Hancock, for one, is not an "India first"
ideologist, but he has a penchant for early dating in general: he has already
proposed much earlier dates for Tiahuanaco and the Sphinx. His talent for
discovering artificial structures in unlikely places is also remarkable
(pyramids on Mars, for example). Hancock's eagerness to play a
role in the Gulf of Cambay affair is probably the worst thing that could
have happened. Seriously, quite apart from the question whether the piece of
wood in question has anything to do with the "ruins", its laboratory dating has
been manipulated in unacceptable ways -- the deepest theoretically possible
dating being accepted as matter of fact or even further exaggerated ("9500 years
ago" or "more than 9500 years ago" -- c'est une façon de parler), and all
problematic issues swept under the carpet. In press releases and popular
publications the piece of wood is pluralised to become "wooden
artifacts", the regular patterns visible in sonar images are
confidently interpreted as an acropolis, a Harappan-style bath, a staircase, a
temple and what not -- all that before a single _scientific_ analysis has been
published in a serious journal. It's difficult not to be wary of such
revelations.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, June 19, 2002 11:26 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Vedic literature and the Gulf of Cambay
discovery
That is quite incorrect. The people who pronounced an early
date for
these artifacts might well be wrong, but they do not have a history
of propagating "India First" ideas. I wonder where YOU got this false
notion.