>>>>> On Mon, 16 Oct 1995 19:29:31 -0400, GRMorton@aol.com said:
>> Here is the quote on the Pterodactyl:
>> "In a 1982 Reader's Digest publication, "The Mysteries of
>> the Unexplained," it was related that a century ago, a very
>> phenomenal thing occurred. If this record is correct, and having
>> so many other anomolies, we certainly do not doubt this account
>> (also, it was related in a verifiable publication), this means it
This is the same publication, Illustrated London News, that printed the
reconstructions of Nebraska Man in the early 20's. Does Carl Baugh also
believe in that?
>> is absolutely impossible for evolution to be the explanation of
>> how life forms got here.
>> "The article refers to the last of the great pterodactyls,
>> the flying dinosaurs of the Mesozoic era. They existed
Trivia point: it's not a dinosaur.
>> supposedly around one hundred million years ago in the Cretaceous
>> period of the Mesozoic era. The record states that in France,
>> some workmen, in the winter of 1856, while working on a partially
>> completed railway tunnel between St. Dizey and the Nancy lines,
>> came across something unusual. IN the tunnel, they had broken
>> and removed a huge boulder of Jurassic limestone, which precedes
>> the Cretaceous by several million years. After they had broken
>> the limestone, stumbling out of the tunnel towards them was a
>> creature which fluttered its wings, croaked, and collapsed dead
>> at their feet. This creature had a wingspan of ten feet, seven
>> inches, with four legs joined by a membrane like a bat. What
>> should have been veet were long talons. The mouth was arrayed
>> with sharp teeth. The skin was black, leathery, oily, and thick.
>> Local students of paleontology immediately identified this
>> creature as being a pterodactyl. This was all reported in The
>> Illustrated London News, February 9, 1856, page 156. They
>> examined the limestone from which the creature had been released
>> and found there a cavity in the exact mold of the creature's
>> body. If this is true, it is absolutely impossible for that
>> creature to have lived more than a few thousand years in any form
Most people would argue that a few thousand years is just as impossible
as many millions.
>> in hibernation. It would have been impossible for it to have
>> lived more than a few thousand years under those circumstances.
>> The worldwide, biblical Noahic flood explains this phenomenon far
>> better than the evolutionary process."~Carl E. Baugh, Panorama of
>> Creation, (Oklahoma City: The Southwest Bible Church, 1989), p.
>> 21-22.
Here's a response by Chris Nedin, saved from talk.origins:
Aaaggguueee! Not this *again*
OK, firstly, this story is true. It is true to the extent that it *was*
reported in the Illustrated London News. So, apparently the final arbiter
of scientific facts are the newspapers. Hmm, this means that Cold Fusion
must be true. What? those nasty scientists have disproved it? Ha! what do
they know, it was in the newspapers, so it *must* be true. Gosh this is
easy, do you think that if I get my thesis published in the local newspaper
I can safely ignore comments from my marking committee? "I don't *care* if
you have studied palaeontology for 30 years, *my* theory has been published
in the newspaper so it *must* be true. Now hand over that PhD". Gosh this
is *really* easy!
Now, to understand what *really* happened, a quick history lesson is in order.
During the early to mid 1800's there was great franco-prussian rivalry, in
most spheres of life, political, scientific, etc. and geology was no
exception. The profile of France in European geology had dwindled since
the death of Cuvier in 1832 and the focus of influence had switched to
Germany and Russia(Prussia) with the release of Murchison's book "The
Geology of Russia" in 1845.
On top of this a small Bavarian location near the town of Solnhofen was
producing some exquisite fossils of fish, reptiles and pterodactyls from an
Upper Jurassic limestone (Gee, I guess pterodactyls predate the Cretaceous
after all). Note this is several years before the first _Archaeopteryx_ was
identified. These fossils were loudly (and rightly) trumpeted by German
geologists, and they just kept on coming.
Now during this period, many geologists were 'gentlemen' with time and
money on their hands. A group of French 'gentlemen geologists' became
rather pis* - er, annoyed at all this publicity surrounding the Solnhofen
finds and decided to do something about it. Thus when the opportunity
presented itself, they took it.
The opportunity can in the construction of a railway tunnel through
limestone of the *same age* as the Solnhofen limestone (Are you begining to
see the picture? :-) )
>From this the tale of the pterodactyl emerged.
Actually in the original report, the pterodactyl "crumbled to dust" at
their feet (neat eh? No evidence)
No evidence was ever found to corroborate the story.
In other words it was a fabrication founded in franco-prussian rivalry. If
they had waited 10 years, we would have had tales of real live
_Archaeopteryxes_ running around in French railway tunnels, sheesh!
This episode is mentioned in a couple of anti-creationist texts, but I do
not have the references.
Chris Nedin
Dept. of Geology and Geophysics
University of Adelaide
South Australia
cnedin@geology.adelaide.edu.au
>> Here is another Baugh claim
>> "NASA discovered some years ago that not only are the stars
>> giving off radio waves, some of the stars are giving off one
>> million times as much radio energy as is produced in our entire
>> Milky Way Galaxy. Stars throughout the universe are emitting
>> radio wave energy. Some entire galaxies are emitting almost
>> nothing but radio wave energy. NASA discovered to their
>> amazement that not only are these stars emitting radio wave
>> energy, but that there is music on those radio waves of energy.
>> NASA also discovered that not only is music emitted but the music
>> being emitted is in a major key. The music being emitted from
>> these stars is harmonious. NASA compared the music being emitted
>> from these star sources to the instruments of an orchestra that
>> are all in tune with each other."~Carl E. Baugh, Panorama of
>> Creation, (Oklahoma City: The Southwest Bible Church, 1989), p.
>> 64
You'd think such momentous news might have made the front pages, but
apparently NASA is keeping it a secret, and Carl Baugh is the only
person able to uncover the truth. Yeah, right <<snicker>>.
Carl Baugh is, I suspect, an embarrassment even to YEC creationists such
as the ICR. His Ph.D. is bogus, from an unaccredited institute. There
seem to be few claims too silly for him, the above two are merely a
sample. The latest copy of Creation/Evolution told the tale of his
claims that some fish teeth found at Paluxy are human. This has been
contradicted by young-earthers such as David Menton from the ICR as well
as mainstream scientists, and yet I heard a report recently of Baugh
claiming that his claims have not even been disputed.
Baugh is an out-and-out crackpot.
-- Jim Foley Symbios Logic, Fort CollinsJim.Foley@symbios.com (303) 223-5100 x9765* 1st 1.11 #4955 * "I am Homer of Borg! Prepare to be...OOooooo! Donuts!!!"