Re: [tied] Ecology, River Sarasvati and roots of Civilization of Bh

From: Juha Savolainen
Message: 18886
Date: 2003-02-18

Dear Kalyanaraman,

Once again you have complied an inchoate collection of
interesting data, speculation and pure assertion,
without ever taking the time to analyse any specific
piece of information with sufficient care and in its
proper context. Hence all this stuff never addresses
the questions posed by more critical scholars,
scientists and other curious seekers of knowledge.

Your discussion of the �Mighty Saraswati River� issue
illustrates this point admirably.

Nobody denies that the Greater Indus Valley area is
neotectonically very active. Nobody denies that river
courses have migrated. Nobody denies that the mature
Harappan sites can be approximately dated from 2600
BCE to 1800 BCE. Nobody denies that this culture and
its neighbours were dependent on the rivers for much
of their prosperity. But putting all this together and
adding to it some recent data on the Ghaggar
paleochannels etc. does not give the required
justification for the popular �Mighty Saraswati River�
story you have been advocating and I have repeatedly
been criticising. Pace Valdiya et al, Ghaggar cannot
have been the "Mighty Saraswati River" for all the
reasons Roy et al. have emphasising, there is no
justification for using the Harappan sites to stand in
for Vedic Aryan sites, the dating of the river
migrations is very imperfectly understood etc.

Unless these problems are taken seriously, all this
Saraswati-seeking will remain just another wild goose
chase after the Lost Continent, the Garden of Eden,
the Biblical Flood and other chimaeras. In the end,
this ardent seeking will only succeed in yielding more
and more illustrations of the Saraswati-seekers� own
beliefs and a nasty "bunkum"-verdict from those who
still value good judgement and critical inquiry.

Regards, Juha















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