Out-of-India - From Theory to Truth: Part 2

[shiv]

hard evidence would be good.

I have a quibble with this widely accepted cliche, but not for this thread

[Yayavar]

I dread..but still look forward to it in another thread.

[Rudradev]

I have a quibble too.

"Evidence" suggests a need to prove something. "Hard evidence" suggests that there is a universal standard by which evidence (in the realm of history) can be qualified as "good" enough to be valid, or rejected otherwise.

So my questions are: (1) to whom do we need to prove the veracity our own history, the very process by virtue of which we exist as we are today? and (2) if we accept the need to prove our history to someone else, we also have to accept standards of what constitutes "hard" vs "soft" evidence as set by someone else who will sit in judgment over these things. And thus set ourselves up for defeat in a rigged system whose pretense of impartiality we have implicitly accepted. No?

[Yayavar]

Hopefully you are not talking in context of my post which basically said - we have indirect evidence suggesting evolving writing scripts. It would be more satisfying to have 'hard evidence' too -- in the sense find an rock or clay or metal inscription in such scripts.

[shiv]

Hopefully you are not talking in context of my post which basically said - we have indirect evidence suggesting evolving writing scripts. It would be more satisfying to have 'hard evidence' too -- in the sense find an rock or clay or metal inscription in such scripts.

OK - I feel my hand is being "forced".

There is a "level of credibility" that triggers belief, and in this case it is not YOU personally who is an unbeliever but you would be happier to see what you call "hard evidence" because it gets easier to show and convince others whose "trigger for belief" rests on that "hard evidence"

This raises a philosophical question. If "hard evidence" is unavailable for a given statement would it be "less credible" than something else for which "hard evidence" is available?

My philosophical quibble with standards of hard evidence is in an article I have written. It is about habits that were inculcated several thousand years before "hard evidence" proved them to be valid. I am not arguing for or against - I am just pointing out that absence of hard evidence should not be an excuse for outright rejection. The other areas of modern science and society where a similar lack of hard evidence can be misleading are too far off topic as is the link below:
https://www.facebook.com/shivsastry/pos ... 3772589826

[Yayavar]

Certainly lack of 'hard evidence' is not rejection and it is not implied that way either. Indirect evidence is sometimes all we have and all we will get. But anything circumstantial certainly requires more effort. If there is a fossil for a bird and a fossil for an amphibian, then a fossil (or livin fossil like duck billed platypus) fills the gap and gives a better understanding - it is hard evidence of the evolution from one to the other. But if none were found one still can make the case of that evolution. So I dont see anything wrong with the term 'hard evidence'.

Indirect evidence, as I noted on evolution of scripts is a valid inference. A script called 'Ni' existed the Budhdhist text says. What if we actually found text in Ni? It then not only confirms Ni but also shows us its form. We get additional information on its relation to other scripts, possibly an indication of how scripts evolved etc. So a 'hard evidence' would enhance our knowledge more than the indirect reference does.

wrt 'washing hands' - yes, it implies that the Indians understood contamination and spread of disease. But does it mean they had a well defined germ theory? Probably did even if it did not include having seen microbes under a microscope. However, would it not be nice to find a description of such a theory? If it is not found does not mean there was no understanding of infection - the behaviour and habits as described in your article attest to a knowledge of spread of infection. Yet one has to agree that it is a different level of inference.

Same goes with determining Neptune exists from the orbit perturbations. Those indicated it existed. It is certainly more satisfactory in actually spotting it using a telescope.

So, I dont see any issue with 'hard evidence'. I just disagree that indirect evidence implies rejection. But I agree that a direct evidence of something is more complete because it includes more information. If a Sumerian tablet said IV had seals, it is one thing; whereas finding those seals is more satisfactory. Is it less credible if there were no actual seals found? Possibly unless there were lots of Sumerian tablets talking about the seals. If only one referenced it one would be unsure. But finding even one seal would be sufficient evidence of seals existing.

In short we certainly infer based on whatever knowledge and information we come across. An inference from indirect evidence is certainly valid. It is not to be rejected. Finding direct evidence provides more information and possibly indirect evidence for something else.

[Gyan]

Re Shiv:- You are misconstruing my comments. I am believer in Out of India theory. I also believe that Harappan knowledge base cannot disappear completely. It was not just one town, but hundreds of cities over thousands of years. But how did it mutate and where is the related evidence? Sanskrit is a complicated language, it cannot appear suddenly in 600 AD. One explanation is that it evolved from Harappan language. But Where is the physical evidence of its development? So I repeat, what efforts have we have made to fill gaps between 1500BC Harappan script to 500BC Brahmi Script and then from 500BC Brahmi Script to 600AD Sanskrit? Discovery of one text of Ramayan has pushed back date of evidence from 1000AD to 600AD.

[shiv]

But Where is the physical evidence of its development?

I am currently writing a reply to Yayavar on the question of what he called "hard evidence" - but before I post that let me point out to you that your asking for "physical evidence" is fundamentally a belief on your part that the presence of physical evidence is necessary for proof. This is a deeply etched belief in our minds - and when we are presented with "physical evidence" we say "OK now I believe it. It was not so believable until this physical evidence was shown to me"

There is a history to this belief - it was not always so. But i don't want to repeat myself - because what you ask and the discussion I had with Yayavar are very similar - I will expand in a separate reply below. In fact the question of physical evidence or writing and literature have a deep bearing on the way we see the world today.

[shiv]

I just disagree that indirect evidence implies rejection. But I agree that a direct evidence of something is more complete because it includes more information.

Please pardon me because this threatens to be a long reply. And please don't think I am buggering about trying to dodge the question of "hard evidence". Not dodging, although it sounds like dodging.

Let me approach this from the opposite direction. When something called "hard evidence" exists, why is it "more credible" or "more complete"?

If you start from the perspective that any information "X" must have "hard evidence" to prove that it is true, then you can divide all information into two sets
1. Information without hard evidence = myths, lies, theories, hypotheses ("untruth")
2. Information with hard evidence= truth

The key of course is "What is accepted as hard evidence?" which has placed some information into the realm of "truth" while other information is "untruth"

Let me take this forward by quoting you and Gyan because both are relevant here. I will quote both and explain below

You said:

I find it hard to imagine that people created very complex languages - with massive literature and error corrections - without a way to write it. I agree though that hard evidence would be good.

Gyan said:

But some issues on Archeological evidence or lack there of, does raise problems. IVF Ended around 1500 BC and definitely had a written script as preserved in hard archeological evidence. Then the next archeological evidence is Brahmi Script in 500BC. What was happening for 1000 years in India? Why does the vibrant Vedic culture not leave behind any evidence of written texts or even temples even though older IVF evidence has been found?

Both of you are asking for "hard evidence" of language. Neither of you are denying that the language is older, but yet both of you have a need for what you call as "more complete" and gyan asks for "physical evidence of its development"

It turns out that the tradition of "written proof" - a.k.a. ' "the written word" ("It is written...") is a tradition that was started with Christianity. The demand for physical proof was one aspect of Greek philosophy the romans inherited, and the Christians took over the Roman empire.

Earlier Greek philosophers wrestled with ideas that could be proved and could not be proved. Many of their arguments (if you read Greek philosophy) were uncannily like Vedantic philosophy or crude renditions of that. Plato in his book "Republic' dreamed of a nation/republic where thinkers and writers would not be allowed to write about things that could not be seen and felt or "known" in this physical world. That meant that Greek Gods with their supernatural powers were not to be believed as real because no power known to human could do those things. So those Gods would be declared "irrational". This was a self goal of an idea by a Greek philosopher because it was ultimately used by Christians against the Romans and by the Protestants against Catholics. What we have inherited today is a Protestant version of verifying the truth (but I digress)

The Christians initially did two things. They wrote about Jesus Christ's life and since it was a written record by human hands it was "truth". Because Christs' life as written was "the truth" all the Greek beliefs had to be discarded as untruth. In fact a lot of Greek texts were simply destroyed in the same friendly way as the later followers of Islam. But these original Christians were Catholics. Then came the Protestants. Now they took "rationality and credibility" even further. They drew a line with Jesus Christ. they said "Everything in the Bible, miracles and all, are true" but miracles that came later (as believed by Catholics) are not true.

Everything after Christ was "written down" by "chroniclers" or "historians" so it was all true true true. everything that came earlier was false false false.

This version of "What has physical proof" and "what does not have physical proof" lasted 1800 years before the first crisis came. In the 1800s German "Assyrilologists" in the Levant started finding ruins and even texts that were older than their 2000 year old history of Christ. This upset them greatly and in fact Nazis were among the people (along with Brits and others who agreed with them) that this could not be right. How could the hated Semites, the ancestors of Jews have "Hard archaeological evidence", "physical evidence" that was older than Europe's Christian past?

Relief came in the form of the conquest of India and the "discovery" of the Rig Veda. Suddenly Sanskrit became the mother language. The Brahmins they met, fair skinned initially (maybe Afghanistan/Punjab) were their long lost European brothers. But soon this theory had to die. How could the black Brahmins of Bengal be their brothers? So the search began for the "Uhreimat" the original land of the Vedas. In general the Europeans pointed to Scandinavia with blue eyes and blond hair. This was not just Nazis, but the British too.

The discovery of Mitanni treaties and Kikkuli horse trainning manuals in a Sanskrit clone language gave "hard evidence" to the Europeans that Sanskrit started in Europe, went to Syria for 100-200 years before vanishing completely and then went on to India. Via Iran

The important thing here for our discussion is that there is now "hard evidence" or "concrete proof" in the form of the Mittanni treaties that a Sanskrit like language was there in Syria in 1800 BC. There is no earlier "hard evidence" in India just as you and gyan have averred. Sanskrit had already been dated to 1500 BC with no proof at all. If you take "hard proof" Sanskrit in India has existed only from 600 AD. But Prakrits were there in Ashoka's time in 300 BC. So the 1500 BC date for Rig Veda is most certainly wrong. But there is no "hard evidence". No "concrete proof"

So now history has been written for us by the West. Indo european languages started somewhere in Eurasia. Why? Because there is "hard evidence" of horses and wheels and all Indo European languages have common words for wheel and axle. Therefore the language must have come from central Asia.No hard evidence of labguage - but extrapolation from archaeology. But when did it arise? Well No "hard evidence" except for a Sanskrit like language in Syria (Mitanni treaties)

Therefore we say 'The mother of Sanskrit was born in Eurasia with horses and wheels. It went to Syria and left "hard evidence' as the Mitanni texts. It then went to India. there is no 'hard evidence" in India. Sanskrit is simply given a date of 1500 BC.

If you look for hard evidence, DO NOT struggle against AIT. it is all known, discovered and "written"

If you are willing to deduce from the existing evidence in the absence of hard evidence, then welcome to the club

[shiv]

And as a corollary to my long post above I would like to add:

It is because of the lack of "hard, concrete evidence" that ancient Indian texts are all mythology, while the histories of Europe are all true chronicles.

Pre history used to be prior to the time before Christ but because of "hard evidence" in the Levant proving the old testament. Anything before 2000 BC is simply mythology conjecture. Ancient Indian science and astronomy was random, like monkeys on typewriter producing Romeo and Juliet by random chance.

[Rudradev]

Excellent posts, Shiv.

I would like to add. All other things being equal, the exact same piece of "evidence" (e.g. some writing on a flexible piece of cellulose-fiber-based surface, be it papyrus or palm leaf) remains "hard" in a dry, arid land for much longer than it does in a lush, tropical, monsoon-blessed, life-filled land.

[shiv]

Excellent posts, Shiv.

I would like to add. All other things being equal, the exact same piece of "evidence" (e.g. some writing on a flexible piece of cellulose-fiber-based surface, be it papyrus or palm leaf) remains "hard" in a dry, arid land for much longer than it does in a lush, tropical, monsoon-blessed, life-filled land.

Exactly the same holds true for bones - apart from the fact that a tradition of cremation and ash disposal in rivers has gone on a long time. Now at some future date if someone dredges the silt deep in the Bay of Bengal - one may find "hard evidence" of things that are myth today.

The words "believer" and "unbeliever" are so significant in this context. These concepts have been known for a long loooooong time

[Yayavar]

Shiv: Thanks for the detailed response that gives me a much better understanding. But there is a disconnect between what you are considering and what was being implied in this context. To clarify it more I used Fossil record or Uranus examples which certainly are not human written records. There might be a psy-ops war out there with the pseudo-historians of Whitzel variety and other AIT supporters but that is not my concern in every discussion.

In the current context where we were talking of writing i.e. scripts, we have - just from my posts - (a) suggestion of why oral was preferred - for dissemination, multiple copies, no technology to do the same otherwise (b) references to different scripts in Jain/Budhdhist stories on Mahavira and Budhdha. (c) logically, a complex language and complex ECC without writing doesnt seem likely

Thus the implication was that there is evolution of writing. We have two end points - let us say - IV seals which are undeciphered and the Brahmi around 400BC in Anuradhapura. But there was certainly writing before. Mittani treaty afaik is in cuneiform though it uses Sanskrit terms and shows Indic influences. Thus it provides us an additional knowledge point - it shows us the influence of Indics in ancient times including on Egyption civilization, it shows another script used for Sanskrit and indicates that the language is much much older. It is a data point in out-of-india - how Indian influence spread all the way out to Syria and beyond.

So this 'hard evidence' is great - it gives us more information that we would have had otherwise. It in no way says there was no other script or evolution or thinking in Indian regions. Sure there will be others who will use it to spin it their way. So what? This evidence is an interesting clue that must fit into the overall inferences we derive from indirect and other direct evidences. It has to tie with human migratory evidence too using DNA markers, it has to tie with other evidence that might surface. Who says that there is no rock edict in Brahmi in the vast areas of IV domain waiting to be discovered or another one to be found in TN/Andhra where so much has been found. And if there is none - so be it. We will find other clues - hard and derived over time and continue our knowledge quest. The psy-ops guys will do their worse let them. We have lived through the worst already.

So the christian emphasis on written record does not dissuade me from the excitement of finding a more direct evidence. It gives me additional clues and knowledge. Carbon dating, form of inscription, if deciphered what is written, where was it found etc. are all data points in painting the whole picture. In parallel multiple sources of indirect evidence provide us other data points too.

Yes, it is harder to find physical evidence in some areas. Deserts or the arctic will preserve but hot tropics or temperate climates will not be as kind. Burial will preserve more than burning. Thus that makes physical evidence even more exciting - it will be rarer but will validate or invalidate some findings and will provide additional pointers. We have been finding a lot of buried cities of IV. Finding submerged ancient dwarka - that is hard evidence beyond references to the city. It now provides us with a lot more to investigate.

Those with ulterior motives might spin it their way - that danger will always exist but we can ignore it in search of 'purer' knowledge.

[shiv]

In the current context where we were talking of writing i.e. scripts, we have - just from my posts - (a) suggestion of why oral was preferred - for dissemination, multiple copies, no technology to do the same otherwise (b) references to different scripts in Jain/Budhdhist stories on Mahavira and Budhdha. (c) logically, a complex language and complex ECC without writing doesnt seem likely

There are probably dozens of aphorisms to describe what I have in my mind.
I will start with two that I can recall to try and make the point I want to make, although it does count as rhetoric

1. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck - it is a duck
2. Paraphrasing Conan Doyle/Holmes: "When you have looked at all possibilities and ruled them out, what remains, however improbable, is the answer"

What I am trying to get at is summarized in these bullet points

• The Vedas are self-described as "sounds", not text to be written
• Accurate intonation/sounds/meter are important for the Vedas and cannot be transmitted by written text
• An extraordinary amount of effort has gone into making them accurately transmitted orally from generation to generation
• No evidence exists of their having been written down or transmitted by writing. Error correction methods are all oral, none call for writing
• The "youngest" dates for the Vedas (accepted by gora scholars whose truths most of us subscribe to) is older than 1200 BC (>3200 years old). Dates that can be gleaned from within the Vedas go as far back as 8000 BC
• The oldest written texts available anywhere in the world are about 4500 years old - small seals/fragments
• The Vedas have 10,600 verses. It is difficult to believe that a body of literature that is so large would have left no written evidence unless they were not meant to be transmitted in writing which is the exact truth of the Vedas

The Vedas do not need writing for transmission or for error correction. Just like music: I would guess that 99% of all music that is taught is done without any written error correction. Yet music knowledge is transmitted well without text. Writing is unnecessary for certain types of information transmission. It is a projection bias error to assume that writing is always necessary and must have existed before the Vedas

So here I call into question your premise quoted below and accuse you of starting with a bias by saying:

logically, a complex language and complex ECC without writing doesn't seem likely

You are applying what you see as logic without asking if your premise is itself wrong in assuming that error correction is not possible without writing.

Thus the implication was that there is evolution of writing. We have two end points - let us say - IV seals which are undeciphered and the Brahmi around 400BC in Anuradhapura. But there was certainly writing before. Mittani treaty afaik is in cuneiform though it uses Sanskrit terms and shows Indic influences. Thus it provides us an additional knowledge point - it shows us the influence of Indics in ancient times including on Egyption civilization, it shows another script used for Sanskrit and indicates that the language is much much older. It is a data point in out-of-india - how Indian influence spread all the way out to Syria and beyond.

I have no doubt whatsoever that writing has evolved - but in this context that does not interest me simply because it is a mistake to link up "Vedas" with "writing" I believe it is necessary to make a mental leap to consider that knowledge, analysis and transmission of information could have been invented by humans and used long before the idea of writing. In fact, aid to memory and calculation like counting on fingers to keep in time and gestures to indicate timbre and meter are muscle memory used for ECC. Try and explain the words timber and meter out of a dictionary/written text?

Let me just add something I said long ago. Writing is a formula for forgetting. But explaining that is a different subject

[Yayavar]

I think we have spoken to different things though there is overlap.

One can remove Veda - Rigveda to be precise - from the context and still discuss writing and benefit or non-benefit of hard-evidence. One can argue that the basis of ECC or other rules could all be derived, applied and done orally.
But even with that one can discuss evolution of writing, indirect inferences and benefits of hard-evidence. If the objection is to findin 'hard evidence' wrt Rigveda that was not proposed at all.

[Murugan]

Oo La La !

Light Skin Oiropeans' skin colour stems from ONE Ancestor Lived Between India and Middle East 10000 Years Ago

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... s-ago.html

[wig]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city ... 131715.cms

5,000 years ago, clay was 'plastic': Expert

Before plastic, there was clay. Demonetisation may have made you more dependent on your debit or credit cards for your everyday buys, but such a system was a way of life 5,000 years ago -during the Harappan civilization. So says Jonathan Mark Kenoyer, one of the world's most reputable experts in Harappan civilization. .
Texts from ancient Mesopotamia have recorded accounts of earthen tablets being used to conduct trade with the Harappan civilization, like credit cards. Kenoyer, delivering a lecture at the Indian Museum on Thursday , said the system was borne out of necessity -just as you use plastic money in order to avoid dealing with large volumes of cash, or because you may not have all the cash you require right then. .
In essence, a debit or credit card bears information about a bank account. When it is swiped by a merchant, it extracts a payment promise from the bank."The trade volume between Mesopotamia and Harappa was huge, and would have required tonnes of copper to mint coins. But they used a sy stem of earthen tablets that contained seals of both civilizations, and were a token of credit," claimed Kenoyer, who teaches at the department of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Just like your credit card, it seems. Kenoyer said a Japanese team has discovered three unusual round pendants of baked clay in Kanmer near Dholavira, Gujarat. "Since the same seal was on all three tablets, it indicated they served as a passport for travellers between different regions," he said.
Kenoyer's journey into Harappan civilization also has a Bengal connect. Shell bangles that many married women wear in Bengal also adorned Ha rappan women. The thickness of the bangles indicated social hierarchy . In 1982, Kenoyer travelled extensively through Bishnupur and Barrackpore, where the shell bangle industry continues with the Harappan tradition.
Amar jutoe Harappar mati Park Street e eshe laglo (The shoes that I am wearing are laced with earth from Harappa)," Kenoyer said, his lucid Bengali drawing gasps. He said he picked up the language as a kid at Shillong, his birthplace.
The Harappan Gallery at the museum has been shut for 16 years. "We will reopen the gallery shortly ," said Sayan Bhattacharya, education officer, Indian Museum.

[chetak]

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/20 ... and-learn/

Celebrate DNA Day with Genographic! Join, Search and Learn
Posted by Miguel Vilar on April 25, 2016

Join us at National Geographic in wishing every past, current, and future Genographic Project participant a Happy DNA Day!

Sixty-three years ago today a ground-breaking paper was published that introduced us to the double helix and revealed the structure of DNA, catapulting forward the field of genetics. The scientific world never looked back.

Eleven years ago this month, National Geographic launched the Genographic Project. This project brought the capability of personal genetics to the household and introduced everyone to the terms mitochondria, Y chromosome, and haplogroup. Nearly three-quarters of a million people have since joined the project, learning about their own haplogroup and their personal genetic story, helping us push science even further ahead. That science can now use your help!


A few months ago, we opened the Genographic Project database to researchers and genealogists to help us analyze the thousands of anonymous DNA results. The product of that research is now starting to come in.

[Neshant]

On a galactic scale, the movements of people on this tiny marble called Earth is almost zero.

[Nilesh Oak]

My public talk at the Press club of India, New Delhi (courtesy: Srijan Foundation)

https://youtu.be/RedV48OCEFg

[ashbhee]

This is what Epigrapher Bryan Wells says about Indologists Steve Farmer and Michael Witzel in this article. I love this guy.

“You would be better off getting medical advice from your garbage man than you would getting ideas about the Indus script from listening to Steve Farmer,” says Wells.

Wells compares fact-checking Farmer to fact-checking Donald Trump. “You have to fact-check every single thing he says because it’s mostly wrong.”

Wells would show Witzel a PowerPoint presentation entitled “Ten reasons you don’t know what you’re talking about” while in the back of a cab.

http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/25/14371 ... orithms-ai

[vanand]

I find out this URL the author says there are anthropological evidence that show population of Gujarat is composed of more or less the same ethnic groups as are noticed at Lothal in 2000 BC
http://www.sol.com.au/kor/16_01.htm

The below URLs is also interesting
http://www.stephen-knapp.com/aryan_inva ... coffin.htm
http://archaeologyonline.net/artifacts/ ... n-theories
http://www.raceandhistory.com/cgi-bin/f ... ad;id=1040

[RajeshA]

The Traditional Epoch of Yudhishthira Era and Mahabharata War

By Vedveer Arya

LINK

Mahabharata War started on 25th Oct 3162 BCE.

[GShankar]

Some new publishing.

1 - http://www.dailypioneer.com/todays-news ... route.html
2 - http://www.deccanchronicle.com/150618/n ... ay-experts

[Murugan]

Genetics and the Aryan Debate
By Michel Danino

http://archaeologyonline.net/artifacts/ ... yan-debate

Priceless Golden Nuggets:

“We found an extensive deep late Pleistocene genetic link between contemporary Europeans and Indians, provided by the mtDNA haplogroup U, which encompasses roughly a fifth of mtDNA lineages of both populations. Our estimate for this split [between Europeans and Indians] is close to the suggested time for the peopling of Asia and the first expansion of anatomically modern humans in Eurasia and likely pre-dates their spread to Europe.”

“The supposed Aryan invasion of India 3,000–4,000 years before present therefore did not make a major splash in the Indian gene pool. This is especially counter-indicated by the presence of equal, though very low, frequencies of the western Eurasian mtDNA types in both southern and northern India. Thus, the ‘caucasoid’ features of south Asians may best be considered ‘pre-caucasoid’ — that is, part of a diverse north or north-east African gene pool that yielded separate origins for western Eurasian and southern Asian populations over 50,000 years ago.”

This shows, once again, that “the Indian maternal gene pool has come largely through an autochthonous history since the Late Pleistocene.” The authors then studied the “U” haplogroup, finding its frequency to be 13% in India, almost 14% in North-West Africa, and 24% from Europe to Anatolia; but, in their opinion, “Indian and western Eurasian haplogroup U varieties differ profoundly; the split has occurred about as early as the split between the Indian and eastern Asian haplogroup M varieties. The data show that both M and U exhibited an expansion phase some 50,000 years ago, which should have happened after the corresponding splits.” In other words, there is a genetic connection between India and Europe, but a far more ancient one than was thought.

Another important point is that looking at mtDNA as a whole, “even the high castes share more than 80 per cent of their maternal lineages with the lower castes and tribals”; this obviously runs counter to the invasionist thesis. Taking all aspects into consideration, the authors conclude: “We believe that there are now enough reasons not only to question a ‘recent Indo-Aryan invasion’ into India some 4000 BP, but alternatively to consider India as a part of the common gene pool ancestral to the diversity of human maternal lineages in Europe.” Mark the word “ancestral.”

[johb]

This needs a strong response
Who is this Shoaib Daniyal
https://scroll.in/article/737715/fact-c ... -was-syria

[Aarvee]

I've googled him. Found this nugget and pretty good blog.

https://dynastycrooks.wordpress.com/201 ... ni-hindus/

[KL Dubey]

All good points only, except:

[*]The "youngest" dates for the Vedas (accepted by gora scholars whose truths most of us subscribe to) is older than 1200 BC (>3200 years old). Dates that can be gleaned from within the Vedas go as far back as 8000 BC

The Veda has no internal dating in it since it does not and cannot contain any historical statements at all.

[KL Dubey]

...The exact origins of Sanskrit, which interest me are still murky and I will continue to work on that - but effort put in to diss linguists is wasted effort because linguistic theories about language connected with AIT are dead. Further arguments about "How to argue against Invasionsists" is a waste fo time IMO

The Sanskrit language originated from thousands of years of attempts by the Indians to make something intelligible out of the mass of Vedic 'data' accumulated. This would include reproduction, cataloging, pattern analysis, and finally etymology (assigning meanings). A small set of the products of these efforts still remains with us in the form of pratishakhyas, nirukta-nighantu, etc. This activity completely disappeared among the Indians in the last 2000 years, probably due to the lack of technology (informatics, data sciences) to go beyond what could be done "manually". In the last 150 years, the most well-known attempts to 'understand' the meaning of the Veda' are from these damn Indologists (AIT, AMT, OIT etc) who see history and geography in the Veda.

[Dipanker]

So how does one explain that Russian and other Balto-Slavic languages sound so much like Sanskrit and also have so many common words ? Indo-European?

[KL Dubey]

So how does one explain that Russian and other Balto-Slavic languages sound so much like Sanskrit and also have so many common words ? Indo-European?

Don't be obtuse. You know the answer and it has been explained already before. One more time and I will have to place you on the ignore list.

Other languages contain corrupted versions of Sanskrit words, originally gained during "out of india" diffusion of Sanskrit (and many other inventions/discoveries arising from Indians trying to make sense of the Veda and exploit it for human needs).

Meanwhile Sanskrit itself continued to evolve within India. The so-called "Vedic Sanskrit" (the language of the brahmanas and Upanishads) is the earliest Sanskrit that is usable for daily parlance. It is the language 'discovered' by humans from the Veda. After that we can assign names such as Late Vedic Sanskrit, Epic Sanskrit, Classical Sanskrit, and modern Sanskrit (containing neologisms required for modern parlance).

[Anshuman.Kumar]

Anybody having any information on the possible dates when the paper on Rakhi garhi DNA will be out

[Prem]

http://gnxp.nofe.me/2017/04/20/aryan-ma ... -they-did/
Aryan Marauders From The Steppe Came To India, Yes They Did!

Same old crap by Abrahamics experts.

[RoyG]

http://gnxp.nofe.me/2017/04/20/aryan-ma ... -they-did/
Aryan Marauders From The Steppe Came To India, Yes They Did!

Same old crap by Abrahamics experts.

We already know that ANI isn't indigenous to the subcontinent.

What you have to pay attention to is the dating.

If it goes past 1700 BC, OIT wins b/c it means our Vedic culture went out after ANI established itself.

Remember, there are no Hittite loan words in the old books. They are only found in the new books.

Razib Khan unknowingly demolishes AIT with this:

In sum, the balance of evidence suggests male mediated migration into South Asia from Central Asia on the order of ~4-5,000 years ago.

"Maurader" believing idiots depend on the 1700 BC date for AIT. They always forget it though.

[Prem Kumar]

SriJoy: read Talageri or watch his 3 videos on YouTube

[A_Gupta]

Conversation with Talageri:
http://indiafacts.org/conversation-with-talageri/

[Vayutuvan]

1. The Brahmanas make it clear that the Rig Veda is composed in 'Brahmavarta' and 'Brahmavarta' is defined as a region of Northern/North-eastern Rajasthan. .

Reference for the above claim please.

[gandharva]

ESHG 2017 abstracts

The titles are already up but the abstracts will only be available this Saturday, May 13. The programme planner and abstract search engine are here. Below are links to a few random abstracts that caught my eye.

To be brutally honest, I suspect that the Rai et al. presentation on South Asian population history (first link below) won't amount to much more than a preemptive strike against the impending confirmation via ancient DNA that the Aryan invasion really did happen. In other words, I expect them to argue for strong genetic continuity in South Asia since at least the Neolithic and against the Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT).

Perhaps I'm being overly cynical and I'll apologize if I'm wrong, but I think it's a good bet, considering the many papers put out by Indian scientists over the past 15 years or so arguing that both the Indo-Aryans and "Aryan" Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a are native to South Asia. At best this is naive, and at worst plain crazy, but that doesn't seem to bother many of our Indian friends. Nevertheless, the ancient DNA sequenced as part of the Rai et al. study, when analyzed properly, should be very useful and I look forward to seeing it...................


http://eurogenes.blogspot.ca/2017/05/es ... racts.html

[A_Gupta]

Other recent discussion:
https://gnxp.nofe.me/2017/04/20/aryan-m ... -they-did/

[gandharva]

This latest paper. What do authors mean by the following line"

"The results of our computer simulations are compared to recent genetic data so as to better correlate the migratory patterns of various populations; they suggest that the initial populations started to coalesce around 4,000 YBP before the commencement of a period of relative geographical isolation of each population group"

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/articl ... ne.0176985