Hi, Theodoric.
Theodoric writes:
The main premise behind the theory is the similarity of the Clovis tools to the earlier existing Solutrean tools. This theory seems similar to the theory that the Egyptians must have come to America because there are pyramids in Central America. Theories like this strike me as racial and elitist.
I agree that that Solutrean hypothesis has been pretty much refuted.
I strongly disagree that it has anything to do with racism or elitism.
The paradigm of anthropology, archaeology and paleontology is steeped in evolutionary thought. So, it’s parsimonious to propose that two similar things are related because of their similarities. Nobody proposes an Egypt-Maya connection because they think Native Americans are too stupid to have come up with pyramids and hieroglyphics on their own: they propose it because the alternative is analogous to proposing that the similarities between chimpanzees and baboons are completely incidental.
No scientist particularly likes to call similarities incidental: we generally predict that similarities are meaningful until there is reason to think otherwise. Granted, in this case, I think there is reason to think otherwise, but, given the history of anthropology, archaeology and paleontology, it doesn’t surprise me that there are some scientists who think some obviously incidental similarities are not so obviously incidental.
-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.
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