Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Pat Buchanan has a column at the Worldnutdaily reciting the familiar litany of idiotic anti-evolution arguments. He's reached for two of the oldest and silliest of them, Piltdown Man and Nebraska Man. And he starts by proving his ignorance:
With publication of "On the Origin of Species" in 1859, the hunt was on for the "missing link." Fame and fortune awaited the scientist who found the link proving Darwin right: that man evolved from a monkey.
The only correct statement in that paragraph is that Darwin did indeed publish in 1859. But no, there was no hunt for a missing link to prove evolution true because one fossil could never do that. The evidence for evolution is found in the patterns of appearance of millions of fossils all over the world, patterns that make no sense at all without evolution to explain why they appeared in precisely that order.
And no, humans did not evolve from monkeys and no scientist believes they did. Monkeys, Mr. Buchanan, are not the same as chimpanzees or the great apes and are only a relatively distant cousin of the species that gave rise to Homo sapiens. This is really, really basic stuff, Pat. You should have learned it by the 10th grade.
In 1912, success! In a gravel pit near Piltdown in East Sussex, there was found the cranium of a man with the jaw of an ape."Darwin Theory Proved True," ran the banner headline.
Evolution skeptics were pilloried, and three English scientists were knighted for validating Piltdown Man.
It wasn't until 1953, after generations of biology students had been taught about Piltdown Man, that closer inspection discovered that the cranium belonged to a medieval Englishman, the bones had been dyed to look older, and the jaw belonged to an orangutan whose teeth had been filed down to look human.
The scientific discovery of the century became the hoax of the century.
Well yes, all of this is essentially true. It's also irrelevant. Yes, nearly a century ago someone played a hoax by creating a fake fossil skull. The skull never did fit into the pattern of human evolution known from other remains and it was never accepted outside of some British scientific circles, and there mostly out of a misplaced sense of nationalism.
The hoax was discovered not by creationists but by scientists, using new tools that did not exist at the time the skull was "discovered." And why were they doing such tests? Because by that time, the Piltdown specimen was utterly anomalous when compared to all the other remains we had. It simply did not fit and made no sense and the scientists were attempting to find out why. In other words, they were doing science.
In 1922, Henry Fairfield Osborn, president of the American Museum of Natural History, identified a tooth fossil found in Nebraska to be that of an "anthropoid ape." He used his discovery to mock William Jennings Bryan, newly elected to Congress, as "the most distinguished primate which the state of Nebraska has yet produced."
Yes, Osborn misidentified a tooth, but he did so quite tentatively and then he organized a new research project to find out if that identification was correct. When he found out it was not, he immediately retracted the claim. As for this alleged quote about Bryan, it appears to be made up by Buchanan. A search for that phrase on Google turns up no source other than this article.
Invited to testify at the Scopes trial, however, Osborn begged off. For, by 1925, Nebraska Man's tooth had been traced to a wild pig, and Creationist Duane Gish, a biochemist, had remarked of Osborn's Nebraska Man, "I believe this is a case in which a scientist made a man out of a pig, and the pig made a monkey out of the scientist."
Wrong again. Osborn did not "beg off" testifying at the Scopes Trial because there was no scientific evidence presented at the trial at all. The judge refused to allow any. And yes, around that time the tooth had been identified as that of an extinct peccary -- by scientists sent by Osborn himself to dig up the evidence and see if it confirmed his tentative identification or not.
Of course, Buchanan is entirely safe in peddling such bullshit; his audience will not -- cannot -- call him on it, for they are as ignorant as he is.
Politics
Comments
Am I reading that wrong, or is he suggesting Duane Gish made that statement by 1925? Gish was born in 1921.
That's quite a zinger for a four year-old.
Posted by: DaveL | March 5, 2010 12:22 PM
Unfortunately people like Pat Buchanan really do believe that science is a religion. And one thing religions don't do is admit to mistakes in their teachings. With religion you claim to be right no matter what the evidence, and you must've really screwed the pooch if you admit an error in past beliefs. Science routinely overturns previous theories because science doesn't care if it was right yesterday. It only cares if it's right tomorrow.
Posted by: penn | March 5, 2010 12:26 PM
In Buchanan's defense (*ugh*), the "most distinguished primate" quote wasn't too far off. (Osborne actually said, "has thus far produced", not "has yet produced").
Anyway, I'm looking forward to Buchanan's sequels to the article. He did a good job of dealing with the evidence for the two most discredited examples of hominid evolution. I'm hoping he'll do an equally good job of dealing with the evidence for all the thousands of examples that haven't been discredited.
Posted by: chaos_engineer | March 5, 2010 12:29 PM
Is there something wrong with being a distinguished primate? I would be quite pleased at being labeled the most distinguished primate that Kansas has produced, though it would of course not be remotely true.
Posted by: Gretchen | March 5, 2010 12:35 PM
Disclaimer: I know very little about Pat Buchanon apart from some of his stated political views, his divergence from the mainstream right, and some of the sorry, barely-disguised racist crap he peddles in certain works (i.e. Death of the West) I've read in college courses. I also know that the guy's a Catholic, so I've always found his denial of evolution a bit curious. I can only assume that it's more a matter of politics than theology.
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 5, 2010 12:38 PM
What a nice coincidence that Adult Swim aired the episode of Moral Orel last night in which Orel discovers the Missing Link. It's really shocking to talk to people who don't know anything about evolution and hear that things like this cause a great deal of confusion and consternation. Not only did humans not evolve from monkeys, they didn't really evolve from any apes either, at least certainly not any living species. Humans and the other great apes all descended from some other ancestral species which could probably be called an ape, but is certainly distinct from any living animal (which answers the idiotic question of why there are still chimps).
Furthermore, the idea of a missing link is meaningless. Animals don't spontaneously give birth to a new species and no scientist would ever claim that. If you lined up every individual animal in the line from the ancestral species forward to humans and walked from the oldest individual to me (for example), you'd never really notice any major changes. You would just notice gradually one species evolving into another. It's the same way that you never notice children growing, except on a macro scale you see them get bigger over the years. Every individual is in some sense a "missing link" but it's confusing to even use the term. It's meaningless.
It should also be pointed out that one hoax and one misidentification don't suddenly make the mind-boggling array of real fossils disappear. Archeopteryx or Tiktaalik don't disappear because someone points out Piltdown Man was a hoax. Even if it did rule out all your faith in fossil evidence, there's still overwhelming evidence from other sources (i.e. genetics, comparative anatomy, biogeography, and direct observation) to prove evolution as an iron-clad fact.
Posted by: Ryan | March 5, 2010 12:41 PM
Interesting - Pat's columns appear a week later on WND then the columns do on Townhall.
Posted by: yoshi | March 5, 2010 12:42 PM
Re Sadie Morrison
The late William F. Buckley Jr. also rejected the theory of evolution. Back in the 1990s, one of his Firing Line shows featured a debate between creationists and supporters of evolution, one of whom was Ken Miller. After the debate, Prof. Miller had a conversation with Mr. Buckley who complimented on his performance. There was some discussion of evolution between the two men which was summed up by Prof. Miller as follows. Prof. Miller found that Mr. Buckley appeared to be quite polite and quite intelligent and totally ignorant of biology.
Posted by: SLC | March 5, 2010 12:47 PM
This year's award for "the most distinguished primate which the state of Nebraska has yet produced [has thus far produced] (*)" goes to ....
Sen. Ben Nelson. (D)
(*) Either works for this purpose.
Posted by: History Punk | March 5, 2010 12:52 PM
DaveL-
Buchanan claims that 'by' 1925 Gish had made that remark. So he could have been younger than 4 when he said that...
Posted by: Michael | March 5, 2010 12:57 PM
Whenever I go over there, I am momentarily surprised when I see that it's not actually called WorldNutDaily but WorldNETDaily. But the former is so much more appropriate!
Buchanan's an interesting case. He's an isolationist, so he was pretty relentless on calling Bush/Cheney on some of their BS back at the start of the Iraq war. But he clearly has no clue about evolution.
Posted by: Dave M | March 5, 2010 1:11 PM
Is that why they call Buchanan a paleoconservative?
I recently had to tackle an even sillier creationism argument on one message board. The claim was that the only reason why slavery remained so entrenched in America for so long was because those evil evilutionists had been spreading their racist lies about the survival of the fittest.
One can just imagine how all those Southern plantation owners must have been caught up in the excitement as hundreds of European intellectuals swept across the southern states spreading the word of evolution with missionary zeal -- years before Darwin had published a word of his revolutionary thesis.
It must take a special kind of stupid to get it so completely wrong.
Posted by: tacitus | March 5, 2010 1:15 PM
Actually, while Osborne thought the tooth was probably an ape, he pointed out it could well be a swine tooth in his original article. Humans and swine have similar diets, so our teeth are very similar. Even if you count this as a mistake, it wasn't much of one!
Posted by: Michael Suttkus, II | March 5, 2010 1:32 PM
But I thought humans evolved from bacteria! (Ok, ok, not directly, of course)
Posted by: Pen | March 5, 2010 1:40 PM
Asides:
Buchanan is Roman Catholic. Fom what I understand the Church teaches evolution.
And: Is does he still appear on the McLaughlin Report?
Posted by: Reverend Rodney | March 5, 2010 2:10 PM
I always have to laugh when creationists act as though the Piltdown Man hoax somehow discredits all evolutionary theory.
I wonder how many pieces of the True Cross have been sold throughout history?
Posted by: Taz | March 5, 2010 2:20 PM
It's great to point out mistakes and I am all for it. Now, how about the scientists who spread the global warming lie. Even in science, idiology can play a part. In that regard, science is not as pure as some will lead you to believe. Also, you call the website site 'world nut daily'. Do you believe what CNN and nost other 'news' outlets tell you? For that matter, how about what Obama tells you? I know scientists who, even after presenting them with facts, still don't understand what Obama is doing to this country. I'm not trying to go off point here, just pointing out how education doesn't always lead to common sense.
Posted by: Rick | March 5, 2010 2:26 PM
Rick,
One word question:
Evidence?
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 5, 2010 2:29 PM
Re the popular term "the missing link": last year the linguist Ben Zimmer wrote a piece tracing its history, which some of you may find interesting.
Posted by: Steve Morrison | March 5, 2010 2:30 PM
Re rick
Mr. rick and his ilk in the climate change denialist community are obviously not satisfied in showing that the overwhelming majority of the climate scientists in the world are only wrong but are also corrupt.
Posted by: SLC | March 5, 2010 2:36 PM
I would like to propose that references to Pat Buchanan's ignorant blather be stricken from any future headlines. Simply use the word "talks" instead, and we can assume that what follows will be ignorant blather.
Over a year this would save quite a few words, leading to correspondingly lower electricity bills.
Posted by: Captain Mike | March 5, 2010 2:43 PM
I thought all "scientists" constantly blathered ignorantly about evilution. After all, evolution doesn't exist in the first place, so talking about it is considered ignorant blathering - you know sort of like the marxist socialist and the HELLthcare bill.
Posted by: Mr. Hopey Changey | March 5, 2010 2:43 PM
Rick - I know scientists who, even after presenting them with facts, still don't understand what Obama is doing to this country. I'm not trying to go off point here, just pointing out how education doesn't always lead to common sense.
You mean intelligent people didn't accept your inane Glen Beck talking points even after you babbled at them? How dare they!
Posted by: Taz | March 5, 2010 2:46 PM
There are indeed scientists who will say that we did evolve from/still are monkeys, based on more modern clade-based classification schemes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eg0G3LQRz8I
It is also legitimate to say we evolved from fish (though note the comments about fish in the video, at about 8:30). It's a question of how far back one cares to go.
Any distinction between a monkey and an ape is utterly irrelevant to creationists. For the vast majority of them, anything put forward in support of evolution is simply dismissed. The entire human populace of Earth could be knee-deep in fossils of transitional species, but creationists would cover them with an impervious layer of denial. For a typical case see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IYQ6LZWlfU&feature;=related
(I suggest stopping after a minute or so, lest you barf on your keyboard.)
Though I am glad Ed and many others go to the effort, I fear that pointing out the ignorance of these schmucks in this sort of forum is a bit of an exercise in banging one's head against a wall. It does help keep the flow of information to those in some position to make a difference, such as teachers. I wish there were a way to get refutations of the drivel from Buchanan and his ilk published right next to their crap.
Posted by: Doug | March 5, 2010 2:53 PM
Taz,
I don't need Glen Beck to figure out what is the truth and I don't follow the media's agenda and I do not follow the worst administration I have ever studied. I don't want to get into this name calling BS. Why do facts get some people so angry? I am not a republican and I don't need to listen to their talking points. I didn't like either candidate for President but I did know Obama was not qualified. He won becasue it was a perfect storm that lead to his victory. Its time we all accept the facts and clean out both sides of the isle and start over.
Posted by: Rick | March 5, 2010 2:54 PM
Check this:
Interesting. Replace "global warming" by any other crankpot statement, and Rick's comment neither gains any coherence or loses any of its stupidity.
Posted by: dean | March 5, 2010 2:54 PM
I have asked before to explain why, even if humans had evolved from modern chimps, than the existence of extant human ancestors would be a problem. Certainly this is not the evolutionary norm, but why would it contradict the whole theory? If you had a highly evolutionarily stable parent species, and then you had a subgroup of that parent species become geographically isolated and introduce a mutation that upsets their evolutionary stability... there is no particular reason, at least not that I can see, why an extant ancestor species could not temporally co-exist with a distant descendant species. Like I say, given our current understanding of evolution it seems unlikely, but certainly not conceptually impossible.
Posted by: James Sweet | March 5, 2010 2:58 PM
Interesting. But if idiology (sic) plays a part in science, does it also play a part in spelling? Because it seems like people who share Rick's idiology (sic) have a tendency spell words a little differently than most people I know...
Posted by: James Sweet | March 5, 2010 3:01 PM
Dan,
I see how your ideology prevents you from having a conversation. Why is that? Think real hard about it. Kind of like a Keith Oberman type of person. I have conversations with people of all back grounds and beliefs. In most cases, it's progressives that get angry and have no real facts to share. They get real upset then change the conversation. Political correctness and progressive liberalism has infected this country and common sense goes right out the window. I bet some of you truly believe what you are saying.
James, I was in a hurry and, yes, made a few spelling errors. Do you have any relevant information or just another weak response?
This is too easy.
Posted by: Rick | March 5, 2010 3:05 PM
So is he referring to the east and west sides of the island, or the north and south sides of the island? Or the top and bottom????
Oh, he just misspelled aisle. Never mind.
Posted by: James Sweet | March 5, 2010 3:05 PM
That's really weird, considering that the Emancipation Proclamation followed Origins by only four years, issued by a President whose detractors liked to refer to him as a "gorilla."
Posted by: Scott Hanley | March 5, 2010 3:05 PM
@Rick:
I love the complete lack of self-awareness that is needed for someone to make this comment.
Posted by: tacitus | March 5, 2010 3:06 PM
Buchanan is a Catholic, yes, but he's the kind of Catholic who thinks Mass should still be in Latin (only).
Enough to build an Ark!
Posted by: Nemo | March 5, 2010 3:06 PM
I have seen your comments and people's respones to them on other threads, and as a result I am quite sure you have already heard all of the relevant information I might have to offer. Unfortunately, little of it seems to have filtered through your idiology (sic).
So in answer to your question: No thanks, I'd rather just take cheap pot shots at this point. I don't think that attempting to enlighten you would be any more productive, and the former is just more fun.
Posted by: James Sweet | March 5, 2010 3:07 PM
James,
Once again, you post an empty, weak response with nothing relevant. Time to step into the real world and out of the fantasy world school and the media taught you.
Posted by: Rick | March 5, 2010 3:09 PM
Rick seems to be under the impression that he's actually presented arguments here. He has not. He's made assertions, of course, but those are not arguments.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | March 5, 2010 3:18 PM
Not about ideology at all - unless it's yours, which seems to be "I'll blindly deny the results of any science I don't like." Perhaps, like many of others who post here, you should study the things about which you comment.
Oh, the bit about "they get real upset then change the conversation" you mentioned? It's probably because they are embarrassed for you because of your lack of comprehension
By the way, try reading carefully: the name isn't Dan.
.
Posted by: dean | March 5, 2010 3:26 PM
Buchanan's political history is no better than his science or history of science. Jennings served two terms in congress from 1891 to 1895. The whole column looks like Buchanan dashed it out facing a deadline. It's nothing more than a mish mash of badly recalled anecdotes.
Posted by: John McKay | March 5, 2010 3:30 PM
My turn.
If, I may ask, just what exactly is President Obama doing that relates to science that these scientists do not understand?
Posted by: Chilidog | March 5, 2010 3:32 PM
Rick, #17: Also, you call the website site 'world nut daily'. Do you believe what CNN and nost other 'news' outlets tell you? For that matter, how about what Obama tells you?
That's right. Everyone is biased, everyone is lying, and no one can be trusted. So we can all just make up our own facts and believe whatever we want to believe.
Does anyone else remember when conservatives used to complain against this kind of "post-modernism?"
Posted by: Chiroptera | March 5, 2010 3:34 PM
Rick - Why do facts get some people so angry?
What facts? You haven't presented any. You haven't even presented arguments to back up your opinions. And the sad thing is, you don't even realize it. Just coming on here and posting that "Obama sucks" or "scientists don't know what they're talking about" isn't making an argument. All you do is spew talking points. Your posts have no substance.
Posted by: Taz | March 5, 2010 3:44 PM
The hijacking of threads by anti-AGWers is becoming so commonplace I think we need a term for it. Something along the lines of Godwin or Poe, so that when someone like Rick first raises the issue, the next person to comment can post a 1-word response like "Warmed!" or whatever, and no one else need waste their time replying.
Posted by: eric | March 5, 2010 3:48 PM
@42 -- Too bad the term Rickrolled is already taken.
Posted by: Dave | March 5, 2010 3:53 PM
Never underestimate the power of Dunning-Kruger.
Posted by: Dr X | March 5, 2010 3:53 PM
@ eric: how about "Hothead!"? Just for irony's sake.
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 5, 2010 3:57 PM
I was referring to Buchanan in #44, but this observation gets to the heart of the problem identified by Dunning-Kruger: Incompetents lack the metacognitive ability to realize that their own conclusions are erroneous.
Posted by: Dr X | March 5, 2010 4:00 PM
@ Dr. X: is that in reference to (in laypeople's terms) a lack of self-awareness?
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 5, 2010 4:05 PM
Are you actually going to try to defend World Net Daily as a credible news source?
I don't know how anybody could read this blog and think Ed was some kind of Obama-worshiping sycophant.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if you could neither name the scientists nor establish the facts to which you refer.
Common sense is often nothing more than a more respectable term for popular bigotry.
Posted by: DaveL | March 5, 2010 4:05 PM
He has to be. If you don't see the world exactly as Rick does, you might as well kneel down daily before your shrine to Hussein!
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 5, 2010 4:11 PM
Sadie, if you haven't yet read the study, it's an absolute must.
Posted by: DaveL | March 5, 2010 4:12 PM
Ed Brayton wrote:
Nitpick: I think you're missing the point. Humanity's ape ancestors evolved from species that, to a non-biologist, look like monkeys. Saying we didn't evolve from monkeys is misleading. If I say we evolved from monkeys and you say we didn't... it sounds like you're agreeing with Mr. Buchanan.
Posted by: David Ratnasabapathy | March 5, 2010 4:13 PM
Because every single liberal is exactly the same, and anyone who reads this blog is a liberal whose thoughts mirror Obama's perfectly. And I'm sure heddle would agree.
Posted by: Captain Mike | March 5, 2010 4:17 PM
Sadie 47,
It could be considered a form of self-awareness. More specifically, it's knowing about knowing. Dunning and Kruger showed that people lacking competence in a particular area don't know enough to critique themselves properly and they don't know that they don't know enough to critique themselves.
The other side of Dunning-Kruger is that the more highly competent tend to underestimate the quality of their own judgments.
Posted by: Dr X | March 5, 2010 4:19 PM
Thanks, DaveL and Dr. X!
Posted by: Sadie Morrison | March 5, 2010 4:27 PM
David @51:
I believe what Ed was saying is that Homo sapiens evolved from a common ancestor of the primate family, making AMH (Anatomically Modern Human) a cousin of Gorillas, Orangutans, Chimpanzees, Bonobos and Gibbons. Primates share a common but much older common ancestor with the old world monkeys, making the relationship between AMH and say a Tamarin or a Guenon much more distant than say AMH and Bonobos.
Posted by: Donna | March 5, 2010 4:49 PM
John McKay | March 5, 2010 3:30 PM:
Since you brought up Buchanan's political history ...
Posted by: llewelly | March 5, 2010 4:56 PM
"Rick": Once again, you post an empty, weak response with nothing relevant. Time to step into the real world and out of the fantasy world school and the media taught you.
"Dear kettle,
You are black.
Signed, The Pot."
Now begone, foul troll.
Posted by: Ray C. | March 5, 2010 5:21 PM
@jamessweet in 27
you're right that the ancestral species can be extant of course. it just so happens that in human beings, that's not the case. it's not hard to find example where that is true though. dogs, for example, are descended from modern wolves. that's a bit of a special case due to artificial breeding, but the point holds.
in fact, evolutionary theory casts doubt on what it even means to be a species. for single-celled, asexually reproducing organisms, the term "species" doesn't care much weight at all (given that the definition of a species is usually a group that can't mate with another group). if you read The Salamander's Tale in Dawkin's The Ancestor's Tale, he discusses how species are distinct mostly due to the fact that animals do in fact go extinct. if every species that had ever existed was extant it would be exceedingly difficult to put animals in so many different categories because everything would shade into each other. it's like the debate over human ancestory and what's really a distinct species...there's even "archaic" homo sapiens that are somehow more primitive than modern humans. somehow that inability to distinguish species which should show the gradual evolution of one into the other is seized on by creationists to show that scientists can't make up their mind.
Posted by: Ryan | March 5, 2010 5:35 PM
In the past, scientists made mistakes that were corrected by the hard honest diligent work of other scientists.
Yes, front page that.
Posted by: Jason Failes | March 5, 2010 5:47 PM
Birds are dinosaurs.
Birds are more closely related to some therapods than others. Therefor, birds are therapods. Therapods are dinosaurs. Therefor, birds are dinosaurs. The alternative, is to define "dinosaurs" in a way that rejects common descent.
Apes.
Just as birds are more closely related to some therapods than others, humans are more closely related to chimps and bonobos than we are to Orangutans. Therefor, humans are apes - unless we define apes in a way that rejects common descent.
Monkeys.
A Golden Lion Tamarin is unmistakably a monkey. A Japanese Macaque is also a monkey. Apes are more closely related to Old World Monkeys, such as the macaque, than they are to New World Monkeys, such as the tamarin. Therefor, unless "monkey" is defined in a way that rejects common descent, apes are necessarily monkeys, and humans, as well, are necessarily monkeys. You, me, Ed, and even Pat Buchanan.
(This means the most reasonable way to interpret Ed's statement is: "humans are not descended from any currently living monkey.")
Posted by: llewelly | March 5, 2010 5:49 PM
@ Ray C.
Likely he's off to Free Republic to tell the other droolers how he kicked some librul butt.
Posted by: Fifth Dentist | March 5, 2010 5:58 PM
I propose that we use the term "pigeon bomb" for asshats like Rick. They show up out of nowhere, crap all over a thread with a mixture of half-baked assertions, ad hominems and other fallacious nonsense, pompously declare "victory" when the on-topic commenters ridicule them, then fly away, never to be seen again. This is exactly what those anti-social crapping pigeons on railway stations do.
Posted by: Graham Shevlin | March 5, 2010 6:16 PM
Rick, #17: Also, you call the website site 'world nut daily'. Do you believe what CNN and nost other 'news' outlets tell you? For that matter, how about what Obama tells you?
Absolutely not. That's why I read the "World Nut Daily" (mostly for amusement), watch CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, Comedy Central, Fox, the various science channels, as well as read the newspaper, the Economist, Time, Newsweek, a few layman's science magazines, and half a dozen others, plus a few blogs here and there. I then distill my own opinions from the information that makes the most sense. Of the two, I find Comedy Central actually contains more reliable "news" coverage than Fox.
Where do you get your news? On what basis do you form your opinions?
Posted by: Scott | March 5, 2010 7:06 PM
That's it!! I'm changing my name.
Posted by: Rick R | March 5, 2010 7:28 PM
DaveL @ 48 "Common sense is often nothing more than a more respectable term for popular bigotry."
Love that line. Might be sig-worthy if I could figure out how to include an attribution. Too many people think "common sense" is a magical term for "correct" or "true".
I do wonder if Rick has been asleep for, oh, 9 years - since he thinks Obama is the worst president yet, but completely missed the debacle of Bush #2 - who most historians regard as either the worst, or one of the worst. He must not have studied King George then.
Posted by: Badger3k | March 5, 2010 8:07 PM
Donna @55:
I think you're thinking of "apes" when you say "primates" since the latter category includes all monkey, apes, lemurs and tarsiers.
Buchanan is willfully ignorant like all outspoken creotards (some of the non-outspoken ones are just regular ignorant). He needs to learn a little bit about how molecular sequence comparisons are arranged hierarchically (and most importantly, in hierarchies that match with one other quite well). I'm sure he's never thought about it, since baby Jesus has already whispered the truth in his ear.
Posted by: Escuerd | March 5, 2010 8:41 PM
I wonder whether Mr. Buchanan is familiar with James Ussher, the Primate of All Ireland? - Dingo
----
PS For a man campaigning to keep the Mass in Latin, his ignorance of the language is
suprisingpar for the course (we are writing about Pat Buchanan after all), ignorance is the default.If anyone is interested, this is the origin of 'primate'.
Posted by: DingoJack | March 5, 2010 9:02 PM
Ed - please lay off Mr. Buchanan. I'm trying to maintain some tolerance for a handful of conservatives and damn it, I like the old guy. Pointing out his ignorance on evolution forces me to question the quality of all his other arguments, which I'd prefer avoid doing.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 5, 2010 9:25 PM
The quote from Osborn about Bryan being "the most distinguished primate which the state of Nebraska has yet produced" is actually correct (though the exact words were slightly different). See
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/wolfmellett.html for the original source.
Posted by: Jim Foley | March 5, 2010 10:06 PM
Rick, buddy:
"I don't want to get into this name calling BS."
Neither do I, Rick, neither do I. When someone is as much of an asshole and moron as you seem to be, though, it's hard to take the high road.
Posted by: democommie | March 5, 2010 10:15 PM
Michael Heath | March 5, 2010 9:25 PM:
Then whatever you do, do not read this.
Posted by: llewelly | March 5, 2010 10:18 PM
For those who want the source from the link posted by Jim Foley (#69):
Osborn, Henry Fairfield, 1922. "Hesperopithecus, the first anthropoid primate found in America," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 8, pp. 245-246
Dingo
Posted by: DingoJack | March 5, 2010 10:34 PM
Donna@55:
I agree. If I say we evolved from monkeys while Ed says we didn't, Ed is correct. Technically. But it's clearer to say that we descended from monkeys when talking to evolution-illiterate people.
It's like when people ask if you believe in evolution. Just say "Yes!". Save the explanation why 'belief' is the wrong word for later.
Isaac Asimov, "Look Long Upon A Monkey", in Magic: The Final Fantasy Collection
Posted by: David Ratnasabapathy | March 5, 2010 10:40 PM
It's not the exact line, but I'm pretty sure it was Einstein who said "Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."
Posted by: Davis | March 5, 2010 11:36 PM
That is the funniest thing I've read today. I just picture a guy sitting in his chair, arms folded, and a big shit-eating grin on his stupid mug.
Posted by: trog69 | March 6, 2010 4:33 AM
Perhaps if you were to provide some we could formulate a testable hypothesis?
Posted by: Azkyroth | March 6, 2010 5:20 AM
"The hoax was discovered not by creationists but by scientists, using new tools that did not exist at the time the skull was 'discovered'."
Ah ha! So you admit that the creationists were right all along! Current "true" fossils are only "real" fossils because their faknessitude hasn't been outed yet.
Taz "I wonder how many pieces of the True Cross have been sold throughout history?"
That was Catholics. Good Protestants don't go for that nuttery. Eventually the lack of nuttery so bored them that they made up the Rapture.
Doug "I fear that pointing out the ignorance of these schmucks in this sort of forum is a bit of an exercise in banging one's head against a wall."
Yes, but it's better than going to a Creationist/apologetics blog and trying there. Now that's banging your head against the wall. At least here we have nachos.
John McKay "The whole column looks like Buchanan dashed it out facing a deadline. It's nothing more than a mish mash of badly recalled anecdotes."
And yet it's no more idiotic than their "well researched" and "expert" columns. Hmmm....
Ryan "...somehow that inability to distinguish species which should show the gradual evolution of one into the other is seized on by creationists to show that scientists can't make up their mind."
Creationists have the same issue. They can't decide which skulls were ape and which were Man. All they know is that their own skull ain't based on no monkey skull.
Azkyroth "Perhaps if you were to provide some we could formulate a testable hypothesis?"
*Sigh* When he asked "Why do facts get some people so angry?", he was asking himself why he gets so angry at facts. That's the only reason why he so studiously avoids using them in dialogues.
Posted by: Modusoperandi | March 6, 2010 5:53 AM
"there was found the cranium of a man with the jaw of an ape"
That's pretty funny. Any complete human skull has the jaw of an ape. You have to wonder what the hell creatards have in mind when you mention "ape".
There has always been opposition to the Piltdown Man; many scientists just didn't buy the story (and unfortunately many did buy the story). Other fossils, scientists who had a greater familiarity with animal bones, and developments in instrumentation eventually led to everyone accepting the Piltdown Man as a hoax.
Posted by: MadScientist | March 6, 2010 6:16 AM
Did someone say something about nachos?
Mmmm... nacholishious [tilts head back, gargles own drool] - Dingo
Posted by: DingoJack | March 6, 2010 7:28 AM
So does Buchanan believe that Catholicism is a fraud because of the Donation of Constantine?
Posted by: Dr X | March 6, 2010 1:22 PM