Africa/Egyptian presence and jewelry in Mesoamerica?

Forum Monk · Post by **Forum Monk** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 10:18 am

Ishtar wrote: So brilliant as I know you are, Monk, for the moment, and until you can prove him wrong, I'm sticking with Kak.

No problem. Pick your heroes as you wish. I personally would be more inclined to accept Kaks view if he were an anthropologist or archaeologist.

He's not and neither am I - so I have as much qualification as he to speak of this.

Ishtar · Post by **Ishtar** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 10:25 am

Forum Monk wrote:
Ishtar wrote: So brilliant as I know you are, Monk, for the moment, and until you can prove him wrong, I'm sticking with Kak.
No problem. Pick your heroes as you wish. I personally would be more inclined to accept Kaks view if he were an anthropologist or archaeologist.

He's not and neither am I - so I have as much qualification as he to speak of this.

I disagree, Monk.

Much as I respect your view, I would have to listen to a guy who is known to be brilliant at maths who also understands Indian mathematics, and is an expert in the Vedic texts as well as in how they pertain to the Vedics' understanding of cosmology. Kak's is an unbeatable combination. Anthropology and archaeology has nothing to do with it. The texts already exist - they don't need digging out of the ground again. And I can't see where anthropology fits in at all.

kbs2244 · Post by **kbs2244** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 10:32 am

Wasn’t it Edison that said
“Genius is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration?”
Once he got his concrete business up and running to support it, he had whole floors of technicians in New Jersey trying out things.
When they found something promising, he had the money to follow up on it.
A lone inventor or discover is not going to change history.
He needs a support group.
That is what made Columbus’s “discovery” so important.
Not that he was first, but that he was the first to go home and then come back with heavy support.

Forum Monk · Post by **Forum Monk** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 12:45 pm

Ishtar wrote:I disagree, Monk.

Much as I respect your view, I would have to listen to a guy who is known to be brilliant at maths who also understands Indian mathematics, and is an expert in the Vedic texts as well as in how they pertain to the Vedics' understanding of cosmology. Kak's is an unbeatable combination. Anthropology and archaeology has nothing to do with it. The texts already exist - they don't need digging out of the ground again. And I can't see where anthropology fits in at all.

I understand what you're saying Ishtar but nothing in the reference you posted indicated he was an expert in Vedic texts. That is strictly your analysis. I would, with out hesitation agree he is an expert at computer science, crytography and artifical intelligence. According to the reference, his interpretation of the Vedic texts is controversial.

I am not trying to discredit him as I am sure he can probably do advanced maths easier than I and he probably knows things I can barely understand. But it doesn't take advance math to see how he is reaching his conclusions and from what I see and even with respect to your own posts in the thread, there is no concensus among the vedic scholars to confirm his conclusions. I personally think he is giving more credit to the ancient vedics than what the evidence warrants. For me is like saying the pyramids encode the circumference of the earth due to some numerical hocus-pocus but there is absolutely no evidence that they really knew or measured the circumference of the earth.

Kak has found what appears to be one of those magic ratios if one applies a very narrow set of values to the terminology. But there is no warrant to apply such a narrow intperpretation even discarding the comments of whom you perceive to be anti-Indian.

rich · Post by **rich** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 12:54 pm

The Greeks did it:

http://geography.about.com/od/historyof ... thenes.htm

So why couldn't anyone else???

Ishtar · Post by **Ishtar** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 1:14 pm

Monk, you're wrong about Kak.

He's much respected, just not by the guy who wrote the Wikipedia article who, it seemed to me, was writhing with jealousy.

The Vedics didn't approach science in the same way that we do, and Kak recognises this. However, it pisses off a whole load of others.

EDIT added:

He's written this article on Science in Ancient India, if you're interested in reading it:

http://www.ece.lsu.edu/kak/a3.pdf

`Veda' means knowledge. Since we call our earliest period Vedic, this is suggestive of the importance of knowledge and science, as a means of acquiring that knowledge, to that period of Indian history. For quite some time scholars believed that this knowledge amounted to no more than speculations regarding the self; this is what we are still told in some schoolbook accounts. New insights in archaeology, astronomy, history of science and Vedic scholarship have shown that such a view is wrong. We now know that Vedic knowledge embraced physics, mathematics, astronomy, logic, cognition and other disciplines. We that Vedic science is the earliest science that has come down to us. This has significant implications in our understanding of the history of ideas and the evolution of early civilizations.

The reconstructions of our earliest science are based not only on the Vedas but also on their appendicies called the Vedangas. The six Vedangas deal with: kalpa, performance of ritual with its basis of geometry, mathematics and calendrics; shiksha, phonetics; chhandas, metrical structures; nirukta, etymology; vyakarana, grammar; and jyotisha, astronomy and other cyclical phenomena. Then there are naturalistic descriptions in the various Vedic books that tell us a lot about scientific ideas of those times.

I think we're going to have to agree to differ here.

Forum Monk · Post by **Forum Monk** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 1:56 pm

rich wrote:The Greeks did it:

http://geography.about.com/od/historyof ... thenes.htm

So why couldn't anyone else???

You're right Rich. Others could have, but the greeks didn't pronounce it in ambiguous wording and we have clear understanding how they measured it and so can reproduce their results. Everytime I look at a proclamation of scientific expertise by the ancient vedics, I am forced to just accept someones word for it because no where is it ever said how they knew, we never see a progression of understanding to the knowledge and usually we never see any evidence that the knowledge was applied in an practical sense. Its black magic and so I am skeptical.

rich · Post by **rich** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:02 pm

I kind of agree with you, Monk, but Ijust like to keep the options open. We never really know when some old scroll'll turn up that's been forgotten and lost for centuries or that may have been burnt.

Forum Monk · Post by **Forum Monk** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:04 pm

Ishtar wrote:Monk, you're wrong about Kak.

Ok - I can accept that criticism.

He's written this article on Science in Ancient India, if you're interested in reading it:

http://www.ece.lsu.edu/kak/a3.pdf

I will read it because I really want to believe what you're saying, but unambiguously.

I think we're going to have to agree to differ here.

Ok for this as well. But I think if you want to acknowledge the vedas proclaim the speed of light you must apply the same units of measure and accept a banyan tree that stood over 800 miles high, and a land over 72,000 miles wide. Seems far-fetched to me.

Ishtar · Post by **Ishtar** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:15 pm

Forum Monk wrote: Its black magic and so I am skeptical.

It's not black magic. And with respect, that has been the response of Christianity for 2000 years to anything that it didn't understand - "it's black magic."

Monk, you really are not a student of this stuff and yet you are pronouncing on it. Yes, we can't see a progression, but that's hardly the Vedics fault. At the time we're reading, they already had the formulas.

Again, this is a classic example of "if it doesn't fit into my lens, or the way I want to see things, then it doesn't exist ... or its black magic."

I'd have more respect for your views on Vedic science if I thought you'd really studied it, in some depth. But you haven't .. and so I can't take your views over Kak's who has studied it for decades, and who is so well respected in his scientific field that he wouldn't risk coming up with some cock and bull theory on magic ratios that was more at home on GHMB.

You say here:

...there is no concensus among the vedic scholars to confirm his conclusions.

But which Vedic scholars are you talking about - I didn't know you knew any. And if you did, how could you tell which ones were right?

I personally think he is giving more credit to the ancient vedics than what the evidence warrants. For me is like saying the pyramids encode the circumference of the earth due to some numerical hocus-pocus but there is absolutely no evidence that they really knew or measured the circumference of the earth.

The same figures (or multiples of those figures) are encoded in metaphor in all the texts - Sumerian, Babylonian, Vedic and Egyptian. They were used to teach the secret mysteries of astronomy and astrology (which weren't separate then). That's why the same figures recur over and over again, and in the right hands they made sense.

But you are applying a modern scientific rationale by demanding evidence about whether they actually got a tape measure out to do it without which, you won't believe it.

That's fine ... but I won't be agreeing with you.

(Sorry if this sounds a little strident. I don't mean it to.

)

rich · Post by **rich** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:22 pm

Whoa hold on there -

Ish wrote:

quote="Forum Monk" rich wrote:
Its black magic and so I am skeptical.

Did not. If it was black magic I'd be even more convinced they were right!!!

Aahhh bullocks - you edited it out

Ishtar · Post by **Ishtar** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:24 pm

Yes, sorry Rich. I have corrected it... it was a typo.

rich · Post by **rich** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:26 pm

No problem - ya' just got a zing outa me - good one!!!

Ishtar · Post by **Ishtar** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:28 pm

So anyway, I think we've gone off on a tangent.

What about the Phoenician boat?

I thought that eveyrone would be really pleased with me for coming up with a boat, for once?

But there's been no comment ...

rich · Post by **rich** » Sat Jul 05, 2008 2:35 pm

Grrrr - yeah. From the link on archaeologica's site about the Gault dig - in the slide show :

http://www.sciam.com/slideshow.cfm?id=t ... A1E7077675

I was musin' that the markings on it kinda remind me of the little drawing of the Ma-iti ship in your pic above. Plus if you turn the pic upside down it has the basic outline of a ship.
But eh - maybe it's just me wanting to find a stone age reference to the boats so take it with a grain of salt - or sand.