keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) (03/21/85)
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Ok guys, here it is. Sorry for the delay, I hate disconnected
references as much as anyone, but the specific references weren't
convenient at the time.
The following transcription is an exerpt from a television program
that aired on PBS channel 28 in Los Angeles at least a year ago.
It was called 'Creation vs Evolution: Battle in the Classroom'
The show was a production of KPBS-TV San Diego (c) 1982, and
was produced by Ryall Wilson. At the end of the show, it was
indicated that you could get a complete transcript of the program
by writing:
Creation
KPBS
San Diego, 92182
It was primarily an interview type of program, with some
narriation. The principal players (in this excerpt) were:
Dr. Bob Slaughter, Vertebrate Palentologist at Southern Methodist University
Dr. William Mayer, Biological Sciences Curriculum Study
Dr. Duane Gish, Institute for Creation Research
Dr. Russel Dolittle, University of California, San Diego
I will start this excerpt with a comment by Dr. Gish on the ICR's
'statement of belief'
Gish: The members of the staff of the Instutute for Creation Research
do sign a statement of faith. That is to maintain the integrity
of our organization. We certainly do not believe that signing
such a statement of faith questions the integrity of our
science. The integrity of our science stands seperate from
our own personal belief you see.
Dolittle: Once you sign a statement of beliefs, then you're trapped into
rationalizing everything that dosen't coincide with, for
example, that literal interpretation of the Bible. What do
these people say about the light that comes here from galaxies
that are millions of light years away for example?
Gish: Of course, if galaxies are billions of light years away from
the earth, it would take billions of years then for the light
to reach the earth from these distant galaxies. How then, if
things are young, if creation took place relatively recently,
rather than billions of years ago, why can we see the light
coming from these distant galaxies? Well, we must remember
that God created a fully operational universe, and he created
those stars to be for signs and seasons on the earth. Obviously
he had to do something so that man could see those stars
immediately. What he must have done then, was to create the
light between the earth and the star so that we would see the
stars immediatly.
Dolittle: Sure, God could have created the light beams out there 6000
years ago. He could have created the fossil record so that
we found it in all this different strata also. Why would he
want to fool us like that? Why would he make us think there
was an evolution if there wasn't an evolution? I don't mind
people believeing anything they want. If their religion wants
to say this or that, that's alright with me. Where I'm
disturbed is that they're trying to intrude into the science
classroom with all this pseudo-science.
At this point I will skip ahead to the part regarding the Paluxy river site.
Narr: Dr. Bob Slaughter is a vertebrate palentologist at Southern
Methodist University. Creationists once sought his professional
opinion of their man tracks:
Slaughter: They showed me one that, I had to admit, I can understand how
anyone might think it was something like that because it was
very suggestive. It was approximately the right size and
slightly 'bean' shaped, I guess is the best way I could say,
but after looking around, I could see that this was the heel
print of a Camptosaur that was apparently going slightly downgrade
without the toes showing. So that bean shape comes from the in-step
of the dinosaur, and oh, 8-10 feet away I could see where the
track was broader, and there was another one where it was broader
and then finally you could see the beginning of the three toes.
I pointed out that here goes the trackway here and thats the
heel print of a Camptosaur, they said "No, he's going this
direction and it's going on to the rock over there, that's
why you don't see others." Well, I could see then that they didn't
really want identification, they wanted authentication of what
they thought they were. But about a year later, a graduate
student and myself were working down in the area, and I said,
"Say, let me show you some of those 'man' prints that you hear
about." We'd go over and look at that very same identical track
and lo and behold, it had sprouted toes. I'm not saying it was
them, you understand, it could have been teenagers just having
fun or something, but that does put human looking footprints
out there for someone to find.
Narr: Other palentologists who have see the footprints dismiss them as
dinosaur tracks, modern carvings, or the marks of erosion.
Gish: But of course, since evolutionists believe that the dinosaurs died
out 70 million years before man even evolved, they refuse to
believe that these possibly could be human tracks. But never the
less, they certainly look like human tracks.
Narr: Some creationists have proclaimed the tracks as the death warrant
for evolution, but they have not published their findings in
professional journals, the accepted forum for scientific debate.
Mayer: The so-called creation scientist has contributed nothing to the
understanding of evolution, they do not publish in reputable
refereed journals, their materials are not subject to peer review,
they are not considered seriously by other scientists.
Gish: Our science is just as good as anyone elses, and so one could not
say we do not have good science. It merely the interpretation of
the evidence that differs. Now as far as those articles dealing
specifically with creation, not often do we publish them in
standard journals, simply because they would never be accepted,
they are not interested.
Narr: Palentologists have explored the same Paluxy river rock formations
for fossil bones. Were the bones of dinosaurs and man found
together? That would be expected if they walked the earth at
the same time
Slaugher: We spent 5 whole summers up there prospecting a 200 mile area of
these same age rocks. Looking for BONES, you find the SKULL of
a man, then we'll have to talk about it. We were looking for
bones, and we collected about 260 tons of these sediments,
brought them back to SMU, dried them, dissolved them, put them
through screens, sorted out the residue. Lots of fishes, lizards
frogs, salamanders, dinosaurs, LOTS of dinosaurs, and a few
mammals, but not a single bit of evidence of any mammal larger
than a small rat, much less the size of a man. We couldn't have
missed it. In all over the last 120 years at least, there's
been millions and millions of fossil bones found, and not a single
time are they ever out of place.
I will skip ahead to a later comment on Archeopterix:
Slaugher: I have some thing here I'd like to show you about Archeopterix.
(he produces a chart of the skeleton of Archeopterix, a modern
bird, and a small lizard-like dinosaur.) It is one of the
perfect transitional animals. The Archeopterix has a reptilian
type of vertebrae. It also has a reptillian tail, many many many
joints in the tail, whereas all modern birds, there all fuzed into
one little biscuit called a Pygostile. The pelvic girdle of
reptiles is in 3 parts, very simple, just like Archeopterix,
whereas in modern birds, the pelvic bones and the sacral vertebrae
are all fuzed into one big basket. The skeleton of Archeopterix
is so reptilian, that if we hadn't the feathers in the beginning,
it probably would have been classified as a reptile.
Later, a note on relationships between man and apes:
Narr: Dr. Dolittles lab is one of many studying the evolutionary
relationships with animals by comparing their proteins.
Dolittle: Proteins are long chains of units called amino acids. The order
of these amino acids is dictated by DNA, your genetic material.
The more closely two creatures are related, the more closely
related are their amino acid sequences. Ever since the time of
Darwin, the chimpanzee has been regarded as man's nearest relative.
Naturally, it was then of interest to biochemists to see what
chimpanzee proteins would look like. Now the first protein to
be looked at in a chimpanzee and compared with a human, was
the hemoglobin molecule. Hemoglobin, one of the blood proteins.
And in fact, there were no differences found in the chimpanzee
molecule when 141 amino acids were looked at in the hemoglobin
alpha chain. In contrast, if you looked at a rhesus monkey,
there were 4 differences. Or if you looked at a rabbit, you
found that the differences got up into the 20's (25). If you
got up to a chicken, you'd find 59 differences, and if you
looked at a fish you'd find there are more than 100 differences.
Now this is exactly what you would expect from the point of view
of evolution.
Narr: Three more proteins were analyzed.
Dolittle: Once again no differences compared, chimpanzees compared with
human. It was astonishing. In fact, a rumor began to sweep
around biochemists that maybe the differences between
chimpanzee and human were really going to turn out to be
cultural (:-) I think). Well, in fact, one more protein was
quickly looked at, this was a large one, 259 amino acids, and
a difference was found. 'Whew', there are differences between
chimpanzee and human after all. Its just that we are very very
closely related.
Gish: If we look at certain proteins, yes, man, then, it can be assumed
that man is more closely related to a chimpanzee than other things.
But on the other hand, if you look at other proteins, you'll find
that man is more closely related to a bullfrog than he is a
chimpanzee, if you focus your attention on other proteins, you'll
find that man is more closely related to a chicken than he is to
a chimpanzee.
Dolittle: Oh BullFrog!, I've heard that jibbergish before I have to tell
you. I have just a BOOK full of data here, of amino acid
sequences from thousands of proteins now from many hundreds of
species, and I will give Dr. Gish my entire set of worldly
belongings, thats a 63 volkswagen and half a house, I will give
him that, if he can find ONE protein in which chickens or
bullfrogs are more closely related to human proteins than
are chimpanzee proteins. There are in fact, more differences
when you compare the proteins of cats and lions on the one hand,
or dog and foxes, donkeys and horses, than there are for the
corresponding proteins in chimp and human.
Gish: Then why isn't man and the chimpanzee a single 'kind'. Since
they are so very similar. Well, I think they're just simply
looking in the wrong place when they make such decisions.
Dolittle: Wrong place? Where's the right place? Look in the good book?
No, I think looking at protein amino acid sequences just about
as compelling a place you could look to find the similarities
between organisms. They're direct reflection of your genetic
material. They stem directly from your DNA.
Narr: Scientists argue over the mechanism, but to the vast majority
the evidence in support of evolution is overwhelming.
Mayer: Evolution is probably the most valid of scientific theorys.
A scientific theory, contrary to popular opinion, is not an
ephemeral guess. It is a hypothesis that has been shown
to be correct again and again and again in a wide vareity
of ways with a tremendous accumulation of data.
Keith Doyle
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"You'll PAY to know what you REALLY think!"