Then I suggest you read the rest of the message I just sent, in which I
explained the answer.
JEFFREY D SOUTHMAYD wrote:
> Don't know what his previous publications about pottery and architecture have to do with this either.
>
>J South
>
>
>
>You are indeed missing the most fundamental point of all: Professor
>Neiman does not engage the DNA evidence. Instead, he engages the
>apparent coincidences between Sally Hemings's conceptions and TJ's
>sporadic presences at Monticello. He professes to have used statistical
>science to prove that the coincidences prove that TJ fathered six
>Hemings children.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>JDS
>
>
>
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Steven T. Corneliussen <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Sent: Fri, 27 Feb 2009 11:53 am
>Subject: Re: A modest proposal re the DNA debate
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > Don't know what any of this research and writing
>
> > has to do with expertise in dna analysis, but perhaps
>
> > I am missing something.
>
>
>You are indeed missing the most fundamental point of all: Professor
>Neiman does not engage the DNA evidence. Instead, he engages the
>apparent coincidences between Sally Hemings's conceptions and TJ's
>sporadic presences at Monticello. He professes to have used statistical
>science to prove that the coincidences prove that TJ fathered six
>Hemings children.
>
>
>The DNA evidence does figure into the Neiman study, but only insofar as
>the nonstatistical threads of the pro-paternity argument are -- or so
>Dr. Neiman says, anyway -- germane in his application of something
>called Bayes's theorem. He applies that to the=2
>0results of the computer
>simulations with which he started his study.
>
>
>In this matter, Dr. Neiman was working as a scientist, precisely in
>order to invoke science's special authority within a humanities debate.
>But his scientific report "Coincidence or Causal Connection? The
>Relationship between Thomas Jefferson’s Visits to Monticello and Sally
>Hemings’s Conceptions” appeared in a leading humanities journal,
>sequestered from the scrutiny of other scientists.
>
>
>Professor Neiman is a distinguished scholar, and statistical science is
>an important tool for him and his colleagues. See for example the
>description from his Web site for the course "Analytical Methods in
>Archaeology" (http://people.virginia.edu/~fn9r/anth588/index.html).
>Excerpt: "This course examines quantitative analytical techniques used
>in archaeology. Topics include, regression, smoothing, correlation,
>measures of diversity and distance, spatial autocorrelation and Mantel
>methods, seriation, ordination, and clustering."
>
>
>So there's no mystery about his qualifications. In his dual roles at
>U.Va. and Monticello, he's obviously superbly qualified. The mystery, in
>my view since 2000 when this all started, is what caused him to become
>so supremely confident that he could actually use statistical science to
>resolve a two-century-old sex mystery for which the evidence is so
>fragmentary anyhow.
>
>
>Steven T. (Steve) Corneliussen
>
>Poquoson, Virginia
>
>
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