On Monday 07 June 2004 05:08, Stephen Goranson wrote:
> Dear list readers,
>
> If I may respond on the subject in the heading; I suggest that "response to
> Goranson" is an unfortunate ad hominem change of the subject line. Of
> course I address the list including Greg Doudna and Dierk van den Berg,
> though I confess I do not understand the latter's text.
Oh, please. How is it ad hominem to simply specify that to which one is
responding? If his subject change is ad hominem, then so is the entire post
below, as well as the little dig above at van den Berg. Whether one agrees
or disagrees with Doudna's comments, this kind of dodge does nothing to
advance discussion of the matter.
> Doudna's response to me misses the main points. As I wrote, this is not the
> first time. Previous discussions--for instance, explicitly on the locus 2
> jar!- -are indeed relevant. As are previous inkwell discussions, and
> previous pointings out that Doudna (and e.g. in this case N. Golb and Y.
> Hirschfeld) require different levels of evidence for Qumran and Jerusalem
> text production. It is fair for people (including de Vaux) to change their
> minds, but to quickly disown an elaborate years-long series of
> self-contradictory attempts, by hook or crook, to redate the scrolls to
> exclude any in first century (an arbitrary cutoff?) is to exclude from our
> perview a subject that Copenhagen Dr. Doudna himself raised in his online
> text: psychology. (Or we might say epistemology or methodology.)
>
> Indeed part of the history of scholarship concerns what they, de Vaux et
> al., thought. That is why, for instance, the 33 AD + or - C14 linen date
> certainly matters: to them surely a first century indication (however we
> might see it now). And there were many such evidence indications. The
> article confuses one jar as the "basis" of a dating with the decades of
> evidence as the dating basis. It is to de Vaux's credit that he
> reevaluated. And de Vaux's dates have been effectively revised; that
> revision makes the Period II continuity even more ineluctable. Yet even
> still now, Doudna did not respond to de Vaux on the continuity of usage in
> Period II, rather wrongly dismissing this weighty matter as merely
> irrelevant. The audience is misled by omitting evidence. Changing a mind is
> one thing. But to seek to forget years of self- contradictory determination
> to redate mss and misrepresent so as to exclude any in first century is to
> miss something. Repeating, by itself, without disowning the past, of
> course, is something I do myself. ("Essenes," via one of the many Greek
> spellings, came from the Hebrew root 'asah, as is increasingly realised--do
> spread the word :) )
>
> Here is another example of heedlessness to evidence which does not fit a
> preconceived conviction. Doudna asserted that no one had challenged
> Avigad's work on Alexander Jannaeus bronze coin dating. I offered to
> provide the reference to a basic work that Doudna should have consulted
> before making such a bold sweeping declaration, a work which precisely
> dismissed one of Avigad's two dates. But no interest was manifested.
> Ya'akov Meshorer, Ancient Jewish Coinage, v.1 p.80.
>
> I can understand why Dr. Doudna wishes to prevent me (he has attempted to
> silence me before) from noting past discussions and publications. I could
> provide other data and bibliography (on misrepresenting Essenes, on dating,
> and so on), but what's the point if there is no interest in unwelcome
> information? Many respondents and reviewers---not just me--have been
> disregarded.
>
> The "one generation" hypothesis is quite unscientific as applied by Doudna
> to the C14 data, omitting evidence, misleading. I understand that Doudna
> wishes me to disregard previous discussions (even while presenting an
> article on previous discussions!). Not only I pointed out Doudna's
> unscientific dismissal of C14 evidence, but so did, for example--despite
> repeated denials and obliviousness--the Radiocarbon expert Dr. Jull.
>
> Not to end on a negative note, I have read over the years some observations
> by Geg Doudna that I found worthwhile. And, in my opinion, we all have
> opportunity to research Qumran history further than has been so far
> realised.
>
> Stephen Goranson
>
>
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--
Dave Washburn
http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur
Learning about Christianity from a non-Christian
is like getting a kiss over the telephone.
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