🚀 go-pugleaf

shelmrei@nmsu.edu (Stephen Helmreich) writes:



>John Robert Ross uses it as the Fragestellung of his 1967 Dissertation
>on "Constraints on Variables in Syntax" and notes that "The anecdote
>is told of William James.  I have been unable to find any published
>reference to it, so it may be that I have attributed it to the wrong
>man, or that it is apocryphal."


There are lots of modern references to this type of story around.
For instance, I believe that I saw it in Sherry Turkle's
contribution to Graubard's (1988) The AI Debate (MIT Press).

The story itself, though, is very old.  It probably can be traced
back to the creation myths of native North Americans.  For example,
in the creation myth of the Hurons and the Iroquois, all that exists
is water and the animals that live in and on water, including the
Great Turtle.  When a divine woman falls to the world, she is placed
on the back of the Great Turtle, who sends the other creatures one
by one to dive to the bottom of the sea to find some earth.  When
some is eventually found (in the version of the legend I have, it
is found by Toad) and given to the woman, she places it around the
shell of Great Turtle, and it forms the beginning of dry land.
"On all sides, the land grew larger and larger, until at last it
formed a great country, one where trees and other plants could live
and grow.  All this country was borne on the back of Great Turtle,
and it is yet today.  Great Turtle still bears the earth on his
back" (Clark, 1960).

I found this in Clark, E.E. (1960) Indian legends of Canada. Toronto:
McClelland & Stewart (reprinted as a paperback in 1992).  Clark's
version of the myth was recorded in 1874, north of Lake Erie, by
a 75-year old Huron sub-chief.  When he told the story, he noted that
he had first heard the myth from the elders of his people when he
was a youth.

So, I suspect that the notion of "turtles all the way down" predates
Hawking's book by a long time, though his book can be used as a
citation.  BTW, Turkle's version of the anecdote is presented much
more positively than is Hawking's.
--
Michael R.W. Dawson                       email: mike@psych.ualberta.ca
Biological Computation Project, Department of Psychology
University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB CANADA T6G 2E9
Tel:  +1 403 492 5175   Fax: +1 403 492 1768