Piotr wrote
> Goodness, John! The author of this site is some sort of Net weirdo,
a visionary and a follower of Velikovsky, speculating about the end
of the world -- see his main pages:
>
> http://www.stanford.edu/~meehan/donnellyr/indexb.html
> http://www.stanford.edu/~meehan/donnellyr/contents.html
Don't worry. It is all a bit of a joke. Ingnatius Donnelly was a
real person who was an American congressman for one term in the
1880s, wrote on Atlantis because of biological (continental drift was
not a theory then), and cultural similarities between the old and new
world (cultural convergence for literate cities). His book "Atlantis
the Antedeluvian World" popularised the work of the oceanic
pioneering vessel, the Challenger in discovering the Mid Atlantic
Rdge (evidence of Atlantis Deonnelly claimed). His real persona is
eminently respectable
Prof Richard L. Meehan
Richard Meehan has degrees from M.I.T. and Imperial College,
University of London. Following service with the U.S. Army he lived
and worked in Southeast Asia in the early 1960s, and then in the
Western U.S. and South America. He has maintained a consulting
practice in Palo Alto and taught at Stanford University for the past
twenty five years. He lives with his family in Menlo Park,
California, a short walk from San Francisquito Creek.
Testimony of the Oaks (Recent Paper presented at Natural Catastrophes
during Bronze Age Civilisations: Archaeological, Geological and
Astronomical Perspectives. A conference at Fitzwilliam College,
Cambridge 11th-13th July 1997)
Book Reviews
Courses taught:
AES 114: Engineering Geology of Quaternary Sediments
CE 294: Geotechnical Failures
STS 180: Dispute Resolution
STS 90q: San Francisquito Creek Geology
He is one of the most respeced experts on international coastal
marine sciences. Don't be put off by the games he is playing! Its a
bit of a hobby, cultivating his multiple personalities
As Jennifer Lee's Honor Thesis on this Website says
Richard Meehan's website "Ignatius Donnelly and the End of the World"
is reflective of the current discussions of MPD and multiplicity. His
website demonstrates a performative understanding of identities.
(49) Both individuals and social groups are fluid and fragmented. The
structure of the website and the interaction between the reader and
website also demonstrate and highlight this performative
understanding of identities.
Meehan's website gives the reader a feel of taking a virtual journey.
The reader is asked to follow one of three "paths," and must
continually make choices during his or her exploration of the
website, along a chosen path. This motif of the journey highlights
the active, participative, and unique experience of the reader.
Meehan looks through a lens of multiplicity. His focus, unlike Noble,
is not on the social group or on society but on the individual.
Individuals have agency through their multiple and changing
identities. Meehan retains the possibility of continual change and
transformation. Identities are not merely imposed on individuals;
individuals perform identities. Meehan's website is about the
negotiation of identity; his theme is the (virtual) journey.
Social groups and roles, in this model, are only points of
navigation -- social groups exist as points of navigation for the
varied individual identities and journeys which are constantly being
constructed. Though an individual may identity him or herself as
a "scientist," he or she in fact has more than one facet to his or
her personality. These identities are constantly changing as
individuals interact.
While there are many possible ways of journeying through the website,
the possibilities are not limitless. Meehan still has an agenda by
making the paths connect; he still has a meaning that he wants to
convey. Indeed, boundaries and constraints are not inherently bad.
They are the walls to our domicile of sanity and safety. Meehan's
virtual journey provides the reader with a framework through which he
or she may negotiate an identity.
Individuals
Meehan's website is populated by many individuals. Some are
recognizable historical figures, such as Ignatius Donnelly and
Aristotle, and some are "regular" people, such as Meehan and his
friend Cessair. Some appear only in one episode; some, like Ignatius
Donnelly and Cessair reappear throughout the website. Unlike Noble,
Meehan's focus is on the ideas and interactions of these individuals
in their various capacities, not on individuals as representations of
specific, unchanging social groups.
Hope this helps set your mind at rest.
Regards
John