Two Worlds or One?

Presentation prepared by: Dr. Raymond Pierotti

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Discussion Questions

• 1. What does it mean to think Temporally as opposed to Spatially as Deloria lays it out in his Chapter, Thinking in Time and Space? from his book, God is Red

  2. What does it mean to be an immigrant? Can an Indigenous population be thought of as immigrants? Do you think it is a coincidence that the three nations that use this argument the most are Australia, Canada, and the United States?

  3. Why is the idea of moving across the Bering Strait into North America problematical for Indigenous peoples? What does this suggest about the creation stories of Indigenous Americans?

  4.  What is Pleistocene Overkill? Why is it controversial in terms on the cultural traditions of Indigenous peoples?

  5. What do Grayson and Meltzer mean when they state that:

     • “Martin's recent writings suggest to us that he is no longer trying to approach this issue within a scientific framework. As we have noted, he explicitly maintains that the North American overkill position does not require supporting evidence. He is unconcerned that archaeologists "wash their hands" of his ideas. He criticizes the search for pre-Clovis sites in the New World as "something less than serious science, akin to the ever popular search for 'Big Foot' or the 'Loch Ness Monster." As one of us has observed elsewhere, Martin's position has become a faith-based policy statement rather than a scientific statement about the past, an overkill credo rather than an overkill hypothesis." (Grayson and Meltzer 2003, 591). 

  6. What is the difference between a faith-based policy and a working and testable hypothesis or scientific statement?