Recent Comments
Re: “Unraveling the continuing mystique of the Dead Sea Scrolls”
The author of the above comment (XKV8R) appears to be wikipedia user Israel XKV8R (see link below, bottom of this comment), whose hypothetical 3-D reconstruction of Qumran (produced under the supervision of Dr. William Schiedewind) is reviewed by U of Chicago historian Norman Golb at this link: http://oi.uchicago.edu/pdf/san_diego_virtual_reality_2007.pdf
Instead of accusing people of engaging in a "smear campaign," perhaps XKV8R should attempt to respond to Dr. Golb's criticisms? After all, the 3-D film was show to thousands upon thousands of decent, ordinary people at the San Diego exhibit, shouldn't the record be set straight on whether they were given accurate information?
Perhaps XKV8R might also care to explain what he meant by his marginal statement in the 3-D film script, There is a third reason, but I never write it down. See Golb's article, p. 7. Is it normal practice for graduate students at UCLA not to write down special reasons they have for certain editorial choices? Does that count as scholarship, or is it more in the nature of seedy academic politics?
For further discussion of the Cargill/Schiedewind "Virtual Qumran" film, see Charles Gadda's article at http://www.nowpublic.com/culture/3-d-film-dogged-unwritten-story-misleading-claims
Gadda concludes that Schniedewind and Cargill (1) failed to correct mendacious statements disseminated by their university about the originality of their work; (2) hid the existence of previous 3-D reconstruction efforts produced by other scholars in Germany and Israel; (3) characterized their interpretive enterprise with misleading assertions like "the solution jumps out at you"; (4) hid a secret "third reason," and (5) subjected the public to a series of demonstrably false and misleading assertions in an effort to shore up a disputed theory, all of this with the assistance of $100,000 received from a prestigious charitable foundation.
XKV8R describes Mr. Gadda's critique as a "smear," but in the absence of a reasoned response on his or Schniedewind's part to any of Gadda's carefully researched points, what appears to have happened here is that a cheap and deceptive academic enterprise has been exposed, and the authors of the enterprise have chosen to remain silent rather than defend their actions.
See XKV8R's wikipedia user page at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:IsraelXKV8R
Re: “Unraveling the continuing mystique of the Dead Sea Scrolls”
P.s. by the "above" comment, I was of course referring to the one before John D.'s. John D. rightly sees through the hypocrisy of XKV8R's statement about a presumed "anonymous alias."