keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) (03/21/85)
[........................] 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 # {ucbvax,decvax,ihnp4}!trwrb!cadovax!keithd "You'll PAY to know what you REALLY think!"