Scientist Fights Church Effort to Hide Museum's Pre-Human Fossils

[FVZA_Colonel]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20061203/sc_livescience/scientistfightschurchefforttohidemuseumsprehumanfossils



Scientist Fights Church Effort to Hide Museum's Pre-Human Fossils
By Kendrick Frazier

Famed paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey is giving no quarter to powerful evangelical church leaders who are pressing Kenya's national museum to relegate to a back room its world-famous collection of hominid fossils showing the evolution of humans' early ancestors.

Leakey called the churches' plans "the most outrageous comments I have ever heard."

He told The Daily Telegraph (London): "The National Museums of Kenya should be extremely strong in presenting a very forceful case for the evolutionary theory of the origins of mankind. The collection it holds is one of Kenya's very few global claims to fame and it must be forthright in defending its right to be at the forefront of this branch of science." Leakey was for years director of the museum and of Kenya's entire museum system.

The museum's collections include the most complete skeleton yet found of Homo erectus, the 1.7-million-year-old Turkana Boy unearthed by Leakey's team in 1984 near Lake Turkana in northern Kenya.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Danged fundies

[VegasWolf]

2. Religion, what else can one say. Things haven't changed much from the time

of the Thunder gods.

[jeff30997]

3. Those idiots are getting more...

Pathetic everyday.

[montanacowboy]

4. So, if they hide them in the back room

they don't exist? OMG, these idiots just cannot stand the Truth in any way shape or form

[Lurking Dem]

5. Don't they realize

that by hiding G-d's works they are thwarting His plan to test their faith? Or something.

[VegasWolf]

6. Scientist fights church! How many times throughout history has this little

scene been played out? The first logical man that pointed out that Thunder was just a noise that occurred in conjunction with a bolt of lightening and was not god expressing his disapproval of some human behavior was probably roasted over the campfire.

[Cheap_Trick]

7. they must not have much faith

if they're so afraid of some fossils that couldn't possibly disprove their dogma. dumbasses

[leftofthedial]

8. as long as there is religion, humans will not become fully civilized

[BreweryYardRat]

37. Only fundamentalist religion.

Sheesh.

[goforit]

9. LOL!!!! they can't deal with the truth.

[WindRavenX]

10. ...

Yeah, I don't think there are words for this.

[FarrenH]

11. The very fact that they're trying to conceal evidence

means they accept it is, in fact, evidence.

[Kellyiswise]

35. If your religion can't stand up to scruitny, what good is it to you?

[YankeyMCC]

12. The powerful continue to try and exploit and oppress the least powerful

in the world.

Cigarette makers turn to the rest of the world as a source of growth when the US market becomes to difficult due to consumer protections and law suites against harmful tactics.

Fundies turn to the rest of the world to push their no-condoms, abstinence only head in the sand approach to fighting HIV/AIDS

Fundies turn to the rest of the world to carry on their fight against fair access to contraception and the safety of women who need abortions.

Fundies turn to the rest of the world promote their anti-science world view.

It's sickening.

We need them here and THere.

[CueST]

13. Scientist Fights Church Effort to Hide Museum's Pre-Human Fossils

Excerpt:

Famed paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey is giving no quarter to powerful evangelical church leaders who are pressing Kenya's national museum to relegate to a back room its world-famous collection of hominid fossils showing the evolution of humans' early ancestors.

Leakey called the churches' plans "the most outrageous comments I have ever heard."

He told The Daily Telegraph (London): "The National Museums of Kenya should be extremely strong in presenting a very forceful case for the evolutionary theory of the origins of mankind. The collection it holds is one of Kenya's very few global claims to fame and it must be forthright in defending its right to be at the forefront of this branch of science." Leakey was for years director of the museum and of Kenya's entire museum system.

http://www.livescience.com/othernews/061203_richard_leakey.html

Faith vs. Science.

[Botany]

14. Dupe

Great Grandma "Lucy."

[Botany]

15. Idiots

BTW Darwin was a Deacon in the Anglican Church & he based his work on
genetics that was discovered by a Monk, Gregor Mendell.

[Jackpine Radical]

17. Darwin didn't know about Mendel's work, which only came to light

in about 1900.

Yes, Mendel's genetic theories filled in the last gaping hole in Darwinian theory, but Darwin himself was long gone by then.

[Botany]

25. Thank you

When I took evolution many years ago I was taught that Darwin read Mendel on the Beagle.

[Jackpine Radical]

27. Maybe you're thinking of Wallace

or various others who anticipated the theory of evolution.

Actually, now that a couple more neurons reported in, I have a dim memory of his maybe having read Malthus on the Beagle.

[Botany]

34. I couldn't find it but didn't he read the English geologist who

looked @ the strata of fossils. Was that Wallace?

[Peregrine]

18. Darwin had no knowledge of Mendel's work

nor did he know anything about genetics. That is the wonder of his discovery of Natural Selection. He knew it had to do with inheritance but had no idea what the mechanism was, but was still able to postulate the evolutionary mechanism.

[RedCloud]

22. Oh Contrair

An exam question in my Phys Anthro was

"Compare Darwin's and Mendel's views on genetics" And sadly this was many moons ago.

[Botany]

26. Thanx

I was taught years ago that Darwin studied Mendel.

[Stargleamer]

29. You may have been thinking of Malthus. . .

Darwin did read Malthus before he wrote his major works.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

30. Kind of like Mendeleev and his undiscovered chemical elements.

Geniality that borders wizardry.

[Last Lemming]

31. I believe

actually, a copy of Mendel's paper was found amoung Darwin's effects and a note in his handwriting was at the top of the page but I can't remember what it said. Something like--interesting--or such. No one really read Mendel until his findings were recreated by several scientists in the early twentieth century.

[n2doc]

16. The war on reason has many fronts, doesn't it? n/t

[nealmhughes]

19. I would think Evangelical leaders in Kenya ought to be looking to shelter their AIDS oprhans

and comfort the dying -- you know, all that Jesus stuff.

[Joe Bacon]

28. Why?

They don't do it here. They're too busy beating nonbelievers with Bibles and they slobber all over cardboard cutouts of Bush just like their kids do in Jesus Camp.

[nealmhughes]

32. Exactly.

[gulfcoastliberal]

20. K&R - delusional retards...nt

[MGKrebs]

21. How about a deal:

The church hides all of it's "relics" and has to sell it's faith without props.

[RedCloud]

23. Good luck hiding this critter...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lungfish

And the religious skeptics keep asking for the next missing link!

I say the ball is in their court. Prove their religion is correct using tangible evidence.

Hey, what about interviewing Lazarus brought back from the dead? Surely he didn't die again, did he?

[Trajan]

33. Well ... since there is no 'credible' biblical evidence that Lazarus ever died ....

We MUST presume he still lives, right ? ...

Would a god revive a man from death, and then leave him to die again ? ...

Would the work of a perfect god be too weak to overcome the 'natural order' ? ....

Mewonders .....

Do the woodworks of the hebrew god-carpenter still stand ? .... were they perfectly framed, and do they possess the magic of their famous maker ? ...

Is that porch still flat and true ? .... Has that fence withstood the windstorms, typhoons, tornados and earthquakes over the millenae ?? ...

Again ... mewonders what becomes of the handiwork of a god ....

[Golden Raisin]

24. Hard to believe it's almost 2007.

Have they figured out or admitted the world isn't flat? Well, I guess if they believe the earth was created in 6 days by an all-powerful sky deity I guess there's no hope.

[Ian David]

36. Dr. Zaius strikes again!

The Sacred Scrolls teach us all we need to know, Dr. Leakey. You must not venture into The Forbidden Zone...


You may not like what you find.


Ahh...

There's nothing like a Republican in love!

[DuaneBidoux]

38. Kenya can be proud. They must not surrender it to religious crazies.

To be able to say that you are the absolute cradle of humanity. What a privledge.

(edited to add a thought which seemed profound at the time)

[Fire Walk With Me]

39. Fundamentalists are terrified that they're not the most important thing in the universe.