On Sun, 22 Sep 1996 17:37:39, Glenn Morton wrote:
GM>...I want you to note something that
>frustrates me to absolutely no end. Yesterday I posted an item about a news
>story on an extremely significant find from Australia. What was the reaction
>here among those who do not like the evolutionary paradigm or do not like my
>views?
>
>Silence, absolutely perfect silence!!!!
>
>There is no response from the anti-evolutionists to anything that they can not
>find an answer for. Thus the answer of choice becomes an collective ignoring
>of the data. We look the other way because if we do, we can justify holding
>onto our cherished beliefs rather than actually dealing with the data.
Sorry to spoil Glenn's argument, but I posted on 26 Sep 96 a
newspaper article dated 22 September 1996, Re: Early artefacts &
rock art discovered in North Western Australia! :-) I only post
weekly now, so perhaps Glenn should be more patient! :-) As Darrin
Brooker wrote: "...If it truly is this significant then maybe you'll
allow more than 24 hours for responses. :-)
GM>I want to ask the anti-evolutionists here on the reflector if this
>is how God really wants Christians to behave in the face of
>difficulty? To bury our heads in the sand and hope that the nasty,
>bothersome piece of information will go away.
Agreed. But Glenn here is (as usual <g>) being too sweeping in his
claims. This particular "anti-evolutionist" does *not* and *never
has* "buried his head in the sand" and "hoped that nasty, bothersome
pieces of information will go away." Indeed, it is *because* I face
the facts that I am *not* convinced of evolution.
GM>Art work created by anatomically ancient hominids demands some
>type of response from the Christian community and yet silence is our
>response. Absolute silence. This is not the high road. It is the
>low road. I do not believe this is the way Christ wants us to face
>the world. He dealt with the way the Roman world actually was, not
>with how he hoped it could be.
Agreed. I don't know why Glenn is so excited. The discovery of
58-75 kya art and 116-176K tools, only underlines the huge gap
between his 5.5 mya Homo habilis Adam theory.
GM>What is the response to the Australian monolith? Does the art
>work imply that they are human?
Yes, but not necessarily *fully* human.
GM>Are they covered by the blood of Christ?
If they were *fully* human they potentially would be.
GM>What is our response to be if the 176,000 year for the occupation
>of Australia holds up?
My Pre-Adamite model would not necessarily have any problems with
it.
GM>It means that anatomically non-modern humans had boats that far
>back and boat building is a HUMAN activity.
There is no evidence that they had *boats*. They may have migrated
to Australia by accident on very primitive watercraft from the
islands of modern Indonesia. But the making of watercraft is a "human
activity" but not conclusive evidence of *full humanity*.
GM>If a believer wants to dismiss the Australian art work based upon
>the dating processes, then he should have the guts to say that he
>thinks the dating processes are flawed. Unfortunately, no one has
>that type of courage. All there is, is silence.
Actually, as I have already posted, there are doubts in *the
scientific community* (including Australia's foremost anthropologis
Prof. Rhys Jones) about "the dating processes".
GM>Is it because we secretly know in our hearts that this is an
>indefensible position? Or is this because we haven't read enough of
>the primary literature to know anything about the dating processes?
I presume that Australia's leading anthropologist has "read enough of
the primary literature to know anything about the dating processes"!
I saw Dr Rhys Jones on TV about this and he pointed out that it is
impossible to know if quartz flakes on the floor of the cave were all
chipped away by the artist(s). Inclusion of flakes that spontaneously
chipped off hundreds of thousands of years ago would inflate the age.
GM>If one gets his information from the Christian press, he is very
>likely to get a very distorted view of what the data actually is.
>This is why so many former young earth creationists are now
>atheists.
Glenn here conflates "Christian" and "young earth creationists". At
the beginning he was criticising "anti-evolutionists". He thus
perpetuates what Johnson calls the "official caricature" of the
creation-evolution debate:
"The Weiner article and book review illustrate what I would call the
`official caricature' of the creation-evolution debate, a distortion
that is either explicit or implicit in nearly all media and textbook
treatments of the subject. According to the caricature, `evolution'
is a simple, unitary process that one can see in operation today and
that is also supported unequivocally by all the fossil evidence.
Everyone accepts the truth of evolution except a disturbingly large
group of biblical fundamentalists, who insist that the earth is no
more than ten thousand years old and the fossil beds were laid down
in Noah's flood...." (Johnson P.E., "Reason in the Balance",
InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove Ill., 1995, p73)
GM>Dennis, I am afraid that in some sense I must agree with Denis
>(one n), not necessarily in the specifics but in general:
>Christians are NOT engaging in the high road in the area of
>creation/evolution. We selectively choose what we will read, we
>selectively choose what we will believe. Evidence and data have
>nothing to do with our belief. We christians are timid rabbits who
>prefer to live in a world in which the facts are those we imagine
>them to be, rather than in a world with the facts as the ARE! This
>may be good policy to retain an unvarying theological viewpoint, but
>it is a massive self-delusion in which we parade around like the
>emporer with no clothes. The louder we proclaim that our science is
>good, the more we can delude ourselves that we are clothed. In
>point of fact, we are naked.
I agree with a lot of what Glenn says here - of course "Evidence and
data" do not (and should noBut as Del Ratzsch points out, "Evidence andBut as Del Ratzsch points out, "Evidence and data" are not the
only factors:
"...Popper was driven to the conclusion that the judgment of whether
or not something constitutes legitimate empirical data is not forced
on us by nature but is in part a result of human choice. If so,
empirical data will not be as purely objective as once thought.
Second, Kuhn argued that the paradigms one accepted affected one's
very perception. If so, empirical data are not as neutral, independent
and dictated by nature as once thought...our experiences, even
sensory experiences, do have some surprising overtones to them. For
centuries perception and observation were thought to be purely
passive processes-an external, independent nature simply imprinted
various information on our minds via the senses, and the observer had
no role in the process other than being the passive recipient. As it
turns out, that apparently is not the case. There is more of the
observer involved than just mechanically operating sensory faculties,
and that involvement, although perhaps preconscious, is an active
involvement. In many cases of perception, we unconsciously "fill in"
various aspects of our own experience, generally without realizing it,
and the shape that this filling takes is molded in part by our
expectations, our intellectual commitments, our theoretical
predispositions and even our general sort of mindset." (Ratzsch D.L.,
"The Battle of Beginnings: Why Neither Side is Winning the
Creation-Evolution Debate", InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove Ill.,
1996, p122)
The fact is that *everybody* (including Glenn) "selectively chooses
what" they "will read" and "what" they "will believe." *No one* can
read everything and *no one* can be infallibly certain that their
worldview is the right one. Glenn has "selectively choosen what" he
"will believe", namely "evolution" and he now "selectively chooses
what" he "will read" to support that belief.
GM>If we ignore the australian finds, then we don't have to change
>our viewpoint. If we ignore the primary scientific literature, we
>don't have to deal with the difficult issues that the scientists
>deal with on a daily basis.
In this case what "primary scientific literature" is Glenn talking
about. What we are all working on is *media reports*!
GM>What changed me from a YEC to a TE was that daily I had to deal
>with the geologic data which literally screamed "OLD EARTH". A
>person's honesty will allow the intentional ignoring of evidence for
>only so long. Eventually one must say, "We Christians are wrong in
>the way we harmonize science and the Scripture."
Again, Glenn contrasts "old earth" with "Christians" and "YEC" with
"TE". He "selectively" ignores Old-Earth creationist positions such
as PC.
GM>To close, Dennis (two n's) the high road DEMANDS an honesty with
>what the facts are. And to achieve that, the high road DEMANDS that
>one read the primary literature (not Christian apologetical stuff),
>to know what the facts actually are! The high road DEMANDS that one
>protect himself from fraudulent claims by Christian apologists of
>all stripes.
It is interesting that those who see the world different from Glenn
are "fraudulent" rather than just plain wrong ! :-)
GM>An example: Hugh Ross in the latest Facts & Faith
>says that modern anthropology teaches that modern man spread from
>Mesopotamia to Africa, Asia and Europe, starting about 33,000 years
>ago. If you hadn't read the primary literature you would have no way
of knowing that what Ross is saying is pure, unadulterated buffalo
>chips.
Actually, Ross does not say that "modern man spread from Mesopotamia
to Africa, Asia and Europe, starting about 33,000 years ago". Here is
exacty what he says:
"Let's compare this chronology with the present archaeological
and anthropological data. Some time before about 35,000 years
ago, humans and civilization sprang up in the Mesopotamian
flood plain, centered in Babel. Roughly 33,000 years ago, humans
began to spread out over Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe.
About 12,000 years ago, large numbers of people began to settle
in North and South America. About 11,000 years ago, migration
from Siberia to the Americas ceased." (Ross H, "The Broken Tie
that Binds", Facts & Faith, Reasons To Believe: Pasadena CA,
Vol. 10, No. 3, Third Quarter 1996, p6).
The key words are "humans" and "civilization". Ross is not talking
about anatomically modern humans or Neandertal man because he does not
regard them as fully human. He is talking about *civilized man*.
This is broadly consistent with what anthroplogy reveals:
"The biological novelty we see in the anatomy of the archaic
sapiens, including the Neanderthals, is clearly accompanied by a
new level of technological competence. Once the new
technology had become established, however, it changed little.
Stasis, not innovation, characterized the new era. When change
did come, however, it was dazzling- so dazzling that we should
be aware that we might be blind to the reality behind it. About
35,000 years ago in Europe, people began making tools of the
finest form, fashioned from delicately struck stone blades. For
the first time, bone and antler were used as raw material for
toolmaking. Tool kits now comprised more than one hundred
items, and included implements for fashioning rough clothing
and for engraving and sculpting. For the first time, tools became
works of art: antler spear throwers, for example, were adorned
with lifelike animal carvings. Beads and pendants appear in the
fossil record, announcing the new practice of body decoration.
And-most evocative of all paintings on the walls of deep caves
speak of a mental world we readily recognize as our own. Unlike
previous eras, when stasis dominated, innovation is now the
essence of culture, with change being measured in millennia
rather than hundreds of millennia. Known as the Upper
Paleolithic Revolution, this collective archeological signal is
unmistakable evidence of the modern human mind at work."
(Leakey R., "The Origin of Humankind", Phoenix: London,
1994, pp94-95)
"This would strongly imply that modern humans, presumably the Cro-
Magnon people who appeared in Europe perhaps 35,000 years ago
at the time of the disappearance of the Neanderthals, must have
driven the Neanderthal to extinction. " (Wills C., "The Runaway
Brain: The Evolution of Human Uniqueness", Harper-Collins:
London, 1994, p56)
"Towards ne end of the last ice age, some 40,000 years ago,
Neanderthal man disappeared from Europe, and was replaced by
men of modern type. These people possessed a greater variety of
stone tools, and worked in bone, antler and ivory; their descendants
are famous for their paintings in the caves of southern France."
(Smith J.M., "The Theory of Evolution", Cambridge University Press:
Cambridge UK, Canto Edition, 1993, p338)
"Steven Mithen, a lecturer in archaeology at the University of
Reading...believes modern humans emerged after a final redesign of
the brain, resulting in a "big bang" of cultural advances that
started 40,000 years ago in Europe with the production of objects
such as beads, pendants, statuettes, paintings and engravings..."
(Patel T., "Stone Age Picassos", New Scientist, 13 July 1996, p34)
GM>And because of what he writes, lots of Christians will now
>repeat these false things and look really stupid to those who know
>anthropology.
Ross may be wrong (I do not agree with him on some things), but he is
closer to whaho believes
that Adam was a Homo habilis who lived 5.5 *million years ago". I
would have thought that *that* would "look really stupid to those who
know anthropology"! :-)
On Sun, 22 Sep 1996 21:12:15, Glenn Morton wrote:
[...]
GM>I have been this route before. Notice the plethora of responses
>to my proving that some member of the Homo genus existed 4.2 million
>years ago, which is also a prediction of my view and which I posted
>on Sept. 1, 1996.
Glenn's post "Early man (Homo) at 4.2 myr" of 01 Sep 1996,
concluded:
"While I will not claim this as confirmation of my view, yet, it
does make me quite optimistic."
Now he has moved from being "quite optimistic" that this much
*disputed evidence* (namely a fragmentary humerus dated 4.2 mya) is
now "*proving* that some member of the Homo genus existed 4.2 million
years ago"!
Secondly, even if this turns out to be "Early man (Homo) at 4.2 myr",
it is not "a prediction of" Glenn's "view". This would be *the
earliest beginnings* of "the Homo genus" at "4.2 million years
ago", whereas Glenn's 5.5 mya Homo habilis Adam "view" requires a
fully *developed* Homo genus *1.3 million years before*!
GM>It is almost a truism that we Christians duck when difficult
>scientific data comes up.
Let Glenn speak for himself. Not all "Christians duck when difficult
scientific data comes up". :-)
GM>I would like to also note that there used to be a lot of the
>famous ID guys on this list 2 years ago. They have, like ascetics,
>retreated to their own private listserv where they don't have to
>deal with people like me and the evidence I present.
I wonder why? Perhaps they found from experience that it was not a
good cost/benefit analysis arguing with Glenn? :-) I think I will in
future reduce my responses to Glenn's posts. I consume a lot of time
answering them but to little avail because he usually ignores them
anyway! :-( I'm starting a new job from next week, and I will have
less time for the Reflector anyway.
God bless.
Steve
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