Pseudoscience, "Rosetta Stone Hoax" and “University of Toronto”.

N.C. Flemming remark that the Pseudoscience corrupt the basis of factual knowledge available to the public, and particularly to students.  It also corrupt and debase the methodology of establishing empirical evidence for past events (in fields such as geology, archaeology, cosmology, or history), and hence the ability of students or the lay reader to distinguish fact from fantasy or invention. It follows that, in order to combat the slow but apparently remorseless growth of pseudoarchaeology, we must understand its appeal. It is impossible to provide the believer with an antidote if we do not comprehend the nature of the belief and the strength of its attraction.

Why I am saying all these?

Because, I read with a big surprise, that the University of Toronto will host (see the picture) two of the greatest promoters of the FYROM pseudoscience. Two Slavmacedonians Engineers Dr. Tentov and Dr. Boshevski promoted...

 their Rosetta Stone Hoax to the Canadian public, on the scope of indulging to the mind of the average Canadian, a sense of false Slavmacedonian pride based on his alleged “ancient roots”. They claim that they have found a connection between the ancient Macedonian language and the modern Slavonic Macedonian language. These two Slavmacedonian university professors are claiming that the "Demotic" script in the well known “Rosetta Stone”, in fact, is a text related to the “old Slavonic Macedonian language” and is Ancient Macedonian. Dr. Boshevski in an interview claimed that they ancient Macedonians fled the Balkans and resettled north as far as Siberia, in order to avoid the Romans and they came in 6^th cent A.D. Here an abstract:

“We cannot accept the notion that the Macedonian-Roman wars "cleansed out" the entire Ancient Macedonian population as much as we cannot accept the notion that the Ancient Macedonians who fled the conflict disappeared altogether. There are well documented historic facts that prove that Ancient Macedonians not only survived the Roman invasion but many who fled north in fact, over time, returned to their ancestral lands in the Balkans.”

[http://www.maknews.com/html/articles/ristova/rosetta_stone_boshevski.html]

We now need to ask what happens if we take on the responsibility of deciding among the various narratives, and demonstrate that some are supported by better evidence than others, and that some are even demonstrably false. Educators who teach contrafactual narratives will appeal to the doctrine of academic freedom, which they will interpret to mean that anyone can say anything. But academic freedom was designed to allow faculty members to express opinions or discuss theories that are controversial. It was not intended to protect individuals like Holocaust deniers who seek to teach what is demonstrably false.

In practice there are established limits to academic freedom. The question is whether the professors’ claims are based on sound research and warranted evidence. In my opinion I do not believe that we should continue to permit the doctrine of academic freedom to serve as a protective smokescreen for the kind of discourse that has no place in a university. It is through the use of evidence that we can separate good scholarship from bad, in any field. The best argument is not the one we like, or the one that is argued most persuasively, but the one that offers the best account of all the available facts. Is disgrace for the University of Toronto, to host the greatest promoters of the FYROM pseudoscience.

More information for the “Rosetta Stone Hoax” that promoting these two Slavmacedonians Professors, in http://ancient-medieval-macedonian-history.blogspot.com/2009/09/rosetta-stone-and-tendov-boshevski.html