How would archaeologists and/or historians react

[Alisha Marie Klapheke]

I'm brainstorming a story idea here. If you hate any kind of fantasy, this is where you should move on. I understand. This one is for the make-believe crowd.

If an artifact could literally show someone its history how would archaeologists, historians, and academia react? Would they want to get the artifact into a lab and museum? Would private collectors go mad for it? Would they not believe that the artifact could truly show pictures, visions, of the past and encourage the medical community to study the individual who claimed to experience the visions?

Let me know what you think would happen if this occurred in today's world.

[EC2]

I use psychic research as one of my tools, and I do talk to historians and archaeologists about it. Some are openly hostile to the idea and think it's rubbish. Some embrace it and admit to actively using it themselves, and some are open minded sceptics. The middle group who embrace and use it, will not 'come out of the closet' because it would mean immediate academic and empirical ostracism. It's an underground thing. I had one guy, an archaeologist say in private to one of my open minded friends, another archaeologist, that he wasn't at all surprised by one of my findings and agreed that what I was saying was highly likely indeed but his public persona to the press was that it was rubbish. He daren't be seen to say anything else (and admitted this to my friend).
So I would say from personal experience, that there would be a lot of hostility and disbelief and attempts to poo-poo the artefact. Even if there was proof there would be entrenched resistance.
There would be people who did believe it and would be willing to run with it in an underground way, but they would have to be incredibly brave and strong and be prepared for an academic, if not personal lynching by standing up and speaking bold - which would make for interesting conflict in the story.

[Margaret]

I would add that a new idea doesn't have to be fantasy for the experts in a field to trash it. One example of many is J. Harlen Bretz's theory, which he first proposed in the 1920s, that a gigantic Ice Age flood carved out the Columbia River Gorge and other features of the American Northwest geological landscape. He was absolutely ridiculed and pilloried by other geologists, because the received wisdom of the day was that geologic features changed only through very gradual processes, never through sudden, dramatic events. Now, it is more-or-less universally recognized among geologists that his theory is correct. The Wikipedia entry about him says:

Bretz received the Penrose Medal; the Geological Society of America's highest award, in 1979, at the age of 96. After this award, he told his son: "All my enemies are dead, so I have no one to gloat over."

I belong to a discussion group founded, run and largely attended by atheists, and I've been surprised to find several of them confiding to me (and in one case to the group) that they have (a) had near-death experiences that changed their lives, (b) had out-of-body experiences they can't explain, (c) think they might remember a past life, and/or (d) have had precognitive visions. It would be extremely interesting to know what percent of scientists have had personal brushes with psychic and spiritual phenomena and believe such things do occur, but can't admit it (possibly even to themselves) for fear of their careers being destroyed. More than 50%? I wonder....

[Alisha Marie Klapheke]

EC2 and Margaret, thanks very much for responding to this thread. I've been so busy that my thanks are a bit tardy. Sorry!

EC2, I find your research fascinating. I suppose I'm one of the open-minded skeptics. I do believe there is much to this life (and others) that we do not understand and we'd be silly, pompous asses to pretend we know all. It's sad that academics feel such pressure to fit in with their peers. It's high school all over again!

Margaret, it does not surprise me that such a thing happened to that geologist. I love his acceptance speech. So funny and sad at the same time. It's interesting to hear what members of your group have mentioned. Living in the southern United States, I often see friends hiding what they really believe about the creation of the earth because they don't want to shock their church pals. Sadness. My personal beliefs as well as many others' don't fit neatly into any little package of religion/spirituality and I wish that was okay with everyone. Oh well.

Thanks again to both of you for sharing your thoughts. I'm working on a premise for a new novel and I will certainly remember them when writing. Thanks!

Off topic P.S. Wish me luck--I just sent out three fulls of my current project to agents/publishers! Eeek!

[Margaret]

Living in the southern United States, I often see friends hiding what they really believe about the creation of the earth because they don't want to shock their church pals.

I live in Portland, Oregon, one of the least churched cities in the US, and it's fascinating (albeit dismaying) to me to see the flip side of this dynamic at work: people with religious beliefs who feel uncomfortable talking about them because atheists get upset by the challenge.

Good luck, Alisha!

[annis]

Slightly off-topic, but along similar lines, I was intrigued by this recent piece of news which is another example of a scientific theory (this one about human ovulation) being ignored for years because it ran counter to the received wisdom of the times:

"For decades, scientific dogma has held that in induced ovulators, the physical stimulation of sex triggers hormonal responses within the female that lead to the production and release of eggs.

In 1985, however, a group of Chinese researchers challenged this idea by suggesting that there might be an ovulation-inducing factor (OIF) in semen itself.

According to veterinarian and reproductive biologist Gregg Adams of the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, the hypothesis ran so counter to common wisdom that "people just ignored it. Me included."

When Adams and his colleagues finally tested the idea decades later, they were taken aback by their results.

In 2005, the team injected the seminal fluid of male llamas - closely related to camels - into the hind legs of female llamas to see if the llamas would ovulate without genital stimulation.

To their surprise, he said, injecting seminal fluid into the female llamas' bloodstream had "a very potent ovulatory effect".

That sparked a seven-year search for OIF in semen"

Full article here:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/science/75170...ecret-unlocked

[MLE]

As a llama breeder of three decades' experience, I can speak to this. Although I don't doubt that the seminal fluid might well include an ovulation stimulation factor, There is a LOT more involved in getting a camelid (includes Llamas, Alpacas, and their wild cousins, Guanacos and Vicunas) to produce a ripened egg.
Since our gene pool in North America is terribly limited, and Foot-and-Mouth disease prevents importing new stock, artificial insemination (AI, in ag business shorthand) has always been of interest to US Llama and Alpaca breeders.

To start with, you can't just pop in a wax semen capsule like you can with a cow, sheep or horse and expect it to arrive in the right place. the opening to the camelid cervix is a long, corkscrew-shaped tube. The male has a cartilaginous 'hook' on the end of his penis (14" long, thin, and only fully extended when he will be supported by the female structures), and he literally 'screws' into the uterus, then extending himself all the way up into the fallopian tube, where he drizzles about 1/2 a teaspoon of seminal fluid, then withdraws part-way and does the other side of the two-horned uterus. It takes at least 20 minutes, which is why they get seated and comfortable for the process.

In rabbits, as in llamas, you can get the female to ovulate by pressing down on the area of her spine where the male's sternum would rest during mounting.

As in everything, many factors work together to produce the observable result.

On the topic of creation, I know many celebrated physicists, biologists and mathematicians who are very aware that the cells demonstrate design far beyond the likelihood of random occurrence. But they have grant money to renew and kids to feed, so they keep their observations to themselves.

Unless you are Arthur C Clarke or Carl Sagan, and you can (without getting laughed out of your profession) suggest that the obvious patterns of design are because aliens seeded the Earth. Getting the question of causality further away doesn't really solve the problem, though.

[Margaret]

Learn something new every day. That is fascinating, MLE!

[Alisha Marie Klapheke]

This is one thread that has grown into an unpredictable mass of cool info! Wow.