Ancient map suggests Chinese seamen were first round the world

[Quixote1818]

THE brave seamen whose great voyages of exploration opened up the world are iconic figures in European history. Columbus found the New World in 1492; Dias discovered the Cape of Good Hope in 1488; and Magellan set off to circumnavigate the world in 1519. However, there is one difficulty with this confident assertion of European mastery: it may not be true.

It seems more likely that the world and all its continents were discovered by a Chinese admiral named Zheng He, whose fleets roamed the oceans between 1405 and 1435. His exploits, which are well documented in Chinese historical records, were written about in a book which appeared in China around 1418 called “The Marvellous Visions of the Star Raft”.

Next week, in Beijing and London, fresh and dramatic evidence is to be revealed to bolster Zheng He's case. It is a copy, made in 1763, of a map, dated 1418, which contains notes that substantially match the descriptions in the book. “It will revolutionise our thinking about 15th-century world history,” says Gunnar Thompson, a student of ancient maps and early explorers.

The map (shown above) will be unveiled in Beijing on January 16th and at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich a day later. Six Chinese characters in the upper right-hand corner of the map say this is a “general chart of the integrated world”. In the lower left-hand corner is a note that says the chart was drawn by Mo Yi Tong, imitating a world chart made in 1418 which showed the barbarians paying tribute to the Ming emperor, Zhu Di. The copyist distinguishes what he took from the original from what he added himself.

Continued:

http://www.economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5381851

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

1. That's cool. I still don't know why we teach kids

all that Columbus BS when we know full well Vikings were here long before him anyway.

Now the Chinese?

Okay. I bet the Soviets were here too.

[IChing]

3. What will happen to Columbus Day for the Love of God !!!

Never-mind the native american's who Discovered it ten or more thousands of years ago.
:evilgrin:

[nickinSTL]

56. Modern Heathens

(those that honor the Norse (or Viking) gods, already celebrate "Columbus Day" as Leif Ericsson and Freydis Ericsdottir Day, in honor of those Europeans who REALLY "discovered" the continent.

(I say "discovered" as, obviously, the Native Americans were already here)

[JHB]

33. Because after Columbus contact was sustained.

Yes, the Vikings got to North America, but their settlements were small, and abandoned or died out in the Little Ice Age. Which makes it a curiosity, but it had no lasting impact. The same with this alleged Chinese voyage, and others postulated by Phonecians, Romans, Africans, etc. -- at best they were one-shot stunts or accidents (if they happened at all).

What was different about Columbus' voyage in 1492? It initiated constant conatct and exchange (for good and ill).

[KurtNYC]

37. Sustained contact ?!

Gene mapping is going to prove that the native peoples of Oaxaca and Peru are chinese descendants. China had been to the Western hemisphere repeatedly prior to the 1408-1435 period.
- China moved their capital city to Bejing PRIOR to Sheng He's journeys because of where it is on the globe. It sits exactly opposite the Falkland Islands.
- Prior to Columbus, there were only 2 places on earth where pottery was made with 3 legs: China and Oaxaca. Same for laquerware.
- Many words in the language of natives of Central America are the same as Chinese words.
- the Chinese had a zoo prior to 1400AD with giraffes and other non-Asian animals which means that they not only had contact with other continents but had the ability to transport large living cargo back to China.

There probably WAS sustained contact until the Confusians rose to power following the Ming dynasty.

More:
http://www.1421.tv/pages/evidence/index.asp

[Silverhair]

49. After which time the contact ceased, so it was NOT sustained.

Contact since Columbus is STILL going on, and will not cease now as the entire world has accurate maps.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

53. I vote to cut off contact

LOL.

[malaise]

69. I have long been interested

in the likelihood of a Chinese connection to our indigenous peoples.
This discovery is fascinating stuff to me and I'd love to see the gene mapping.

Not so long ago, FIFA was forced to admit that football (soccer to you)was not British but Chinese. Since there was overwhelming evidence, FIFA was forced to rewite their history.

http://www.fifa.com/en/history/index/0,1284,103480,00.html?articleid=103480

[SpiralHawk]

2. Gloriosky !

Why the next thing you know they will discover that Turtle Island (North America) was actually inhabited by human beings for the last 30,000 years or so, and that those peoples have a message for everybody: take care of the earth; she feeds you, clothes you, warms you, and gives you air to breathe. Stop abusing her. Appreciate and take care of her. End of sermon.

[Sal Minella]

8. Nice job.

[jpgray]

4. Zheng He (or Cheng Ho, whatever) was a total badass

Why the Chinese gave up on those voyages is a mystery to me--they built solid ships and had total control of their surrounding waters.

[KurtNYC]

42. The Confucians rose to power following a lightning-sparked fire

which burned most of the Forbidden City. The Confucians wanted little to do with the world beyond China. China had nothing to learn from the rest of us and then had little to gain from contact. For example, europeans were still navigating using latitude only and didn't really undertand how or why a magnetic compass worked.

[Silverhair]

55. Everybody navigated using latitude only until the 19th century.

The ability to tell longitude at sea was not available to humanity until the development of very accurate clocks. To be able to tell longitude at sea you have to know the precise time.

Even today, all navigation at sea require precision clocks. Of course nowadays precision clocks are a trivial item.

[the_spectator]

62. He might have been a total badass, but he definitely had no balls -

being a eunuch.

[Warren DeMontague]

5. "Ancient Chinese Seamen, Huh?"

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Borgnine]

22. Oh, you beat me to it!

Nice work nonetheless.

[Quixote1818]

6. Can anyone see if Hawaii is on the map?

If so then James Cook died almost for nothing there.

[roguevalley]

7. The world is a much more complex place than we know. Explain

Roman amphora found in Brazil. :-D

[IChing]

9. Cocaine traces found in Egyptian mummies

for that matter.

[Joanne98]

32. Cocaine AND nicotine. Those plants are only found in the

Americas. Egyptians had to have an ancient trade route. This explains the Mexico pyramids

[Solon]

47. About the Pyramids...

While I certainly think it is possible that the Egyptians and New World Kingdoms could have had contact, that actually DOESN'T explain the Pyramids of either Mexico or Egypt. The reason is this, if you wanted to build a large stone building easily, that will LAST, the best type of structure is a pyramid. Pyramids are stable, when they have a good foundation, as is demonstrated, they can last thousands of years, even after raids and wars. Plus, the argument that one influenced the other would only make sense if they served the same purpose, they didn't, Egyptian Pyramids served as protection of the Pharaoh's possessions and a way point to the after-life. Mayan Pyramids served as temples to appease the Gods they took LIFE from, and so gave them life in return, human sacrifice. Not to mention the differences in structure, look at the example of Nubian Pyramids, that, while they have differences from Egyptian Pyramids, they served the purpose of memorial for the Nubian Pharaohs, even if those Pharaohs weren't buried within them. This is a very base same purpose as the Egyptians had, for to be forgotten was to be dead in the afterlife.

[IChing]

58. Why not Atlantis? Who knows

The word for the Atlantic is very ancient and similar in many different languages and continents.

History is an empty page written by the the ones that live in the nexus of generations.

[JohnLocke]

15. Link?

I've never heard about that.

[IChing]

16. links here from academic articles

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=8548128&dopt=Abstract


http://www.faculty.ucr.edu/~legneref/ethnic/mummy.htm
http://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?pid=S0717-73562001000200015&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en

[salib]

10. B.S.

If we are to base anything significant on this map, then the map says it all. Isn't it amazing that Europe, especially Western Europe and the Med are MUCH MORE ACCURATELY defined than the coast of China, Japan, etc.?

Amazing too, how they obviously found the northern ice-breaker routes around North America and Siberia/Scandinavia. Also, what about Antarctica, again in better detail than India.

Rubbish.

[OxQQme]

11. Here's a couple more

These appear to be older by milleniums.

[newswolf56]

12. I don't doubt Zheng He circumnavigated the globe, but he wasn't...

the first -- not even close. Obvious question: where did he get his navigation charts?

At the very least he probably had some of the originals from which the the Piri Reis map was made -- charts so old they show land in the Antarctica that has been under ice for thousands of years. My best guess -- based on knowledge of obscure (but very real) archaeological evidence in North America -- is the Minoans (apprx. 1400-2400 BCE) were probably the first "modern" folk here (and were probably the founders of the ancient copper-mine complexes on Isle Royal in Lake Superior and at Copper Hill, Tenn.). There's also evidence a number of maritime peoples were here after the Minoans -- and well before the Norse: Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Celts, even Roman naval vessels blown astray in a story. At the time of the Roman Empire, the Chinese had the largest ships in the world, eight-masted ocean-going junks, and there is a Taoist monk's story of walking the West Coast -- if I remember right, from what is now California to what is now British Columbia -- in something like 700 AD. There is also scattered epigraphic evidence that at least one Chinese exploration party got as far east as the Appalachians, just as there is more conclusive evidence in the form of Oghams and standing stones the ancestors of the Celts reached the Pacific Coast. Interestingly, Aboriginal traditions say many of these earlier visitors settled, especially in Appalachia, where legend calls them "the Old People." They were said to be kindly and wise; a Cherokee tale (since suppressed in the name of political correctness) attributes them with teaching the Cherokee their 13-month plant-and-tree calendar, which was nearly identical to the ancient tree-calendar of the proto-Celtic peoples. Thus Aboriginal peoples all over North America were taken totally by surprise by the genocidal intent of our own Christian ancestors.

Indeed, based on the evidence of both folklore and archaeology, the pre-Christian contacts were mostly peaceful trading and exploration ventures, with cultural respect demonstrated by all parties. Particularly conclusive evidence in the form of undeniably related (and therefore shared) flint-knapping techniques comes from the similarities between the Clovis culture of North America and the Solutrian culture of Europe, which suggest oceanic migrations, perhaps in both directions, some 20,000 years ago.

Proven over-seas contacts between the continents are thus far more ancient than patriarchially arrogant, ethnocentricly vicious Modern Man is willing to admit -- a reluctance some feminists claim (no doubt with absolute accuracy) results from the fact most of these early seafarers and explorers were peoples of the Great Goddess: the ultimate enemy of patriarchy and Abrahamic religion, the deity whose resurrection is more fearful to the present-day ruling class even than "godless Communism" and its Red Army. Hence the methodical suppression of all such evidence -- especially if it suggests genuine inter-cultural achievement without conquest and/or exploitation -- even when the evidence has been repeatedly confirmed by the best scientific techniques available.

[muriel_volestrangler]

17. The Piri Reis map is not very accurate about Antarctica

And has nothing to do with anyone who circumnavigated the globe - it shows Antarctica joined to South America, which would cause a few problems for anyone trying to go round the world. It shows the north-eastern coast of South America very well, and Europe and Africa - all of which is perfectly possible for a map of 1513. North America and the Caribbean are shown extremely poorly - they look like a guess based on "there are lots of islands there", while the south of South America and Antarctica are complete guesses, with no resemblance to reality at all.

http://www.uwgb.edu/dutchs/PSEUDOSC/PiriRies.HTM

[newswolf56]

21. Thank you! I have never been a von Danikenoid, but don't doubt...

the archaeological evidence of ancient inter-continental voyages (much of which I have seen myself, a small portion of which I actually discovered) and the supportive folk tales, both among the oral literature of that part of Aboriginal America called the Eastern Woodland Culture and far more obscure but equally suggestive material among the coastal tribes of the Pacific Northwest.

Even so I am delighted by the debunking of the Piri Reis map -- especially since NO written account I have ever seen of it showed a copy large enough or clear enough to facilitate even the most rudimentary comparisons with other maps (and I am quite accustomed to working with both topographical maps and nautical navigation charts). So of course I had to rely on the accompanying text -- inaccurate though its claims may have been (and probably were).

Not that such debunking in any way weakens my hypothesis: megalithic evidence is pretty hard to argue with, though the fact it occurs globally raises a second possibility that the raising of stones is yet another of proof of the sort assembled by Gimbutas et al of a formerly world-wide Old Religion that -- exactly like Abrahamic religion today -- retained specific liturgical elements regardless of culture or locale. In other words, the whole cultural diffusion theory may be at best misleading in that what we are looking at in North America for example may be proof of an indigenous culture of hitherto unimaginable achievement. Nevertheless it is essential to keep an open mind: Oghams inscribed on the cliffs of Vancouver Island and on rocks at the edges of the Sierra Madre surely tell of cross-cultural contact as well.

The one notion I reject out of hand is the von Danikenoid delusion: the notion that Homo Sapiens Sapiens (especially our Cro-Magnon ancestors, with brains larger than our own) had to get help from beyond to be able to say, as Taliesin did, "I know the star knowledge from before the worlds were born" or Amergin a thousand years earlier: "who but I foretell the ages of the moon?" Alexander Marshack on this subject is especially informative: he traces counting the phases of the moon and tracking the seasons to about 35,000 years ago -- probably now with the revisions of carbon dating to as long ago as 50,000 years.

Thanks again.

[muriel_volestrangler]

26. I agree the archaeological evidence is worth considering

for small contacts between the continents long before Columbus - and the Solutrian hypothesis is fascinating. The last I heard, there was some possible DNA evidence to back that up - though it wasn't definite.

[newswolf56]

31. There are several anomalous corpses -- mostly bones actually -- of...

non-indigenous genotypes, some suggestive of European origin, one suggestive of Japanese (Ainu) origin. This latter is Kennewick Man, found inland on the Columbia River: the bones now (and probably forever) withheld from science by the American Aboriginal version of the classically American religion-versus-science fight, the archaeological site where the bones were found irreparably destroyed on orders from the Clinton Administration in an especially despicable act of Aboriginal vote-seeking. As always, U.S. corporate media is loathe to cover such issues -- at least to cover them adequately -- so knowledge of both the corpses/bones (I believe one of the anomalous bodies was an approximately 8,000-year-old mummy found in a salt mine c. 1975 or so) is extremely difficult to unearth even by those of us who are looking for it. The one passageway through this frustrating information barrier is via academic archaeology, a realm from which my sources are all either retired or have gone on to the great dig in the sky. Nevertheless I believe there are seven anomalous bodies total, though that is merely my impression, not a fact.

Two vital political notes: the Kennewick Man episode is THE reason the Democrats are powerless to resist the creationoids' ongoing efforts to banish science from public education and the drive toward theocracy in general; at Kennewick, the Democrats in the person of the Clinton White House were themselves guilty not only of the banishment of science but of the deliberate, politically and religiously motivated destruction of scientific evidence -- and are thereby so compromised they dare not ever again object when Christians demand the same consideration be given "intelligent design": hence the terrifying unopposed thrust toward American theocracy. But the Aboriginal stance is not merely a matter of theocratic zealotry; what is ultimately at stake are Indian reparations claims, which due to legalized American bigotry have to be based on continued substantiation of a "we-were-here-first-and-forever" premise. It is no coincidence that NAGPRA -- the North American Graves Protection Act -- (which proclaims ALL archaeological evidence on the continent no matter how anomalous or ancient to be of "Native American" origin and is therefore a truly murderous blow to science) was proposed and enacted just at the moment undeniable megalithic and epigraphic evidence was emerging of North America as a genuine cosmopolis of ancient European, North African and Asiatic exploration, trade and -- yes -- even permanent settlement.

To my way of thinking the suppression of knowledge in the name of religion is always evil no matter which religion is doing the suppressing -- recognition of which (and of the fact that nearly all religions are inherently oppressive) is precisely the reason so many Marxist countries ban religion entirely.

[H2O Man]

39. That is a tortured view

of the Native American Burial Protection and Repatriation Act, which has absolutely nothing to do with the issues of religion and science in classrooms.

[newswolf56]

45. Please explain how the methodical suppression of scientific evidence...

"has absolutely nothing to do with the issues...in classrooms." At the very least -- and with all due respect -- it appears you are contradicting yourself.

[H2O Man]

57. I think that

it might be more interesting to hear you give a serious case of how the Burial Protection and Repatriation Act compromises democrats in the sense of your statement: "The Kennewick Man episode is THE reason the Democrats are powerless to resist creationoid's ongoing effect to banish science from public education and the drive toward theocracy in general." I am wishing that Vine Deloria had not passed away before hearing that .... I'm sure we would have had fun coming up with possible court cases where, in an effort to subvert science in public education, Pat Robertson demanded that the grave goods stolen by the ghouls who "excavated" the Slack Farm in Kentucky in 1987 be returned for proper reburial. (See "National Geographic" Vol 175, No 3; March 1989; pages 376-393. Of course, National Geographic is known for attacking science in the classroom.)

Perhaps Pat Robertson & Co. are actually closer in thought process to some of the scientists who continue to "teach" modern myths such as that found in "On Earth (environment/politics/people)," which in a recent issue had the great "Mammoth Mystery" .... in which Guy Robinson "a paleoecologist at Fordham University, is finding evidence that the first humans in North America killed off an array of spectacular mammals." Upon reading Sharon Levy's article, one finds that Guy Robinson is not uncovering any evidence of that at all. He is finding evidence of the general period of time in which this array of mammals apparently died off; however, as anyone familiar with paleo finds in the northeast knows, the clovis points are simply not associated with much other than caribou in this region. Perhaps this Guy should spend more time in the classroom, reading a textbook called "Native American Voices," by Susan Lobo and Steve Talbot: in it, he would find enough of Vine's "Mythical Pleistocene Hit Men" to correct the errors in thought of Carl Sauer,Robert Ardney, and Jared Diamond on this easily-discredited "theory." (Small world, meeting Vine again; bet the Chinese did find the west coast.)

To be honest, however, I will admit -- before being exposed -- that the Burial Protection and Repatriation Act can impact the classroom. In order to explain, I again say, it's a small world .... for I had pulled out some of the early drafts of the legislation that was advocated and written NOT by Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, but by Indian people. I'm actually working on something that involves this topic .... and had copies of the 2-28-90 Report of the Panel for a National Dialogue on Museum/Native American Relations; several letters and memos from the American Indian Law Alliance; and Oren Lyon's 12-12-89 affidavit regarding an estimated .0025 of 1% of the Heye Foundation's "collection." Clearly, the Heye collections' remaining 99.9975% of artifacts will face serious troubles in teaching anyone. (We never should have let those Indians into this country. If they don't LIKE the USA, let them go back to their own country!)

I remember in the early 1990s, getting a phone call about a school in upstate New York. In their Jr. High School's science lab, they had a display, under glass, of the bones from amphibeans, reptiles, Onondaga children, birds, and mammals. For about a week, the school's superintendent refused to speak with me. Being an institution that accepted federal taxes, I let him know we needed to talk about the display that some might call "science."

He was eager to tell me that he had known an Indian in college. I told him I had known a white person in college -- again, small world. The short story is the human remains, taken from the Bates Site, needed to be returned.

Now, over the years, I've heard many, many scientists talk about how terrible the burial protection act was. (The creationist threat is, however, as new as a recently-chipped fluted point.) Some talk about the value to science in grave robbing, or excavating burials, if you will. I do recall Oren answering this in 1991: he noted the Nazis had made fascinating scientific discoveries, but that the world community recognized that, because they violated the human rights of the Jews and others, the science was invalid. And, simply put, it's the same here.

Others said "you can't say who these burials belong to." Oren noted that we can, without question, say who they do not belong to -- they are not the scientists' by any stretch of the imagination.

One of the last reburial projects I worked with Onondaga Chief Paul Waterman involved the Roanoke Site. These were non-Indians who choose to live like Indians. Archaeologists dug their graves, and many ended up in a museum in Ohio. Indians wanted to rebury them. People at the cultural center at the museum asked Paul "why?" His answer was, "I'm not sure that everything can be explained. Some things you either understand, or you just don't. Maybe the goal should be to teach respect for other people, even if you don't fully understand them." I don't think Pat Robertson would agree with that. I wish more archaeologists would.

[H2O Man]

59. Part Two ......

This photo is from the reburial ceremony in Jamesville, NY. It is on the "yard" of a state prison. Those familiar with Onondaga's struggle with NYS over widening I-81, including the stand-off and the events at Attica State that week, might appreciate the irony. Strange to take shoe boxes of human remains from the basement of a museum, and rebury them on the yard of a place keeping living people in boxes. Onondaga recognizes the relationship they have with prisoners.

Note that many of the people here are non-Indian. An educational process, in my opinion. Some of the burials were families, killed by infectious diseases, who were literally buried with the parents holding their children's hands. Is it possible for a "scientist" to respect that? I think so.

[newswolf56]

64. Your implicit suggestion that the Kennewick Man case is related...

to the circumstances pictured above is absurd. To even imply that my opposition to the deliberate destruction and suppression of archaeological evidence in the Kennewick Man case (or in any case like the Kennewick Man case) is equivalent to opposition to reburials and/or rituals of the sort depicted above is deliberately offensive -- the calculated provocation of a spit-in-my-face insult. Especially since -- as often happens -- you in your arrogant malice have no idea who you are spitting on: I went to jail for the cause of Civil Rights (Tennessee 1963), suffered the long-term ruination of a hitherto-infinitely-promising journalism career as a direct result, and am in fact (and very proudly) one-sixteenth Iroquois -- the identity of my specific nation sadly lost forever due to the selfsame sheet-and-pillowcase Caucasian racism with which you so viciously seek to enshroud me.


Edit: word rage (angry typographical error).

[H2O Man]

66. The Kennewick case

was decided, no matter if you agree with it or nor, on the grounds of the Native American Burial Protection and Repatriation Act. I do not think that was intended as an insult to you. You did, however, make a claim that remains unexplained .... regarding democrats and creationism in the classroom. That line still belongs to you. The "racism" (I do not think there is such a thing as "race," but will agree on the word for discussion's sake) belongs to archaeologists. Certainly not all, of course. But too many.

[newswolf56]

74. For those who are interested in the First Amendment implications...

of the Kennewick Man case, here are a number of informative links:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2002346169_kennewick24.html

Here is what professional anthropologists have to say:

http://physanth.org/positions/kennewick.html

What H20 Man is maliciously concealing is the fact that if those who want to suppress the Kennewick Man evidence prevail, Congress will have indeed violated the First Amendment's prohibition against establishing a religion -- which will in turn provide the Christians with a solid foundation for a "me too" demand that would at the very least mandate the teaching of Creationism, which in turn would open the door to imposition of total theocracy. The more astute fundamentalists know this and are watching closely; so therefore are the atheists:

http://atheism.about.com/b/a/099743.htm

And here is the conclusion drawn by the best examination of the issues I could find online:

If Native American origin theories are accepted as a basis for determining the ownership and study of archaeological resources uncovered on public land, a dangerous precedent will have been set. What will stop the government from incorporating other religious beliefs into its policies?

The entire document -- part of a collection of scientific papers -- is available here:

http://www.friendsofpast.org/earliest-americans/battle.html

(Note too the link to the much more detailed Kennewick Man file on the header.)

As to the theocratic tyranny enabled by NAGPRA, I too can attest to that. During most of the 1970s, several colleagues and I -- all volunteers but working with advice from professionals -- surveyed Western Washington and some North Pacific islands for astronomically oriented monumental evidence: megaliths, mountain-top trenches, anomalous mounds etc. Employing significant solar and lunar azimuths from two deep-in-the-Cascade-wilderness megalith sites, we amassed a huge file of data: photographs, maps, site drawings, azimuths of alignments with other terrain features, the azimuthal grid connecting the sites, and of course eight-place UTM grid coordinates of the confirmed sites (many of which were themselves in the remoteness of the back country). All this data was subsequently lost in a fire; in the mid-'90s, working from memory and a single map of site relationships that had coincidentally survived, I decided to try to reconstruct as much of the material as I could, and began contacting those colleagues who were still alive (three had already died). Instantly I began hearing NAGPRA horror stories: under the federal government's interpretation of NAGPRA, it is illegal to even photograph or map even at conjectural sites -- no matter not so much as a single teaspoonful of soil is disturbed -- without the permission of local tribal authorities. Which of course will NEVER be given to anyone who might discover material that could be used to challenge the "we-were-here-forever" foundation of reparations claims. Thus the suppression of a substantial body of evidence: evidence that, ironically, could prove ancient American Aboriginal culture possessed hitherto unrecognized astronomical skill.

Yet another example of how religious fundamentalism (in whatever form) is always and forever the absolute enemy of knowledge.

One of the several lessons to be drawn from H20 Man's attack on me is that despite his liberal guise, the attack itself -- both its form and content -- reveals he is indeed a fundamentalist. Another is that fundamentalism (with all its inherent oppressiveness and malice) comes in many forms: tragically, it is not limited to the Abrahamic religions. Thus, by his opposition to science, and his favoring of religion over science, does H20 Man prove himself to be no different from the Christians who are his ideological kindred -- ironically the same Christians with whom (in the malicious projection that was part of his attempt to assault my credibility) he sought to associate me.

Which leads to a third irony -- this one potentially horrific: that suppression of science by American Aboriginal creationists contributes to victory for ALL religious opponents of science and thus not only to the foundation of American theocracy but (therefore and inevitably) to the ultimate victory of Christianity: the very religion in whose name American Aboriginal peoples have already been nearly exterminated.

Knowing too well the infinitely malignant cunning of Christian fundamentalist intent, I have not a scintilla of doubt this is the hidden agenda behind the Senate bill (SB 536 Sec. 108) that would forever end all debate about NAGPRA's intent: methodical nullification of the First Amendment -- with Christian theocracy the inevitable result.

[ShadesOfGrey]

81. That was a very interesting read!

Thanks for the links!

"To many, it is unthinkable for Congress to pass a law restricting or prohibiting scientific research because it might prove contradictory to biblical creationists' cherished beliefs about how the world was made and the human species came into existence. Surely, no legislation should demand emptying our museums of all evidence of early peoples' lives because some citizens find offensive research that might contradict their worldview."

I agree! Too much of our history is lost to us because of religion.

[newswolf56]

63. Your hatefulness is truly breathtaking:

Not only do you try to assassinate my character by associating me with (let's see): the Christofascists (paragraphs 1,2, 3 and 8); the Nazis (paragraph 6); grave robbers (paragraphs 1,3,4 and 8); and of course American racism in general (paragraph 5) -- you also maliciously seek to twist my words into something utterly different from what I said.

Given your clearly practiced skill at demagoguery, I have no doubt it was deliberate dishonesty that prompted you to falsely accuse me of claiming "the Burial Protection and Repatriation Act compromises democrats" (sic); even allowing for the probability you meant NAGPRA, I said nothing of the kind. Instead what I did was report reality: that the Clinton Administration's politically motivated suppression of the Kennewick Man evidence -- and its far more damning wanton destruction of the site from which the bones were recovered -- has perpetually compromised the Democrats as allies of Constitutional liberty in America's impending religious war: the persecution of scientists and the suppression of science for religious purposes is identical regardless of who is doing it, or the name of the religion in which it is done. Obviously -- and I submit your stance is brazen hypocrisy -- you believe one group has the right to oppress while others do not; I agree with our Constitution that NO group or individual has such a right, and I believe I made that point very clearly.

Indeed if your standards were universally applied, there would be no archaeology at all: the modern-day occupants of Italy would be able to halt forever the excavations at Pompeii and Herculanium, the present-day Turks would be able to prevent all further excavation at the site of Troy, and -- worst of all -- the Christians would be able to put an end to paleontology itself, claiming that to disturb the fossilized bones of a dinosaur is to disturb a grave dug "by God Himself."

Nevertheless were your response not so deliberately insulting, it might have been interesting to discuss the difference -- which apparently you do not recognize -- between the wanton pot-hunter looting of American Aboriginal burial sites and village locales (which was emphatically opposed by every archaeologist I ever knew) and the meticulous cataloguing of evidence characteristic of scientific inquiry. The former is merely another manifestation of the bottomless greed at the heart of capitalism; the latter is vital to our understanding of the world -- yet NAGPRA prohibits both. Indeed even the site-surveying I was doing with a colleague in the late 1970s -- using the relationships between major landmarks and significant astronomical azimuths to locate (and find) sites of archaeo-astronomical interest -- is now prohibited by NAGPRA unless it is conducted under the supervision (and absolute censorship) of local tribal authorities. By seeking to end pot-hunting and ghoulishness, NAGPRA has in fact sounded the death knell of an entire scientific discipline. But not even NAGPRA sanctioned the Clinton Administration's destruction of the Kennewick Man site -- that was more like some library-burning outrage typical of Christianity.

It might also have been interesting to discuss with you the poetic evidence of underlying similarities between the Taoist and Zen notions of Tao and Suchness and the American Aboriginal concept of Great Holy Mystery (yes, that concept -- the one so savagely, deliberately and belittlingly mistranslated by Christians into "Great Spirit"). In ancient and traditional poetry there are even suggestions of a kindred vision (methodically destroyed by Christianity and now therefore lost forever) at the core of European paganism.

Before this exchange -- though I will admit I never had much respect for your writing ability -- I did respect you as a thinker. But now I recognize you as just an other oppressor: someone who (exactly like the Christians) has your own self-patented truth and will allow for none other. Thus I'll not debate you further: exchanging words with zealots -- especially insultingly hateful zealots -- is always a waste of time.

[H2O Man]

68. Gosh.

I'm crushed.

[newswolf56]

40. Caught this error too late to edit:

Third sentence in first paragraph should read: As always, U.S. corporate media is loathe to cover such issues -- at least to cover them adequately -- so knowledge of both the corpses/bones and the sites themselves (I believe one of the anomalous bodies was an approximately 8,000-year-old mummy found in a salt mine c. 1975 or so) is extremely difficult to unearth even by those of us who are looking for it.

(Dropped text in boldface: what I get for trying to write coherently while my brain is still in NumbLock -- that is, before it is suitably re-animated by the day's first cup of coffee.)

[newswolf56]

46. Another error too:

The proper name of NAGPRA is "North American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act." (Usually even half awake I'm not that sloppy, but I was up working on a project until nearly 6:30 a.m.; my apologies to readers who were perplexed by my sleepy sentence structure.)

[applegrove]

13. Cool. But I think if we had the maps of the very first travelers. They

didn't have maps. Though they didn't circumnavigate until around this time.

But lots of one ocean voyages. Back & forth across the Pacific or Atlantic.

[Ediacara]

14. I don't buy this story

This map has the "Island of California." This was a purely Spanish mistake as they didn't want to sail all the way north in the Gulf of California or all the way south in Puget Sound. They simply assumed that Baja California to the Olympic Penninsula was a very big island. Had the Chinese really explored the west coast, they'd have gone far enough south to see that Puget Sound ended rather abruptly.

I think this is probably an 18th century map falsely claiming it was copied from something made in the 15th century.

[H2O Man]

24. Good call.

I'm interested in the "local history" in the isolated area of rural, upstate New York where I live. For many years, I've worked with other area historians on mapping some of the old turnpikes/state roads that existed before the Revolutionary War. (We are just west of the Fort Stanwix Treaty Line, and so the records are not exact, to say the least.)

A couple years ago, a friend excitedly reported finding a "true copy" of an old map, dating from 1798. I saw that it had "place names" that were not used until 1820, and which were not used after 1850. Hence, it seemed the map had to have come from that period, and had "copied" an older map (or maps). He remains convinced that it is from 1798, and his selective perception allows him to ignore the obvious evidence that it could not be older than 1820.

Reading maps is an art.

[BurtWorm]

28. I agree with you.

It isn't very plausible that a single ship could have charted Australia AND Pacific North and South America AND Atlantic North and South America AND Europe AND Africa AND Asia in a single year. It's like the composite global map of a cloudless night around the world that so many are fooled into believing is a snapshot of a single moment.

Which isn't to say the Chinese adminral didn't circumnavigate the world. Just that it isn't at all likely he would have used or even seen a map like this one.

[Lexingtonian]

35. same here

Probably early 19th century, actually. The Arctic shoreline of Siberia is a giveaway too. Never mind the shoreline of Antarctica.

I'm willing to buy that Zhuang He's fleet got to the Cape of Good Hope. Maybe, on an outside chance, he saw Tristan da Cunha. But the "evidence" that Chinese fleets got to the Rio de la Plata or San Francisco Bay is scurrilous.

[troubleinwinter]

48. Scientists and historians have debunked the idea that Zheng He

circumnavigated the globe (even by Chinese modern scholars). He did travel extensively, but it is rejected that he ever reached the Americas, but likely reached the east coast of Africa.

The history surrounding him and his journeys is quite interesting, nonetheless.

[matcom]

18. CNN Speculating whether or not the U.S. was discovered by a Chinese Muslim

:rofl:

[T Town Jake]

19. It doesn't matter much to me or any open-minded person...

...who circumnavigated the globe first in human history - truth is never scary.

But that "map" and the assertions made on behalf of it are BULLSHIT.

It's a silly forgery, at best.

[Chomp]

20. Is Columbus still being taught as straight fact???

Oh God.

[ComerPerro]

23. LOL. Chinese seamen. ... I'm feeling immature today

[kitkatrose]

29. Glad I wasn't the only one.

:D

[ComerPerro]

30. You have a dirty mind, you know that?

Do you find it funny, that Chinese seamen could be found spread all over the world long before any other seamen?

[BrotherBuzz]

41. I find it funny because it was an impossibility....

Admiral Zheng He was a eunuch. :shrug:

[NuttyFluffers]

65. depends, a percentage of eunuchs have been known to get erections

also depends on the sort of castration. most likely it was just the testes that were removed, leaving most of the other seminal glands intact (which are deeper recessed in the body cavity -- such removal would be far more life threatening, and, frankly, foolish to perform).

if that was the case, and he was of the percentage that could have an erection, and could be placed in a situation where he can be stimulated to the point of ejaculation, then semen could very much be a possibility. the testes are only there to provide sperm. the other glands along the way provide the various fluids that combines together to make the viscuous mix we call semen.

so, on a strictly scientific level, impossibility = incorrect

but hairsplitting a juvenile joke (which i thoroughly enjoyed!) just makes us both look like big ol' poindexter goobers. :+ come, we celebrate our nerdiness! :toast:

[Dead_Parrot]

38. ...Snigger...

beat me too it. :)

[HereSince1628]

25. I dunno about this map, it seems to show too much.

Look closely at the map. Ignoring the defects in the coastlines of the western hemisphere this map seems to include all the continents...including Antarctica.

It shows relatively detailed outlines of Europe, including the British Isles.

It also appears to show remarable knowledge of North America including the coast of Greenland, what may be a rendition of Hudson Bay, what seems to be the Gulf of St Lawerance, and the Yucatan peninsula, and what might be Baja California and the Gulf of California.

It would literally take many many generations to collect this information
firsthand. It would certainly take more than 30 years, and more than the 15 years from 1405 to 1408 available to Zheng He, since the Chinese parts of the map were drawn by 1418.

Clearly the map is a compilation, it's even called a chart of the _integrated_ world, which suggests put together from pieces. I'm open to the idea that the Chinese were aware of parts of the western coasts of north and south america.
I am not saying the Chinese lacked technology to build ships to do such travel. I just don't think we have convincing evidence that they did.

The critical question seems to be what is on the map that is original to Chinese explorers by 1408, and what was cartographic information that would have been available to a map maker in 1763?

[Silverhair]

27. Sorry, it is a map made by Europeans.

If the Chinese had done the exploration by 1418, then the greatest accuracy would be in the Western Pacific, then on the rest of the Pacific basin, and finally, the worst accuracy on the lands furtherest away - Europe. But this map has the greatest accuracy in Europe, and worst in the Pacific.

Further, that much exploration takes many voyages, not just one or a few, and given the technology of the time, would take a century or two. Any civilization that would make that kind of committment to sea exploration would also leave colonies.

Sorry, the map is a fraud.

[KurtNYC]

43. Just a couple of facts

The Chinese had magnetic compasses at least as early as 240BC and possibly 1000 years prior to that. Once they developed accurate ways to determine longitude there is no reason why their maps should be more accurate on one part of the globe than they are on another. That said, the map in the OP does not appear to be a map for navigation but rather a big picture diagram of the continents.

Given CHINESE technology and the largest fleet of ships yet built, Zheng He could have mapped the globe within 2 to 3 years. And finally, genetics will determine whose colonies were left behind. There were >60 million people in the Western Hemisphere when Columbus arrived (he had a map btw).

http://www.oceansonline.com/zheng.htm

[Solon]

44. Too true...

The Phonecians had the technology for a trans-Atlantic voyage back in the time of the Ancient Greeks, the Chinese, certainly, had the technology to weather a trans-Pacific voyage back as early as at least 500 AD. Only two things stopped such voyages, politics and economics. If a region is unstable, or hostile forces surround you, you aren't going to look for new frontiers, but try to protect those closest to home. Also, the incentive for exploring new lands, new trade and new resources, only makes sense when you have an economy growing REALLY fast and a population to match.

[Silverhair]

67. It was 19th century before anybody could accurately determine longitude...

...at sea. Even today, to determine longitude at sea REQUIRES precision timekeeping. That was not available to anybody until the 19th century.

[muriel_volestrangler]

72. 18th Century: Harrison's chronometer tested in 1762

http://www.nvo.com/tradejamaica/longitude1/

[KurtNYC]

73. They used eclipses and other events

which allowed them to synchronize time.

As for today, I'm pretty sure they use GPS.

[Quixote1818]

60. Like half the people posting here it's clear you didn't read the article

The map shown is a copy and contains notes on what was taken from the earlier map.

[Redstone]

34. I have serious doubts.

1) It's a "copy" of a map from 1418? How do we know how many things were changed from the original when the "copy" was made?

2) How would they have known about Antarctica? I know those Chinese seagoing junks were impressive ships (yes, I've read about the old Chinese fleets), but I don't think they'd have survived the Roaring Forties.

3) Of all the rivers they charted, they missed the Amazon?

I belive that there is a damn good chance that the Chinese fleet(s) visited the Western coasts of North and South America, and everyone knows that they spent a good deal of time around Western Africa. Beyond that, the evidence isn't too compelling.

Redstone

[Silverhair]

50. Don't you mean Eastern Africa? NT

[Redstone]

52. Duh. Thank you for the correction. I did indeed mean Eastern.

(And I'm not being sarcastic; I do appreciate corrections when I have temporary brainburn like that.)

Redstone

[AngryAmish]

36. I read somewhere

if this is a true reproduction that the western shore of Africa and Europe could have been made from maps provided by the Portugese.

[LisaL]

51. Then again, this map is probably fake.

[Quixote1818]

54. Read the last pharagraph posted above

The map (shown above) will be unveiled in Beijing on January 16th and at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich a day later. Six Chinese characters in the upper right-hand corner of the map say this is a “general chart of the integrated world”. In the lower left-hand corner is a note that says the chart was drawn by Mo Yi Tong, imitating a world chart made in 1418 which showed the barbarians paying tribute to the Ming emperor, Zhu Di. The copyist distinguishes what he took from the original from what he added himself.

[LisaL]

61. LOL. It might have been made only 20 years ago.

"Beijing. January 17. INTERFAX-CHINA - It was announced a map bought for only USD 500 proves legendary Chinese explorer Zheng He discovered the Americas 75 years before Columbus. But the map was likely made in the last 20 years, a Chinese historian told Interfax.

"The map is a fake and was made in the last 20 years," Mao Peiqi, a history professor at Renmin University told Interfax.

Mao has seen a copy of the map and found clear errors which show the map maker didn't understand 18th century China, the time when the map was allegedly made."


http://www.interfax.cn/showfeature.asp?aid=9286&slug=ZHENG%20HE%20CHINA%20DISCOVER%20AMERICA

[Spurt]

70. Radio carbon-dating

http://stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3543104a11,00.html

[Leopolds Ghost]

71. We know of an ancient radiation/ that floods dismembered constellations...

An old man sits collecting maps in a room all filled with Chinese lamps/
He saves what others throw away! He knows that he'll be rich someday!

[newswolf56]

75. For those who are truly interested in the First Amendment implications...

of the Kennewick Man case (related to the main topic because it is about the methodical, theocratically motivated suppression of conclusive evidence American Aboriginals were not the sole prehistoric occupants of North America), please see my #74 above.

[omega minimo]

76. To be brutally frank

the depth and comprehensiveness of the experience and concepts described so syllabllistically somewhat rather challenging and anyway not needful of reading between the lines unless the viewer had assumptions to jump to conclusions that the comments were automatically offensive where they were not although small minds or even big ones with attiudes calibrated not to consider openly, honestly the snapping clarity of your posts and lacking sense of humor or sense might unfortunately fall back on snarkitude missing the larger points and the opportunity to expand the discussion of fascinating ideas.

:shrug:

[SPKrazy]

77. Vikings may have made it to Heavener, Oklahoma

http://www.touroklahoma.com/detail.asp?id=1+5U+5325

Heavener Runestone State Park

The question is "who made the runestones"

Some theorize it was Vikings who made it to the mouth of the Mississippi, up the Arkansas, then up the Poteau rivers to Heavener.

No one knows where or when the Runestones came from.

78. Europeans in North America

If this is such a big problem, the repression of science in studying the migrations of peoples across the continents and at what times this occurred, linking this to current controversy such as Creationism in the classroom, then why isn't it more on the front page

and also, can't DNA now provide evidence as to true genetic links between peoples?

It seems to me that people link their egos to their intellect too much. Emotions are part of our make-up, and actually fuel our greatest aspirations.

[newswolf56]

80. Because in the Hotel California of corporate mass media, they are...

"Programmed to Receive" -- which means unless they receive orders to cover something, they don't: one of the many reasons why -- though we can check out any time we like from media thralldom -- too many of us "can never leave."

[sweetheart]

79. semen were first in to the uterus

And then so much irony.