<HTML>In Avry’s objections to my Tiwanaku article in the thread started by Mikey below, Avry raised a point that got me thinking. He said:
“Archaeology may draw on multiple resources, but to state the conclusions as anything less than conjecture is foolhearty. It is 'best guess' only, given what they know, but what they know comes from mostly unbalanced data.” [He went on to suggest that this was a problem for archaeology; what “unbalanced” data might be, I’m not sure.]
I dealt briefly with this point in my reply to his posting, but I think it requires a somewhat fuller consideration that I initially gave it.
The charge that archaeology as a whole is “conjecture” or a “best guess” because it does not produce absolute knowledge is, it seems to me, a charge that could be levelled at the entire scientific enterprise. All scientitic hypotheses are provisional on the continued support of the evidence. No matter how “factual” they may seem, they can ultimately all be derided as “best guesses” (and the word “guess” suggests a level of randomness not shared by hypotheses -- hence it’s rhetorical value to anti-scientists). But hypotheses are based on the evidence at hand and they represent the best current, rational attempt to make sense of that evidence. And in this respect, archaeology is no different from any of the sciences, physical, natural, or social.
Now to my mind, it is precisely because science does not deal in absolute knowledge that it is so powerful a heuristic tool. In the face of new evidence or more sophisticated analytical techniques, any and all hypotheses may have to be reconsidered. Evolution could be disproved tomorrow, given the right discovery, properly verified as genuine (thus excluding creationist-manufactured “evidence”). Even something as basic as a heliocentric solar system could, conceivably, be overturned with single verified discovery, although after 500 years of experiment and observation, this seems unlikely. Conversely, the constructs of “alternative” history could also be lent validity if some hard evidence were forthcoming. But my basic point stands: scientific “conjectures” are all provisional on the support of the evidence. Those that withstand scrutiny and checking, especially for protracted periods (such as the heliocentric model of the solar system), don the aura of “fact.” But scientific “facts” are at heart actually provisional conclusions that, someday, may require reconsideration.
This, I think, is a source of major misunderstanding (see Deano’s first post in the “Avry’s objections ...” thread below). It is often claimed that science purports to tell The Truth in some absolute way, when it does not and cannot. It tells only what our current state of knowledge is -- and that might have to be revised, modified or entirely abandoned pending further testing and analysis. From my experience, this is a deeply unsettling prospect for most people, who prefer the notion of <i>knowing</i> The Way It Is rather than hypothesizing (or, using Avry’s rhetoric, “guessing”) about it. They tend to think of science is incomplete for this reason, crippled by a lack of certainty. I say, if you want absolute knowledge, don’t look to science. Look instead to the claimed eternal truths of revealed religions. They are the ones who deal in absolutes.
This leads me to a larger socio-political point. Absolute knowledge, by its nature, cannot be compromised. You cannot sell out, for instance, on the will of God or the absolute truth of Marxist dialectic. For this reason, disputes among bearers of absolute knowledge usually take the form of pogroms, persecutions, witch-hunts, and schisms. Obviously, religious dogma is a prime example of such thinking, and a glance at the history of religious disputation tells a lot.
In contrast, when you accept that all knowledge is provisional you have also to accept that, no matter how convinced you are that you right, you might still be wrong. In such a knowledge-producing system it is counter-productive to kill, imprison, or silence your critics -- because they might be right. Thus, in the world of science, you don’t find competing views being sorted out by the methods of pogrom or inquisition. They are sorted out in the pages of journals, of books, and at conferences. To be sure, the disputes are often vitriolic and personal and political. But scientists do not go marauding against their opponents (even outside science), or torture them to shut them up. Instead, they argue with them. To my mind this harnessing of the human penchant for disagreement is one of the greatest gifts of science’s central tenets to humanity -- all knowledge is provisional; you might be wrong, no matter how right you think you are; you have to deal with critics, not kill them or attempt to silence them.
So, finally, to alternative history. Where does it fit in? I think it doesn’t. It stands entirely outside science or liberal scholarship. It abuses the methods of scholarly investigation or, in the case of Hancock, denies their existence altogether (see the “View From the Trenches” article on his website). As such, alternative history comes closer to religious revealed “truth” than to a scientific hypothesis, which is founded in evidence and predicated for its existence on the continued support from that evidence. Alternative historians offer assertion, speculation, innuendo, selective presentation, wild guessing, misrepresentation, superficial analysis of complex phenomena (e.g. mythology), dependence on outmoded and/or disproven theories, defunct paradigms (e.g. hyperdiffusionism) -- anything but hard evidence. Their supposed case is smoke and mirrors, a tissue of possibilities glued together with rhetoric and posturing. It most certainly is not a hypothesis (since it is not founded in evidence), nor can it withstand even perfunctory critical scrutiny. The alternative house falls apart when you knock on the door.
So, to come back to Avry’s basic point, readers are presented with a stark choice: accept the un-evidenced “conjectures” and “best guesses” of the alternatives, closing their eyes to what evidence we have in order to do so (see Hancock’s ignoring 30 years of work at Tiwanaku); or rely on the “conjectures” and “best guesses” (aka “hypotheses”) of the people who allow consideration of all the available evidence to guide the shape their (provisional) views.
It seems clear to me which approach is likely to yield the more reliable results.
Garrett</HTML>
