From pasttime2000@hotmail.com Mon Jul 16 09:06:43 2001
From: “Jerome Sigler” <pasttime2000@hotmail.com>
To: brownh@hartford-hwp.com
Subject: Fwd: The Steppe, as you see it—huh??
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 01:15:01 -0000

On diffusionism

Extracts from a long dialog in 2001

What follows are extracts from a long dialog between Haines Brown and Jerome Sigler taking place in July-November 2001, which was concerned with diffusion theory.


From: “Jerome Sigler” <pasttime2000@hotmail.com
To: BROWN@CCSUA.CTSTATEU.edu
Subject: Fwd: The Steppe, as you see it—huh??
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 01:13:14 -0000

Dear Prof. Brown,

I just now ran across your piece having to do with the Hsiung-nu, Tocharians, diffusionism, and the like. You've had your fun with those topics; my turn now. I won't be able to do it justice, or your ideas, in such a brief letter. But writing it will make me feel a hell of a lot better. Here goes.

First off, Diffusionism. When I was about 30 years younger, I learned from a crusty old German professor that Diffusionism wan't just a cast-away victim of the “New Archaeology” though it was that as well. It was also a perfectly good, workable theory for use in archaeology, now hoisted overboard in the unseemly haste dump history, all to make room for other disciplines some were anxiously waiting to bring onto the good ship ARCHAEOLOGY. The history of archaeology (pun not intended) during the 60s was largely a record of their inclusion; no sense going into all that.

But why dump history?? And migration?? or, for that matter, diffusion??

They all inter-relate. Perfectly good working theories, all of them, or they WERE until some wag (Binford, perhaps??) became determined that archaeology was to become a SCIENCE. And, these research stratgegies, why—they aren't scientific! Out they go!! And, yes, bye the bye; don't-take-my-word-for-it; check-it-out-yourself; there is BOTH the movement of bodies, the movement of genes; cf. the Folk-Wandering Period in late ancient-early Medieval history; whole peoples wandered off from their ancestral homelands to new ones, remade a continent, and today we call it “Europe”—AND, yes; that same German professor also mentioned the “Wave-of-Advance”, though I think he might have called it “stimulus diffusion”, or something quite like it. People do migrate. America, Australia, early human “Out of Africa” movements, anyone??

And now, some 25 years (and whole generation) after the New Archaeology saw the light of day and the New Archaeologists got “religion𔃉, we see what kind of “science” the archaeology of today has become—why, just look at it!! Post-Processualism!! One silly, half-baked (but somewhat true; notice I said SOMEWHAT!!) trend replaces another. So much for science. One might even want to call it the revenge of history. But in some respects, even the New Archaeology had it better. But I digress.

You seem to be bucking a rather large trend here yourself, since the good ship ARCHAEOLOGY has now returned to port and sailed away once again, since Prof. David Anthony and others are striving to re-fill the bathwater, retrieve the baby, and get things moving again on the “What REALLY happened in History” front. Isn't that what archaeology/prehistory are supposed to be doing?? Telling about things “the way they REALLY were”, and not filling the pages of journals with other “trends” that won't survive until the end of the decade?? Whatever happened to Ethnoarchaeolgy?? Nobody writes about THAT any more.

This letter is tooooo long already, and so I will close with the hope that, if you are by now shaking your head madly from left to right and right to left, you will at least read Andrew Sherratt's ANTIQUITY article of 1997:71:271–287, if you have not already done so, and carefully note as well as his rather understated plea for a reconsideration of the use of diffusionism. Read the article and tell me if your rather under-rated estimation of its explanatory power still has any value.

Yours sincerely,
Jerome Sigler


From brownh@hartford-hwp.com Mon Jul 16 13:33:07 2001
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 13:33:02 -0400
To: pasttime2000@hotmail.com

Jerome,

. . .

I've no recollection of my diffusionism piece to which you refer, and no idea where on line it might be. Also, rather than develop a critique of my critique, you point me to sources to which I no longer have ready access.

Nevertheless, my ignorance won't stop me from making a comment or two ;-)

I've thought quite a bit about models of action in history, and at this point tend to rely heavily on thermodynamics. The Second Law makes clear that for constructive action to take place, there must be a dissipating environment (a thermodynamic engine). I won't go into that here (you will be happy to know), but another implication is that what “emerges” (the result of constructive action) must be constrained by some empirical structure (i.e., empirical data).

Now, by diffusion we mean the diffusion of such empirical structures that enter an actor's environment. However, from a thermodynamic viewpoint, this structure does not cause the action, but is merely a condition for it that defines the probability distribution of its possible outcomes. . .

Sorry for the abstruse nature of these comments, but they were only meant to be hints. I know for certain Sherratt would find them irrelevant, for I don't recall that he was much interested in action models. A more empirically-based critique of diffusionism, I think, is Mokyr's Lever of Riches.

. . .

Haines Brown


From: “Jerome Sigler” <pasttime2000@hotmail.com>
To: brownh@hartford-hwp.com
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 20:13:40 -0000

Dear Haines,

. . .

Take, for example, your paragraph where you launch your ideas, beginning with “I've thought quite a bit about models of action in history...” Here I assume you have retained a copy of your letter. Try as I will, I cannot understand the legerdemain by which you bring thermodynamics into the discussion—except—that here you make the A PRIORI assumption (one you neither demonstrate nor attempt to prove) that human action and human conduct and human affairs are subject to it, in any way?? Your proof for this?? I reject out of hand the notion that this is in someway a “commonplace” in our modern, scientific, up-to-date-we're-with-it world.

. . .

It would take me far too long to develop this argument here, but, essentially, it is based on the fact that humans are CONSCIOUS beings (= self-reflective) and since they have MINDS which are essentially un-physical, (yes, I do mean spiritual), their actions cannot be subsumed under any kind of MECHANISTIC argument such as the one you bring to bear on human activity and human action. But, first off, prove your argument. Let's see you do it. I reject your argument categorically and challenge you to defend it. I am an old Aristotelian. First, ya gotta prove it to me. I welcome it. Kindly do so.

Having used this bit of scientism in an attempt to somehow invalidate the idea of diffusion, you gratuitously complicate the record of human action in time (history) by needless reference to “constructive action” and “empirical data.” I'm not Occam, but here is his razor, coming right down on your remarks: Would you care to consider a more behaviouristic, more (pardon the phrase) “down to earth” argument?? What about “Monkey see, monkey do??” Humans are great copiers. I find it a bit ludicrous to think that all throughout history/prehistory humans have NEVER solved their problems by copying others?? Give me a break.........

I also had some problems with your freedom/determinism dichotomy. In my view, what you do here is merely to create a CONFLATION. You have mixed up, or at least attempted to so mix, two utterly irreconcilable, contradictory points of view. But I see the thrust of your argument, despite that. All the same, you are treading on the edge of the problem of the FREEDOM OF THE WILL. Be careful with that one. Therein lies a briar-patch that has ensnared many an interloper. But you are not seriously in danger from its thorns, provided you don't really think that freedom and determinism can operate simultaneously in the same mind, and provided you fully accept the principle of contradiction. I have read your text several times, and what you are saying, unless I get it entirely wrong is, that, after all, humans have free choice. If so, then there is nothing and no one and no force outside of the consciousness of the individual that IMPELS one choice or another. It is, then, a reasoned judgment. As with all reasoned judgments, there are fools and wise people, and—guess what?? Often fools make bad choices. So do wise people, but less often. Is that why they are wise?? In the case of diffusion, I am always reminded of the ethnological film of the Australian explorer with his stainless steel hatchet, and the astonished look on the face of the New Guinean who has today for the first time met— gasp!! whoddathunk it!! WHITE MEN!!—and is astonished to discover that this funny-smelling white guy's hatchet chops better than that rock he had been working on for hours, making sharp!!

Just one note of yet another source, and it will have to be that, since I am determined that this letter shall not look like a term paper. You might want to try to find a rather interesting book, with which I do not, of course agree 100%, but which takes up “determinism,” “freedom of the will,” and such like, without putting the reader to sleep, and which to some extent ( some extent!! ) props up my argument above about consciousness being rather unphysical. It is THE QUANTUM SELF, Danah Zohar and I. N. Marshall, NY: William Morrow, 1990

. . .

The best, Jerome Sigler


Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 22:29:06 -0400
From: <brownh@hartford-hwp.com>
To: pasttime2000@hotmail.com

Your note helpfully provides needed focus, and so let me take as many of your points as I have time for and see if I can manage to address some of your concerns.

But the real focus of my concern is that most historical explanation contains a hidden metaphysics, as you yourself admit. An insistence upon naturalistic explanation helps expose such assumptions to a critical inspection.

> Try as I will, I cannot understand the legerdemain by which you
> bring thermodynamics into the discussion—except—that here you
> make the A PRIORI assumption ( one you neither demonstrate nor
> attempt to prove ) that human action and human conduct and human
> affairs are subject to it, in any way?? Your proof for this??

. . .the entire universe arose from a singularity (the Big Bang is more or less the consensus view). So everything in the universe must represent a specification that arose out of some prior and more universal state. For example, while a biological organism has its own distinctive mode of behavior, it must nevertheless continue to obey the laws of mechanics.

Now why include historiography? As I admitted above, there are approaches to historiography that certainly would not fit. That is why I insist upon naturalism. . .

As for thermodyamics, not only does it insist you can't get something for nothing, but offers a way to approach an explanation of action. For example, a poem is an emergent phenomenon, and therefore unique and rather unpredictable. We think of it as a product of a creative imagination, but is it not actually the result of informed struggle?

. . . In less thermodynamic terms, the poet has to expend an effort; if ideas were active agents, then writing a poem would require no effort at all; like the Owl of Minerva, the poem would automatically emerge at the gathering of dusk. b) The act of creation could not have taken place without constraints. That is, the poet had to learn the language and his craft, and he has a certain vision to articulate. While these constraints shape the outcome, the outcome does not reduce to them as long as the poet expends an effort.

> You make a grand assumption here; that humans are no different in
> kind and in behavior than anything else in the physical realm.
> Quite on the contrary, I take the opposite position. It would take
> me far too long to develop this argument here, but, essentially, it
> is based on the fact that humans are CONSCIOUS beings (
> self-reflective ) and since they have MINDS which are essentially
> un-physical, ( yes, I do mean spiritual ), their actions cannot be
> subsumed under any kind of MECHANISTIC argument such as the one you
> bring to bear on human activity and human action.

It seems to me you have two basic points here. With one I entirely agree, and with the other I entirely disagree.

To be brief, there's no question humans are creative, but what exactly do we mean by saying that? When you have defined a creative act, I suspect you will also have defined thermodyamic emergence. A creative act is a surprise, is a novelty, is unpredictable, is improbable, etc. In human terms, a creative act is not just improbable (nature abounds in emergent processes), but is also purposeful.

. . .

One reason I’m not inclined to accept a supernatural explanation of creative activity is that I'm not sure animals can’t be creative. Not only do animals have a hard-wired creativity (a bird's nest, for example), but we are realizing more and more that animals have some culture and can learn from the example of others. But this, too, is a tough issue.

In sum, I'd like to wield my own Occam's razor and do without the supernatural, because bringing in a spirtual factor seems to contradict naturalistic explanation, and reduces historiography to little more than an amusement or propaganda.

> Having used this bit of scientism in an attempt to somehow
> invalidate the idea of diffusion, you gratuitously complicate the
> record of human action in time ( history ) by needless reference to
> “constructive action” and “empirical data.” I'm not Occam, but here
> is his razor, coming right down on your remarks: Would you care to
> consider a more behaviouristic, more ( pardon the phrase ) “down to
> earth” argument??

> I also had some problems with your freedom/determinism dichotomy.
> In my view, what you do here is merely to create a CONFLATION. You
> have mixed up, or at least attempted to so mix, two utterly
> irreconcilable, contradictory points of view. But I see the thrust
> of your argument, despite that.

The contradiction between freedom and determinism I see as an artifact of western culture (I could put this is more provocative terms, but I'll spare you). I think the alternative is to represent everything as a “process,” rather than as a succession of empirically defined states with an inferred causal relation between them (like the frames of a movie film).

So how does one see things as emergent processes that are both open and yet at the same time probabilistically determined? The answer, I believe, is to see all things as essentially causally connected. That is, causality is not an accident to be investigated after the empirical dimension is defined, but causality is presumed to be essential, even prior to the empirical. Cosmology seems to support such a startling view, incidentally, for matter in the universe is an end product generated ex nihilo (the perfect vacuum).

. . .

> All the same, you are treading on the edge of the problem of the
> FREEDOM OF THE WILL. Be careful with that one. Therein lies a
> briar-patch that has ensnared many an interloper. But you are not
> seriously in danger from its thorns, provided you don’t really think
> that freedom and determinism can operate simultaneously in the same
> mind, and provided you fully accept the principle of contradiction.

Yes, I would agree that freedom and determination are categorical opposites invented by the mind. But I suspect the categories are far from being universal (not sure how I’d go about to prove this, however). More importantly you now understand that I see them as our mind’s feeble attempt to grasp process, which (if emergent) is simultaneously free and constrained (probabilistically determined).

> I have read your text several times, and what you are saying, unless
> I get it entirely wrong is, that, after all, humans have free
> choice. If so, then there is nothing and no one and no force
> outside of the consciousness of the individual that IMPELS one
> choice or another.

I think of free choice as an opportunity to struggle to achieve an unlikely end. But, without recourse to superstition, I don’t see how a mental representation of that end can have motive power. If I have in hand a map of New York city, I can use it to go someplace I like. But the map is an inert object, and likewise a mental representation of that map has virtually no real power to have an effect. To suggest otherwise seems to require a mystical belief that ideas are can be objective and independent agents. I thought that went out with Hegel. As for your second point, I can choose to jump, and with greater effort, jump higher, but I can’t defy gravity.

Well, I ran on much too long. What I didn’t get to was to draw out some of the thermodynamic implications for the historical process, such as the relation of the economy to politics, or more relevantly, for the diffusion of culture.

Haines


A summary of points not discussed

Jerome,

Here are the points I would need to defend:

1. Without elaborating the point, I assume that our historical arguments must be naturalistic, and my appeal to thermodynamics was meant to illustrate that this assumption does not at all denigrate the possibility and importance of human creativity. I don’t think diffusion theory can be meaningfully discussed without such axioms being clearly stated in advance, for diffusion (as historical explanation, anyway) involves assumptions that do not represent a scholarly consensus.

2. A supernatural argument that assumes humans have a mysterious inner creative capacity (a Promethean spirit), impoverishes explanation by evading the actual mechanism of development, it leaves a door wide for the entry of pernicious ideologies, and it represents a parochial avoidance of the intersubjective language so necessary in today’s globalized world.

3. It seems to me perfectly legitimate to employ cultural diffusion to explain empirical change. There is no question that ideas developed by one group of people can diffuse to other peoples and affect their behavior. However, historians go further than this and appeal to cultural diffusion to explain human development, such as the rise of civilization. While many historians are entirely satisfied by a short-range explanation based on immediate causality (causal relations inferred from the proximity of events), some pursue a long-range explanation of development that necessarily goes beyond immediate causality.

4. The same point from a different angle is that while new value can be realized in the sphere of circulation, it cannot be created there. That is, social interaction is necessarily a zero-sum game with respect for development, although that relation can be its pre-condition. In terms of diffusion theory, the novel idea you learned from your neighbors offers you an opportunity to develop, but is not the cause of your development (see the Mokyr book, to which I referred earlier, which provides empirical evidence for this point).

5. Diffusion theory must be looked at more critically than most other theories because historically it has served to promote racism and imperialism. That is, the most notable instances of an appeal to diffusion theory tends to see the cultural stimulus as passing from white Indoeuropeans to backward peoples of color, despite migration (especially if “migration” is defined as an advancing wave of cultural advance rather than as social movement) taking place in quite the opposite direction. That is, in the case of the Eurasian steppe, the prevalent direction of cultural diffusion was toward the West, not toward the East.

Haines Brown