On Wed, 1 Dec 1999 20:52:58 -0600 (CST), Susan B wrote:
SB>Has anybody ever heard of "The Revised Quote Book" put out
>by the Creation Science Foundation of Brisbane, Australia?
Since I quoted from it recently in one of my responses to Susan's "Why
lie?" post, to the effect that the reason creationists quoted from
evolutionists is because they *are* still believers in evolution, clearly I have
heard of the RQB and indeed I own a copy of it.
But I gather from a later post from Susan that she wants to know if there is
a more recent one that "The Revised Quote Book". My copy is dated 1990,
and I looked on the Answers in Genesis online bookstore at
http://shop.gospelcomdirect.com/AIG/detail.asp?NodeID=182 and they
have a picture of it that looks just the same as mine, complete with the
yellow sash at the bottom right-hand corner with "New" on it. I would be
interested if it has been updated since 1990.
SB>.http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/patterson.html
And I am probably in a unique position on this List to shed some light on
this one-sided story. I was a member of the Australian Fidonet Creation vs
Evolution echo when Lionel Theunissen posted his letter to Patterson (see
below) and Patterson's reply (see below) to the echo in early 1995.
Theunissen's letter as worded in such a one-sided way that a busy Patterson
would almost certainly agree with it. It is interesting that Theunissen does
not have a copy of his letter to Patterson on the above web site, even
though he has everything else.
The thing is that Patterson confirmed that "The specific quote you mention,
from a letter to Sunderland dated 10th April 1979, is accurate as far as it
goes". This was important because Theunissen was doubting that it could
even be checked.
I am not a YEC and I do have some constructive criticisms of the CSF. I
do suspect they overreached themselves in giving the impression they had a
copy of Patterson's letter in their files, rather than just Sunderland's book
which referred to the letter. But the RQB makes it clear that the quotes in
particular were from Sunderland's book, so I don't know why they didn't
just say that to Theunissen. But Theunissen was an openly hostile critic of
the CSF, who had disrupted their meetings, so the CSF's Carl Wieland's
unwillingness to help Theunissen is understandable, even if not justifiable.
I also agree that the CSF's gives the impression that Patterson is saying
there *are* no transitional forms (in the sense of a direct `parent-child'
relationship), when he is saying there is no way to *know* that any
particular fossil is such a direct transitional form.
But evolutionists are also happy to thrive on this same ambiguity, using the
word "transitional" in the sense of an indirect `uncle-cousin' relationship, to
imply to a direct `parent-child' relationship.
And while I do agree their CSF's quote book still needs a bit of work in
that they could obtain more of the primary references (I myself have
obtained a number of them), and getting rid of some of the less checkable
quotes, I do not agree that the Revised Quote Book is as bad as
Theunissen makes out. To be sure there are still some errors in it, but most
of the quotes I have checked out are accurate, although at least one is
wrongly referenced.
I personally have benefited greatly from the RQB in my early days in the
Creation/Evolution controversy, because it was an eye opener to me that
there were *any* quotes by evolutionists with doubts about or problems
with aspects of evolution. I think this is the real reason why the
evolutionists try to discredit the book-because it is *effective*!
BTW I also disagree with Theunissen's claim that Patterson's "keynote
address" to the American Museum of Natural History "has been
misrepresented" and that it "is a comment on systematics only, rather than
a general comment on evolution".
I have a photocopy of the original transcript, complete with typos, and
although it was not a "keynote" address, it *was* an address by Patterson,
a senior paleontologist and systematist with the British Museum of Natural
History (London), to a group of professional systematists at the American
Museum of Natural History (New York), in which he was quite critical of
modern evolutionary theory, likening it to the pre-Darwinian creationists
(the *philosophical*, not the Biblical, sort).
I have been meaning for some time to post Patterson's transcript to my web
page. Susan's post has reminded me and I have now done it. See
http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones/pattamnh.html
It can be easily seen that Patterson's claim that: "...my talk was addressed
to professional systematists, and concerned systematics, nothing else", is
not borne out by his actual words, which while they were "addressed to
professional systematists, and concerned systematics", they most certainly
were not "nothing else"!
Steve
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Received: 27 January 1995
-=> Quoting Lionel Theunissen to Stephen Jones <
[...]
Firstly, here is the bulk of the message that I wrote to Patterson dated 9th
of July 1993:
(QUOTE ON)
TO:
Palaeontology Department, British Museum of Natural History.
ATTN: Dr. Colin Patterson.
July 9th 1993.
Dear Sir, I recently read your book "Evolution" and feel compelled to write
to you. I notice in the forward of your book an invitation for readers to
contact you. I realise that this was made some time ago, so I hope that you
will not mind this intrusion on your time. However, you are probably the
only person who can solve the particular dilemna I have...The reason I am
writing to you is because of the use of several 'quotations' of yourself in
Creationist literature here in Australia...In 1990 the CSF published a
booklet entitled the "Revised Quote Book". It is a 'revised' version because
the original "Quote Book" was withdrawn after a number of the
'quotations' were found to be blatant misquotes.
The "Revised Quote Book" contains five quotations of yourself. None of
these are checkable in a library; Two are quotes of a letter you wrote to
Luther D. Sunderland, a Creationist who has since published a book
entitled "Darwin's Enigma" containing excerpts of your letter. Two are
extracts of a BBC TV interview you gave in 1982, and the other refers to a
keynote address you gave at the American Museum of Natural History in
1981.
The editor of the "Revised Quote Book" claims that the source material is
held on file for all the 'quotations'. I recently contacted the CSF asking if
they could provide me with the source for your particular quotations, as
they were otherwise uncheckable. I received a rather rude reply from Dr.
Carl Wieland, the director of the CSF...He refused to allow access to the
files, and so writing to you is the last practical measure I can take in my
investigation.
Specifically, I would appreciate it if you could clarify the meaning (as well
as the accuracy of the quotation) of your words in the following example,
as I suspect that you are being misrepresented by the Creationists.
The 'quote' is a current favourite. I have personally heard Carl Wieland use
it in his lectures, and it is in wide use by the general Creationist community.
It appears in the "Revised Quote Book" under the heading "Are there any
transitional forms at all?":
35. '...I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of
evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I
would certainly have included them. You suggest that an artist should be
used to visualise such transformations, but where would he get the
information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it
to artistic licence, would that not mislead the reader?
I wrote the text of my book four years ago. If I were to write it now, I
think the book would be rather different. Gradualism is a concept I believe
in, not just because of Darwin's authority, but because my understanding of
genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people
are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a
palaeontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical
problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record. You say that I
should at least 'show a photo of the fossil from which each type of
organism was derived.' I will lay it on the line -- there is not one such fossil
for which one could make a watertight argument.'
(Personal letter (written 10 April 1979) from Dr Colin Patterson, Senior
Palaeontologist at the British Museum of Natural History in London, to
Luther D. Sunderland; as quoted in "Darwin's Enigma" by Luther D.
Sunderland, Master Books, San Diego, USA, 1984, p.89.)
Creationists claim you are saying that there are no transitional forms.
To me, however, you just seem to be saying that it is difficult to determine
which of the many transitional forms we are aware of are truly ancestral to
other known species.
For example, it is difficult to deny that archaeopteryx is clear evidence of a
high-level transition between reptiles and birds.
However, it is, as you point out in your book "Evolution" (p133),
impossible for a fossil to disclose whether it is a true ancestor of something
else.
For me, fossils such as archaeopteryx are definite transitional forms
although they are not necessarily in the direct ancestral line which led to
modern birds.
They may have, for example, branched off somewhere along the line,
although they would at least be closely related to the true ancestors of
birds.
The reason we have to construct evolutionary linages from such examples
is because they are the species which just happened to be preserved and
discovered as fossils.
I would greatly appreciate your comments on whether my interpretation,
the Creationist interpretation, or some other interpretation of your words is
correct.
Yours Sincerely,
(QUOTE OFF)
CONT'D-->
========================================================================
========================================================================
Received: 27 January 1995
-=> Quoting Lionel Theunissen to Stephen Jones <=
*Now here is Dr. Pattersons' reply dated 16th of August 1993:
(QUOTE ON)
Dear Mr Theunissen, Sorry to have taken so long to answer your letter of
July 9th. I was away for a while, and then infernally busy.
I seem fated continually to make a fool of myself with creationists.
The specific quote you mention, from a letter to Sunderland dated 10th
April 1979, is accurate as far as it goes.
The passage continues"...a watertight argument. The reason is that
statements about ancestry and descent are not applicable in the fossil
record. Is ARCHAEOPTERYX the ancestor of all birds? Perhaps yes,
perhaps no: there is no way of answering the question. It is easy enough to
make up stories of how one form gave rise to another, and to find reasons
why the stages should be favoured by natural selection. But such stories are
not part of science, for there is no way of putting them to the test."
I think the continuation of the passage shows clearly that your
interpretation (at the end of your letter) is correct, and the creationists' is
false.
That brush with Sunderland (I had never heard of him before) was my first
experience of creationists.
The famous "keynote address" at the American Museum of Natural History
in 1981 was nothing of the sort. It was a talk to the "Systematics
Discussion Group" in the Museum, an (extremely) informal group.
I had been asked to talk to them on "Evolution and creationism": fired up
by a paper by Ernst Mayr published in SCIENCE just the week before. I
gave a fairly rumbustious talk, arguing that the theory of evolution had
done more harm than good to biological systematics (classification).
Unknown to me, there was a creationist in the audience with a hidden tape
recorder. So much the worse for me.
But my talk was addressed to professional systamatists, and concerned
systematics, nothing else.
I hope by now I have learned to be more circumspect in dealing with
creationists, cryptic or overt.
But I still maintain that scepticism is the scientist's duty however much the
stance may expose us to ridicule.
Yours sincerely,
Colin Patterson
(QUOTE OFF)
[...]
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Stephen E. (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ Email: sejones@iinet.net.au
3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ Web: http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
Warwick 6024 -> *_,--\_/ Phone: +61 8 9448 7439
Perth, Western Australia v "Test everything." (1 Thess. 5:21)
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