Archive for October, 2006
Pseudoarchaeology: ABC’s Nightline Demonstrates Journalistic Gullibility
On Friday night’s broadcast of Nightline (October 27, 2006), ABC once again demonstrated it’s lack of journalistic intelligence in its reporting of the Bosnian “pyramid” nonsense. In spite of many genuine archaeologists publicly denouncing Semir Osmanagic as a fraud who is putting genuine archaeological resources at risk.
The Nightline segment, reported by Nick Watt, called Osmanagic [...]
Stolen and Looted: The Getty and the Museum of Fine Arts Return Artifacts
Recently, some museums like the J. Paul Getty Museum and Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts have tightened their policies on acquisition of artifacts and have even returned artifacts to their country of origin.
The Getty repatriated a 4th century BC inscribed tombstone and a 5th century BC marble relief (which I posted about here) to [...]
Anthropology Blog Carnival!
The first ever issue of The Four Stone Hearth hosted by Kambiz at Anthropology.net.
The Four Stone Hearth is a new Anthropology Blog Carnival that is named for the four disciplines of anthropology: archaeology, ethnography, physical/biological anthropology, and linguistics. This issue has articles by Afarensis, Salto sobrius, Archaeology.about.com, and myself among others. My [...]
Book Review: Dancing Skeletons, an ethnography
Dancing Skeletons: Life and Death in West Africa
Author: Katherine A. Dettwyler
Publisher: Waveland Press, Long Grove, IL
Year: 1994
On average, about 17 children out of 1000 under the age of 7 dies in the world each year (El-Ghannam 2003) because of malnutrition, homicide, wars, drowning, car accidents, what have you -a sobering statistic for any loving parent. [...]
Who You Gonna Call? Skeptic’s Circle!
The 45th Skeptic’s Circle is up at The Inoculated Mind and Karl has the first ever Podcast version [.mp3] of Skeptic’s Circle. I recommend opening the .mp3 and clicking the individual links as the podcast plays, bookmarking the sites you want to go back and read more carefully.
Well done Karl!
… and don’t miss [...]
Forbidden Archaeology? The Exaggeration of the Antiquity of Man -part 2-
In an earlier blog post, I mentioned the Nabta Playa monuments that date back to the Neolithic and the attempts of certain significance-junkies to use this as a stepping stone for positing a greatly exaggerated antiquity of man. In that post, I reviewed an article that ran in a mystery-mongering magazine called Atlantis Rising [...]
ArtiFACTS: Recent News in Archaeology 10/5/06
Aztec RuinsIn Mexico, archaeologists have uncovered a 15th century monolithic altar with a frieze of the raingod Tlaloc and an agricultural deity. This altar is an exciting find to Mesoamerican archaeologists and it wasn’t found in some remote jungle but in the very heart of Mexico City! Mexico City Major Alejandro Encinas said:
“It is [...]
[Book Review] The Science of Noah’s Flood (part 2 of 2)
The first part of this 2 part review can be found here. In this part, I conclude my review of Noah’s Flood: The New Scientific Discoveries About The Event That Changed History (Ryan and Pittman, 1998), and offer a list of references for those that seek further reading. This review is primarily about the [...]
Carnival of the Godless #50…
… is up at Salto Sobrius. So go get your good godless gifts of great godless groupies today.
And when you’re done there, visit The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. Billing itself as a “clear thinking oasis,” the RDF is fast becoming one of my favorite places on the internet. There, you will [...]
