Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site psivax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!oliveb!hplabs!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen From: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: numerous responses Message-ID: <819@psivax.UUCP> Date: Tue, 29-Oct-85 12:14:29 EST Article-I.D.: psivax.819 Posted: Tue Oct 29 12:14:29 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 2-Nov-85 05:10:11 EST References: <438@imsvax.UUCP> Reply-To: friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) Organization: Pacesetter Systems Inc., Sylmar, CA Lines: 207 Summary: In article <438@imsvax.UUCP> ted@imsvax.UUCP (Ted Holden) writes: > > Immanuel Velikovsky invented the "punctuated equilibria" notion of >evolution (he called it "catastrophic evolution") in 1950, and anyone >interested in this should, by all means, have a copy of "Earth in Upheaval" >on his shelf. How do you equate "catatrophic evolution" with "punctuated equilibria"? The only similarity I see between them is that they both postulate periods of rapid change alternating with relative stasis. However, the nature and causes of the rapid change are totally different in the two "theories". In P.E the change is driven by the speciatian process itself, and is essentially unrelated to external events, while Velikovsky's theory is based on periodic global catastrphes driving the change, with little importance given to speciation. Under P.E the periods of rapid change are *asynchronous* between the various lineages, while under Velikovsky's "theory" the periods of rapid change should be essentially simulataneous among all life forms. Besides which P.E is largely an extension of the ideas of Ernst Mayr, who started writing in the *40's*, before Velikovsky. > Nonetheless, anyone who studies fossils, >including Gould, has noticed the same basic truth which Velikovsky >describes; that there simply ARE no intermediate forms, and that the >changes in fossil records going from one geological epoch to another occur >as if, at each such change, "a curtain had been drawn in a play and a >complete new cast of characters presented when the curtain was raised again" >(Velikovsky's words). > Wrong, this is *not* what Gould, or anyone else, says. There are many intermediates, but there are often discontinuities in the chain of intermediates. These discontinuities are *not* restricted to the epoch boundries, they occur regularly throughout the fossil record. New forms may appear at almost any point, and old forms my disappear at almost any point. The epoch boundries are largely *geological* and represent points of significant climatological or geophysical change, which are quite naturally associated with an increased turnover in living species. However these boundries are *not* by any means sharp, they are usually rather gradual and indistinct. > In like manner, Clube and Napier of the British Royal Observatory, in >their book "The Cosmic Serpent", report on the like obvious fact of global >catastrophes (obvious to anyone who has read much in the way of ancient >literature) which Velikovsky describes in "Worlds in Collision". When was this book published? What are thier backgrounds? > > It turns out, that some of the major "punctuation" marks are >discernable, and include the disaster which Louis and Walter Alverez >postulate as having ended the age of dinosaurs, Well, actually this is the only one that has any standing that I know of, and even it is less certain than you seem to imply. In particular there is considerable evedence for *gradual* change across the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundry, including a gradual appearence of new mammalian forms over the last million or so years of the Cretaceous and the prior extinction of several dinosaurian groups, well before the Alvarez Event. In addition it is not yet established that the various anomolous layers around the world are actually synchronous. All this suggests to me a gradual ecological shift which had already grealy reduced the number of dinosaurs followed by a series of meteoric collisions finishing the job. All in all rather similar to the extinction of Mammoths by the combimed effects of climatic change and human hunting(where human hunting takes the part of the meteors). > as well as the Noachian >Deluge, which most scientists still wrongly regard as a fairy-tale. Evidence? Ovid was not a scientist, he was a collector of stories. Even if he were a scientist, science is a dynamic process and any studies that long ago would have long since been supercede by more detailed, recent studies. Give me recent(last 20 years) *scientific* evidence for a world-wide deluge. Remember, we are learning new things all the time, much of what we thought we knew even 20 years ago has been found to be inaccurate. This is why *recent* references are important, to make sure that the best available data are being used. > >Next Case, Matt Crawford's article: > > Sorry Matt, but no thinking person could buy this line of reasoning. The >cosmologists have at their disposal, as Archimedes would have said, a lever and >a place on which to stand i.e. something other than theories to work with. >They have measurable distances, measurable properties of light, measurable >radio emissions etc. and sooner or later would have arrived at correct >conclusions regarding the universe as a whole, with or without geologists >around. What measurable distances?? I am sorry but we have really only measured the distances to the planets and to the *very nearest* stars, everything else is conclusion and deduction! You do not seem to realize just how indirect most astronomical "measurements" are! So what if we can measure the properties of light, if uniformitarianism doesn't hold we cannot assume that these properties are the same out there among the stars and so cannot make any deductions at all. Since your arguments against geological dating are based on denying uniformitarianism you arew attacking the basis of astronomical measurement just as much as geological measurement! > There are many things which argue against the notion of geologists and >paleontologists having a "better understanding" of anything than cosmologists >do: their (paleontologists) gullible acceptance of Piltdown creatures (man and >chicken), the obvious huge differences in the ages assigned to things by >geologists and anthropologists in instances in which the techniques of both >disciplines are applicable, ... > Can you give any *recent* examples of these sorts of things, remember our techniques are continually being revised and improved. Or do you really think that astronomers are immune to gross errors like the that? How about the Cepheid Yardstick fiasco? The distances estimated by the astronomers were off by a factor of *two* because they had used the wrong type of Cepheid to calibrate the principle medium range estimation method, which was based on the period- luminosity relationship of Cepheid variables(but the *other* type of Cepheid variables) > > > Finally, consider the true gem of the book of Isaiah, chapter 14, verses >12 through 21, more or less: > > "How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning (light- > bearer, morning star)! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst > weaken the nations.... They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, > and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, > that did shake kingdoms; That made the world as a wilderness and > destroyed the cities thereof..... > > This was a hymn of thanksgiving for Venus's having finally settled into a >stable orbit which no longer threatened the earth. Isaiah not an eye-witness? >You'd better think again. > Oh really! Well all I can say is you have a very poor understanding of the scriptures if you can seriously consider tis explanation! Isaiah was not even talking about a physical event! He is furthermore talking of a *past* event, I see no evidence in the text that he claims to have actually witnessed this happening! > > > ELEPHANTS > >From Chris Lewis's recent flame: > My understanding of the basic food chain in the far north is that plankton >live with no need for warmth, little fish eat plankton, big fish eat little >fish, penguins, seals, and eskimos eat big fish, polar bears and killer whales >eat all of above except plankton. Elephants don't figure into any of this; >the finding of mammoth bodies, perfectly preserved, in places which have never >thawed from the day they died to this day (and hence which could not possibly >support mammoths) indicates the occurrence of something very strange. You seem to have the Polar Ice Cap confused with the Arctic Tundra. The food chain you are talking about is the Ice Cap food chain, not the Tundra food chain, which is based on small shrubs, short grasses, and hardy sedges, all of which would (and still do) provide adequate food for large herbivores, including Caribou and *Yak*. > If >mammoths were so well adapted to cold weather, they should still be found in >the arctic; Why? Why shouldn't they become extinct like so many other animals? >Finally, it should be obvious to anybody that caribou and deer migrate somewhat >FASTER than elephants. A herd of mammoths might could survive by migrating >back and forth between Georgia and Maryland, say, but a herd of mammoths trying >to get to Novo Sibirsk from anyplace where they could hope to survive the >winter would not even get there in time to turn back. > But why shoiuld they need to migrate? Yak don't! And Reindeer stay in the Arctic all year round, beeing more nomadic than migratory. Bison can eat even in deep snow by "burrowing" for the dried graas beneath the snow, an elephant-like Mammoth could have done this even easier with its long snout(trunk) and powerful tusks! > > In other words, the whole thing is somewhat >more controllable than hot-air ballooning, but not much more so. This wouldn't >have helped the Quetzalcoatlus-Northropi's children very much, assuming that >creature lived in our gravity and, thus, perforce functioned entirely as a >glider. Their lives would have depended on their parents getting back to the >nest EVERY time, and micro-buses and knock-off wings weren't available. PLEASE, noone hase *ever* said they function *entirely* by gliding. And thier wings were quite capable of withstanding the minor stresses of the *gentle* flapping necessary to provide full control to a predominant glider. All you need to do is watch vultures circling without flapping to realise that they have almost complete control of where they go. They make very precise *repeated* circles at a constant altitude, gliding all the while! Pehaps human made fixed-wing gliders do not have this control, but observation shows that flex-wing avian gliders *do*. > >You seem to have missed the entire section on pterosaurs in my long "ultrasaur" >article. Check out Adrian Desmond's "Hot Blooded Dinosaurs", page 182 and >thereabouts, for more on the limits of size for flying creatures. And you seem to have missed my discussion on sensationalism in popular science books to keep the audience interested! Dr Desmond nowhere *really* claims that these pterosaurs were too large to fly, he only pretended to do so to catch your eye. -- Sarima (Stanley Friesen) UUCP: {ttidca|ihnp4|sdcrdcf|quad1|nrcvax|bellcore|logico}!psivax!friesen ARPA: ttidca!psivax!friesen@rand-unix.arpa