I find it interesting to compare the furore over the Phoenician proposal with the total calm over the KharoááhÄ proposal [N2732] - an archaic script in which some Sanskrit and Sanskritized GÄndhÄrÄ texts occur.
Couldn't the same arguments the Semiticists who would unify Phoenician with Hebrew are making be just as easily made by Sanskritists to say that
KharoááhÄ should be unified with Devanagri? After all ancient Sanskrit texts in whatever script are traditionally written and published in Devanagri or Latin transliteration by scholars that deal with them, just as it is claimed that Phoenician texts are written and published in modern Hebrew characters or transliteration by scholars. GÄndhÄrÄ probably has a similar relationship to Devanagri as Phoenician has to modern Hebrew. There are going to be exactly the same things to deal with in searching texts etc as Peter, Elaine and Dean worry about with Phoenician - yet we don't have any howls of disapproval over KharoááhÄ from Sanskritists.
Maybe it's because Indic scholars are more accustomed to reading different scripts - or perhaps the software people in India are better than those the Semitic scholars have? :-) Of course Semiticists could always out-source their work to Bangalore or Hyderabad :-)
- Chris
