I wonder if there's misunderstanding over Greg Doudna's shotgun analogy.
Greg: reading only Stephen's transcription of the footnote, you're not
saying 'just as hundreds of pellets are expunged from a gun in a single
shotgun blast, so were many texts produced within a very short timespan at
Qumran'--which is how I read Stephen's interpretation of your analogy
(please correct me if I'm wrong Stephen). Rather, it sounds like you're
just likening the shape probability density function of a C14 dating as a
function of 't' to the pellet density function as a function of 'r' when a
shotgun blast hits a target. That is, just as there's greatest liklihood
the date of a document was written at the center of the Gaussian curve
(which doesn't mean it was written then, but merely that it is most probable
it was written then), so also is the greatest concentration of pellets at
the center of the shots dispersion pattern [or P(t)~D(r)]. Is this correct?
--Justin Dombrowski
----- Original Message -----
From: "Greg Doudna" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, August 07, 2005 2:47 PM
Subject: [Megillot] Jannaeus, His Brother Absalom, and Judah the Essene
To Stephen Goranson:
I must confess puzzlement at your answer.
YOU have me in your article saying that I likened the
production of all c. 900 Qumran manuscripts
to a shotgun blast. I asked where I said THAT.
I confess I am unable to find in your response
an answer to my question.
I see your quote of my analogy of the shotgun blast.
But I see nothing in the quote you provide about applying that
to all c. 900 Qumran texts (!). How is the quote you give from
me an application by me of that analogy to ALL c. 900 Qumran texts?
May I repeat my request that you tell me where I said such a
ridiculous statement (so that I can get it corrected)?
Alternatively, if you are unable to show where I said
this ludicrous thing that you have me saying, may I ask your
intentions concerning rewording your article as it pertains
to representing my good name on this point?
No need for a lengthy discussion--a brief straight answer
will suffice.
Thank you.
Greg Doudna
Here is the complete text of Greg Doudna's footnote 92 [with my stars and
brackets added]:
"92. 'Management scatter' denotes a statistical spread around *a*
[single] 'true
date.' A useful analogy is *the* [single] blast from a shotgun at a
target and
the spread of the individual shotgun pellets."
I say that is mistaken; disregarding C14 date ranges from any plural
number of
manuscripts is unscientific. Plus the text above the footnote does not
specify
any subset--which, even had it done so, would be another a priori,
hypothetical,
wrong definition and presumption, an outside hypothesis, serving to
disregard data.
There is a tension or absurdity moving from one (say skin) sample and
muliple
mss. Single event, single blast, single erruption, single battle, single
generation (generation having many meanings, including if I recall
correctly two
text generations in a single day!)--I did not introduce or imagine these.
I
started making notes to respond, but it got rather long. I naddition to
the
three texts in my paper--in the second case I join Dr. Jull's criticism
of
disregarding certain "outliers" and in the third I note a "permanent"
date end
is not so-- I now disagree with a fourth text, the GD megillot post
today. I
disagree on the facts and on how to frame the question. Since we've
disagreed on
interpreting Qumran C14 for years, I question whether a long thread is
useful. I
have a right to disagree with these texts I cited and quoted. The problem
is not
my text. The problem was Doudna getting some of the science wrong. The
absurdity
is in the position, not my wording, as I have known for years.
Reconsider.
Megillot readers could take, for example Doudna's fine Figure 3 on page
462. Ask
any respected C14 scholar of professor of statistics if a deposit date of
63 BCE
is plausible. Doudna wrote that it was, after dismissing 5 of 19 date
ranges,
2-sigma, totally after 63 BCE.
On happier notes: Thanks for admiring some parts of "Jannaeus, His
Brother
Absalom, and Judah the Essene." And recall that I wrote that some pages
of the
Doudna DSS After Fifty Years v.1 article provide "much helpful
information." I
wrote that Doudna changed his dating proposal after the Qumran Chronicle
article. I ended the section by noting that Doudna's pursuit of
additional data
was "constructive."
best,
Stephen Goranson
Quoting Greg Doudna <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>
> To Stephen Goranson: I was admiring your article on your website
> concerning Judah the Essene and Absalom--in my opinion one of your
> better
> pieces of work--when I came to, alas, my own name to which was
> attributed
> something that, if I said it, would be extremely stupid (of me).
> You argue against an idea that all c. 900 Qumran texts were produced
> in a single moment like a "shotgun blast"--which I fully agree with
> you is absurd, and join you wholeheartedly in informing your readers
> that such an idea is to be condemned and consigned to outer
> darkness--and you have me saying this!
>
> You write:
>
> "Doudna offers an analogy of a single 'shotgun blast' around
> a true date. That analogy does not suit the 900 or so Qumran
> manuscripts; though it could relatively better apply to
> tests of one manuscript."
>
> Your second sentence implies that I applied the analogy in the
> first sentence (of the "shotgun blast" of radiocarbon dates) to
> all of the Qumran texts, "the 900 or so Qumran manuscripts".
>
> The only problem, Stephen, is I can't seem to find where I said
> this. I would like to offer a retraction and get this
> corrected. Could you tell me where I said this?
>
> I know I suggested that the image of the "shotgun blast"
> could be applied, as an analogy, to interpreting radiocarbon dates
> of an hypothesized *subset* of the c. 900 Qumran texts which *were*
> from a single generation. (That is, radiocarbon dates on a subset
> of the Qumran manuscripts from the same generation would produce
> radiocarbon dates which might be likened to a shotgun
> blast around the "bullseye" of the true generation date.)
> It seemed, and seems, like a reasonable analogy to me.
>
> Obviously there is a big difference between saying ALL of the
> Qumran texts were produced in a generation and proposing that
> a SUBSET of the Qumran texts were produced in a generation.
> The one is a non-starter and ridiculous. The other is
> a reasonable starting-point for discussion.
>
> (I know you are an honorable scholar and would not
> intentionally represent a scholar as saying the one,
> if you knew that he/she said and intended the other.)
>
> But at the footnote that you give at this point in your
> paper, I see I was saying the second (the "shotgun blast" analogy
> applied to the subset).
>
> Is it possible you are referring to some other statement of me
> and have gotten the wrong footnote cited??
>
> And you write (continuing your attribution to me):
>
> "It is misleading to presume regarding circa 900 Qumran manuscripts
> (surfaces prepared when written on) plus their subsequent deposits
> in 11 caves as a single event ..."
>
> I agree that it is misleading and ridiculous that anyone could
> suggest all circa 900 Qumran manuscripts were prepared and written
> as a single event! The problem is, I can't find where *I* ever
> said this. And I don't know anyone *else* who has ever said this.
> Would you tell me where I said this so I can get it corrected?
> Thank you.
>
> Greg Doudna
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>
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