[Aztlan] "The Maya had no Wheel...."

[Michael Finley]

This will be my only comment on this topic --- I just want to support 
Craig Berry's  comment, which is bang on. The problem is very  
intriguing and interesting, but for now, not solvable, I fear.

Michael Finley

Craig Berry wrote:

>On Mon, 14 Aug 2006, bertram perkel wrote:
>
>  
>
>>It is a basic tenet of the scientific method that the absence of
>>proof can never support a hypothesis that anything exists or does not
>>exist.
>>    
>>
>
>Absolutely.  But that's what makes the mesoamerican wheel such a puzzle.
>If the wheel were utterly nonexistent in mesoamerica, that would be mildly
>surprising but relatively easily explainable.  If it were in common use as
>a practical tool (as evidenced by artistic depictions, or still better
>actual wheeled artifacts or identifiable debris from such), that would
>certainly be very easy for us to understand.
>
>What makes this case so fascinating is that we have the 'toy' wheeled
>artifacts -- which indisputably demonstrate that the idea of wheels and
>axles was available to at least some mesoamerican cultures -- but no
>evidence of its *ever* being exploited in any other way, despite the clear
>utility of e.g. carts and wheelbarrows in performing many tasks we know
>these people performed.
>
>These cultures included demonstrably brilliant engineers and craftsmen who
>eagerly incorporated countless technological refinements into common
>practice.  So we're left with only two reasonable explanations:
>
>1) Wheels *were* in common use, but left no archaeological traces (that
>   we have found so far, anyway).
>
>2) Wheels were not in common use due to some cultural or technological
>   factor we have not yet discovered.
>
>Either way, it's a fascinating puzzle.
>
>--
>   )   Craig Berry - http://www.cine.net/~cberry/
>  =+=   "It's our differences (of which there are none) that make
>   (   our sameness so exceptional!" - Principal Skinner, "The Simpsons"
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