On Sun, 08 Dec 1996 19:33:37, Glenn Morton wrote:
[...]
GM>Let me explain something to you that your legal education would not have
>covered. It is called the taxonomic system.
>
>We are taxonomically called Homo sapiens sapiens. Neanderthal is
>called Homo sapiens neaderthalensis. Homo is the genus. We and
>Neanderthal are in the same genus. The first sapiens in both names
>is the species. We and Neanderthal are in the same species (Those
>silly taxonomists! Imagine them agreeeing with me!) The second
>sapiens and the neanderthalensis is the variety name. We and
>Neanderthal are m=taxonomically viewed merely as different
>varieties.
Just because Tattersall choses to go against the prevailing
>taxonomy is no reason for me to do so.
There is nothing hard and fast about this. It is indeed just "the
prevailing taxonomy". Neandertal man has been repeatedly
reclassified:
"Ever since the first discovery of Neanderthal remains in the early
nineteenth century, they have existed in a land of taxonomic limbo.
At various times they have been classed as a different species from
humans, then put in with humans, and later demoted again.
Currently, the consensus is that they form a subspecies slightly
different from ourselves and dignified with the name Homo sapiens
neanderthalensis." (Wills, 1994, p55)
If Tattersal's lack of tear ducts finding is confirmed, H. sapiens
neandertalensis' classification will doubtless change back again:
"Based on the belief that Neandertals and anatomically modern humans
were reproductively isolated from one another for about 60,000 ears
(though they may have been neighbors geographically), some
evolutionists now suggest that the Neandertals were more distinct
from modern humans than has been realized. Stephen Jay Gould
(Gould S.J., "A Novel Notion of Neanderthal," Natural History, June
1988, p20) and Chris Stringer... (Stringer S., "The Dates of Eden,"
Nature, 331, 18 February 1988, p565), even suggest that the
Neandertals be removed from our species (sapiens) and once again
given their earlier designation Homo neanderthalensis." (Lubenow
M.L., "Bones of Contention: A Creationist Assessment of the Human
Fossils", Baker Books: Grand Rapids MI, 1992, p68)
[...]
GM>The opinion of paleolithic art experts says that this is art and
>is man-made. But the fact that these experts disagree with you and
>Mr. Jones is quite silly of them.
Au contraire! As I pointed out, even Marshack seems to have recently
given up on the Golan Venus. Here is the whole brief article again:
=======================================================
Early Etchings
The creation of the first artistic images is usually credited to early
Europeans, who some 33,000 years ago began carving vulvas and
animals on rock and ivory in France and Germany. The discovery
of this 54,000-year old, three inch wide engraved flint may
change that perception. The flint was excavated near the Syrian
town of Quneitra; in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights by
Naama Goren-Inbar of Jerusalem's Hebrew University. Both
Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans lived in the region
when this image of four nested arcs were engraved-with another
piece of flint And both were tool users and hunter-gatherers. But
archeologist Alexander Marshack of Harvard's Peabody Museum
says it's most likely the artist was a more modern human since
known Neanderthal artifacts to date, aside from tools, have been
limited to things like beads and worked ivory. Marshack doesn't
know what the image represents. "When I looked at it for the
first time, it looked like a rainbow with rain, but that's not what
I'm saying it is," he says. "If I am correct, and this is an early
depiction, then you have evidence that art did not begin in
Europe. And if it was there in the Middle East, it was probably
also in Africa and Australia and in Asia. Europe was not the
beginning of everything."
("Early Etchings", Discover, Vol. 17, No. 7, July 1996, p26)
=======================================================
Fron Glenn there has been an "overwhelming silence" about this. He
seems to be in denial mode. :-)
GM>I have only seen one article critical of the object and lots
>supporting it. Look below:
>
>Against:
>
>Andrew Pelcin, "A geological Explanation for the Berekhat Ram Figurine,"
>Current Anthropology,Dec. 1994, 35:5, p. 674-675. He never actually examined
>the object.
Also add to "Against":
"Early Etchings", Discover, Vol. 17, No. 7, July 1996, p26! :-)
BTW how does Glenn know that "Pelcin...never actually examined the
object"?
GM>In favor see:
>
>Alexander Marshack, "On the "Geological' Explanation of the Berekhat Ram
>Figurine," Current Anthropology, 36:3, June, 1995, p. 495;
Which article itself suggested that a "late Middle Paleolithic
incised composition from the site of Quneitra, Israel" (the same
one mentioned in the "Early Etchings" article above), be "addressed"
instead in "the debate on possible pre-Upper Paleolithic symboling":
"Until publication of these analyses, the debate on possible
pre-Upper Paleolithic symboling may perhaps best be addressed not by
suppositions at a distance but through the microscopic analysis of a
late Middle Paleolithic incised composition from the site of
Quneitra, Israel. I pointed to the Quneitra analysis in my recent
criticism of the Eurocentric presumption that there was a punctuated,
apparently genetic "species" shift in symboling capacity at the
Middle/Upper Paleolithic transition" (Marshack 1994:386-87) (Marshack
A., "On the `Geological' Explanation of the Berekhat Ram Figurine,"
Current Anthropology, 36:3, June, 1995, p495)
GM>Desmond Morris, The Human Animal, (New York: Crown Publishing,
>1994), p. 186-188;
Morris only has a paragraph and a picture:
"The newly found sculptural object the most ancient man-made
image in the world - is a small stone figurine of a woman,
unearthed at an archaeological site on the Golan Heights. It is
extremely crude, but the head is clearly separated from the body
by an incised neck, and the arms are indicated by two vertical
grooves, apparently cut by a sharp flint tool. It is a find that
establishes the even greater antiquity of the human fascination
with symbolic images." (Morris D., "The Human Animal: A Personal View
of the Human Species", ISIS: Oxford UK, 1994, p192)
As he says, it is indeed "extremely crude".
Renfrew, in a recent archaeology book I read at a newstand, says that
only the neck is incised. The arms may not be. Therefore it may
not be a figurine at all, jjust a bit of rock that someone made a
couple of cuts at to see what it was like underneath, and then
abandoned.
GM>L. A. Schepartz, "Language and Modern Human Origins," Yearbook of
>Physical Anthropology, 36:91-126(1993), p. 117;
1993
>Robert G. Bednarik, "Art Origins", Anthropos, 89(1994):169-180, p. 170;
1994
>R.G. Bednarik, "Comments", Rock Art Research 5:2(1988): 91-107, p. 98;
1988! :-)
Note again the "Early Etchings", article is *1996*
JB>Shaman art is consistent with the view that covenant making, God
>worshipping man is a sudden, recent event. The idea that he
>existed 5 myr ago is completely at odds with the evidence which,
>even viewed most favorably, bespeaks only of incipient humanity.
Hooray! Someone else agrees with me. :-)
[...]
GM>Jim, If you want to dismiss what my friend says go ahead and do
>so. The first point with Hugh's "expert" was that the paper the
>fellow wrote was given at a Christian conference, NOT a scientific
>conference. If we cite this type of 'expert' then I know lots of
>'expert' giving papers on the geocentricity of the earth. A person
>needs to have done a certain level of study before he can become an
>expert. This guy that Ross cites may have done it, but his name did
>not ring a bell among the anthropologists or neural anatomists I
>have been reading over the past couple of years.
Well, if Hugh's "expert" is the guy who writes the anthropology
pieces for Ross' Facts & Faith, he is right up with the latest
anthropology.
BTW I wonder how many of the "anthropologists or neural anatomists"
Glenn has "been reading over the past couple of years" claim that
Homo habilis/erectus lived 5.5 mya and had the technology to constuct
a 3-decker Ark? Come to think of it, what does Glenn's
anthropologist "friend" think of Glenn's theory?
GM>Secondly, I hate to say this but it has been my experience that
>Christians presenting 'scientific' papers at Christian conferences
>are too often woefully wrong about the facts of the field. When I
>have gone to check the facts out, I find that they are wrong about
>99% of the time. I think it is because the only way to be invited
>to give a paper at those things is if you tell people what they want
>to hear. If you tell them what they need to hear, you won't be
>invited. Christians want to hear that evolution is false and that
>geology and anthropology supports their interpretation of the Bible.
>I wish this bias were not so. But since it is, I don't trust that
>type of source without hearing the line of reasoning and having
>references.
No doubt there is an element of truth in this, and no doubt it was
particularly true in Glenn's experience as a YEC. But it is less true
as time goes on, as Ratzsch points out:
"The newly emerging upper tier of the creationist movement, however,
seems to have little patience with the vague popularized treatments
and is, again, undertaking to do the meticulous detail work that a
genuinely scientific creationism requires...Most of
this group's present work seems to fall into three areas: (1)
constructing a competent philosophy of science defense for the
legitimacy in science of the hypothesis that life embodies design and
structure not well accountable by purely natural means; (2) exploring
detailed technical- and perhaps ultimately intractable-problems with
attempts to explain relevant data, structures and events (like the
origin of life) by purely natural means; and (3) attempting to
construct rigorous, legitimately scientific positive cases for
creationist positions (such as design theory) in various areas of
conflict with mainstream theory....those in the emerging upper tier
are starting out with serious credentials (Ph.D.s from Cambridge,
Harvard, the University of Chicago and Berkeley, for instance) in
relevant areas (such as philosophy of science, paleontology,
chemistry, mathematics) and with a recognition that shortcuts will
not do. Future work produced-whether right or wrong-is not likely to
be either uninformed or more polemical than substantive." (Ratzsch
D.L., "The Battle of Beginnings: Why Neither Side is Winning the
Creation-Evolution Debate", InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove, Ill.,
1996, pp84-85)
GM>Christian apologists need to take a long hard look in the mirror.
So do TE "Christian apologists", especially those who claim that
"evolution is" *true "and that geology and anthropology supports
*their* interpretation of the Bible"! :-)
[...]
GM>Fourth, Ross gave none of that fellows' line of reasoning
>supporting such a conclusion. So as far as I know the guy just made
>a statement with no evidence. At least, my friend gave me, and I
>gave you the line of reasoning backing up his assertion. Just
>saying there was no language in the hominids requires me to trust
>Ross and this unknown guy AND go against the beliefs of the vast
>majority of anthropologists. They almost all believe that there was
>some level of language among Homo erectus and Neanderthal. (see
>Dean Falk, "Comments", Current Anthropology 30:2, April 1989, p.
>141)
This is by no means a consensus, or even a majority view:
"Could the Zhoukoudian erectus speak? Their hunting and
technological skills would suggest they possessed some kind of
symbolic communication. If the skull was, in fact, used as a symbol
as we have speculated, then symbolic communication is even more
suggestive. However, this is a subject on which there is little
agreement. Some anthropologists argue that the tools used by H.
erectus assumes speech capability; others study the evolution of the
skull and how the brain (e.g., Broca's area) was affected, and
conclude speech began quite early in hominid evolution (Falk, 1987).
Still others believe that speech did not originate until the Upper
Paleolithic, or at least cannot be proved until then (Davidson and
Noble, 1989). At this point, we agree with Falk when she says,
`Unfortunately, what it is going to take to settle the debate about
when language originated in hominids is a time machine Until one
becomes available, we can only speculate about this fascinating and
important question' (1989, p. 141)" (Nelson H. & Jurmain R.,
"Introduction To Physical Anthropology", West Publishing Company:
St. Paul, Fifth Edition, 1991, p483)
GM>The only thing my friend pointed out was that there are no scorch
>marks. I had not realized that. Now, you can dismiss my friend as being a
>non-expert, but I will now plagiarize his point and note that there are no
>scorch marks on the flute. This does not take an expert. So, to conclude,
>Hugh's alternative is at odds with the observational data and once again, when
>I go to check out what a Christian apologist says, I find that it is false.
I am not sure that the bow or guide part of a fire drill would
necessarily have "scorch marks" on it. In any event, Ross does
not say that it definitely *was* used in lighting fires, just that it
was one alternatuve:
"However, they seem to overlook some more obvious considerations.
The bone was found near a hearth with charcoal and many burnt
fragments of animal bones. One of the holes goes all the way through
the bone and the other does not. These facts suggest at least some
likelihood that the bone was an instrument for lighting fires (by
twirling a twig in or through one of the holes with a bow). The
holes may result from the bone's use as a hammer head or an axe head.
Other possibilities abound. Most importantly, the researchers
apparently did not construct a bear femur flute according to this
bone's specifications to test whether or not it is capable of
producing music." (Ross H, "The Meaning of Art and Music", Facts &
Faith, Reasons To Believe: Pasadena CA, Vol. 10, No. 4, Fourth
Quarter 1996, pp6,11)
GM>Why should this be the case? Shouldn't Christians strive to the
>highest levels of excellence and get their facts straight?
So says the man who claims that Noah was a Homo habilis (or is it
erectus) and built a 3-decker Ark 5.5 mya, and then forgot everything
until only about 30 kya, he regained the ability to make a bone
whistle! :-)
[...]
GM>Ross is silly to call a being that manufactures musical
>instruments, manufactures jewelry, engages in underground mining and
>built stone walls and paved areas, AND left evidence of the worship
>of bears(like the Chippewa and Ainu of recent times), a
>non-spiritual non-human. By this criteria, you aren't human either.
>(You don't worsip bears do you?)
Ross may be *wrong* on this, but that does not make him "silly".
Glenn believes that Adam was a Homo erectus who lived 5.5 mya. I
think Glenn is wrong in this, but I don't think he is silly.
Happy New Year!
Steve
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