Something between curiosity and aggrievement greeted me as I passed the Custom House each day on my way to work. Once you’ve noticed it, it’s hard to “un-see” the Crown of England perched superior to the Harp of Ireland on that grand building’s ornamentation.
But this was Dublin and I am an Athlonian. Dublin is not my city; who am I to question its iconography? Besides, the Custom House dates from 1791 and I am a physicist, not a historian.
Anyway, whinging about our difficult past was not always welcome. My letter in the Irish Times about Sheela-na-Gig sculptures from my native Westmeath being locked away in London met a swift rebuke. “During many centuries of British exploration and conquest” went the reply:
“Let us hope so indeed” went a third letter:
Historians say that myths tell us more about the society who told, recorded or created them than it does about anyone who went before. The Athlone statue and our passports are of our time. Do we wish to adorn them with colonial money-gods of a “privileged nobility” - at a time when the rest of the world is taking theirs down? Or do we prefer more noble concepts our ancestors sought to communicate to us through our myths, our tales, our stories - concepts that more inclusively span our complex identity spectrum? Surely there is room on our iconography for female as well as male? Surely there is room for curiosity, enlightenment and hope, and all that Sinann inspires?
Reference: The paper that triggered the protests in Athlone: A Networks-Science Investigation into the Epic Poems of Ossian, Advances in Complex Systems 19 (2016) 1650008. DOI: 10.1142/S0219525916500089. Freely available at A Networks-Science Investigation into the Epic Poems of Ossian.
But this was Dublin and I am an Athlonian. Dublin is not my city; who am I to question its iconography? Besides, the Custom House dates from 1791 and I am a physicist, not a historian.
Anyway, whinging about our difficult past was not always welcome. My letter in the Irish Times about Sheela-na-Gig sculptures from my native Westmeath being locked away in London met a swift rebuke. “During many centuries of British exploration and conquest” went the reply:
they brought things with them: law, the conventions of civilised conduct and, perhaps most importantly, the language in which Mr Kenna expresses his opinions - let us hope they do not come looking for these things back.
In all the excitement and pride over our prosperous, modern nation, we tend to forget what a thick, filthy, ill-mannered, poverty-stricken, pig-ignorant crowd of bog-trotters we were just a few short centuries ago, before the British Empire took us under its kindly and cultured wing.
The letter-writer’s sarcastic style was as effective as his knowledge of the past: “Brehon Law … appeared to work quite well”, he said – “the brehons (judges) themselves maintained that the system represented the law of nature.”
Physics is not just about laws of nature; “physics is what physicists do late at night” said Nobel-Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman. As atoms, electrons or quarks interact with each other, so too do people or characters in a story – be they now or in the distant past. And that was my conduit into the days of yore – my route back to Ireland after emigrating to Coventry, where late at night I lay thinking about the Brehon laws of old. All I had to do was to take the maths developed for physics and apply it to old stories.
Surrounded by a vibrant team of mathematicians in Coventry, we analysed a medieval Irish text, telling how an army under the leadership of Brian Boru challenged Viking invaders, culminating with the Battle of Clontarf in 1014. Despite centuries of lore, revisionists of late told us that it wasn’t an Irish-versus-Viking conflict at all! It was the Irish at it again – fighting against each other while the more sophisticated Vikings just helped out.
But mathematics combined with the annals told us otherwise. We developed a way to measure war on spectrum between either side of a binary debate. With an Irish-versus-Viking conflict at one end, and civil war at the other, the annals deliver a score a third of the way along ➖ a predominantly Irish-Norse conflict but not wholly so.
Athlone plays an important role in the story of Viking Age – it sits on Ireland’s longest river, the Shannon – a natural defensive line between the eastern and western provinces. It was at Athlone in 1002 that the king of Meath (which included Westmeath), submitted to Brian Boru, an act that opened the way for Brian’s dominion over all of Ireland. And the importance of Athlone to all of Ireland endured. In 1607 the Flight of Earls had marked the end of the old Gaelic Order and a sad story of emigration started. One Irish soldier returned from Spain in 1626 as a Franciscan friar on a mission to rescue Ireland’s ancient manuscripts - to preserve her identity. It was at a meeting in Athlone in 1630 that they started compiling what would become the Annals of the Four Masters - chronicles of our history and mythology.
Athlone’s role in history continued. It was in 1691 that Sergeant Custume and his stalwart band stood fast against Williamite invasion. It was at Athlone that the “unforgettable fire” decommissioned Moydrum Castle during the War of Independence. It was there that Radio Éireann broadcast to the world from the 1930s. Athlone stood alongside capital cities such as Vienna and Helsinki, embraced as it was between them on the old radio dials. It was at Custume Barracks in Athlone that the 26-county government built a nuclear bunker during the Cold War – a new capital they could decamp to should the missiles fly. It is Athlone that would be capital of a federal reunited Ireland under the Éire Nua". ("New Ireland") proposal.
Thus Athlone is not only the physical centre of Ireland; it is central to her mythology, her history, her identity – no matter where on the political spectrum you find yourself. So imagine my consternation when I arrived home in Spring 2019 and saw in the local newspaper how a statue from the Custom House had been selected to represent my town.
Two years ago, Westmeath County Council called for a new sculpture for Athlone. It was to be “uniquely 'of' the town” and address its “heritage, memory and environment.” And “in particular”, it should address the town’s “location in relation to the River Shannon.” To my dismay the Council decided on a replica of Custom-House iconography! It is not a crown but a neo-classical Neptunesque figure - a “river god of the Shannon”, claimed to “hark back to Irish mythology.”
Why is this so very, very wrong? And why should you care?
In 2016 we published further mathematical investigations into the past. In the 1760’s, shortly before John Beresford had the idea to build the Custom House, James Macpherson published what he claimed were translations from Scottish-Gaelic sources of a third-century bard named Ossian. He tried to align his work with the Classics as, during the Imperial Era, British administrators viewed themselves as inheritors of the torch of civilization - passed on from ancient Greece and Rome. Conquest and colonization were justified if a devalued, inferior and even expendable Gaelic culture was replaced by something that emulated the eminence of the Classics. So, positioning the epic poems of Ossian within a classical context would add legitimacy and authority to the new Scottish epic.
Ireland’s antiquarians were aghast! They protested at attempts to misappropriate Ireland’s heroes and identified thinly veiled characters from the Irish epic tradition. Ossian, “an illiterate Bard of an illiterate age” in Macpherson’s work, was Oisín, the warrior-poet of the Fenian Cycle in Irish mythology. Ossian’s father, Fingal, a Scottish king for Macpherson, was Fionn mac Cumhaill, leader of the Fianna. They accused Macpherson of lacking “decency in the illiberal abuse of all ancient and modern writers who endeavored to throw lights upon the ancient state of Ireland.” In our paper, we analysed Ossian in a similar manner to how we had previously analysed the Fenian Cycle and indeed the Viking age. Again, the mathematics gave a clear answer ➖ “quantifiable structural affinities with the Irish texts and a dissonance from the Classics.”
In Irish mythology the personification of the Shannon is Sinann. She is a woman – not a hairy man. She is the granddaughter of Lir (of the “Children of Lir” fame) and her story is as beautiful as it is inspiring. As Athlonian, Celtic scholar and linguist Maud Joynt wrote in 1912: “To the Boyne as well as the Shannon among Irish rivers was attributed the gift of inspiration.”
Whatever about Macpherson’s inspiration, we certainly know what inspired Beresford. He was the first commissioner of revenue for Ireland and his world was one of “privileged nobility”. Beneath it lay “the impoverished underclass struggling for basic civil rights” who “should be kept down by a policy of unyielding repression.” Of the 14 “river heads” on the Custom House only the Liffey is female – a “quite conceivable eighteenth-century misunderstanding of Anna Liffey” as personification of Abhainn na Life. The river heads represent commerce and profit – hence their appearance on reverse of old bank notes. They have nothing to do with Irish mythology. The prime position of the Custom House is still held by a crown perched superior to the harp which is surrounded by the lion and unicorn. Just in case anyone is in doubt as to what they celebrate, the hairy-faced neo-classical river head concocted to represent the Boyne has the inscription “1690”.
Athlone’s unfortunate sculpture is therefore neither “uniquely 'of' the town” nor does it address its “heritage, memory and environment.” Its claim to “hark back to Irish mythology” in relation to the Shannon represents ignorance at best - or triumphalist colonial misappropriation of identity and gender in a town devoid of secular female iconography. It stands for profit and domination – not for curiosity and education that Sinann inspires.
Ossian provoked the greatest literary controversy of all time. Athlone’s new statue is controversial too. It initially found favour when Westmeath County Council put a model up for public viewing in January 2019. But the Council - ranked “worst in country for transparency, accountability and ethics” - failed to share its symbolism or to explain that in Irish mythology the river takes the female form of the goddess Sinann. When informed of our paper, people rejected the statue. Peaceful street activities, art, poetry, newspaper items, radio broadcasts, an open lecture and a petition followed. But these failed to convince the Council of their folly and Athlone’s mayor proudly declared they are “not for turning.” They erected the statue in the dark of night at the darkest time of year (19.12.2020) at Custume Place, named for Ireland’s defenders and directly outside the Williamite HQ where the “grim Dutch gunners eyed them well”. Over 90% of a thousand comments posted online in the days after erection of the statue shared my dismay.
So, this is an Athlone issue - why should you care? What has it to do with your identity? If issued in the last few years, perhaps you should look at your passport - it may well contain the same symbolism:
Physics is not just about laws of nature; “physics is what physicists do late at night” said Nobel-Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman. As atoms, electrons or quarks interact with each other, so too do people or characters in a story – be they now or in the distant past. And that was my conduit into the days of yore – my route back to Ireland after emigrating to Coventry, where late at night I lay thinking about the Brehon laws of old. All I had to do was to take the maths developed for physics and apply it to old stories.
Surrounded by a vibrant team of mathematicians in Coventry, we analysed a medieval Irish text, telling how an army under the leadership of Brian Boru challenged Viking invaders, culminating with the Battle of Clontarf in 1014. Despite centuries of lore, revisionists of late told us that it wasn’t an Irish-versus-Viking conflict at all! It was the Irish at it again – fighting against each other while the more sophisticated Vikings just helped out.
But mathematics combined with the annals told us otherwise. We developed a way to measure war on spectrum between either side of a binary debate. With an Irish-versus-Viking conflict at one end, and civil war at the other, the annals deliver a score a third of the way along ➖ a predominantly Irish-Norse conflict but not wholly so.
Athlone plays an important role in the story of Viking Age – it sits on Ireland’s longest river, the Shannon – a natural defensive line between the eastern and western provinces. It was at Athlone in 1002 that the king of Meath (which included Westmeath), submitted to Brian Boru, an act that opened the way for Brian’s dominion over all of Ireland. And the importance of Athlone to all of Ireland endured. In 1607 the Flight of Earls had marked the end of the old Gaelic Order and a sad story of emigration started. One Irish soldier returned from Spain in 1626 as a Franciscan friar on a mission to rescue Ireland’s ancient manuscripts - to preserve her identity. It was at a meeting in Athlone in 1630 that they started compiling what would become the Annals of the Four Masters - chronicles of our history and mythology.
Athlone’s role in history continued. It was in 1691 that Sergeant Custume and his stalwart band stood fast against Williamite invasion. It was at Athlone that the “unforgettable fire” decommissioned Moydrum Castle during the War of Independence. It was there that Radio Éireann broadcast to the world from the 1930s. Athlone stood alongside capital cities such as Vienna and Helsinki, embraced as it was between them on the old radio dials. It was at Custume Barracks in Athlone that the 26-county government built a nuclear bunker during the Cold War – a new capital they could decamp to should the missiles fly. It is Athlone that would be capital of a federal reunited Ireland under the Éire Nua". ("New Ireland") proposal.
Thus Athlone is not only the physical centre of Ireland; it is central to her mythology, her history, her identity – no matter where on the political spectrum you find yourself. So imagine my consternation when I arrived home in Spring 2019 and saw in the local newspaper how a statue from the Custom House had been selected to represent my town.
Two years ago, Westmeath County Council called for a new sculpture for Athlone. It was to be “uniquely 'of' the town” and address its “heritage, memory and environment.” And “in particular”, it should address the town’s “location in relation to the River Shannon.” To my dismay the Council decided on a replica of Custom-House iconography! It is not a crown but a neo-classical Neptunesque figure - a “river god of the Shannon”, claimed to “hark back to Irish mythology.”
Why is this so very, very wrong? And why should you care?
In 2016 we published further mathematical investigations into the past. In the 1760’s, shortly before John Beresford had the idea to build the Custom House, James Macpherson published what he claimed were translations from Scottish-Gaelic sources of a third-century bard named Ossian. He tried to align his work with the Classics as, during the Imperial Era, British administrators viewed themselves as inheritors of the torch of civilization - passed on from ancient Greece and Rome. Conquest and colonization were justified if a devalued, inferior and even expendable Gaelic culture was replaced by something that emulated the eminence of the Classics. So, positioning the epic poems of Ossian within a classical context would add legitimacy and authority to the new Scottish epic.
Ireland’s antiquarians were aghast! They protested at attempts to misappropriate Ireland’s heroes and identified thinly veiled characters from the Irish epic tradition. Ossian, “an illiterate Bard of an illiterate age” in Macpherson’s work, was Oisín, the warrior-poet of the Fenian Cycle in Irish mythology. Ossian’s father, Fingal, a Scottish king for Macpherson, was Fionn mac Cumhaill, leader of the Fianna. They accused Macpherson of lacking “decency in the illiberal abuse of all ancient and modern writers who endeavored to throw lights upon the ancient state of Ireland.” In our paper, we analysed Ossian in a similar manner to how we had previously analysed the Fenian Cycle and indeed the Viking age. Again, the mathematics gave a clear answer ➖ “quantifiable structural affinities with the Irish texts and a dissonance from the Classics.”
In Irish mythology the personification of the Shannon is Sinann. She is a woman – not a hairy man. She is the granddaughter of Lir (of the “Children of Lir” fame) and her story is as beautiful as it is inspiring. As Athlonian, Celtic scholar and linguist Maud Joynt wrote in 1912: “To the Boyne as well as the Shannon among Irish rivers was attributed the gift of inspiration.”
Whatever about Macpherson’s inspiration, we certainly know what inspired Beresford. He was the first commissioner of revenue for Ireland and his world was one of “privileged nobility”. Beneath it lay “the impoverished underclass struggling for basic civil rights” who “should be kept down by a policy of unyielding repression.” Of the 14 “river heads” on the Custom House only the Liffey is female – a “quite conceivable eighteenth-century misunderstanding of Anna Liffey” as personification of Abhainn na Life. The river heads represent commerce and profit – hence their appearance on reverse of old bank notes. They have nothing to do with Irish mythology. The prime position of the Custom House is still held by a crown perched superior to the harp which is surrounded by the lion and unicorn. Just in case anyone is in doubt as to what they celebrate, the hairy-faced neo-classical river head concocted to represent the Boyne has the inscription “1690”.
Athlone’s unfortunate sculpture is therefore neither “uniquely 'of' the town” nor does it address its “heritage, memory and environment.” Its claim to “hark back to Irish mythology” in relation to the Shannon represents ignorance at best - or triumphalist colonial misappropriation of identity and gender in a town devoid of secular female iconography. It stands for profit and domination – not for curiosity and education that Sinann inspires.
Ossian provoked the greatest literary controversy of all time. Athlone’s new statue is controversial too. It initially found favour when Westmeath County Council put a model up for public viewing in January 2019. But the Council - ranked “worst in country for transparency, accountability and ethics” - failed to share its symbolism or to explain that in Irish mythology the river takes the female form of the goddess Sinann. When informed of our paper, people rejected the statue. Peaceful street activities, art, poetry, newspaper items, radio broadcasts, an open lecture and a petition followed. But these failed to convince the Council of their folly and Athlone’s mayor proudly declared they are “not for turning.” They erected the statue in the dark of night at the darkest time of year (19.12.2020) at Custume Place, named for Ireland’s defenders and directly outside the Williamite HQ where the “grim Dutch gunners eyed them well”. Over 90% of a thousand comments posted online in the days after erection of the statue shared my dismay.
So, this is an Athlone issue - why should you care? What has it to do with your identity? If issued in the last few years, perhaps you should look at your passport - it may well contain the same symbolism:
Half-form images of 14 different river gods – like those on the Custom House and Liffey bridges, in Dublin city centre – are at the edge of each page.
Historians say that myths tell us more about the society who told, recorded or created them than it does about anyone who went before. The Athlone statue and our passports are of our time. Do we wish to adorn them with colonial money-gods of a “privileged nobility” - at a time when the rest of the world is taking theirs down? Or do we prefer more noble concepts our ancestors sought to communicate to us through our myths, our tales, our stories - concepts that more inclusively span our complex identity spectrum? Surely there is room on our iconography for female as well as male? Surely there is room for curiosity, enlightenment and hope, and all that Sinann inspires?
Reference: The paper that triggered the protests in Athlone: A Networks-Science Investigation into the Epic Poems of Ossian, Advances in Complex Systems 19 (2016) 1650008. DOI: 10.1142/S0219525916500089. Freely available at A Networks-Science Investigation into the Epic Poems of Ossian.
Ralph Kenna is an Athlone native and Professor of Theoretical Physics at Coventry where his research includes mathematical investigations into epic narratives, especially those from Ireland.
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Maith thu Ralph, brilliantly argued as usual. You are casting a valuable light on an aspect of our post and neo-colonial experience that nobody else is with the same effect. The battle for our cultural identity and ownership of our past. This is a vital strand in fight for identity of which the current war of words over our revolutionary past is part. Keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteRalph - thanks for posting this on TPQ. A lot of great insight there. The application of a mathematical framework is certainly a novel way for the issue to be explored.
ReplyDeletenice, really nice, Ralph, thanks for your post
ReplyDeleteInteresting, and there was me thinking that Athlone's greatest historical moment was holding AC Milan to a draw in the UEFA cup.
ReplyDeletePeter - there is a great photo of the AC Milan team getting off the bus to make their way to the dressing rooms.
ReplyDeleteI am just wondering in respect of this piece the role of foundational myths in any social or historical formation, nationalism's myths as much as religion's. This comment in particular interested me "more noble concepts our ancestors sought to communicate to us through our myths, our tales, our stories."
ReplyDeleteHow should we treat myths - with scepticism or respect? Do they enhance understanding or blur it?
Why is it a choice?
Delete"scepticism or respect?"
DeleteDepends on context, what function the myth serves and onto whom it confers advantage.
As Ralph's comment below suggests, they are, or perhaps more accurately they were, a part of the glue which held societies together: held them together in a pre multimedia world when less competing narratives existed, and where in less atomised cultures, outliers could only survive dependant upon their ability to endure consequential extra hardship.
Jordan Petersen in his series of lectures 'Maps of Meaning' contends that all stories, not just tales and myths, are archetypal accounts of the ever enduring tensions between chaos and order. They have/had value to the degree that they serve/served group cohesiveness and subject of course to each individual's alignment, whether that be to the in-group or out-group!
Larry Hughes comments
ReplyDeleteThe application of mathematical framework to determine historical fact makes me a tad nervous. That was an interesting read and I enjoyed it. Athlone has certainly been central in more than just geographical location. It made me smile at the writer thinking at night about Ireland and it's history and trying to apply the history in some way to his physics studies. I wonder do Peter and Steve R lie awake at night pondering the wonders of Finchley... As for interpreting history through mathematical or scientific modelling it's a brave man who would promote that with Ferguson, Witty, Fauci and Holohan bringing science into such deliberate and criminal disrepute at this time. Regarding the Customs House maybe suggest the free state do what it did with the post boxes..leave them there crown and all and slap a couple coats of emerald green paint over it... There now, Job done.. sure isn't it grand? !!!
Larry
ReplyDelete"As for interpreting history through mathematical or scientific modelling it's a brave man who would promote that with Ferguson, Witty, Fauci and Holohan bringing science into such deliberate and criminal disrepute at this time"
What planet are you on, Larry? The one occupied by Trump and Bolinasario? Or are those scenes from ICU units in the South-East and London that BBC cameras have recorded "staged" in your humble opinion?
Larry
ReplyDeleteWhy would I ponder Finchley? I'm Irish not English. Are you back on the bucky again sad sack?
Thanks for the nice comments and feedback!
ReplyDeleteDes, I think you have hit the nail on the head – this is a “battle for our cultural identity” – who are we as a people? What got us here and what are our aspirations?
AM, I think your question of how we should treat myths is a really important one. Again it’s a question of identity. Not plugging it or anything (I can send pdf’s of chapters if anyone is interested), but it is discussed by Robin Dunbar in his chapter of our book “Maths meets Myths”: https://www.springer.com/gb/book/9783319394435
In the abstract of Dunbar’s chapter he says “Storytelling has played a major role in human evolution as a mechanism for engineering social cohesion. In large measure, this is because a shared worldview is an important basis for the formation not just of friendships but, more generally, of social communities. Storytelling thus provides the mechanism for the transmission of shared cultural icons and shared histories within a community”
So, my answer is that without shared cultural icons such as mythology we are a collection of individuals – we fulfil Thatcher’s dream when she said “there is no such thing as society”. That is precisely what Athlone’s statue (and the symbolism in new passports) represents – the individualistic approach of “greed is good”.
And that brings me to Larry’s point that it is brave to do this stuff now. We’ve been doing this type of research for 10 years; the Ossian paper I cite in the blog was from 2016 and the book I mention above is 2017. These belong to a well-established field called “Sociophysics” where concepts from physics are applied to society. Physics and sociology both rely on probabilistic maths so the bridge between the two is far more solid than it would appear at first sight.
Returning to Des’s point, myths predate history in a sense – before any branch of Christianity or any other established religion arrived in Ireland. They have universal messages that everyone can identify with. Properly understood and properly presented they can inspire and unify.
Ralph,
DeleteI am cautious towards attempts to define “us” as “a people”.
As a people we need to ensure an input into defining who we are rather than leaving it to others to make the call. Peoples evolve.
“The people” we are now has arrived at this moment via a number of different routes – a growing number from abroad who have no reason to feel they carry any mythological DNA that can be used to define them. Myths might work in fixed societies but not so well in those that are fluid.
I think it is difficult to create an identity that everyone can subscribe to. We can see the problem that postmodern identity politics gives rise to. Benedict Anderson’s imagined community holds as good here as it does elsewhere. A lot of work has to go into imagining a community and it often leaves out from that “community as one” the dissenter. The imagination includes but also excludes.
Dunbar flagging up the social cement purpose of storytelling seems fine. A social cement is frequently ideological and not necessarily accurate in the story that is being told. A shared worldview is fine until it is not shared by everyone.
The physicist Brian Greene has stressed the importance of story telling but he makes no concession to any claim of accuracy that might be made on their behalf. His deep time cosmology could never be intellectually reconciled to biblical based young earth myths.
I don’t feel we need to have shared cultural icons to avoid being a mere collection of individuals on a piece of land but not in any society. I would argue that if we have a number of shared core values based on secularism, rights and cooperation, we can easily escape the Thatcheresque atomisation of society.
“Greed is good” is not intellectually rooted in the breakdown of societal myths but is in some cases rooted in religious mythology, which allows the greedy to develop and promote prosperity theology. Myths can work both ways.
I like the idea of concepts from physics being applied to society but to me physics is a hard nosed science which sweeps aside myths such as a young earth. I wonder what physics actually has to say to myths apart from using mathematical formulae for measuring their impact (if I understand it correctly).
I don’t come at this from any nationalist perspective. I no more hold to obligatory nationalism than I do obligatory Catholicism. And I am one of those people who ultimately believes in a global government. But my thinking on the matter is so poorly developed that I would call it retarded rather than erudite.
" I wonder do Peter and Steve R lie awake at night pondering the wonders of Finchley"
ReplyDeleteSpeaking only for myself, nope. I sometimes wonder were Belfast is heading and how it can be improved collectively for all, but I'm also in total agreement with the OP- The mythos of Ireland is utterly important and should never be sullied by an unneseccary mixing with other fables.
Barry I'm not arguing the point with you while you're under your bed hiding. Peter and Steve R I'm just yanking yet chain. As for buckie not if it was for free. In relation to physics determining historical accuracy I can't imagine how that could work but I'll watch that link when I've time.
ReplyDeleteLarry Hughes
ReplyDeleteSteve R Barry Peter that "unknown" comment was from me. Finally figured out how to send by phone at 60 ... Fukn genius
To clarify on the physics part of my blog. It is not the case that physics per se tells us something about myths or history. It’s that mathematical concepts developed for physics can be applied to social networks, be they current, historical or mythological.
ReplyDeleteIn the late 19th century physicists recognised that, just as people interact with each other, so do atoms. Statistical concepts developed for sociology were imported into physics. This is statistical physics, and, as it developed, it advanced mathematics too. New concepts, developed for physics, were exported back to sociology. From this, a new discipline called sociophysics emerged around the end of the 20th century. Our work belongs to the genre of sociophysics.
Obviously atoms are very different to people but viewed on large enough scale maths developed for physical systems can be applied to societal ones. This says nothing or little about the individual but can say a lot about societies. Network theory burst on the scene in this context in the 1990’s. It has been applied in all sorts of contexts – epidemiology, history, myth, and fiction.
So the connection between assemblies of atoms in physics and societies in mythology is that you can use mathematical concepts developed for the former and apply them to the latter. We do this to compare the societal network described in one myth or story to that of another. In the paper I cited in my blog, we compare Ossian to Irish mythology and to the Classics. This puts Ossian closer to the Fenian Cycle than to works of Homer despite claims to the contrary 250 years ago. Likewise the statue places the new face of Athlone closer to colonial values than the values embedded in Sinann’s story.
But finding that Ossian is closer to Irish mythology is not new – you don’t need maths to for that; it was recognised 250 years ago (there is a recent revisionist interpretation around that but that’s another discussion). The initial purpose of our paper was not to discover something new in mythology but to test if methods imported from physics can arrive at the same conclusions as humanities. I.e., it was to test the mathematical approach. It is that that led to the awareness of misappropriation in Athlone and triggered the protests. The awareness could just as well have been triggered by anyone familiar with the backdrop to the Ossian controversy.
That said, interdisciplinarity can generate new findings in the field to which the techniques are imported too. If you’re a Game of Thrones fan you might like this very recent paper: https://www.pnas.org/content/117/46/28582. In it we develop the methodology beyond the network theory as a kind of new direction in digital humanities. One element of this paper is to compare different narratives – the Fenian Cycle is in there too.
There are other concepts shared by physics and mythology and one is universality. The question I pose in my comment “who are we as a people?” might be better states as “who are we as people?” to reflect that universality. But my comment was rather directed against Athlone’s statue and elitist iconography than advocating myths as the be all and end all. You say “Myths can work both ways” and I agree- that’s what I was trying to qualify when I said “Properly understood and properly presented they [myths] can inspire and unify.” In other words, if we want a statue or passport, we should be careful what messages we are sending. So, I don’t mean we should “be” the same people as described in our myths – but we can be inspired by the qualities in them that we (now) value, we being anyone, anywhere – you don’t have to have be associated with Ireland, for example, to be inspired by Sinann. It would be difficult to create an identity that everyone can subscribe to, I agree, but Athlone’s story shows it is easy to create one that (nearly) everyone can reject. The message I am trying to send in my blog is not to do that, especially as we have more universal concepts to draw from.