Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 16, No. 289.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/
Submit to: humanist@princeton.edu
[1] From: FRISCHER49@aol.com (16)
Subject: Re: 16.285 the archaeological imagination
[2] From: "Al Magary" <al@magary.com> (9)
Subject: Re: 16.285 the archaeological imagination
[3] From: Willard McCarty <w.mccarty@btinternet.com> (19)
Subject: no imagination involved?
--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2002 06:51:00 +0100
From: FRISCHER49@aol.com
Subject: Re: 16.285 the archaeological imagination
Those interested in the archaeological imagination, insofar as it involves
VR, might be interested in the following:
http://www.piranesi.dsl.pipex.com/cvro/frischer.pdf
USA contact information:
home tel. 310 313-3739
cell 310 266-6935
home fax 310 391-1460
email frischer49@aol.com
3441 Butler Avenue
L.A., CA, USA 90066
Rome contact information:
tel. 06 5373951
cell 349 473-6590
email frischer49@aol.com
Via F. Ozanam 75
00152 Rome
Italy
--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2002 06:51:27 +0100
From: "Al Magary" <al@magary.com>
Subject: Re: 16.285 the archaeological imagination
> Professionally-trained archaeologists take a dim view of
intuitional
> site-finding and tend to depend upon various methods of remote
sensing
> (from satellites to magnetometers) as well as historical
evidence....
Well! So much for an exploration of the archaeological
imagination among today's diggers.
So many ways of looking into the past, aren't there?
Al Magary
--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2002 06:52:22 +0100
From: Willard McCarty <w.mccarty@btinternet.com>
Subject: no imagination involved?
Thanks to Patricia Galloway in Humanist 16.285 for the vigorous kick
delivered to diving-rod archaeology -- since that is not what I was after.
My example of intuitional site-finding wasn't a good one. But however
excellent the mechanization I have difficulty believing that archaeology
when done well requires no imagination at all. I have no difficulty
believing that the ground has shifted, some bits now requiring less
guess-work than before. The fact remains, however, that the archaeologist
like the historian is dealing with traces of a vanished past. Between those
traces and knowledge of that vanished past some human 'making of the absent
present' (as John Stuart Mill said of the imagination) has to occur.
Unless, of course, we conveniently define archaeology as the practice of
recovering the traces, not their meaning -- and even so, I'd guess (as I
must) that pattern-recognition is not in such a high state of perfection as
to rule out intelligent intervention into the mechanical reassembly of parts.
Yours,
WM
Dr Willard McCarty | Senior Lecturer | Centre for Computing in the
Humanities | King's College London | Strand | London WC2R 2LS || +44 (0)20
7848-2784 fax: -2980 || willard.mccarty@kcl.ac.uk
www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/wlm/
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