(a) - The hoaxologist published this theory as an article in a magazine he funds himself. The magazine contains archaeology articles and advertisements for antique furniture that he owns.

(b) - He claims Luigi Pernier, who discovered the disk in 1908, was motivated to create it and plant it there because he was jealous of Sir Arthur Evans' fame.

(c) - Luigi Pernier, the discoverer of the Phaistos Disk, is dead and cannot defend himself, nor has anything ever been written or recorded to indicate Luigi Pernier did anything wrong.

(d) - He seeks to create a debate in London at the Society of Antiqueries as to whether it is a forgery.

(e) - He chooses who will debate his theory that the disk is a forgery.

(f) - He has invited as a keynote speaker another archaeologist who is an expert in Aegean scripts.

(g) - When I offered, by email, to appear at the debate and defend Luigi Pernier and disprove the forgery theory, I have so far received no response. I do not expect to receive an invitation. Therefore, the following is my debate.

(h) - Less than a day after I first published this web page, I received this email response.

Dear Ms. Watson,

Please excuse my delay in answering your very interesting e-mail as I have been inundated with e-mail correspondence. I would certainly be interested in receiving your abstract for either an oral or poster presentation for the Conference provided it is [sic] basically consists of new and original ideas beyond your Minoan wave spiral concept and not something that you have already published on your website (which I have made reference to in my article).

I look forward to your reply and to the possibility that you might attend the Conference.

Cordially,

Jerome M. Eisenberg. Ph.D.
Editor-in-Chief, Minerva,
The International Review of Ancient Art & Archaeology,
and
Chairman, International Conference on the Phaistos Disk

I have extensively researched the Phaistos Disk for eighteen years (now 22) and I believe it is an authentic Minoan artifact. I also believe that the man who created this hoax theory is motivated to draw attention to himself, to sell subscriptions to his magazine and to create more advertising revenue for his advertisers. I suggest it is not Luigi Pernier who was jealous of Evans but the hoaxologist who is jealous of Luigi Pernier for achieving something remarkable in archaeology. Eisenberg has no qualms in destroying Luigi Pernier's good name and reputation in order to sell subscriptions and furniture. He may call his scheduled event the International Conference on the Phaistos Disk, but he certainly has no intentions of holding a serious debate on the Phaistos Disk suitable to the antiquarian society.

The Society of Antiqueries in London is centuries-old and is a respected forum for debate, but Eisenberg does not hesitate to use this society to commercialize himself. The original concept of the debate was one of scholarship and not commercialism. The Society should halt this conference, or remove him from control of who will attend, and take control of it themselves, so that at the center of the debate is the Phaistos Disk. The debate should include anyone who has original material to present in debating this hoax theory, which also entails defending Luigi Pernier and his good name. If only linguists and scriptologists attend, then no meaningful debate can be expected that would disprove the hoaxologist's theory, as the Phaistos Disk contains a one-off script, if it really is a script at all.

In conclusion, the Phaistos Disk hoax theory is not sound and is even dangerous because it threatens to derail the possibility of significant research into the area of Minoan astronomy. More important than selling antique furniture is to discuss whether the Minoans were astronomers in their own right. A look at the Phaistos Disk and these eight patterns might justify the funding of more research into this area of archaeoastronomy.

The disk preserves plane geometry that may have been used in the construction of the Great Pyramid, with both exterior and interior views of the Great Pyramid preserved on the disk. Also preserved is the use of the Great Pyramid to study the stars and map the constellations. The picture perfect Constellation Argo is on the disk as is a big star inside the seven shields (pentagram inside a heptagon). And when you consider there are 48 main constellations, which we suspect came from (or through) Minoan Crete, and there are also 48 unique pictographs on the disk, then you could conclude, as I have done, that the pictographs could be graphic abbreviations of the constellations (some of them now perhaps obsolete) and they also display the origins of the myths from which they came, sometimes recognizable as either Minoan or Egyptian mythology and some others.

The pictographs indicate the Minoans merged many of their ideologies regarding astronomy, geometry, and religion with the Egyptians for a transformation of myths from Egypt through Crete and eventually to Greece. Did they get all this science from Sumer or Babylon? I don't know. I have not gotten that far in my research, but based on what I have found and understood, the Minoans were astronomers in their own right.

Astronomy may have been just as popular and well-known then as astrology is today, and maybe that whole part of the world shared their ideas with each other and developed them individually in their own countries. Whatever the case, the Minoans were brilliant. Their civilization was pre-history's enlightened world, and the Phaistos Disk reveals it.