Katherine Reece Wrote:
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> A lot of mistakes are made by well intentioned and
> good scientists when they step outside the area of
> their expertise. That's why I want to see
> something supporting the Maya cultural connections
> being made; and to see it in a peer reviewed
> journal because then Mesoamericanists can double
> check the cultural connections. And frankly,
> that's how history books are changed.
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Kat. I strongly agree that scientists are more prone to mistakes when they make pronouncements outside of their field. That’s precisely why rejection of acoustical findings at Maya sites is spurious. Mayanists rejection is unscientific and easily rebutted.

Archaeoacoustics is interdisciplinary. It needs archaeologists, acousticians, and musicians or psychoacousticians.

Rejecting Mayanists were not just uninterested in objective consideration of acoustical findings at Chichen Itza. They were downright hostile. Mayanists didn’t recognize that acoustics is a hard science. Confronted with novel evidence, rejecting Mayanists covered their ears and raised the drawbridge. That’s simply bad science!

That’s the difference between Mayanists who reject intentional acoustics at Chichen Itza and the multidisciplinary team at Stanford assembled by CCRMA to study Chavín de Huántar. Contrast their response with Stanford, whose paper for the forthcoming AAAS meeting is titled:

“A Multidisciplinary Methodology for Studying Ancient Auditory Environments”

I would gladly have invited Mayanists to speak at AAAS. But since they did no science they had nothing to contribute.

Wayne Van Kirk tried valiantly to persuade Mayanists to consider evidence he patiently collected for intentional sound at Maya sites. Quite a few Mayanists wrote in support of his postings. But the institutional response was ridicule and rejection.

That’s when I became interested. As a recognized acoustical scientist I thought I could speak to other scientists across disciplinary lines. Since institutional Mayanists minds were closed. I did my best to substitute for them. Our work product should improve if Mayanists participate in the research instead of obstructing it.

Here's what's new. Acoustics introduces a new form of evidence that is essentially independent of culture. If Mayanists interpretations and confident acoustical findings appear to conflict, it is the Mayanists task to reconcile them. Such conflict signals opportunities for new learning.

About a decade ago I was contacted by an academic historian of science at a university in Arizona who was following the acoustical debate with fascination. Archaeologist’s hostility to evidence of intentional acoustic design mirrored an earlier conflict between archaeoastronomy advocates (Anthony Aveni and others) and archaeologists. Aveni believed some ancient ritual sites were designed to be astronomical observatories. The opposition demanded epigraphic evidence that the ancients were aware of periodicity of the sun, moon, and stars. Eventually, Aveni provided that evidence, and archaoastronomy became accepted - after about a quarter of a century. The science historian thought archaeoacoustics was following a parallel path. But archaeoacoustics IS becoming accepted science. Unless Mayanist attitude changes, the joint paper you asked for will not be written, and history will not remember rejectionists kindly.