence from MBA/LBA Spain, Sardinia, Italy, Sicily, Libya, Balkans, Greece, Anatolia (Hittites as well as others, such as Lydians), Syria, Phoenicia, Nubia, as well as Egypt and Israel--and even Assyria and other Mesopotamian cultures where the chronology is only partially based on the Egyptian.
Chronology in archaeology, just like dating in geology/paleontology, has always been a thorny problem. It has to be, by its very nature; stamping everything "(c) 2002" or "Made in Sumer 5000 BC" is a strictly modern phenomenon. The fact that the chronologies are being debated is not, therefore, much of a surprise; the fact that the concensus chronology has gone essentially unchallenged for as long as it has is the real surprise.
The (but then, I supposed I'm dating myself) Curtmudgeon
Established Member
I find sites that warn that contamination can be a problem with Carbon-14 and Pottasium-Argon dating, but still maintain that with proper caution, both dating methods can yield reliable dates.On 2002-07-16 16:53, nebularain wrote:
Why, thank-you, sir! [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img] I respect your input as well, even on points we've disagreed on.On 2002-07-15 20:09, beskeptical wrote:
I find your posts to be quite intelligent as are many of the posters on this board.
No, I wasn't after questioning radio carbon dating. I've heard some of the arguments against it, but I'd have to really study them before I could formulate an opinion for or against either side, which I have not had time to do. Sure would make for an interesting research project, though.
Established Member
Um, no, actually. The problem is that somewhere, as yet to be determined, the Manetho chronology gets off by ~200 years as indicated by the problems caused in other cultures' chronologies when they are based on, or aligned to, it. There's no need to re-insert the time anywhere else in the chronology. The dates given for all dynasties before the necessary cut(s) simply are ~200 years too early.On 2002-07-19 07:31, samsara15 wrote:
The problem I have with taking two hundred years out of Egyptian cronology is that it has to be re-inserted somewhere else.
Most of the theories about specific locations to start the cutting revolve around the idea that Manetho has made consecutive in his list dynasties that were, in fact, overlapping--in other words, he claims that (and I may be off on some of these numbers, but for example's sake let's not get bogged in the details) Dynasty XXII was followed by XXIII was followed by XXIV was followed by XXV, all of them as pan-Egyptian ruling classes, when the actual sequence may have been more that XXII ruled northern ("Lower") Egypt from Sais or Tanis at the same time as XXIII was ruling southern ("Upper") Egypt from Memphis, and that during that same time, or a part of it, XXIV was claiming to rule Egypt but really were only holding onto a rump state in the western desert oases or down in Nubia; then XXV came along, wiped out the bloody lot of them, and truly did rule all of Egypt. This is seen as being most likely (for a number of different reasons) in the Third Intermediate Period (TIP), but of course the Second Intermediate Period (SIP) also comes in for some smaller consideration.
The whole deal with the IPs (even the First) is that they are already agreed to be times of dynastic confusion and upheaval; that's why they were called IPs in the first place, as opposed to the Old, Middle and New Kingdom periods which really were (or certainly give every impression of being) periods of consecutive dynastic succession with little or no civil unrest or warfare.
I know for a fact that one of the TIP dynasties, and I believe that I remember correctly that it was the XXIV, is already agreed by virtually every Egyptologist to be a complete overlap with the XXIII. And yet Manetho does not mention any overlap, and treats them as successive dynasties rather than competing dynasties. So it's not like the New Chronologists, in any of their varied redating schemes, are proposing some radical new idea.
Also, as I mentioned earlier, it's not just on a dynastic level that there are likely to be problems. Individual Pharoahs, in any dynasty including Kingdom dynasties (although probably with a much lower probability than IP dynasties, granted) can have elevated their heir (or intended heir) to a co-Pharoah-ship. So Pharoah X reigned N years, his son Pharoah X+1 reigned M years, but the total of their reigns is actually N+M minus the number of years they were both Pharoah. Again, even the existing concensus chronology allows for this in isolated instances, but perhaps there is evidence that more cases should be recognised.
I don't think any proposed new scheme requires doubling the SIP (in fact, if any changes are proposed, it's a reduction, not a doubling), or probably making any changes in the short Middle Kingdom period. As I recall while sitting here at work with no resources to hand, most of the schemes require most of their changes in and around the TIP. But that means that all earlier dynasties, including Pre-, Old, FIP, Middle, SIP and New, get moved up by roughly two centuries.That's not easily done. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away... If we move the New Kingdom dates up about 200 years, then the Middle Kingdom and the Second Intermediate Period have to take up the slack. There'e not much to work with in the Middle Kingdom, only two dynasties. I don't think the evidence supports doubling the Second Intermediate period.
And yes, that means that Old Kingdom monuments like the Giza Pyramids and the Great Sphinx get an automatic 200-year facelift in their ages.
Navigating David Rohl's Nunki.net site drives me batty (can we all say, BAD user interface?), but if you move your cursor over the Sphinx that is sorta hiding in the cutsy picture he's got there and click, you get to his Timelines page, which is a lot easier to handle than the main site. Clicking on the Egyptian icon there gets you to his New Egyptian Chronology page, finally. Of course, he's waaaaaaaay behind time getting the critical TIP chronology on-line (it's in his book, though), but in any case you can see side-by-side his current working dates v. the 'Old Chronology' dates up through Dynasty XX. (Those of you who are bugged by Roman numerals, especially in an Egyptian setting, will be glad to know Rohl uses Arabic numbering on his site; I'm just used to the older style from long reading and studying in archaeology.)
As I indicated in an earlier response, although I first got exposed to this whole issue by Rohl's book, it really is Peter James' much more thorough study in Centuries of Darkness that has me convinced of its validity. James doesn't go into nearly the depth that Rohl does in proposing a solution to the problem, though; he really seems to be trying first to get the establishment to accept that there is a problem, so that then more widely-spread attention can be focused on solving it. Rohl, on the other hand, wants to present problem-and-solution in a nice, neat package. I like his solution in general, but I will admit that perhaps he takes it a bit too far when he claims that he has identified an Egyptian statue of Joseph as "vizier" or "first minister" of Egypt exactly according to Genesis. Coat-of-many-colours and all.
The (I have one coat, and it's grey) Curtmudgeon
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: The Curtmudgeon on 2002-07-19 17:58 ]</font>
Established Member
Yes, that's pretty much it in a nutshell: there is growing evidence that there is chronological problem, most centering around a 200-year figure but +/- 100 years from that doesn't surprise me at all; then everyone who does agree to this proposes their own solution for where the problem lies. So there is growing agreement on the problem, but little as yet agreement on the correct solution for it.On 2002-07-19 13:57, samsara15 wrote:
The only websites I can find that offer any guidlines in dating ancient Egypt suggest a erro marign of up to 300 years for dates prior to 2040 BC, plus or minus 30 years for dates down to 669 BC, after which the quoted dates are presumably more certain. No indication at all given of how the quoted dates were arrived at, and no two sites agree on dates.
The 669 BC date is pretty much the only stake-in-the-ground left standing in Egyptian chronology: that's the date of the Persian overthrow of the native Pharoanic government, so it is separately established by the Persian chronology, which is fairly well attested to that period by working backwards from the Alexandrian timeline only three centuries later. And Alexander's time is pretty much set in concrete by the combined Greco-Roman dating. So there is no real question about 669 BC or any date after that in Egypt.
The (it's been about that long since I had a date) Curtmudgeon
Order of Kilopi
I love it. What a great idea. I'll make it my sig until I can find out how to change names and keep BF status. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]On 2002-07-18 15:40, The Curtmudgeon wrote:
I don't know, "Dear Homo sap" has a certain ring to it! [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_rolleyes.gif[/img]
Hey, BeSkep, if you really do think about changing your handle to be more "feminine" (and I for one don't think it necessary, but you're the one who has to field the various questions that arise), you could try 'Beskeptigal' instead. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]
The (or not) Curtmudgeon
I like "Dear Homo sap" too. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_lol.gif[/img]
Established Member
FYI, you're talking Assyria in 669 BC. Persia wan't a blip on the radar screen in 669 BC...not even on the sceen until 550 BC. Secondly, the source I found only allowed a thirty year error margin in dates between 2040 Bc and 669 BC.On 2002-07-19 17:55, The Curtmudgeon wrote:
Yes, that's pretty much it in a nutshell: there is growing evidence that there is chronological problem, most centering around a 200-year figure but +/- 100 years from that doesn't surprise me at all; then everyone who does agree to this proposes their own solution for where the problem lies. So there is growing agreement on the problem, but little as yet agreement on the correct solution for it.On 2002-07-19 13:57, samsara15 wrote:
The only websites I can find that offer any guidlines in dating ancient Egypt suggest a erro marign of up to 300 years for dates prior to 2040 BC, plus or minus 30 years for dates down to 669 BC, after which the quoted dates are presumably more certain. No indication at all given of how the quoted dates were arrived at, and no two sites agree on dates.
The 669 BC date is pretty much the only stake-in-the-ground left standing in Egyptian chronology: that's the date of the Persian overthrow of the native Pharoanic government, so it is separately established by the Persian chronology, which is fairly well attested to that period by working backwards from the Alexandrian timeline only three centuries later. And Alexander's time is pretty much set in concrete by the combined Greco-Roman dating. So there is no real question about 669 BC or any date after that in Egypt.
The (it's been about that long since I had a date) Curtmudgeon
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