Link to the Indo-Eurasian_Research
List, moderated
by Steve Farmer (Comparative History), Michael
Witzel (Indology and Linguistics),
Lars Martin Fosse (Indology and Linguistics), and Benjamin
Fleming (Comparative Religion). The List
currently has 885+ research members from over 30 fields
(with hundreds of other onlookers). It focuses on premodern
studies globally. Core members are located in South Asia,
Iran, China, Russia, Eastern and Western Europe, Australia,
Japan, and the United States.
Updated 15 September 2008.
Please note that articles and lectures below are organized
topically, not chronologically.
Book-in-progress: Brains
and History: The Evolution of Thought (the
first book to integrate finds from neurobiology
and global studies of the rise and fall of traditional
religious and philosophical systems; the book should
be finished by the end of 2008). See also Syncretism
in the West: Pico's 900 Theses (1486), a long
case study of how religious and philosophical
systems emerged globally in manuscript traditions. That
study provided the initial data for the theoretical model
described in my work. It includes a Latin edition
and the first reliable translation of Pico's famous text.
Lecture,
21 August 2008: The
Neurobiological Origins of Religion: Implications
for Comparative Mythology. Second
Annual Conference of the International Association
of Comparative Mythology, Ravenstein, the Netherlands.
Download
paper abstract here. The paper presents the first testable neurobiological
model of the origins of primitive religion. It presents
evidence that anthropomorphic modeling of the world is
a predictable byproduct of neural processing. This in turn
suggests that primitive myth and religion
predate the anatomically modern brain, pushing their
dates reliably to before ca. 200,000 years BP. Tests of
the model are proposed that involve studies of hyper-anthropomorphizing
forms of synesthesia and various developmental disorders
that disrupt the so-called social brain. (Parts of this
paper are extracted from chapter two of my book-in-progress.)
New
Project Description: S.
Farmer, W. Zaumen, R. Sproat, and M. Witzel.
Simulating
the Evolution of Political-Religious Extremism: Implications
for International Policy Decisions. (A much expanded
description of this project with open-source code will be
available soon.) Part of a long-term project to develop
open-source tools that allow policy analysts and historians
to build cultural simulations without any formal programming.
The first application of our tool set, described here, focuses
on modeling the links between the emergence of modern communication
networks and global expansions of political-religious extremism.
The simulation architecture can be easily adapted via an
intuitive graphic user interface (GUI) to model cultural
developments of many other types. One use involves expansion
of our earlier simulation designs that model the growth of
premodern thought systems. On this topic, see Farmer, Henderson,
Witzel, and Robinson, Computer
Models of the Evolution of Premodern Religious, Philosophical,
and Cosmological Traditions. That paper is described
and downloadable in the next section.
Top downloads:
Steve Farmer, Richard Sproat, and
Michael Witzel, The
Collapse of the Indus-Script Thesis: The Myth of a Literate
Harappan Civilization. EJVS 11-2
(13 Dec. 2004): 19-57. (Well over 100,000 downloads
since publication.) See also on this article Science 2004
(306): 2026-9. The paper arose from unexpected
theoretical predictions of the model noted above.
Steve Farmer, Neurobiology,
Stratified Texts, and the Evolution of Thought: From
Myths to Religions and Philosophies (Preprint,
Harvard and Peking Universities joint conference on
comparative mythology, 2006; Beijing, in press; a slightly
different version will also appear in Cosmos 2008).
The paper includes discussion of neurobiological and
computer models of the growth of premodern religious
and philosophical systems; it ends with a look at tests
of the model involving, among other things, the so-called
Indus script and controversies over recently discovered
Chinese tomb texts, in particular the Guodian version
of the Laozi (discovered
1993).
Steve
Farmer, John B. Henderson, and Michael Witzel, Neurobiology,
Layered Texts, and Correlative Cosmologies: A Cross-Cultural
Framework for Premodern History, Bulletin
of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 72
(2000 [2002]): 48-89. The first published paper ever
to seriously link neurobiology and the evolution
of religious and philosophical traditions; also the
first published paper to question the old Indus-script
thesis, dealt with in detail in Farmer,
Spoat, and Witzel 2004 (see above).
Steve Farmer, John B. Henderson,
Michael Witzel, and Peter Robinson, Computer
Models of the Evolution of Premodern Religious, Philosophical,
and Cosmological Systems. (Online adjunct
of the article in the Bulletin of the Museum of Far
Eastern Antiquities, Dec. 2002.) The first computer
simulations to attempt to model the evolution of traditional
religious and philosophical systems.
Theoretical
Conclusions, from Syncretism
in the West: Pico's
900 Theses (1486): The Evolution of Traditional Religious
and Philosophical Systems (1998),
91-6. Other book
extracts on this page.
Michael Witzel and Steve Farmer, Horseplay
in Harappa: The Indus Valley Decipherment Hoax, [cover
story] Frontline 17 (19) (13 Oct. 2000): 4-11.
Steve Farmer, The
First Harappan Forgery: Indus Inscriptions in the Nineteenth
Century (2003).
Recent
lectures:
- University of Edinburgh, Scotland,
28-30 August 2007. "Methodological Problems in
Studies of the Global Distribution of Myths." Paper
Abstract.
- Stanford University, 11 July 2007. "The
Strange Case of the So-Called Indus Script: Distinguishing
Writing from Non-Linguistic Symbols." Paper
Abstract.
-
University of California at Berkeley, 29 March 2007.
Society of Ethnobiology. Steve
Weber, Dorian Fuller, and Steve Farmer (Presenter: Steve
Farmer). "Seed, Plant, and Farming Signs in the Indus
Symbol System: New Methods for Studying Harappan Civilization. Paper
Abstract.
Papers in set #1 below include
articles on the so-called Indus script and on links between
neurobiology and the evolution of human traditions. On a
book currently in progress that covers both these topics,
see the top of the page.
Papers
in sets #2-4 below contain slide lectures, web pages, and other papers
linked to Indus
research.
Papers in set #5 below contain
miscellaneous articles.
1.1-1.6.
Papers on the so-called Indus script and comparative
history (India, China, and the West)
1.2. Steve Farmer, Richard Sproat,
and Michael Witzel, The
Collapse of the Indus-Script Thesis: The Myth of a Literate
Harappan Civilization. EJVS 11-2
(13 Dec. 2004): 19-57. On my collaborators, see Richard
Sproat (Computational Linguistics, University of Illinois)
and Michael
Witzel (Indology, Harvard University).
1.3. A feature story on the Farmer,
Sproat, and Witzel paper appeared in the 17 Dec. 2004
issue of Science.
See A. Lawler, The Indus Script:
Write or Wrong? Science 2004
(306): 2026-9 (there is also an Italian version).
There are errors in the story, but it does faithfully
record the debate generated by our paper, which criticizes
the script adherents cited in the article. For those
criticisms, see our
original paper. Another article on our paper appeared
in Facts magazine
(Switzerland) on 17 February 2005 (PDF, 600 K, Die
Saubermänner vom Indus).
Another appeared in Der
Tagesspiegel (Germany) on 21 February (Wer
die Zeichen zu deuten weiss). An abbreviated version
of the latter appeared in Der
Standard (Austria) on 18 February 2005. A
TV documentary for German public TV (a bit sensationalistic)
that covers part of our work was released in June 2008.
1.4. Talk
given at the joint Harvard-Kyoto Roundtable in Kyoto, Japan,
on 6-8 June 2005. Steve Farmer, Steven A. Weber, Tim Barela,
Richard Sproat, and Michael Witzel. Temporal
and Regional Variations in the Use of Indus Symbols: New
Methods for Studying Harappan Civilization. Abstract.
1.5.
Richard Sproat and Steve Farmer, Morphology
and the Harappan Gods. In Inquiries into Words,
Constraints and Contexts. Festschrift in the Honour
of Kimmo Koskenniemi on His 60th Birthday. Preprint
bound presentation version, Saarijävi, Finland,
2005. Online publication CSLI Studies in Computational
Linguistics, Stanford University, 2006.
1.6. Steve Farmer, John B. Henderson,
and Michael Witzel, Neurobiology,
Layered Texts, and Correlative Cosmologies: A Cross-Cultural
Framework for Premodern History, Bulletin
of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 72 (2000
[2002]): 48-89. Special Issue: Rethinking the Correlative
Cosmology of Early China (published December 2002).
This paper includes the first cross-cultural study of so-called
correlative systems (in China), bandhus (in India),
and systems of correspondence (in the West). Hence the
collaboration of one Western specialist, one Sinologist,
and one Indologist in writing the paper. The first suggestion
that that the Indus civilization was not literate was a
prediction of the model developed here and in the next
two papers.
1.7. Steve Farmer, John B.
Henderson, Michael Witzel, and Peter Robinson, Computer
Models of the Evolution of Premodern Religious, Philosophical,
and Cosmological Systems. (Online adjunct
of the article in the Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern
Antiquities, Dec. 2002.) Discusses computer simulations
of the rise and fall of fractal-like structures (multilayered
mirroring cosmologies, scholastic hierarchies, Neo-Platonic
and Neo-Confucian systems, etc.) characteristic of fully
developed manuscript traditions.
1.8. Steve Farmer, John B.
Henderson, and Peter Robinson, Commentary
Traditions and the Evolution of Premodern Religious and Philosophical
Systems: A Cross-Cultural Model.
This theoretical paper, updated most recently in 2002, is
based on an invited lecture Henderson and I gave at the University
of Heidelberg in 1997. The paper presented our initial views
of how multilayered hierarchies and similar scholastic
structures were shaped cross-culturally in commentarial traditions.
The theoretical framework is provided by mathematical models
of nonlinear dissipative systems. Some but not all of the
data presented here show up in 1.5 and 1.6. The paper
contains the first public discussions of computer simulations
of the evolution of premodern religious and philosophical
traditions (work on this subject is being continued
with Bill Zaumen, an MIT trained physicist formerly at Sun
Microsystems).lThe
first expence Magazine on 17
Files
2.1-2.5. Slide shows and lectures on the Indus symbol
system
These slide lectures
provide illustrations of the conclusions
systematically presented in other articles (especially
1.2).
2.1. Sixth Harvard University
Indology Roundtable, 8 May 2004. The
Mythological Functions of Indus Inscriptions: Eight Conclusions
Arising from the Nonlinguistic Model of Indus Symbols. 3.6
meg pdf. Introduces new data on the magical origins,
later ritual, administrative, and political uses, and sudden
disappearance of the Indus symbols. Also gives prima
facie evidence of human sacrifice in the Indus Valley.
2.2. University of Bologna, 15 January
2004: Harappiani
analfabeti: Implicazioni teoriche delle ultime ricerche
sulla più antica civiltà indiana. 3.5
meg pdf. An English adaptation of this Italian lecture,
with some added slides, is found in 2.3.
2.3. The
Illiterate Harappans: Theoretical Implications of Recent
Studies of the First Indian Civilization.
4.2 meg pdf. A superset of slides made up
for talks at Washington State University at Vancouver
on 19-20 February 2004, combining materials from lectures
2.2 and 2.4.
2.4. Long Beach State International
Conference on the Beginnings of Civilization on the Indian
Subcontinent, 18 October 2003: 'Writing'
or Non-Linguistic Symbols? The Myth of the Literate Indus
Valley. 3.5 meg pdf. Most
materials in this invited lecture are now incorporated,
in updated form, in file 2.3. Conference
Webpage.
2.5. Fifth Harvard University
Indology Roundtable, 10 May 2003. Five
Cases of 'Dubious Writing' in Indus Inscriptions (1.6
megs). Presented the first detailed evidence that the Indus
symbols did not encode speech. The statistical arguments
developed here are superceded by materials presented in Farmer,
Sproat, and Witzel 2004 (article 1.2), but much of the data
here even now remains unpublished.
3.1-3.4 Additional background materials
on the so-called Indus script
3.1. The
First Harappan Forgery: Indus Inscriptions in the Nineteenth
Century (1 meg pdf). A short essay on the origins of
the Indus-script thesis, which Western researchers slipped
in through the back door (along with some fudged
evidence) in the 1870s and 1880s. Must reading for would-be
'decipherers'.
3.2. Walter
Fairservis and the Indus Symbol Problem (webpage).
In the late 1960s, the great archaeologist Walter Fairservis
nearly became the first researcher to reject the old
Indus-script myth, but then went through an odd conversion,
and spent the last 20 years of his life trying to decipher
the undecipherable. A cautionary tale.
3.3. Working
files from online discussions of the Indus question.
Parts but not all of these materials are incorporated in
the articles and slide lectures noted above.
Recently
discovered signs from Umm el-Marra: Linguistic or nonlinguistic? (Added
27 October 2006).
Perishable
Indus "texts"? Another Case of Spurious Evidence
(vs. Bryan Wells) u
What
do highway signs have in common with the 'Dravidian'
Indus-script model? A reductio ad absurdum of
the most famous argument advanced by Indus-script adherents
(small pdf file).
Statistical
predictions concerning unique Indus signs (makes
predictions concerning findings in the still unpublished
third volume of the Corpus of Indus Seals and Inscriptions).
From 2003.
A
look at some unpublished seals (looks
at a few still unpublished seals that support these predictions).
Odd
reconstructions of Indus inscriptions (reviews
a strange 'reconstruction' of some Indus inscriptions
by Fairservis that illustrates one way in which those
inscriptions are commonly distorted).
More
odd reconstructions (looks
at three different 'reconstructions' [not so labeled]
of a single inscription by Mackay, Parpola, and Mahadevan
as another example of such distortions.
3.4. Abstract of a long unpublished paper:
Steve Farmer, The
Illiterate Harappans: New Light on India's Oldest Civilization. All
the key arguments are now incorporated in Farmer, Sproat, and
Witzel 2004 (1.2 above).
4.1-4.3. Papers on extreme Hindu
nationalist manipulations of ancient history
in India: The famous 'Horseplay in Harappa' incident
(2000)
The following articles, accompanied
by comments by Romila Thapar, Asko Parpola, Iravatham Mahadevan,
Richard Meadow, and other researchers, can all be accessed
through Horseplay
in Harappa:
4.1. Michael Witzel and Steve
Farmer, Horseplay
in Harappa: The Indus Valley Decipherment Hoax, [cover
story] Frontline 17
(19) (13 Oct. 2000): 4-11.
4.2. Michael Witzel and Steve Farmer, New
Evidence on the 'Piltdown Horse' Hoax, Frontline 17
(23) (24 Nov. 2000): 126-129. See also articles on pp.,
122-26, collectively entitled A
Tale of Two Horses.
4.3. Hindi translation of Michael
Witzel and Steve Farmer, Horseplay
in Harappa, with a supporting
editorial by Romila Thapar (New Delhi, 2001).
5.1. Miscellaneous
5.1. A biography
(in French) of Pico's nephew-editor Gianfrancesco Pico, an
extreme anti-syncretist who collaborated (with Girolamo
Savonarola) in the posthumous doctoring of Pico's works,
was recently published in France as Steve Farmer and
Steven Vanden Broecke, Jean-François
Pic de la Mirandole (c. 1470-1533), in Centuriae
latinae II. Cent une figures humanistes de la Renaissance (Genève:
Droz, 2006).
The paper was written in 2000.
I can provide
an informal English translation of the work as a PDF:
write me directly for a copy.
Go
to book description of Syncretism in the West
to