"She builds a persuasive case with both archaeological and genetic evidence that the path to the Americas was coastal (the Kelp Highway hypothesis) rather than inland, and that Beringia was not a bridge but a homeland — twice the size of Texas — inhabited for millenniums by the ancestors of the First Peoples of the Americas."
"Throughout “Origin,” Raff takes on pseudoscientific nonsense rooted in bigotry and colonial thinking. She eviscerates claims of “lost civilizations” founded on the racist assumption that Indigenous people weren’t sophisticated enough to construct large, animal-shaped or pyramidal mounds and therefore couldn’t have been the first people on the continent. She convincingly disposes of the Solutrean hypothesis of ancient Europeans in the Americas with logic and evidence. "
"Given the fast and furious pace of discovery in this field, Raff is clear that not everyone will agree with her interpretations of the data. “All scientists must hold themselves open to the possibility that we could be wrong, and it may very well be that in five, 10 or 20 years, this book will be as out of date as any other,” she writes. “That possibility is what makes working in this field so rewarding.” That, she explains, is how science is done."
Have you read the book, Richard? Both reviews seem to have Raff in favor of the standstill and kelp highway hypotheses that are the consensus view right now.
Does she add much to the picture or is she just summarizing things?
ETA: I remember long ago, when just a wee bookworm, reading Brian Fagan's The Great Journey. The book told the then-standard Clovis First story but had tacked on as an afterthought a chapter on Pre-Clovis possibilities. It looked as if some editor asked him at the last minute to give a quick review of alternative models.
How the world has changed. . .
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/08/2022 02:03PM by Lot's Wife.